Hitler's Foreign Policy 1933-1939: The Road to World War II [Updated, Revised] 192963191X, 9781929631919

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2009 Winner ofthe Pritzker Lifetime Achievement Award for Military History

HW LE hS FOREIGN POLI 1933°1939

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France and the Nazi Threat: The Collapse of French Diplomacy 1932-1939 Mussolini: The Secrets of His Death Mortal Crimes: Soviet Penetration of the Manhattan Project Top Nazi: Karl Wolff—The Man Between Hitler and Himmler Empire on the Adriatic: Mussolini’s Conquest of Yugoslavia The Origins of the War of 1914 (3-volume set) The Origins of Fascist Ideology 1918-1925 Max Corvo: OSS Italy, 1942-1945 Hitler’s Contract: The Secret History of the Italian Edition of Mein Kampf Secret Intelligence and the Holocaust Israel at High Noon Balkan Inferno: Betrayal, War, and Intervention, 1990—2005

Calculated Risk The Murder of Maxim Gorky The Kravchenko Case: One Man’s War on Stalin The Mafia and the Allies Hitler’s Gift to France The Nazi Party 1919-1945. A Complete History Closing the Books: Jewish Insurance Claims from the Holocaust Encyclopedia of Cold War Espionage, Spies, and Secret Operations The Cicero Spy Affair The Orlov KGB File The First Iraq War, 1914-1918: Britain’s Mesopotamian Campaign Becoming Winston Churchill Salazar: A Political Biography

Gerhard L. Weinberg Author of A World at Arms

Hitler’s Foreign Policy 1933-1939 The Road to World War II

Enigma Books

All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Enigma Books New York www.enigmabooks.com

Copyright © 2005 by Gerhard L. Weinberg Copyright © 2010 by Gerhard L. Weinberg ISBN: 978-1-929631-91-9 Printed in the United States of America

THIS PAPERBACK EDITION CONTAINS THE COMPLETE HARDCOVER TEXT, WHICH HAS BEEN REVISED AND CORRECTED.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Weinberg, Gerhard L. [The foreign policy of Hitler’s Germany] Hitler’s foreign policy 1933-1939: the road to World War II / Gerhard L. Weinberg. - [1st ed.] ‘

p. ills cm. Originally published in two volumes: The foreign policy of Hitler’s Germany. Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1970. Updated and revised. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-1-929631-91-9 [pbk]

1. World War, 1939-1945--Causes. 2. Germany--Foreign relations--1933-1945. I. Title. II. Title: The foreign policy of Hitler’s Germany. DD256.5 .W417 2004 327.43/009/043

Contents

Maps

vil

Preface to the Combined Edition Preface to the 1993 Edition Preface Introduction to Part 2

Xvi XX

PART 1

Diplomatic Revolution in Europe 1933-36 The World Through Hitlet’s Eyes First Steps of the New Regime

746)

General Viewpoints, Disarmament; Four-Power Pact; the Churches

Eastern Europe

48

German Policy Toward Poland, the Soviet Union, Lithuania, and the Ukraine in 1933

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

71

The Far East to the Summer of 1935

96

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

106

ae German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and

Relations with Britain and France

126

Germany and the European Powers from the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

142

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

163

10. The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

187

11, Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936 The German-Austrian Agreement; German Relations with Italy England, and France; Outbreak of the Spanish Civil War

206

IZ The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936

234

aS On to War: The Axis, the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the Four-Year Plan

14. Conclusion

258 278

PART 2

Starting World War II

1937-1939 15. The Position of Germany in 1937

287

16: Hitler’s Preparations, 1937—38

300

Ly Britain and France Face the German Threat

326

18. Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

19; Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937—39

339 394

20; Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a

Tripartite Alliance

413

PAN Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

432.

2. Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1937-38

475

2. German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

484

24. War Denied: The Crisis over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

Deo

2); War Denied: The Crisis over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

572

Zo Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

639

2s The Road to War

693

28. Hitler Gets His War

765

2u8 Conclusion

787

Bibliography

804

Index

837

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Preface to the Combined Edition

1k the decade since the original two volumes of The Foreign Policy of Hitler’s Germany appeared in a paperback edition with the preface that is also included hete, some further works dealing with the origins of World War II have appeared. It is, however, a continuing source of astonishment to me that the reason why I originally started this project forty years ago—the absence of the sort of detailed study of the road to World War II that had been published earlier by numerous authors about the origins of World War I— has remained true. A recent survey of German foreign policy from 1933 to 1939, in spite of some useful insights, sets the scholarship on the subject back rather than forward.' Its author even repeats the tale of the interpreter Paul Schmidt about Adolf Hitlet’s alleged surprise at the British declaration of war that had been demolished as fakery in 1958!2 The only substantial work covering the general subject that has appeared in recent years, that of Donald Cameron Watt, is much more narrowly focused both chronologically and geographically than the account offered here.? A detailed examination of the respective roles of Hitler and his foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, in unleashing the war brings little new evidence to this important topic except to emphasize in somewhat more detail the correctness of my thesis that Hitler decided in the winter of 1938-39 that Germany would certainly start a war against France and Great Britain in the following year.* Many of the documents cited from the British Foreign Office archives in this work have since been published in the British official series, but some have not. Furthermore,

the interpretation of the confusion produced in the minds of the leaders in London by the various approaches from internal opponents of Hitler in Germany is substantiated by a recent investigation of that contentious topic.° Over the years, there has certainly been extensive debate in the relevant literature about many of the topics dealt with in this book. The arguments about the policy of appeasement continue, though without much new material being brought forward. Probably the abandonment of the peace settlement of 1919 by the United States 1. Rainer F. Schmidt, Die Aussenpolitik des Dritten Reiches 1933-1939 (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2002). The short (131 pp.) survey by Marie-Luise Recker, Die Awssenpolitik des Dritten Reiches (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1990), is a very useful introduction to the subject, the literature, and the interpretive controversies; but is not designed to

cover the issues in detail. The book of Margaret Lamb and Nicholas Tarling, From Versailles to Pearl Harbor: The Origins of the Second World War in Exrope and Asia (New York: Palgrave, 2001), is too filled with errors to be useful. 2. Ernst Meier-Hermann, “Goring und die englische Kriegserklarung am 3.9.1939,” Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, 9 (1958): 375-76. 3. Donald Cameron Watt, How War Came: The Immediate Origins of the Second World War, 1938-1939 (New York: Pantheon Books, 1989). The book by Reynolds M. Salerno, Vital Crossroads: Mediterranean Origins of the Second but also has World War, 1935-1940 (Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press, 2003), is important for Anglo-French relations focus. a narrow 4, Stefan Kley, Hitler, Ribbentrop und die Entfesselung dees Zweiten Weltkriegs (Paderborn: Schéningh, 1996). 5. Vasilis

Vourkoutiotis,

“Gegner

der Diktatur

als Freunde

der Demokraten?

Verstandigungsprobleme

4, No. 1 zwischen deutscher Opposition und britischer Regierung vor Miinchen,” Zeitschrift fiir Weltgeschichte

(2003): 77-90.

xit

Hitler’s Foreign Policy 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

deserves far more emphasis than I have given it—and than practically all other scholars have. The Pittsburgh Agreement, which served as the charter of the newly created Czechoslovakia, was, after all, signed in Pennsylvania, not in Paris or London. One of

the few countries to emerge from the catastrophe of World War I strengthened rather than weakened immediately thereafter dumped the responsibility for upholding the peace settlement it had helped formulate on those most weakened by the ordeal. It is hardly surprising that in the face of a Germany that had in reality emerged from the war and the peace in a very strong position, the French and British were most hesitant to accept the burden that the United States had thrust upon them.° It is worth noting that in a field where the account offered here has been most severely challenged, that of Germany’s relations with Austria and the annexation of the latter by the former, new material and the newest scholarship underscore and return to the interpretation offered in this book. My insistence that the attempted coup in Vienna in July 1934 was ordered from Berlin, not initiated independently by the Austrian National Socialists, can no longer be challenged seriously. We now know not only that the coup was announced in Berlin the day before it occurred—because for technical reasons the local Nazis had postponed it for a day—but that Hitler himself had informed the German general in command of the German military district adjacent to Austria that the coup was about to take place.’ Those who still argue the point, as the recent survey cited above does, need to explain how it was that the authorities in Berlin knew ahead of time that the coup would take place, that the Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss would be killed, and even the name of the man whom the plotters intended to put in his place.’ Similarly, the most recent analysis of the annexation process itself allots absolute priority to the role of Hitler as opposed to those scholars who in the intervening years had assigned a major independent role to Hermann GGring.° The situation in regard to access to archives has changed in some respects. French archives as well as those of the former Soviet Union are now accessible, though those of

the latter are by no means fully open to scholars. The recent scholarship of those who have utilized these does not substantially affect the account offered here.!° Only the opening of intelligence records—if and when it takes place—is likely to bring substantially new insights. Thus there is now some indication from French intelligence and related records that the shift in the policy of the two Western Powers toward a firm line in early 1939 may owe more to French than to British initiative as suggested in the account presented here. 6. On the meaning and impact of the 1919 peace settlement for Germany, see Gerhard L. Weinberg, “The Defeat of Germany in 1918 and the European Balance of Power,” in Weinberg, Germany, Hitler, and World War II: Essays in Modern German and World History (New York: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1995), pp. 11-12; and the fine new book, Margaret MacMillian, Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World (New York: Random House,

2001).

7. Anton Hoch and Hermann Weiss, “Die Etinnerungen des Genberalobersten Wilhelm Adam,” Wolfgang

Benz (ed.), Miscellanea: Ferstschrift fiir Helmut Krausnick (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1980) p. 47. 8. The arguments can be followed in the account of the conference in Vienna on the 50th anniversary of the German annexation of Austria. Gerald Stourzh and Birgitta Zaar (eds.) Osterreich, Deutschland und die Machte: Internationale und dsterreichische Aspekte des “Anschlusses” vom Marz 1938 (Vienna: Verlag der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1990). 9. Georg Christoph Berger-Waldenegg, “Hitler, Géring, Mussolini und der ‘Anschluss’ Osterreichs an das

Deutsche Reich,” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte 51 (2003): 147-182. 10. Examples of the use of French archives are Eugenia C. Kiesling, Arming Against Hitler: France and the Limits ofMilitary Planning (Lawrence: Univ. Pres of Kansas, 1996); and Peter Jackson, France and the Nazi Menace: Intelligence and Policy Making, 1933-1939 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). Examples of works utilizing archives of the former Soviet Union are Aleksandr M. Nekrich, Pariahs, Partners, Predators: German-Soviet Relations

1922-1941 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997); and Ronald Radosh et al. (eds.), Spain Betrayed: The Soviet Union in the Spanish Civil War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001).

Preface to the Combined Edition

xiii

In this combined edition, a small number of corrections and additions have been

made. For the convenience of readers, the bibliographies and indexes have been combined, as have the comments on archives. In view of the importance of the subject—the origins of the greatest war in history of which we know—and the dearth of other detailed studies of those origins, I am delighted that it has been possible to make the full text available in this edition which combines the two books originally published separately. Gerhard L. Weinberg May 2005

Preface to the 1993 Edition

n the twenty-five years since the first of these two volumes was completed and the fifteen years since the completion of the second, there has been much published on National Socialist Germany and on the origins of World War II. Although there has been a great deal of interest in and publication about specific problems and also about the immediate origins of the war in the crises of 1938-39, rather to my surprise no one has attempted a broadly based analysis of the origins of World War II. The rather curious attempt to rewrite history by A. J. P. Taylor in his 1961 book, The Ongins of the Second World War, was quickly and irrefutably torn to shreds by the Swiss historian Walther Hofer;! although begun before the appearance of Taylor’s book and published afterward, these two volumes neither owe anything to his efforts nor require revision because of them. While some reviewers regretted the absence from my book of detailed confrontation with Taylot’s work, I remain convinced that a scholar should engage in controvetsies only with those who have engaged the evidence seriously but have arrived at different readings or interpretations. The documentary evidence which has become available since the original publication has, on the whole, served to reinforce rather than to alter the main theses presented here. Thus, for example, the speculation that the German effort to keep Lord Halifax

from visiting Germany in 1937 was directed from the very top? is now confirmed by the publication of the relevant portion of the diary of German Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels on his conversations with Hitler. This now reinforces the basic thrust of the argument advanced in these volumes that the German government was in no way and at no time after 1934 interested in any real agreement with Great Britain and waved off all attempts from London at a genetal settlement. The new evidence thus continues to undermine the postwar and Cold War apologetics and reinterpretations which pretend that Germany did want an agreement with England.* Similarly, the discovery of a reference to Hitler’s 1936 memorandum on the Four-Year Plan confirms the broad outline of Hitler’s conceptualization of war as likely to begin some four years in the future, as opposed to the extraordinary effort of one historian to suggest that the German word vier had best be translated as eight.> Jost Dilffer’s work on the German navy has demonstrated beyond any doubt that the Germans deliberately violated the 1935 naval agreement with England in the very

1, Walther Hofer, Die Exndfesselung des Zeiten Weltkrieges (Frankfurt/M: S. Fischer, 1964), pp. 419-50. 2. See below, pp. 374-75. 3. Elke Frohlich (ed.), Die Tagebiicher von Joseph Goebbels, Pt. 1, Vol. 3 (Munich: Saur, 1987), pp. 336-37, 348. 4, I reviewed some of the arguments (before the publication of the Goebbels material) in an article, “Hitler and England, 1933-1945: Pretense and Reality,” German Studies Review, 8 (1985), 299-309. 5. See Gerhard L. Weinberg, “Hitler’s Memorandum on the Four-Year Plan: A Note,” German Studies Review, 11

(1988), 133-35. The discussion of the Four-Year Plan will be found on pages 271-77 in this volume.

Preface to the 1993 Edition

XV

year itwas signed,° while Jochen Thies has shown that Hitler’s long-term aims not only anticipated war with the United States but also included a Getman domination of the whole globe.’ The big project of the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich to publish all of Hitler’s speeches, writings, and directives of the years before 1933 serves to reinforce tather than to alter the picture of a leader who always rejected, vociferously and in public, any notion of returning to the Germany of 1914. Fat from wanting to undo the Treaty of Versailles, he ridiculed those whose aims were limited to that perspective as ignorant and incompetent “Grenzpolitiker,” border politicians, while insisting that he himself by contrast was a “Rawmpolitiker,” a space politician, who intended to seize enormous areas for Germans to settle in and become agriculturally self-sufficient. New light on the foreign policies of other countries has not materially altered the account in these volumes. The work of Gerhard Krebs on Japan provides substantial additional detail but no fundamental revision.? The successors of the Soviet government have now confirmed the authenticity of the secret protocol to the August 1939 GermanSoviet Nonaggression Pact. The leading Russian scholar in this field, Vjacheslav Dashichev, not only confirms the general interpretation of Soviet policy offered in these two books but has gone beyond that to argue that Stalin had decided to sign with Germany before 10 March 1939, and that his speech at the Eighteenth Party Congress was designed to prepare Communist party leaders for this orientation of Soviet policy. Although there are still those who doubt that in the winter of 1938-39 Hitler was looking forward to a war against the Western Powers and hoped to secure his eastern flank for such a war by subordinating Hungary and Poland to Germany, everything that has come to light in recent years continues to support that interpretation. It would perhaps have been better if I had stressed more explicitly the extent to which German military preparations in the years 1933-39 were concentrated on the perceived needs of a wat in the West, zot a wat in the East. That is most obvious in the area of armored watfare, where the Germans did not initiate projects to cope with the armor of the Red

Army until the late summer and fall of 1941, when the fighting on the Eastern Front demonstrated that the Soviets had tanks substantially superior to anything in the German arsenal. The recent publication of a partial transcript of a conversation between Hitler and Finnish Marshal Mannerheim underlines the German prewar assumption that their military preparations were designed for the war against the Western Powers.'’ Far too much of the historiography of both the origins and the course of World War IT has been distorted as a result of the application of hindsight from the experience of the war; before

the war the Germans assumed that their hard fighting would be in the West, not in the East, and they made their preparations accordingly. The fact that in 1941 they attacked in the East with an army essentially the same size as that launched against France in 1940 and an air force and navy smaller than that employed in the West in May 1940, a point 6. Jost Diilffer, Weimar, Hitler und die Marine: Reichspolitik und Flottenbau 1920 bis 1939 (Dusseldorf: Droste, 1973).

7. Jochen Thies, Architekt der Weltherrschaft: Die “Endzjele” Hitlers (Dusseldorf: Droste, 1976). 8. Eberhard Jackel (ed.), Hitler: Samtliche Aufzeichnungen 1905-1924 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1980); Clemens Vollnhals et al. (eds.), Hitler: Reden, Schriften, Anordnungen, Februar 1925 bis Januar 1933 (New York, London, Paris: Saur, 1992). 9. Gerhard Krebs, Japans Deutschlandpolitik, 1935-1941, 2 vols. (Hamburg: MOAG, 1984).

10. Note his piece, “Planungen und Fehlschlage Stalins am Vorabend des Krieges—der XVUI. Parteitag dei Schwelle zum KPdSU(B) und der sowjetisch-deutsche Nichtangriffspakt,” in Klaus Hildbrand et al. (eds.), An der 1990), Gruyter, De York: New (Berlin, System internationale das und Weltkrieges Zweiten des Weltkrieg: Die Entfesselung , pp. 303-14. Unterredung mit 11. Bernd Wegner (ed.), “Hitlers Besuch in Finnland: Das geheime Tonprotokoll seiner It might be argued Mannerheim am 4. Juni 1942,” Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 41 (1993): 117-37, esp. P: 132. East, but on this the in suffered just had army German the disaster the for that this was simply his alibi likely to be easily fooled. occasion Hitler was speaking to a military leader whom he respected and who was not

Xvi

Hitler’s Foreign Policy 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

heavily stressed by the history of World War II being published by the German Military History Research Office, serves to emphasize the extent to which German planning and preparations were dominated by their preconceptions about Soviet weakness and Slavic inferiority.'? At some points new information requires that the original presentation in these volumes be slightly modified. It is now clear that at the beginning of the Italo-Ethiopian War Germany was not completely neutral but instead did provide a small amount of assistance to Ethiopia.!3 While there is no doubt that the Soviets did have a spy in the German embassy in Warsaw, the evidence now points to Gerhard Kegel and xot to Rudolf von Scheliha.!4 Although it has not been possible to revise the relevant portions of the two volumes, it has been feasible to correct minor errors in the original edition,

many of them pointed out to me by kind readers of those volumes. Chapel Hill, North Carolina Match 1993

12. See Horst Boog et al., Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg, Vol. 4, Der Angriff auf die Sowjetunion (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1983), Pt. 1. 13, The

evidence

first came

to light in Manfred

Funke,

Sanktionen

und Kanonen: Hitler, Mussolini und der

internationale Abessinienkonflikt 1934-1936 (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1970); a more detailed account by Edward B.

Westermann, “In the Shadow of War: German Arms Shipments and Loans to Ethiopia, 1935-1936,” in Harold

G, Marcus (ed.), New Trends in Ethiopian Studies (Lawrenceville, NJ: Red Sea Press, 1994), pp. 1036-52. 14, See Ulrich Sahm, Rudolf von Scheliha 1897-1942: Ein deutscher Diplomat gegen Hitler (Munich: Beck, 1990).

Preface

hirty years after the outbreak of World War II, the literature about the background of that conflict is enormous and constantly growing, but there is no comptehensive study that attempts to do what Sidney B. Fay, Pierre Renouvin, Bernadotte Schmitt, Alfred Wegerer, and Luigi Albertini had done within a similar period about the origins of World War I. Many factors may be adduced to explain this phenomenon: the absence, on the whole, of a controversy similar to the “war guilt” argument that stimulated a whole generation of scholars in the interwar years, a declining interest in diplomatic history that has accompanied the apparent decline of diplomacy as the main instrument for the conduct of international relations, the trend in historical scholarship that

emphasizes monographic treatment of specific episodes for the benefit of other scholars at the expense of broader treatments of interest to a wider public, and a recognition that any account that deals only with diplomacy in the traditional manner but ignores other factors cannot be adequate for an understanding of the origins of World War II.! One factor of a less philosophical but no less effective chatacter in restraining scholars may be the very flood of evidence that threatens to overwhelm every attempt at synthesis. It is easy to forget that those who wrote on the outbreak of World War I were restricted almost totally to the use of memoirs supplemented by collections of documents published by the various European governments. With all its advantages and disadvantages, and in spite of its bulk and complexity, this material was subject to finite restrictions of volume, if little else. In addition to a somewhat similar deluge of printed materials, the post-World War II generation of students is both blessed and cursed with the veritable Himalayas of paper left behind by National Socialist Germany as well as relatively full access to American archives. Furthermore, though too recently for full consideration in this work, the British Foreign Office records for the early and mid-1930s ate now accessible. In the face of this plethora of riches, despair comes easily. If the available material presents great difficulties by its sheer bulk, to say nothing of other problems, the question of organization is solved more readily. Whatever the conflicting ambitions, rivalries, and ideologies of the world’s powers in the 1920s and 1930s,

it is safe to assert that, with the solitary exception of Germany, no European nation con-

sidered another world war as a conceivable answer to whatever problems confronted it. Local wars and conflicts, specific aggressive moves or attempts at subversion, miscalculations leading to hostilities—all these were conceivable, and most of them occurred. But without German initiative another worldwide holocaust was inconceivable to contemporaries in all countries and is unimaginable retrospectively for the historian. Accordfor ingly, the course of German foreign policy provides the obvious organizing principle War,” Review of Politics, 1. See the provocative essay by Raymond J. Sontag, “The Origins of the Second World 25, No. 4 (Oct. 1963), 497-508.

xviii

Hitler’s Foreign Policy 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

any account of the origins of World War II. This is not to assert that no other power or other factor bears any substantial share of the responsibility for the outbreak of that war or the developments leading up to it but rather to suggest that a complex question is perhaps best studied by examining its core. Since Erich Kordt’s preliminary survey in 1947? there has been no comprehensive attempt to examine the course and development of German foreign policy in the National Socialist era. There have been many monographs dealing with specific crises or issues, especially of the later 1930s, as well as episodes and figures in the history of other powers during those years, and such studies have been used where appropriate, but the author is not awate of any other overall account. The able German scholar Hans-Adolf Jacobsen has worked at length on the internal structural development of the mechanisms for the control and implementation of foreign policy within National Socialist Germany;? we have discussed our respective endeavors to assure a minimum of overlapping. In the course of preparing this study, it became evident that the path to war consisted of two rather different stages, stages which in the international sphere paralleled the internal development of Germany. The years from the beginning of 1933 to the end of 1936 saw a diplomatic revolution in Europe. From a barely accepted equal on the European stage, Germany became the dominant power on the Continent. With the remilitarization of the Rhineland, the stalemate in the Spanish Civil War, the forming of

the Axis, and the signing of the Anti-Comintern Pact, this phase was completed. The diplomatic initiative in the world belonged to Germany and its partners. This part attempts to show how and why this dramatic transformation of the world scene was accomplished—I say world scene because, perhaps for the last time, a purely European power initiated events that impinged dramatically on the whole globe. Once this phase had been completed, Germany’s determination for war became the central issue in world diplomacy. The question now became, when, how, and under what circumstances did

Hitler launch the first of his wars and what had been the course and effect of the attempts to keep him from doing so? That story is the focus of Part 2. In writing this book, I have become indebted to numerous individuals and institutions. Dr. Fritz T. Epstein read and commented on substantial portions of the manuscript; my colleagues Albert Feuerwerker, Sidney Fine, and Glen Waggoner also read chapters. Hans-Adolf Jacobsen not only discussed the relationship of our respective probes of National Socialist foreign policy but provided some useful documents. Joseph Anderle, George Kent, and Howard Smyth helped on special points. The family of the late William E. Dodd permitted access to the Dodd papers; the papers of Jay Pierrepont Moffat are used and quoted with the permission of his widow, Mrs. Albert Lévitt. The Houghton Library of Harvard University allowed access to the William Phillips papers, and the University of Delaware Library permitted use of the George S. Messetsmith papers. The Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress and the U.S. National Archives were both kind hosts during my lengthy stays. I am grateful for assistance from the Departmental Records Branch of the Adjutant General’s Office—now the Modern Military Records Division of the National Archives—the Foreign Studies Branch of the Office of the Chief of Military History, the Historical Office of the Department of State, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library at Hyde Park, the Wiener Library in London, the Public Record Office, the West German Federal Archives in Koblenz, and the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich. The reference 2. Erich Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, Die Aussenpolitik, des Dritten Reiches (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1947; 2d ed., 1948).

3. Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik, 1933-1938 (Frankfurt/M: Metzner, 1968).

Preface

xix

librarians at the University of Michigan have been most patient and helpful. My work has been greatly aided by grants from the Kentucky Research Foundation of the University of Kentucky, the International Relations Program of the Rockefeller Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the American

Council of Learned

Societies, and the Horace R. Rackham School of Graduate Studies of the University of Michigan. For over a decade my concern with this project has imposed itself on the patience of my wife Wilma. Whatever I may owe to fellow scholars, all errors of fact and judgment are my responsibility. Ann Arbor, Michigan September 1969

Introduction to Part 2

lhe absence of a comprehensive treatment of international relations and the origins of World War I on which I commented in the preface to Part I, covering the years 1933-36, has not been remedied in the interim. There has been a great increase both in

atchives available and in literature published, but the problem of how the world came to be involved in a massive conflagration for the second time within a quarter of a century has continued to be a subject of great interest but of either very summary or limited monographic treatment. In the reassessment of the issues provided here, not only many archives but the works of other scholars have been freely drawn upon, even those with different perspectives or different conclusions. While looking at the fateful question of how so great a disaster could befall humanity, I have been impressed by two considerations. The first is that the memory of what in the 1920s and 1930s was referred to as the “Great War” was of enormous significance, and that many decisions and choices were made in terms of what people rightly ot wrongly thought to be the lessons of that conflict, its outbreak, its nature, and its outcome. All looked through that frame, often concentrating on different aspects or

drawing contradictory inferences but still carrying the burden of that experience as each interpreted its relevance to current problems. If this heritage of the past is a recurring theme, the focus for understanding the unfolding of new developments must be on German policy. It has become fashionable in some circles to reverse this perspective. It is at times suggested that Germany plunged Europe into war because she had been appeased too much by others—and that Japan thrust Asia into war because she was not appeased enough. The fact remains, however, that the initiative lay with Germany, and to a lesser extent with Italy, in Europe and with Japan in East Asia. After many years of studying the subject, I still believe that the most meaningful way to analyze how the whole world was plunged into war is to center attention on those who made the key choices and decisions. In these, they were affected both by domestic developments in their own countries and by the actions and reactions of others, but that in no way alters the source of the major trends. The idea that the historian can see better by walking on his hands instead of on his feet has the charm of novelty, but is apt to lead to misconceptions. Of the three countries taking the initiative, Germany was the most important. Italy could start a colonial war in Africa, and Japan could initiate a limited war in East Asia. Terrible enough for those directly affected, neither of these conflicts would necessarily have spread around the globe. Only the initiative of Germany as Europe’s most advanced and powerful industrial and military power could and did go beyond the immediate limits of one region or continent and explode into a worldwide catastrophe. Centering a study of the origins of World War II on the foreign policy of Hitler’s Germany, therefore, still provided a useful, and I hope productive, approach. Since that

Introduction to Part 2

xxi

war completed the process, initiated by the First World War, through which the Europeans destroyed the basis of power for their control of the globe at the beginning of the twentieth century, the issues are of significance not only for the larger and smaller countries of Europe, but for the world as a whole Part I traces the diplomatic revolution by which the European situation was transformed. From a tolerated equal, Germany became by the end of 1936 the dominant power on the continent. Since that part originally appeared, some new material and many additional publications dealing with its period have become available, but little of it would require substantial change. The reviewers have been kind, and what criticism there has been has centered more on my reluctance to engage in debate with the latest schools of interpretation and lines of controversy in German scholarship than with the substance of the account. Since this study is designed to illuminate the events of the 1930s rather than the arguments of the 1960s that criticism may be validly applied to this book as well. There is, however, one significant difference between the two parts. At the time that I wrote

on the period 1933-36,

there were

vety few studies dealing with the

problems of those years in a detailed and scholarly way; and it was therefore necessary to base the bulk of that account on primary sources. For the years 1937-39, on the other hand, there is a vast scholarly literature, much of it of very high quality indeed. It has accordingly been possible in many places to follow other scholats across the mountains of evidence; I have tried to acknowledge my debt to these guides in the notes and to indicate where and why I have decided to go on a slightly different path. By the end of 1936, the National Socialist regime had not only consolidated its hold on Germany, but had laid the foundations for the expansion toward which it was working. The initiation of rearmament, the launching of the Four-Year Plan, the remilitarization of the Rhineland, the creation of the Axis, the signing of the Anti-Comintern Pact; all these and other steps were in the past. Adolf Hitler, who was the unchallenged

leader of the nation, could now move toward the goals he had charted by the means he pteferred and in accordance with his assessments of other nations. These means and assessments, their origins and their nature, have been discussed in Part 1. Now he would

have the opportunity to apply them. Germany’s determination for war had become the central theme of world diplomacy. The way in which Hitler moved, how some tried to restrain him from doing so, how others hoped to benefit from his policies, and how the

world situation evolved under these circumstances would be the theme of the following years and of Part 2. In research of this type, the scholar accumulates obligations almost as rapidly as notes. I have been assisted in many ways by kind friends, Fritz T. Epstein, Joseph Anderle,

Harold

C. Deutsch,

Donald

C. Watt,

and Jonathan

Zorach.

Hans-Adolf

Jacobsen provided some important documents, and the late Howard M Smyth helped in significant ways. The Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, the Historical Division of the Department

of State, the Departmental

Records

Branch

of the Adjutant

General’s

Office—now the Military Archives Division of the National Archives—the Foreign Studies Branch of the Center for Military History, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library at Hyde Park, the Wiener Library in London, the West German Federal Archives in Koblenz, the German military archives in Freiburg, the German Foreign Ministry atchives in Bonn, and the Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte in Munich have all been most

helpful. I happily join the numerous scholars who acknowledge the assistance of Patricia Dowling with the State Department Records in the National Archives. The staff of the

Xxil

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Public Record Office in London was most generous with a demanding customer; all

quotations from the Foreign Office, Cabinet, Lord Halifax, and Sir Nevile Henderson

papers there are reproduced with the kind permission of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. Permission to use the papers of William E. Dodd was given by his family; the papers of Jay Pierrepont Moffat are used and quotes with the permission of his widow, Mrs. Albert Lévitt; the Houghton Library of Harvard University allowed access to the William Phillips papers; the University of Delaware Library permitted use of the George S. Messersmith papers; the London School of Economics allowed use of the Hugh Dalton papers; King’s College of the University of London made available the papers of Lord Ismay, which are quoted with the permission of the Trustees of the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives; the Beaverbrook Library allowed use of the David Lloyd George papers, and Clare College of Cambridge University the Baldwin and Templewood (Sir Samuel Hoare) papers. A collection of microfilms of Milch papers was made available to me at the Imperial War Museum in London. I am especially grateful to Lord Lothian and to the Scottish muniments. Nicolaus von Below and Wolf Eberhard permitted use of materials at the Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte in Munich. Reference librarians and interlibrary loan specialists have been most helpful at the University of Michigan and at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The scholar who attempts to work the vast and scattered mines of modern archives and to digest the masses of material gathered from them assuredly needs research grants. I want to express my appreciation for the support of the Kentucky Research Foundation of the University of Kentucky, the International Relations Program of the Rockefeller Foundation,

the Social Science Research

Council, the American

Council of Learned

Societies, the Horace R. Rackham School of Graduate Studies of the University of Michigan, the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the American Philosophical Society,

and the William Rand Kenan, Jr., Trust research fund of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The opinions, conclusions—and errors—of this work are the author’s. My late wife Wilma not only suffered through my two decades of work on this project but also helped by copying documents in London and Freiburg. This book is therefore dedicated to her memory.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy 1933-1939 The Road to World War II

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VOM pe > Peet TE FO conic Ms ends cctenith'g { nee+05) "ine 99) epee rhy ‘ Hanfstaengl became the foreign press chief of the party, and his activities in that capacity will be recorded. Like Liidecke, however, he was an independent-minded

adventurer; he was

rather too intent on chasing skirts;*+ and his openly voiced criticisms of some of Hitler’s associates and temporary departures from the true doctrine made it impossible for him to fit in. As Ltidecke had fled in 1934, so Hanfstaengl was to flee in 1937; and again like

Reich hitlérien (Paris: Centre, 1963], pp. 314f.); and in an excerpt from a report on National Socialist groups in the United States by Carl-Heinrich Nolle of the Auslandsamt of the Stablhelm published in Der deutsche Imperialismus und der xweile Weltkrieg (Berlin: Rutten & Loening, 1961), 2:301. See also Jacobsen, p. 68, n. 3. 28. It is worth noting that years later Hitler remembered

Liidecke as

a man who

spoke French, English,

Spanish, and Italian like a native and by implication as a man who could be depended on to seduce the right women. Hugh R. Trevor-Roper (ed.), Hitler's Table Talk, 30 October 1941 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1953), p. 102. 29. Liidecke, pp. 128, 261-66. ; 30. See also Alan Cassels, “Mussolini and German Nationalism, 1922-25,” Journal of Modern History, 35 (1963), 137-57; Klaus-Peter Hoepke, Die deutsche Rechte und der italienische Faschismus (Dusseldorf: Droste, 1968), Part 5;

Ernst Deuerlein (ed.), Der Hitler-Putsch (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962), pp. 543-47. 31. On Liidecke’s efforts to rejoin the National Socialists in 1939 through Fritz Wiedemann, then German consul general in San Francisco, see the interrogation of Wiedemann of 10 November 1945 in the Nuremberg

Trials Material, U.S. National Archives. On L.’s care in his speeches see the 2 May 1935 note by Leibbrandt of the APA, in EAP 250-d-18-05/5, T-81, Roll 11, Serial 32. 32. There is no study of Hanfstaengl’s role in the history of national socialism, but see his memoirs, Hitler, The Missing Years (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode,

1957). As Liidecke’s anti-Semitism

survived his escape to

Ametica, as can be seen in his memoirs, so Hanfstaengl’s survived World War II, as may be seen in his

memoits (e.g., pp. 31f., 80f.). 33. Hitler’s subsequent reference to this in his Table Talk of 6 July 1942 was related to his memory of Hanfstaengl’s alleged avarice (Irevor-Ropet edition, No. 252; Picker edition, No. 171; Ritter edition, No. 230).

34. See the memorandum on Hanfstaengl in the unpublished memoirs of George S. Messersmith (then U.S. consul general in Berlin) in the University of Delaware Library. For Hanfstaengl’s assessment of Hitler, heavily stressing the sexual aspects, see, in addition to his memoirs, the long memorandum

on Hitler of 3 December

1942 in the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, P.P.F. 5780 (the “Dr. Sedgwick” of this memorandum is Hanfstaengl).

The World Through Hitler’s Eyes

13

Ludecke, he failed in his efforts to return to the Reich in 1939.35

Rosenberg, Liidecke, and Hanfstaengl were all greatly concerned about getting the outside world to understand and appreciate Hitlet’s ideas. Rosenberg was prepared to accept whatever Hitler did and said; his experience was to prove that it would be impossible to arouse enthusiasm in the outside world; but since he never attempted to change anything, Hitler rewarded his loyalty by allowing him to continue in office. Lidecke and Hanfstaengl, however, sought to have Hitler make minor modifications in his tactics in order to enhance his reputation abroad. For such men there was no room in National Socialist diplomacy, and soon they were succeeded by men who shared their interest in international intrigue and their lack of responsibility but were careful to keep to themselves their own opinions of tactical details. One other National Socialist figure who dabbled in foreign affairs before 1933 was Hermann

Goring. He, too, had some international adventure behind him, and he was

already representing Hitler in some external negotiations, in Danzig for example.*° He was to continue to play a role in the German-Danzig-Polish complex as well as some other aspects of foreign affairs after 1933; but his numerous offices in the Third Reich were to direct most of his extensive energies to domestic affairs. Upon Hitlet’s accession to power there was no ready-made apparatus to replace the established diplomatic service as the chosen implement of new policies.37 Hitler would have to utilize the old while experimenting with the new. The first was to prove much simpler and the second much mote difficult than might have been anticipated. The doctrines of race and space were not limited in their implications to general considerations of foreign policy aims and methods but had very specific import for the policies to be followed toward individual countries. The space Germany needed was to be found primarily in the East, in Russia. The major theme of the foreign policy sections of Mein Kampf and of most of Hitler’s second book was this insistence on the conquest of territory toward the Urals. This theme, constantly reiterated in his speeches before 1933, was one in which Hitler’s perception of Russia, primarily in terms of his doctrine

of race, seemed to fit most precisely with the requirements of space policy. The land area the Germanic farmers would be settled on was inhabited by Slavs, an inherently inferior group. They were incapable of organizing a state or developing a culture. The only state organization ever successfully imposed on these inferior people had been established and maintained by individuals of Germanic racial stock whose russification had been no more real in the racial sense than the supposed germanization of Poles and Czechs had made real Germans

of these groups. This stratum of good racial stock, however, had

been weakened even in prewar Russia by political attacks from the developing Slavic bourgeoisie with its Pan-Slavic and anti-German ideology. The world war had drastically depleted the Germanic group: war always bears most heavily on the racially best elements who setve at the front while the racially inferior attempt to escape service. The enormous

casualties Russia had suffered thus decimated the Germanic stock,

especially in the officer corps in which they were heavily represented. The final blow came during the Bolshevik Revolution in which the last remnants were exterminated. 35. The story as told by Hanfstaengl in his memoirs (p. 290) is contradicted by the contemporary record to be found in the memorandum of the British government accompanying a letter by Sir Ronald Campbell to John Franklin Carter of 23 June 1942 in the Henry Field papers, Franklin D. Roosevelt Library. I am indebted to Dr. 15 Field for permission to use this document. See also the reference to a letter, Bormann to Hanfstaengl,

August 1939, in Joseph Wulf, Literatur und Dichtung im Dritten Reich (Rowohlt, 1966), p. 413.

1960), pp. 36. See Ernst Ziehm, Aus meiner politischen Arbeit in Danzig, 1914-1939 (Marburg: Herder-Institut, 143-45. See also Hoepke, pp. 310-13.

37. Jacobsen, pp. 13-15.

14

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

This process of elimination of the Germanic element in Russia had left behind an amorphous block of Slavs, ruled and exploited for the benefit of world capitalism by the Jews. Inherently, the Jews were even less capable of organizing and maintaining a state than the Slavs, and would in any case be destroyed on the triumph of Pan-Slavism

among the Russian people. The remaining Slavic population, however, would constitute a permanently feeble and unstable society. The “Slavs have no organizational ability whatever,” and a purely Slavic Russia would have no power; in fact, it would fall into

dissolution. That recent events —World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution—had so weakened

Russia, therefore, constituted

a piece of “good luck” for the future of a

Germany that would know how to profit from it.* The vast number of Russians presented no problem in itself: Germany had defeated the great Russian armies in the war,” and space and numbets alone were not important. Nobody, Hitler maintained, would ever attive at the idea that there was any danger of Russian hegemony in the world, because there was no inner value—meaning no racial value—in the Russian population,

however numetous.*? Since the reduction of the Russian population by slaughter and expulsion was implicit in his policies, it is not surprising that Hitler referred to the rural areas of Eastern Europe, notoriously suffering from overpopulation,

as being thinly

settled.41 Territorial conquest eastward was thus both necessary and simple, and the major areas to be conquered lay in Russia. If Germany were to conquer Russian territory, it had to concern itself with the tier of new states that had gained their independence after the first world war because all the

great powets of Eastern Europe had been defeated in that conflict. Poland was the largest of these states. It should be noted that Hitler did not pay nearly as much attention to Poland as many of his German contemporaries. To them, regardless of political otientation, Poland was an abomination, temporary but most irritating.4* The Poles were,

in German eyes, an Eastern European species of cockroach; their state was generally referred to as a Saisonstaat—a country just for a season; and the expression po/nische Wirtschaft—Polish economy—was a phrase commonly applied to any hopeless mess. The general orientation of German foreign policy with its goal of a return to the borders of 1914, at least in the East, hoped for a new partition of Poland, probably in cooperation with the Soviet Union. There is no evidence to suggest that anyone who occupied a leading position in Weimar Germany recognized that the existence of a strong and independent Poland might have great advantages for Germany. Until the Germans had broken what were commonly known as the “chains of Versailles,” they did not notice that the same chains had bound Soviet Russia. Official German policy called for permanent hostility to Poland, manifested in a trade war as well as constant friction over ques-

tions of minorities and revisionist propaganda.* In the Weimar period, German policy toward Russia was influenced to a great extent by the priority of revisionist hopes against Poland; in Hitler’s view, policy toward Poland was incidental and subordinated to his aim of territorial agerandizement at the 38. The clearest presentation of Hitler’s views, summarized above, from which the quotations are taken, is in

Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 155-59. 39. See Hitler’s comments in Mein Kampf, 1:215. 40. Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 128. This would not, of course, preclude the convenient use of the Russian or

Bolshevik menace as a tool, first of domestic and later of foreign propaganda, by the National Socialists. Hitler explained to his associates that this was a device for the consumption of others; his own policy was based on

the gross underestimation of Russian power described in the text. 41. Hitlers xweites Buch, p. 102. 42. See Christian Holtzle, Die Weimarer Republik und das Ostlocarno-Problem, 1919-1934 (Wiirzburg: Holzner, 1955): 43. See the important dissertation of Gaines Post, Jr., “German Foreign Policy and Military Planning, The Polish Question, 1924-1929” (Stanford, 1969).

The World Through Hitler’s Eyes

15

expense of the Soviet Union. This certainly did not make him any friendlier toward the Poles than his predecessors, but he did not share their fixed objectives because he thought them inadequate. His desire for enormous territory rather than border tevision automatically diminished the long-term importance of Poland and freed from rigid preconceptions Hitler’s short-term tactics toward that country.44 He assumed Polish hostility toward Germany, understood Poland’s close ties with France, and was aware of the

possibility of a Polish preventive war against Germany; but in the conduct of relations with Poland, Hitler could proceed pragmatically, subordinating everything to the tactical requirements of other policies.

If the doctrine-of space led Hitler to seek tetritorial expansion eastward, the pre-

sumptive increase in strength that would accrue to Germany from such expansion added yet another reason to the many existing ones making for enmity between Germany and France. Surely France would do anything to prevent such an enormous increase in German might. On this assumption, it seemed safer to defeat France first, that is, before

moving East, so that Germany would not have a dangerous enemy at its back while engaged in the great enterprise. The first great war Germany would fight, therefore, would be against France; the second would be against Russia. In fact, Hitler now asserted that

in the long run the first war would prove useless unless it paved the way for the second.*5 As the concept of space reinforced enmity for France, so it accentuated a hitherto only slightly apparent difference in Hitler’s attitude toward England. Until about 1923, England was regularly included with France among Germany’s present and future enemies, but with greater emphasis on the enmity of France.*° Perhaps British opposition to the French occupation of the Ruhr stimulated a more fundamental differentiation between the two powers.*7 England now appears in Hitler’s view of the world in a separate category. His new attitude toward Great Britain was a mixture of admiration and hate, never entirely untangled. He thought he recognized in the British upper classes the product of a process of selective breeding not entirely unlike what he hoped to accomplish in Germany. Similarly, he often referred to the ability of a small number of Englishmen to control the Indian subcontinent as a model for his own vast schemes of conquered areas and subdued peoples.** On the other hand, Jews were allowed to play a part in British society, Britain had a democratic

form of government,

and the people of

England were oriented more toward trade and industry than toward agriculture. The Jews were imagined to have all sorts of great influence; by definition democracy destroyed responsibility and leadership in a society; and trade and industry were not only not as healthy occupations as agriculture but had a debilitating effect on the social structure. Nevertheless, the hegemony of France, apparently created by the Paris peace settlement, would strengthen France in world competition for trade and empire and was thus against the interests of Great Britain.4? Opposition to the strongest power on the continent in defense of the European balance would logically place England alongside Germany in its conflict with France—even if that conflict eventually produced a 44, The same interpretation, with slight differences in emphasis, may be found in Martin Nationalsozialistische Polenpolitik, 1939-1945 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1961), pp. 9-11. 45. Mein Kampf, 2:741.

Broszat,

'

A. V. 46. See the source collections of Deuerlein, Phelps, and Boepple which concentrate on this period, and N. van Woerden, “Hitler Faces England: Theories, Images and Policies,” Acta Historiae Neerandica, 3 (1968),

145-46. fir. 47. Schubert, pp. 74-75. to 48. It never occurred to Hitler that the small number of Englishmen in India might be related in any way equally large their success; had the British attempted the sort of large-scale settlement accompanied by the not have been nearly slaughter of the indigenous population Hitler projected for his own empire, India would as quiet as Hitler, already somewhat erroneously, imagined it to be. 49, Mein Kampf, 1:699; Hitlers xweites Buch, p. 173.

16

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Germany so strong that England would again turn against Germany,” at a time when, presumably, it would be too late.

In Hitler’s eyes, the only thing required to persuade England of the wisdom of an alliance with Germany would be the abandonment of Germany’s world trade and naval ambitions. These had threatened England before the war, and he believed them responsible for British entrance into an alliance with her former enemies France and Russia against Germany. The new eastward directed space policy that Hitler projected for Germany would entail finding food for Germany’s people by competition for land in Europe instead of competition for trade in the world and would thus remove any basis for hostility between Germany and England. Furthermore, if France was one great danger to England, Russia with its expansionist possibilities in the oil-rich Near East and toward

India was a second danger, while the rising trade empire of the United States was a third.5! With no cause for enmity with Germany, therefore, and with a shared hostility to France and Russia, there was no reason why England should not become an ally of Germany, at least temporarily. As has been mentioned, there are explicit hints in Hitler’s

second book that such an alliance might subsequently give way to renewed enmity, but that was a distant future in which Germany would have acquired the territory needed to take care of itself. The new emphasis on Lebensraum strengthened the apparent wisdom of a German alliance with Italy. Hitler had favored such an alliance on purely pragmatic grounds: Italy’s ambitions in the Mediterranean clashed with those of France, and this common hostility to France could furnish the basis for joint action.52 Hitler’s plans for expansion eastwatd would upset France but not Italy. The divergent expansions of Italy and Germany constituted a potential tie between them; they would not bring the two powers in conflict with each other, but both could be achieved only over the opposition of France. The alliance between Germany and Italy that appeared to be the logical deduction from this set of facts was confronted by a negative factor in the form of a potential division between the two powers and a positive factor in the form of a potential additional tie. The potential tie was the ideological affinity of Italian fascism and national socialism; the potentially divisive factor was the question of South Tyrol. Hitler was an early and continuing admirer of Mussolini and his program. The fascist seizure of power in Italy seemed to him a harbinger of his own success. The attacks upon the Fascist leader by the liberal newspapers in Germany and elsewhere confirmed Hitler’s assessment of their spiritual kinship. Personal admiration for Mussolini played an undoubted part in this, and the curious type of friendship Hitler developed for his distant hero was to outlast shocks that would have sundered most personal relationships. In the period before 1933 the actual dictator of Italy and the prospective dictator of Germany dealt with each other by unofficial emissaries; Liidecke performing this role for Hitler, while Major Giuseppe Renzetti acted in a similar capacity for Mussolini. Lidecke merely made a few brief trips to Rome, but Renzetti as president of the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Berlin and later as Italian consul general provided a means of regular contact. While it is known from Liidecke’s memoirs that he made his first trip to Italy for Hitler in 1922, Renzetti first appears in the documents in 1931, referred to in a letter to Rosenberg as “our friend.”*? The earliest available reports prepared by Renzetti 50. Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 167, 174. 51. Ibid., pp. 172-74. 52. Walter Werner Pese, “Hitler und Italien, 1920-1926,” Vierteliabrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 3 (1955), 113-26, has

shown that Hitler favored common action with Italy before Mussolini’s march on Rome. 53. Arno Schickedanz to Rosenberg, 13 January. 1931, Nuremberg document 1146-PS

(U.S. National

Archives). Referring to a recent statement by Mussolini about Goring, Schickedanz wrote: “The Duce surely received this understanding through our friend Renzetti.”

The World Through Hitler’s Eyes

17

for Il Duce are those of 15 October and 20 November 1931.54 The latter records that Renzetti brought Hitler some political advice from Mussolini and reports on Hitler’s great desire to make a trip to Rome to see the Italian leader. At that time, as during all of 1932, the ardent hopes of Hitler for a meeting with Mussolini came to naught,>° ae the contact remained and would provide a continuing means of direct communication outside regular diplomatic channels even after Hitler came to power.*° The very first contact between the two leaders in 1922 was used by Mussolini to bring home to Hitler the danger to German-Italian relations in the question of South Tyrol. The German agitation for revision of the peace treaties constantly called attention to those people of German background who had been transferred from Austria to Italy by the Treaty of St. Germain and were being subjected to a process of italianization.>” In the 1920s, the German minority in South Tyrol was probably the one most subject to tepression of their original nationality and thus a plausible object for attention by those German parties that claimed a monopoly in national patriotism. Italian insistence on the maintenance of the existing border on the Brenner made revision here incompatible with German-Italian friendship, and Hitler promptly decided that the question of South Tyrol must be sacrificed to the vastly greater interest in a German-Italian alliance.58 Although this was a most unpopular stand in Germany, where in any case public opinion was very anti-Italian because of Italy’s alleged unfaithfulness to its alliance with the Central Powers, Hitler publicly defended a renunciation of South Tyrol. The relevant portion of the second volume of Mein Kampf was published as a separate brochure in 1926, and the impetus for Hitler to prepare (though never to publish) a second book in the summer of 1928 was closely related to the problem that the unpopularity of his position on this issue created for him in German domestic politics. The National Socialists constantly tried to deprecate the importance of the South Tyrol issue and to point to the agitation over it in Germany and Austria as simply a convenient pretext for Jews, Marxists, Freemasons, and others to attack Mussolini. Within

the party, Hitler defended his position on South Tyrol as essential for Germany if it were to regain its position of power and influence, a position it could secure only by alliance with Italy and England.°? To Mussolini, Hitler reaffirmed his renunciation through Ettore Tolomei, the leading proponent of the policy of italianization of South Tyrol. Of 54. Renzetti to Mussolini, 15 October and 20 November 1931, National Archives Microcopy T-586, container

491, frames 050253-56. On R.’s career in Germany see Hoepke, pp. 248, n. 20, 258, 307-8. For Mussolini’s use of R. to contact liberals and socialists see Eugen Schiffer, Ein Leben fiir den Liberalismus (Berlin: Herbig, 1951), p. 227. 55. See Renzetti’s reports to Mussolini of 12 January, 9 June, and 30 June 1932, T-586, container 491, frames 050259-265; Hoepke, pp. 316-17. 56. Some known examples of such contacts will be referred to subsequently. The published Italian diplomatic documents indicate that this channel remained in use for many years and was not unknown to the Italian diplomatic service. Attolico to Ciano, 14 June 1939, I Documenti diplomatici Italiani, 8th series, Vol. 12, No. 231; 2 September 1939, ibid., Vol. 13, No. 607. See also Winfried Schmitz-Esser, “Hitler-Mussolini: Das Sudtiroler

Abkommen von 1939,” Aussenpolitik, 13, No. 6 June 1962), p. 327. 57. The discussion of South Tyrol here, except where otherwise noted, is based on the author’s introduction to Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 21-25, 34f., and Conrad F. Latour, Siidtirol und die Achse Berlin-Rom, 1938-1945 (Stuttgart: a Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962). 58. The chronology of this reversal is carefully traced in Schubert, pp. 76-81. See also I Documenti diplomatic Italiani, 7th series, Vol. 1, No. 131.

59. See the report on a conference in the National Socialist party headquarters in Munich on 31 March 1932,

quoted in Der deutsche Imperialismus and der zweite Weltkrieg, 2:478. See also Hoepke, pp. Loft. 60. The draft of Tolomei’s report to Mussolini of 30 September 1928 on his meeting with Hitler on 14 August 1928 has been published in Karl Heinz Ritschel, Diplomatic um Siidtirol, Politische Hintergriinde eines europaischen Versagens (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1966), pp. 133-37. (Hoepke is mistaken in setting the date as mid-August 1929 [p. his second 165].) It should be noted that the Hitler-Tolomei meeting took place a few weeks after Hitler wrote book.

18

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

course, this should not be taken to mean that other circumstances might not lead to other perspectives. Hitler would refrain from a ruthless drive for colonies and world trade as a tactical sactifice to secure the assistance of England, but that would not keep him from grandiose colonial plans when England failed to fulfill his expectations. He would ignore the South Tyrol question as a tactical sacrifice to the needed alliance with Italy, but that would not prevent him from seizing that area, plus other large portions of northern Italy, once Italy had left the Axis. In few other areas is the relationship between Hitler’s long-term aims and short-term opportunism more clearly revealed. There was still one other potential source of difficulty between Germany and Italy, and on it Hitler was not prepared to make concessions so readily—the annexation of Austtia.“| Hitler always argued that Austria and Germany should be joined in one countty and never ceased to make this opinion public. The very fact that tactical considerations led him to renounce claims to South Tyrol probably made him all the more obdurate in regard to the Anschluss. It is clear from his writings—and later acts—that this desire was not due to any great love for the land of his birth. Rather, it was the desire to expand the racial base of the forthcoming German empire. He hoped that his renunciation of South Tyrol would ease Italy’s objections to the Axschluss, and that the time would come when Italy would see no more reason to oppose a union of Austria with an anti-French Germany.®* Subsequent developments unveiled by events quite early in the yeats of his rule were to prove this a miscalculation, but the policy which produced that abrupt confrontation of his illusions with the real world around him can be understood only if the illusions and their place in his thinking are kept in mind. If Austria was to be swallowed up completely, Hungary was another potential ally, even if not a very important one.® A revisionist power opposed to Yugoslavia, which was backed by France and in turn opposed by Italy, Hungary might be fitted into the German alliance system.®* The National Socialists and other extremist groups in Bavaria had been in contact with similarly oriented elements in Hungary in the years before 1923, and there had been talks about simultaneous revolutions in both locations in November of that year. Liidecke had been it! Hungary as Hitler’s emissary, and a similar role had been played by another international adventurer, Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter, whose career was ended by death in the putsch of 9 November 1923.% It was to Scheubner-Richter as their intermediary of a decade before that the leader of the Hungarian rightists, Julius Gombos, referred when, having become prime minister of 61. The questions of South Tyrol and the Azschluss were closely related. Italy had little to fear as long as the agitation emanated from a small and weak Austria. If Austria ever joined Germany, Italy would face a neighbor both large and strong. 62. Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 208f. To Tolomei, Hitler described the Anschluss as certain but in the distant future (Ritschel, p. 137). 63. It is striking how few references there are to Hungary and to the Magyars in Hitler’s various written and oral comments, especially on the Habsburg empire. The converse is his emphasis, in a very negative way, on the Czechs. Perhaps this reflects the narrow nationalistic concerns of his Vienna days where Czechs were numerous and Magyats mote distant. 64. Hitlers xweites Buch, p. 217. Hungary is here grouped with Spain, another country which had scarcely attracted Hitler’s attention. 65. These relations are reviewed in Schubert, pp. 168-80. See also the letter of Ludendorff to Horthy in Miklés Szinai and Laszlo Sziics (eds.), “Horthy’s Secret Correspondence with Hitler,” New Hungarian Quarterly, 4, No.

11 (1963), 176f Hans Bleyer, “Die ungarlandische Deutschtumsfrage im Spiegel der diplomatischen Gesprache zwischen Budapest und Berlin,” in Gedenkschnijt fir Harold Steinacker (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1966), pp. 303-05. 66. There is no reference to Scheubner-Richtet’s Hungarian contacts in the adulatory biography by Paul Leverkuehn, Posten auf ewiger Wache (Essen: Essener Verlagsanstalt, 1938), pp. 191-94. This book does provide considerable information on this shadowy figure, however, including his connection with White Russian émigrés and his trip to Wrangel’s army in the Crimea. The assertion that Scheubner-Richter was a Russian agent in World War I has never been substantiated and is most unlikely. On his role in the early NSDAP see Walter Laqueur, Russia and Germany, A Century of Conflict (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1965), pp. 58-68.

The World Through Hitler’s Eyes

19

Hungary, he sent greetings immediately after Hitler became chancellor of Germany.” Another Central European country that figured in Hitler’s perceptions and plans was Czechoslovakia. His analysis of prewar Austria dealt very extensively with the growing power of the Czechs in both Bohemia and Vienna itself, his attacks on the Habsburg dynasty were phrased to a great extent in terms of their failure to combat this trend, and his praise of the Pan-German movement was based heavily on the anti-Czech clement in Georg von Schéneter’s program.” In Hitlet’s eyes, the nationality problem in Bohemia was the presence of Czechs in an area he believed appropriate solely for German settlement.’? He assumed that the Czech state would be hostile to Germany, and he kept in contact with sympathetically inclined elements among the German population of Czechoslovakia.”! When the time came, they were to be the tool of far-reaching schemes.

Yugoslavia appeared in Hitlet’s mental world primarily in two ways. First, he thought of Yugoslavia as an enemy of Italy and friend of France and thus as a possible partner of France in a war against Mussolini’s Italy; and second, as the country of the Serbs who had followed their national interest realistically and persistently by working for the destruction of Austria-Hungary. It should be noted that in Hitler’s assessment of people in terms of their racial awareness and value, this point constituted something of a

plus mark for the Serbs. Hitler was, of course, aware of the struggle over the border between Austria and Yugoslavia in Carinthia, but there is nothing on his part to suggest any special interest in that issue. Other European countries appear to have played little part in Hitler’s thinking before 1933; what references to them can be found will be men-

tioned in the context of their later relations with Germany. Outside the European continent and its colonial extensions, the major areas of im-

portance for German foreign policy were the Far East and the United States. Hitler’s vision was primarily continental, and he paid very little attention to either area, a habit that was to continue until 1945. He was not especially interested in the Far East, a fact that was to be reflected in a more than usual confusion in German policies toward that area after 1933. Three facets of Hitler’s perspective on Far Hastern affairs deserve mention. In the first place, there can be no question that he shared in some way the aversion to the people of Eastern Asia expressed in references to the Yellow Peril, widespread in

those early years of the twentieth century when so many of Hitler’s ideas were formed.” His own racist orientation, of course, served only to intensify this attitude. Second, Hitler

did not share the sinophilism current in the Germany of his day as a counterweight to the “Yellow Peril” fears. In the third place, he had somewhat kindlier feelings toward

Japan.’3 Though of “racially uncteative stock,” the Japanese were at any rate very clever; 67. The instructions of Gémbés to Kélman de Kanya, then Hungarian minister to Germany, of 1 February 1933 are quoted in Elek Karsai (ed.), “The Meeting of Gémbés and Hitler in 1933,” New Hungarian Quarterly, 3, No. 5 (1962), 172. The message as delivered to Hitler on 7 February 1933 is in Documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1945, Series C, Vol. 1, No. 15.

68. On this subject see the author’s paper, “Czechoslovakia and Germany, 1933-1945,” in Miloslav Rechcigl, es Jr. (ed.), Czechoslovakia Past and Present, 1 (The Hague: Mouton, 1969), pp. 760-69. 69. On the key role that the nationality conflict with the Czechs played in the origins of national socialism see Andrew G. Whiteside, Austrian National Socialism before 1918 (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1962). 70. Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 78£.; Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction, pp. 37-38. 71. In view of the post-1933 contacts between Sudeten German National Socialists and the German government, in which the latter helped finance the former, it is ironic to see the signatures of two Sudeten German

Kutt Lidecke to members of the Czech parliament, Rudolf Jung and Hans Knirsch, on the letter authorizing

in 1923. collect money for the Nationalsozialistische Partei Grossdeutschlands in the United States after Hitler’s arrest ! 191. p. facing photograph Liidecke, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 72. See Heinz Gollwitzer, Die Gelbe Gefahr; Geschichte eines Schlagwortes (Gottingen:

1962).

:

Hague: Nijhoff, 73. Ernst L. Presseisen, Germany and Japan, A Study in Totalitarian Diplomacy, 1933-1941 (The Mohr, 1962), (Tiibingen: 1935-1940 Machten, den zwischen Japan und Deutschland Sommer, 1958), pp. 2-5; Theo

20

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

and their aggressive moves in the Far East, which brought down upon them the attacks of the liberal press, were to their merit in Hitlet’s eyes.” The United States originally drew very little attention from Hitler.” In his political speeches and writings Hitler echoed the denunciations of the United States in general and President Wilson in particular that were then current in Germany. He was sure that Jewish influence had been responsible for America’s entrance into the war, but his teferences to the United States were few indeed. His interest was aroused, however, by

American immigration legislation and by the very considerable importation of American automobiles into Germany. This latter fact drew Hitler’s attention to the advantages of a large domestic living space, and thus market, for industrial as well as agricultural purposes. This evidence of American strength was related, in Hitler’s eyes, to American immigration legislation. These laws seemed to Hitler, not without reason, to be basically

racist in orientation. They reinforced a tendency he believed inherent in the process of migration from Europe to America: the best and most enterprising members of each community, i.e., the Nordics, emigrated to America. The United States was, therefore,

not the melting pot of the American imagination but the great meeting place of the Nordics who maintained their racial purity by strict immigration laws. This gathering of the finest Nordic racial stock from each European country explained why the Americans had made such good use of their living space. With a racial headstart over the others— especially the European countries drained of their best blood by the same process that had made America strong—and with a vast area on which to proliferate, the American

people were exceedingly dangerous and a real threat to German predominance in the world. Only a Eurasian empire under German domination could hope to cope with this menace successfully. A third big war was added to the original two; after the wars against France and Russia would come the war against the United States. One of the major tasks of the National Socialists would be the preparation of Germany for this conflict. This assessment of the United States was to give way in the early 1930s to a far different one.’ Under the impact of the world depression and its effect on the United States—an effect Hitler thought permanent—Hitler concluded that the United States was really a very weak country. Turning again to a racial explanation, he came to believe that America was a racial mixture after all, a mixture that included Negtoes and Jews.

Such a mongrel society, in which “the scum naturally floated to the top,” could not construct a sound economy, create an indigenous culture, or establish a successful political system. America was a weak countty whose hope for strength had been destroyed in the past by the victory of the wrong side in the Civil War and whose hope for the future, if there were any, lay with the German-Americans. In any case, the United States could not interfere with Hitler’s plans which, in confidential discussions, were now said to include

Mexico and much of Latin America. Thus Hitler was to go forward in the 1930s, unconcerned about the United States and generally uninterested in it. The basic hostility remained, but concern about America’s racial strength had vanished.

It should be noted that, with insignificant exceptions, the general nature of Hitlet’s views as summarized in the preceding pages was readily recognizable before his assumption of power.’’ In fact, the rise of the National Socialist party was financed to a conpp. 8f. 74. Hitler’s speech of 23 May 1928, Volkischer Beobachter, 25 May 1928; cf. Hitlers xweites Buch, p. 25 75. The following is summarized from the author’s article, “Hitler’s Image of the United States,” Aymerican Historical Review, 69 (1964), 1006-11. In addition to the evidence cited there see Hitlet’s speech of 4 August 1929 in Preiss (ed.), Adolf Hitler in Franken, p. 114. 76. Weinberg, “Hitler’s Image of the United States,” pp. 1010-13.

77. The author has been careful to avoid using evidence from a later period. It is true that practically none of

The World Through Hitler's Eyes

Zi

siderable extent by the thousands and thousands of Germans who paid admission to public meetings at which Hitler publicly proclaimed his belief in these ideas and policies. He tried to leave his audiences in no doubt about his meaning; on the contrary, he tepeated the same ideas and even phrases over and over again. He assured them that, if granted power, he would ruthlessly and brutally establish a dictatorship in Germany, build up Germany’s military might after its republican institutions and ideas had been Swept away, and then proceed to lead his country as its absolute dictator in a series of wars. In promising a ruthless dictatorship, he did not hesitate to say explicitly that it would be like that of Italy and of Soviet Russia.78 In promising war, he was always personal and specific: “I believe that I have enough energy to lead our people whither it must shed its blood [xu blutigen Einsatz], not for an adjustment of its boundaties, but to save it into the most distant future by securing so much land and space that the future teceives back many times the blood shed,” Hitler said on 23 May 1928.79 Why did millions of Germans respond so enthusiastically to these appeals? Certainly the terrible cost of the war had left many Germans disillusioned with wat and fearful of its repetition. But it should be noted that the disillusionment in Germany was not quite like that in Western countries. There were books expressing such sentiments as characterized Erich Maria Remarque’s A// Quiet on the Western Front in other countries than Germany, but one would find it exceedingly difficult to match outside Germany the literature glorifying war that was typified by the works of Ernst Jiinger and was applied to the postwar period by the members of the Free Corps.®° More important, perhaps, than this survival of militaristic attitudes was the psychological disorganization produced by defeat. Unaware of the real situation, the German people had seen their hopes tumble from the vision of victory to the reality of collapse in a few months of 1918. After the glory of a powerful state, after the immense sacrifices of war, their world had crashed

down around them. In the preceding decades, while the peoples of England and France were painfully learning to govern themselves, the German people had been trained to think that this was neither possible nor desirable for them. In the chaos and despair of a defeated country, it was easier for many to mock the brave few who tried hard to reconstruct a self-respecting society than to take a hand in the difficult task of rebuilding. It was simpler to put one’s faith in one man who would take care of everything than to assume a share of the responsibility for the agonizing choices to be made in daily political life. Those who agreed that one man was to lead and decide while they would obey and follow could not thereby escape the responsibility for his decisions; they simply accepted that responsibility in advance.*! A further factor of great significance was the widespread acceptance of racial ideology among the people of Germany. Whether or not willing to agree to all its Hitler’s opinions on the subjects discussed here ever changed, but reliance on material of the pre-1933 petiod minimizes the danger of later events or documents influencing the interpretation. 78. An example of 28 February 1926 in Werner Jochmann (ed.), Im Kampf um die Macht, Hitlers Rede vor dem Hamburger Nationalklub von 1919 (Frankfurt/M: Europaische Verlagsanstalt, 1960), p. 103. 79. Volkischer Beobachter, 25 May 1928.

80. For illuminating samples and comments see Robert G. L. Waite, Vanguard of Nazism, The Free Comps Movement in Postwar Germany, 1918-1923 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1952). Note Waite’s defense of his extensive quotations: “Had I relied on paraphrase, it seems probable that I would not have been

believed” (p. ix).

“il

,

81. An instructive illustration of this may be found in Dietrich Orlov’s University of Michigan Ph.D. disserta-

Unition on the Southeast Europe Society (Siidost-Europa Gesellschaft), The Nazis in the Balkans (Pittsburgh: without possibly quite and Hitler from directives no with organization, This 1968). Press, versity of Pittsburgh of the his even being aware of its existence, carried forward a comprehensive program for the establishment to point National Socialist New Order in Southeast Europe. Much of the time after 1933 Hitler did not have within a framethe way; consensus in Germany was sufficiently widespread for many to proceed on their own work that was generally understood.

ey

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

horrible implications, vast numbers were prepared to accept its premises. It is significant that in a country where academic persons were high in prestige, the pseudoscience of racism had made very rapid inroads in the academic community. Furthermore, it is clear from all accounts of National Socialist gatherings that anti-Semitism was the most popular part of Hitler’s appeal to his audiences. If so many followed, it was in part that they were enthusiastic about the direction he wanted to take. Certainly one should not overlook the belief of many that the National Socialists did not necessarily mean precisely what they said; that Hitler’s more extreme ideas should not be taken seriously; that, once in power, the movement would find itself forced into a

more reasonable course by the impact of responsibility and reality. Many of those who deluded themselves in this opinion were to argue after World War II that Hitler had deluded them. But he had not lied to them; they had misled themselves. In many instances this self-delusion was greatly facilitated by the hope that Hitler did mean what he said about destroying the Social Democratic Party and the trade unions, regardless of the methods used and the purposes for which this might be done.** There was also the hope of some of the older generation of German leaders that the dynamism of national socialism could be harnessed to theit own more limited goals. But above all there was the opposition of millions to the Weimar Republic, its ideals and its practices, and the whole tradition of liberalism and humanism to which they were related. The German people was to be the new all-powerful god and Hitler the all-powerful prophet; and already in January 1933 there were many who identified the two.*4 He could lead Germany back to strength; he could overcome the psychological depression of past defeat and the economic depression of Germany’s contemporary situation. Many in Germany opposed Hitler’s rise to power, some of them recognizing clearly the implications of his policies, especially in the field of foreign affairs.*5 Before 1933 the millions who pushed Hitler forward, and the small clique who installed him in office, by

no means constituted the whole population. But there were vast reservoirs of support for the new leader to draw on, and for many years the support was to increase rather than lessen. The national acceptance df the leadership principle implied the unconditional surrender of the country to the will of a leader who had explained for years what he would do with power when he secured it. His people were not to be disappointed. They would get all the wars he had promised, and he would remain faithful to the ideas he had preached until the bitter end.

82. An excellent introduction to the subject is found in George L. Mosse, The Crisis of German Ideology, The Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1964). See also Hermann Glaser, SpiesserMdeologie, Von der Zerstorung des deutschen Geistes im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Freiburg: Rombach, 1964). 83. A local case study illustrating this process is in William S. Allen, The Nazi Seizure of Power, The Experience of a Single German Town, 1930-1935 (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, Inc., 1965).

84. See the thoughtful summary in Karl Dietrich Bracher, Wolfgang Sauer, and Gerhard Schulz, Die nationalsozialistische Machtergreifung (2d ed.; Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1962), pp. 22-27. 85. A startlingly accurate pre-1933 analysis may be found in Theodor Heuss, Hitlers Weg, Eine historisch-politische Studie tiber den Nationalsoxialismus (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1932), pp. 96-105. This book by the late president of the West German Federal Republic has now been reprinted.

Chapter 2 First Steps of the New Regime General Viewpoints; Disarmament; Four-Power Pact; the Churches

he conduct of foreign policy in the first months of Hitler’s chancellorship may be seen as the double interaction between his plans and hopes on the one hand and on the other the existing realities in Germany’s domestic and international situation. Characteristic of this period is the constancy of Hitler’s plans; their execution, however, involved some adjustment to the exigencies of the contemporaty scene. The economic difficulties of a nation at the depths of the great depression and the loss of the considerable worldwide esteem attained by the Weimar Republic might appear to have placed obstacles in Hitler’s path, but in fact these appearances of adver-

sity were provided for in the general concept of policy Hitler had projected. He had never argued for a policy of advance by negotiation on a step-by-step basis. He had joked about the advances made during the Weimar period when he had not attacked them as intrinsically bad. He believed that the prerequisite for success in foreign affairs was a revolutionary change in the domestic situation in Germany, and he had never pretended that this would not take considerable time. The whole structure of Germany must change, the opposition parties be crushed, democratic and pacifist thought extirpated,

and a large new military force built on an ideologically unified basis. It would force from that new base that would enable Hitler to guide German foreign new lines. He had spelled this out in Mein Kampf and his second book; he reaffirmed it in his famous speech to German industrialists on 27 January

be that new policy along had publicly 1932.' After

becoming chancellor, Hitler could no longer proclaim these objectives quite so pub-

licly—for reasons he perceived in a mannet to be described subsequently—but he was perfectly willing to voice them in private. For this we have not only the recollections of Hermann Rauschning? but the contemporary record of Hitler’s comments to key elements in Germany whose support was at that stage essential to the realization of his aims. On the evening of 3 February 1933, Hitler had an opportunity to meet and address the leading German generals and admirals as guest of General Kurt von Hammerstein, the commander in chief of the German army. Hitler would need these men, and most of them had neither met him nor read his writings. This was his chance to secure their support and allegiance, to show them how their interests coincided with his. He knew

1. The speech was published at the time by the Eher-Verlag, “Vortrag Hitlers vor westdeutschen Wirtschaftlern im Industtie-Klub zu Diisseldorf.” See also Domarus, 1:68—90. 2. Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction.

24

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

that they were the only ones who could stop him if they would; he would point out the common toad ahead. Hitler spoke for two hours, and he was as explicit in private as he had hitherto been in public.? In his presentation, Hitler explained the need for domestic change as the first order for a new and mighty Germany. Democracy, Marxism, and pacifism must disappear from the scene. “Internal unity is the prerequisite for every state. We failed in 1918 because we had not been politically trained for insight and unity, because class conflicts counted for more than the fatherland.” “Democracy is the most disastrous thing there is. Only one person can and should give orders.” “The population must learn to think nationalistically and thus be welded together. This cannot be done by intellectual means alone, but only by force. Whoever will not accept [our] insight must be forced.””* The economy of Germany could be saved only by an expansion of its land base. This could be accomplished only by the army when it was drawn from a country that had been properly indoctrinated. He and his party would take care of the domestic consolidation and indoctrination, and it would be the generals’ task to build up the army.

This process would, however, take time.> During that time, Germany would have to do some negotiating at Geneva under the pretense of equality of arms with other powers but secretly prepare a much greater force.° This would be the time of greatest danger, because it would be during this petiod, while a weak Germany prepared to attack her neighbors, that France—if it had any statesmen at all—would launch a preventive war against Germany.’ What would Germany’s new military might be used for? Hitler left his audience in no doubt: “Lebensraum for the surplus population,” one of those present noted. Another quotes Hitler as calling for the “conquest of Lebensraum in the Hast and its ruthless germanization.””® 3. Brief accounts in Herbert Rosinski, The German Army (London: Hogarth, 1940), p. 215; Hermann Foertsch,

Schuld und Verhdngnis (Stuttgatt: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1951), p. 33; John W. Wheeler-Bennett, The Nemesis

ofPower (London: Macmillan, 1954), p. 291. The main sources are “Aufzeichnung Liebmann” (hereafter cited as Liebmann Notes), Vzerteljabrshefte fir Zeitgescbichte, 2, No. 4 (Oct. 1954), 434-35; Mellenthin to Foertsch, 4 June

1951 and enclosure, “Hitler vor der filhrenden Generalitat in der Bendlerstrasse, Febr. 1933,” [4 February 1933] (hereafter cited as Mellenthin Notes), Munich, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 105; notes by Eugen Ott

commenting on Mellenthin Notes, February 1952, Institut fur Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 279, pp. 18-19. Admiral Raeder’s account in his memoirs, Meim Leben (Tuibingen-Neckar: Schlichtenmayer, 1956), 1:280—81, directly contradicts the independently prepared contemporary records of Liebmann and Mellenthin. Since the actual construction program of the German navy from 1933 on, as will be shown, was based on the policies ascribed to Hitler by the Liebmann and Mellenthin notes, one may safely assume that at the time the commander in chief of the German navy understood Hitler very well but subsequently found reasons for revising his memory. Raeder always proudly referred to his honorary doctorate, conferred in recognition of his historical work on German cruiser warfare in World War I. In general, he remembered more about cruiser war-

fare than the canons of historical accuracy. 4, Mellenthin Notes. The Liebmann Notes contain the same thoughts in more abbreviated form. But compare the last sentence in the quotation, “Wer nicht einsehen will, muss gebeugt werden,” with Liebmann’s version,

“Wer sich nicht bekehren lasst, muss gebeugt werden.” 5. The Liebmann Notes tefer simply to “time” (Zez#); the Mellenthin Notes to “many years” (viele Jahre). 6. On Hitler’s attitude toward the Geneva negotiations see pp. 36ff., below. 7. The phraseology of the two records differs on this point in detail but not in substance. Liebmann: “The most dangerous time is that of the build up of the armed forces. There we will see whether France has statesmen; if it does, it will not allow us the time but will attack us (presumably with its eastern satellites).” Mellenthin: “The path which I have explained to you will take up many years. If France has capable statesmen, it will attack us during the period of [our] preparations; not itself, but probably through its vassals in the east.” The allies of France that Hitler refers to are Poland and Czechoslovakia. 8. The first quotation is from the Mellenthin Notes, the second from the Liebmann Notes. Eugen Ott, one of those present at the meeting, commented after the war: “I remember the speech as having the character of a sharp offensive; the plan to secure new Lebensraum in the East ‘seemed to me at the time a crucial declaration.

Fritsch [then commander of Wehrkreis II, the military district that included Berlin] and Fromm [Ott’s successor as chief of the Wehram#| shared this impression and were both alarmed, but Fromm ttied to reassure Fritsch that these boundless schemes would be halted by the strength of reality and restricted to a reasonable basis.”

First Steps of the New Regime

25

Key themes in this presentation will be discussed in connection with their relation to the conduct of foreign affairs in 1933-34, but first they should be compared with Hitler’s explanation of his policies to a group of industrialists soon after, on 20 February. If Hitler needed the passivity of the generals while consolidating his absolute power in Germany, he needed money from the industrialists for his party’s campaign in the election then in progress, an integral part of that consolidation. He promised the generals a vast program of rearmament and conscription, militaristic indoctrination of the nation, and removal of the danger that civil commotion might require army involvement in domestic conflict? The industrial leaders of Germany were promised very much the same thing; but with his great political and oratorical talent, Hitler was careful to attune his presentation to their orientation.!° He would protect private property against bolshevism—that was why democracy had to be terminated. If the generals had been told that the people must be unified on the subject of military service, the industrialists were assuted that it must be unified on the subject of private property. The new ideology is similarly defined as requiring an end to pacifism and a rejection of the concept of teconciliation between peoples.'! Domestic political consolidation would be followed by economic progress. The consolidation, moreover, would come after the election in which

the National Socialists would try to increase their hold on the country; but if the election turned out poorly, “the battle would be fought with other weapons.” Only in a consolidated Germany could rearmament take place; the decision on that subject would be made in Germany, not in Geneva. The immediate role of the industrialists in all this was to provide money for the election campaign. They could contribute generously in a situation where, as Hermann Goring explained, “there would be no more elections for at least ten but more probably a hundred years.” If Hitler did not elaborate further on this occasion, it may have been in part due to the fact that his audience included individuals,

and represented the same group, to whom he had spoken at greater length a year before at Dusseldorf. Then he had tied the identical themes to future conquests; now he wanted

only to draw their attention to the immediate needs of the election campaign. Hjalmar Schacht collected the funds for that campaign; he would soon be providing it for others. The election itself, the enormous propaganda effort accompanying it, the suppression of all civil liberties during the campaign through the Reichstag fire decrees,!? and the weak opposition or more frequently complete cooperation of the ministers who were not National Socialists enabled Hitler to proceed at a tremendous speed with the consolidation of his regime in February and March 1933.'3 Hitler was doing in domestic affairs what he had said he would do, and with consummate skill.'* Sometimes he could Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 279, p. 19.

9. For a fine analysis of the generals’ reaction and their apparent willingness to accept Hitler’s word on domestic affairs while disregarding his prognosis of aggressive wat see Karl Dietrich Bracher, Wolfgang Sauer, and Gerhard Schulz, Die nationalsozialistische Machtergreifung (Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1962) (hereafter cited as Bracher, Machtergreifung), pp. 732-43. 10. The text is printed as Nuremberg document 203-D in Trial of the Major War Criminals (Nuremberg, 1946— 1948) (hereafter cited as TMWO), 35: 42-47; Géring’s speech at the same occasion in ibid., pp. 47-48; Krupp’s note of 22 February on his reply on behalf of those present is 204-D, ibid., p. 48. See also Bullock, pp. 334f. 11. The German is “Ablehnung der Volksverséhnung.” der Lubbe, 12. The most recent research suggests that the fire could conceivably have been set by Marinus van Hindenburg and the unassisted. Historically the most significant point is that with the approval of President rights of all cabinet, Hitler used the welcome pretext provided by the fire to suspend the constitutional Act, were the basis of the Germans for the duration of his rule. The decrees of 28 February, not the Enabling

totalitarian system installed by the National 13. A superb account of this whole process 14. It should be noted parenthetically that who thought they might restrain Hitler by any severe test. Much of the opposition in

é, Socialists. may be found in Bracher, Machtergreifung. the incredibly low intellectual and political level of mapa of those serving in the same cabinet with him rarely put Hitler s abilities to this petiod was created only in the post-1945 period by imaginative

26

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

move directly: on 3 February he had promised the generals that anything considered treason would be punished by death; one paragraph of the 28 February 1933 emergency decrees so provided. In other respects Hitler had to temporize and compromise, but that had the advantage of making the revolution appear less abrupt. Whatever elements in German society could be used in the process of consolidation would be used, even at the cost of temporary comptomise. This procedure combined the advantage of lessening opposition at the moment with the advantage of preparing the way for the subsequent absorption or destruction of that element. Years before, when he himself was in jail after the 1923 putsch, Hitler had explained this approach for the benefit of some followers involved in ideological and organizational hairsplitting. “According to Hitler, the avail-

able time is too short to make the people ready for action [frontreif] only with the National

Socialist ideology. We must therefore be satisfied with making the people nationalistic, so that they are ready for action, in alliance with other nationalist groups. To do this, it will

even be necessary to make some compromises.” The author of this description continued by comparing Hitlet’s expressed need for compromise with his own earlier ideological intransigence: “Today, when Hitler for the first time placed major considerations of foreign policy on the scales, I really had my first doubts whether we have been completely correct in our position. I am absolutely convinced that Hitler will never deviate one iota from his National Socialist ideals . .. but when that sometimes seems to be the case, it happens because of greater aims.”

The first major measures of the new chancellor were, accordingly, directed toward domestic concerns. In the first cabinet meetings, practically nothing was said about foreign affairs. Consolidation of his internal position was Hitler’s main and most immediate concern, and the records of the cabinet meetings reflect this clearly.!° The firm establishment of totalitarian rule, however, has been shown to be an integral part of Hitler’s foreign policy plans, just as the perpetual territorial expansion that was the essence of his

foreign policy was an integral part of his perception of the nature and needs of German society as defined in racial terms. The traditional distinction between domestic and foreign policy, and the related question as to the priority of one over the other, is thus

largely irrelevant to an analysis of German politics in this period. Nowhere is this more obvious in the first years of National Socialist rule than in matters of economic and budgetary policy. The world depression had hit Germany hard, even if the self-centered German public then—and since—failed to recognize that there were other countries either as badly hit or in an even worse situation. Hitler never expounded any detailed economic program in public, but he made his views known in the cabinet the first time budgetary

problems arose. A proposal for the construction of a reservoir triggered Hitler’s exposition of policy. Nothing demonstrates the relationship between economic and foreign policy in Hitler’s thinking more dramatically than the protocol of the cabinet meeting of 8 February 1933. “The Reich Chancellor stated that in judging the request . . . another decisive consideration had to be taken into account. Germany was now negotiating with foreign countries about her military equality of rights. But Germany could not content itself with that. ... The next five years in Germany had to be devoted to rendering the German people again capable of bearing arms. Every publicly sponsored measure to memoir writers like Franz von Papen. His Der Wahrheit eine Gasse Munich: Paul List, 1952) is mainly fiction. 15. Hermann Fobke to Ludolf Haase, 21 August 1924, in Werner Jochmann (ed.), Natonalsozialisnuis und Revolu-

tion, Ursprung und Geschichte der NSDAP in Hamburg, 1922-1933 (Frankfurt/M.: Europaische Verlagsgesellschaft, 1963), pp. 132-35. 16. Protocols of cabinet meetings of 30 January 1933, TMWC, 25:372-76; 31 January, Documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1943, Series C (hereafter cited as G.D., C), 1, No. 3; 1 February, ibid., No. 7; 2 Februaty,

ibid., No. 8.

Furst Steps of the New Regime

27

cteate employment had to be considered from [this] point of view. ... This had to be the dominant thought, always and everywhere.” While some ministers stressed the military importance of waterways and highways—neither of which were to be overlook ed in later years—the defense minister expressed his full agreement with Hitler, who “again stressed that for the next four/five years the main principle must be: everything for the armed forces. Germany’s position in the world was decisively conditioned upon the position of the German armed forces.'7 The position of the German economy in the world was also dependent on that.” The decision of the cabinet was to look at the whole budget, to see what could be done for the armed forces, and “finally to see what funds were left” for such projects as the reservoir that had sparked the discussion.'® In a similar vein, on the following day Hitler informed a conference on government measures to increase employment that the program in this field inaugurated under his predecessor, Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher, should now be converted to projects of military importance. Hitler held that the public label previously given to this employment program was especially suited to the concealment of its new character as a part of his own rearmament policy.'° This account of Hitlet’s views of priorities in the economic field shows that, patadoxically, the depressed nature of the German economy in 1933 would be of great advantage to him. It meant that the rearmament he wanted, in its initial stages, would not have to compete for labor and resources with other economic activities, a competition that would have raised the danger of the inflation Hitler wished to avoid, at least in its more obvious manifestations, because of the German public’s horrendous memories of

the runaway inflation of 1923. Rearmament would mean employment for workers and profits for employers; once the economy was reactivated by this stimulus, secondary effects could be headed off by controls. As soon as full employment was reached, drastic measures would hold the needed workers and resources in the public portion of the economy, but by then the regime would be sufficiently established to cope with a problem that might have been quite difficult in 1933. In one important respect, however,

Hitler would have to overcome some resistance right away. The rearmament policy required enormous state expenditures. This meant large-scale deficit financing and a break with the moderate fiscal policy of the von Papen and von Schleicher regimes that had followed and partially modified the rigidly deflationary policies of Chancellor Briining. If vast schemes of rearmament were to be financed, there would have to be a

drastic change in the policy of the Reichsbank. The president of the Reichsbank was Hans Luther, a man who prided himself, not

without considerable justification, on trying to aid the economy of a depression-ridden country without resorting to remedies likely to be more dangerous than the disease. When Hitler asked him for the credits needed to finance rearmament, Luther offered one hundred million marks, the legal limit of the Reichsbank.”° Hitler, of course, expected to 17. It should be noted that Ambassador Nadolny recorded in his memoirs that at their first meeting after 30 January 1933 Hitler told him that he first had to make all of Germany National Socialist. This would take four years, and only then would he turn to foreign policy. Rudolf Nadolny, Mein Beitrag (Wiesbaden: Limes, 1955), p. 130. 18. G.D., C, 1, No. 16. The record has been quoted at length to demonstrate that the tie of rearmament to eco-

nomic policy was present from the beginning. This is recognized in Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 785. A good survey may be found in Arthur Schweitzer, Big Business in the Third Reich (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, f i ; 1964), chap. 7. 19. See the quotation in Dieter

Petzina,

“Hauptprobleme

det deutschen

Wirtschaftspolitik,

1932-1933,

Vierteljabrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichte, 15, No. 1 Jan. 1967), p. 43. 20. On this controversy see Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 786; Earl R. Beck, Verdict on Schacht (Tallahassee: Florida State University, 1955), pp. 36-37; Hans Luther, Vor dem Abgrund, 1930-1933, Reichsbankprasident in Krisenzetten (Berlin: Propylaen Verlag, 1964), pp. 304-306. Hitler’s subsequent account of the incident in the Table Talk,

Trevor-Roper edition, No. 193; Picker edition, No. 83 (text and commentary in the Ritter edition, No. 64, ate

28

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

spend billions and later claimed that he first thought he had misunderstood Luther. But he had heard correctly, and Luther was promptly replaced by a man who was in full agreement with the creation of limitless amounts of credit instruments as a procedure for financing rearmament. The new man was Hjalmar Schacht, who had probably been promised the Reichsbank presidency in any case and who on assuming that position on 17 March 1933 inaugurated a new fiscal policy.2! He converted the device of “employment creation bills” (Arbeitsbeschaffungswechsel originated by Luther into an unlimited credit program, using bills drawn on what was essentially a dummy corporation, the Metallurgische Forschungs-G.m.b.H., created by the government and several private firms. These bills, the “Mefo-bills,” functioned as a concealed form of money; twelve

billion marks’ worth had been issued by 1938 when the government turned to other methods of financing rearmament. It is with this dramatic change in fiscal policy that one can see at the beginning of National

Socialist rule the interrelation

of the rearmament

program,

the hope

for

recovery from depression at home, and the aspiration for conquest abroad. The newly appointed Reich Commissar for Air, Hermann Goring, could now tell Ernst Heinkel that the new ait force would be built as he had predicted.” As early as February the German navy teceived its first big installment of extra money, followed by even more in March.” If there was any money left over, the Minister of Transport—who was to become the only cabinet member ever to defy Hitler to his face—could build reservoirs.24 Such financial questions must be viewed apart from the details of rearmament policy and disarmament negotiations because of the time interval between the authorization and the expenditure of the large sums involved. The focus of many students of National Socialist Germany on expenditure for arms, delivery of weapons, and the actual size of Germany’s forces has obscured the fact that a rise in these, however significant in itself, reflects deci-

sions made some time before. This is especially true in the case of air and naval armaments in which the interval between the planning and delivery of warships in the one case and the development and mass-production of aircraft in the other is particularly great. Thus the eighty million extra marks allotted to the German navy on 1 May 1933 was used to start work on the Scharnhorst,> a ship publicly announced as 26,000 tons but really 31,300 tons,”° which was launched on 3 October 1936 and put into service on 7

January 1939.77 The time lag in this instance was six years; the varying budgetary allocations for the Scharnhorst during that period reflected construction stages, not policy decisions. If the need for domestic consolidation involved temporary postponement of the mote ambitious foreign policy plans of the new chancellor—even though the period of postponement would be utilized for rearmament—other not entirely unrelated factors postponed changes in the personnel who would actually conduct Germany’s relations quite unreliable). 21. According to Kliefoth of the American embassy in Berlin, on the evening of 1 February Schacht told him

that Hitler had wanted him to take over the Ministry of Finance but that he had urged the retention of Schwerin von Krosigk in that position while asking for the presidency of the Reichsbank for himself so that

Luther could be pushed out (Kliefoth to Hull, 2 February 1933, Dodd Papers, Folder 1933 Germany). 22. Ernst Heinkel, Svéirmisches Leben (Stuttgart: Mundus-Verlag, 1953), pp. 270, 287ff.

23. TMWG, 35: 590-91. 24, Freiherr von Eltz-Rubenach refused to accept a golden party badge from Hitler at a cabinet meeting in 1937 and thereupon resigned. 2 MW Gys5i5o 1. 26. Ibid., 34:188. 27. See the useful compilation in Rolf Bensel, Die deutsche Flottenpolitik. von 1933 bis 1939 (Beiheft 3 der MarineRundschan) (Frankfurt/M.: Mittler, 1958), pp. 71-77.

Furst Steps of the New Regime

ys)

with foreign countries. Only Friedrich W. von Prittwitz und Gaffron, the German am-

bassador to the United States, decided that he could not in good conscience setve the

new masters of Germany,”§ and this provided Hitler with a conveniently distant post to which he could send Hans Luther as a consolation prize after forcing his resignation from the Reichsbank. There is considerable evidence that Hitler had originally planned to make Alfred Rosenberg his foreign minister, or at least state secretary in the Foreign Ministry—the second highest post in that agency.2? This was prevented, however, by the insistence of President Paul von Hindenburg that Constantin von Neurath remain as foreign minister, thereby practically excluding Rosenberg from the other position as well. Von Neurath knew of Hitler’s original intention,3° which may help to explain the confidence he displayed when recounting to the British ambassador President Hindenburg’s insistence that he be retained.3! Hitler himself regretted his inability to reorganize the Foreign Ministry immediately with suitable personnel. When he summoned Mussolini’s special contact man, Giuseppe Renzetti, to the Chancellory on 31 January to thank him for Mussolini’s congratulations of the day before, Hitler asked Renzetti to assure Il Duce that Neurath would follow his

wishes, and that while he could not reshape the Foreign Ministry as quickly as he wished

because of a lack of qualified personnel, he hoped in time to surround himself with

faithful followers.*? Both as a consolation prize for Rosenberg, and as a possible means of preparing for later changes in the diplomatic service, Hitler authorized the creation of a foreign policy office of the National Socialist party, the Aussenpolitische Amt or APA. He had been persuaded of the wisdom of this idea by Kurt Liidecke in the middle of March, and the agency was formally established on 1 April 1933 with Rosenberg as its chief.33 The new organization began to develop in the spring of 1933 as a potential base for a future reorganization of the foreign service. Its subsequent escapades in various fields will be examined in their chronological and geographical context, but the initial period which is

relevant here proved to be singularly inauspicious. Efforts to recruit individuals with diplomatic experience failed.*4 Liidecke himself, who thought of the agency he helped establish as an organization for foreign propaganda as much as policy, wanted to be ptess attaché in Washington while simultaneously strengthening the power base of the APA in Berlin. Both of these efforts seemed to make headway at first. He apparently at one point secured Hitler’s agreement to his appointment.** He also had some initial success in setting up a fundraising luncheon among German bankers and industtialists.*° In his eagerness to have the world receive only good news from Germany, however, Liidecke overreached himself by demanding, in Rosenberg’s name, the recall from

Germany of a prominent American correspondent, H. R. Knickerbocker. The resulting protests from America were utilized by Liidecke’s enemies in the party, especially Ernst DonGion G. le Non 15 29. There is a good summary of this subject in Schubert, pp. 220-26. 30. Interrogation of von Neurath, 12 November 1945, Nuremberg Trials Materials in the National Archives. 31. Documents on British Foreign Policy 1919-1939, Second Series (hereafter cited as B.D., 2d), 4, No. 235. 32. Renzetti to Mussolini, 31 January 1933, in National Archives T-586, container 491, frames 050275—76. 33. Seabury, pp. 33ff.; Schubert, pp. 226-32; Jacobsen, pp. 45-89. Only sources not cited in these books are

noted below. 34. See the strange story in Werner Otto von Hentig, Mein Leben eine Dienstreise (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1962), pp. 292-95.

35. Memorandum by Bulow, 24 April 1933, Microcopy T-120, container 2371, Serial 4601, frames E 188728—

29, (Documents from National Archives microfilm will be cited hereafter by T number with other identifying

numbers separated only by a “/”.)

36. In addition to Liidecke’s memoirs, see Biilow’s note of 22 April 1933, T-120, 2376/4606/E 193047 and the letter of Fritz Biilow to his uncle, Bernhard von Bulow, 25 April 1933, ibid., frame H 193048.

30

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IL

Hanfstaengl, to have him jailed.3”7 Though later released, Liidecke was soon rearrested

and then escaped abroad. His first arrest had occurred while Rosenberg was in London on a trip that was such a fiasco it greatly reduced the prospects of Rosenberg becoming a key figure in National Socialist diplomacy and the APA one of its major agencies. Thete is some evidence that Hitler and Rosenberg had discussed the possibility of a trip abroad by Rosenberg early in April 1933 to try to persuade the horrified Western world of the beneficence of national socialism.4* Rosenberg decided to go to London early in May, while his rival in the field of foreign propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, who had been made Minister of Propaganda on 13 March, wanted to go on a similar trip to

the United States.39 Goebbels gave up his plan and thus saved himself a great deal of embarrassment that would surely have accompanied any trip undertaken immediately after the great book-burning in Berlin,*” but Rosenberg was determined to go on his mission. He had been in England before, in 1931,4! and he apparently hoped that an

explanation of Germany’s domestic policies would reduce the strong shift of British public opinion following upon the National Socialists’ assumption of power. This, in

turn, might strengthen his claim with Hitler to a key role in foreign affairs (as the AngloGerman naval treaty was to do for Ribbentrop). The course and outcome

of the Rosenberg visit, however, were the opposite of

what had been intended.” The British foreign secretary, Sir John Simon, and the undersecretary, Sir Robert Vansittart, were unimpressed by Rosenberg’s defense of the persecution of the Jews, suppression of constitutional freedoms, and establishment of con-

centration camps in Germany. Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald and the Conservative party leader Stanley Baldwin declined to see the itinerant propagandist, while the swastika-bedecked wreath that Rosenberg left at the Cenotaph, the British war memorial,

was unceremoniously removed. Negative comments in the press publicly signaled the failure of Rosenberg’s mission, and he found it expedient to cut short his trip and return

to Germany, much sadder but little wiser. The obvious rebuff he had suffered greatly reduced the effectiveness and prestige of the APA, though Hitler allowed it to continue

in operation. This was

apparently due to three factors: Hitler’s personal loyalty to

37. Messetsmith dispatch 1303 of 12 May 1933. Part of this is printed in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1933 (hereafter cited as U.S. 1933), 2: 400-402; the rest, with additional information on Lidecke, is in the National

Archives, State Department Decimal file (hereafter cited as State), 811.91262/112. See also von Neurath’s note RM 278 of 3 March 1933, T-120, 1493/3087/D 621755—56; Diaty of Jay Pierrepont Moffat, 8 May 1933, Houghton Library, Moffat Papers, Vol. 33. Another scheme of Liidecke’s shortly before had been an invitation to visit Germany extended to the American racialist author Lothrop Stoddard (Moffat Diary, 26 April 1933, ibid.). Rosenberg’s own recollection of Lidecke is in Serge Lang and Ernst von Schenck (eds.), Memoirs ofAlfred Rosenberg (trans, by Eric Posselt, Chicago: Ziff-Davis, 1949), pp. 60-61 (the edition of this work by Heinrich Hartle under the title Lergte Aufzeichnungen, Ideale und Idole der nationalsoxialistischen Revolution (Gottingen: Plesse Verlag, 1955], is tendentiously distorted). 38. When Walther Funk, then head of the Reich Press Bureau, talked with Hitler on 10 April about Roosevelt’s

invitation to the preliminary economic talks in Washington, Hitler mentioned Rosenberg as one possible person to send (G.D., C, 1, No. 149), Schacht went instead.

39. Gordon (Berlin) tel. 72 of 1May 1933, State 033.6211 Goebbels, Joseph/1; New York Times, 1 May 1933, p. ie 40. Messersmith dispatch 1305 of 12 May 1933, State 862.00/2984. According to Werner Stephan, Joseph Goebbels (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1949), pp. 185-86, Hitler turned down the idea. According to Helmut Heiber, Joseph Goebbels (Berlin: Colloquium, 1962), p. 248, Hitler forbade the trip after Rosenberg had allowed the plan to leak out. 41. Testimony of Rosenberg, TMWC,

11: 453-54; see also the reference to the prior meeting of Rosenberg with

Lord Hailsham in Hoesch’s tel. 132 of 15 May 1933, G.D., C, 1, No. 237. 42, Schubert, pp. 230, 232-35. In addition to the sources cited there see Lord Vansittart, The Mist Procession

(London: Hutchinson, 1958), p. 475; Atherton (London) for Norman Davis to Hull, tel. 114 of 9 May 1933,

State 500.A 15 A 4/1850; Jan Masatyk report 13 of 16 May 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1316/2376/D 49701214 (on these Czech documents see the bibliographic note), There is a mote positive evaluation of Rosenberg’s London ttip in Jacobsen, pp. 74-75.

Furst Steps of the New Regime

31

Rosenberg as to other associates of his struggle for power, regardles s of their political and personal failings; the occasional successes of the APA, such as arrangin g in the month after the London debacle the first visit of the head of a foreign government— Julius Gombés of Hungary—to National Socialist Germany; and the associate d prospect of eventually using the APA in some manner to reorganize the foreign service after all, or at least to keep it in line by the threat of competition. But Rosenberg himself would have to wait until 1941 for a ministerial appointment; Hitler would continue to work with the Foreign Ministry which by that time had been entrusted to another of his followets.# Hitler’s utilization of von Neurath and the other officials of the Foreign Ministry had the advantage of making it seem that no radical changes in German foreign policy were intended during those first years of his rule when the danger of foreign intervention seemed most acute to him. Few German diplomats were better suited for such a tole than Constantin von Neurath. His appearance was as distinguished as his cateer. He had held several important diplomatic posts before being recalled by Hindenburg from the embassy in London in 1932 to serve as foreign minister. The German ambassador to Italy, Ulrich von Hassell, and the chief of the German delegation to the disarmament conference in Geneva, Rudolf Nadolny, had been considered his competitors for the post of foreign minister in 1932,44 and Neurath’s friction with both men in 1933 reflects more an anxiety over the secureness of his own position than a concern for the fate of

his country. A jovial person, often inclined to take his vacations more seriously than his official responsibilities, Neurath was no hindrance to Hitler’s ambitions.45 He put up no resistance to the consolidation of Hitler’s power in domestic affairs; if no anti-Semitic

towdy, he did not hesitate to move into a house expropriated from a Jew. There were occasions when he tried to temper the headlong rush of National Socialist foreign policy with greater finesse of execution, but pride of place long repressed any setious doubts he might have.*¢ The rumors of his imminent departure soon died down; and late in May 1933 the American chargé d’affaires in Berlin aptly concluded: “Baron von Neurath has shown such a remarkable capacity for submitting to what in normal times could only be considered as affronts and indignities on the part of the Nazis, that it is still quite a

possibility that the latter should be content to have him remain as a figurehead for some time’yet.’’47 This “some time yet” would include the first period of intensive rearmament, which

in Hitler’s own terms had been described as one of four or five years. The new budget plans were agreed on early in April; at the same time the navy was told to replace its onefront mobilization plan (against Poland) with a two-front plan by 1 April 1934 and to be teady for action within the framework of the whole armed forces within five years.*® Though these time estimates must not be taken too literally, they do suggest that there was a short-term concern with preventive war waged by Poland and France and a longterm expectation that in the late 1930s Germany would be ready to move on its own. The problem, as General Wilhelm Adam, who held a position equivalent to chief of staff

of the army, put it in a memorandum of 15 March 1933, was how to rearm without pro43. Rosenberg’s letter recounting his disappointment when von Ribbentrop was appointed foreign minister in 1938 (Schubert, p. 235, n. 4) has been published in Theodor R. Emessen (ed.), Aus Géorings Schreibtisch (Berlin:

Allgemeiner Deutscher Verlag, 1947), No. 29. 44. TMWG, 40: 462; Nadolny, p. 121.

,

45, Seabury, pp. 27-28; Jacobsen, pp. 28-33. A useful biography of von Neurath by John L. Heineman is Hitler’s First Foreign Minister: Constantin von Neurath (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979). 46. When the Enabling Act was discussed in the cabinet on 15 March 1933, von Neurath first suggested and then quickly withdrew the idea of leaving with the Reichstag the power to ratify treaties (IM WG, 31: 402-9). He was as willing to leave uncontrolled power in Hitler’s hands in foreign as in domestic affairs. 47. Gordon dispatch 2428 of 22 May 1933, State 862.00/2985.

48. TMWC, 34: 473; Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 796, n. 212 and p. 797, n. 222. =

32

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

voking a preventive attack Germany could not resist.” Putting the issue in diplomatic terms, Mussolini explained to von Hassell on the same day that the question was how Germany could secure through negotiations the time it needed to rearm without French interference? For an examination of how Hitler hoped to cope with this problem one must turn to Germany’s position in the disarmament negotiations then in progress in Geneva.?! Germany’s international position clearly suffered from Hitler’s domestic victory. Under the Weimar Republic, Germany had attained status in three ways, each related to the other. The German state had secured a measure of international standing by its participation on an equal basis in the Locarno treaties and by the allocation to it of a permanent seat on the council of the League of Nations. Hitler certainly did not look upon these attainments as desirable, and any attenuation of them could only be welcome to him as an opponent of both Locarno and the League. The Weimar Republic had also developed relatively good relations with Russia, Austria, and Italy. The first two of these countries Hitler soon alienated, intentionally at that, while the last was to be a friend with some teservations. The third, and in the long run though intangible perhaps the most important international asset, was the recovery of a substantial measure of international

goodwill for Germany, especially in Great Britain and the United States, but in a special way also in France. There was the growing feeling that the peace treaties that had ended the world war had been excessively harsh on Germany, that the many modifications since made in Germany’s favor had been too few and too late, and that in some areas further concessions might well be appropriate. It is not necessary to examine here either the origin or the wisdom of these attitudes, but their existence provides a significant part

of the background for the events of 1933. The import of this situation for specific developments will be reviewed where relevant; it will suffice to point out one illustration

of Germany’s new position in the world that is not without ironic ramifications. Included in the five-member Lytton Commission, established by the League in cooperation with the United States to investigate the situation arising out of Japan’s seizure of Manchuria in the fall of 1931, was a representative of Germany, Heinrich Schnee, the last governor

of German East Africa. The changing tides are personified by his role. From 1924 to 1932 he had served in the Reichstag as a member of the German People’s party (DVP), the party of Gustav Stresemann. In view of his participation in the unanimous verdict of the Lytton Commission against Japan’s aggression, the German government found its hands tied.°? In spite of a special request from the Japanese government that Germany at least abstain, a vote was cast on 24 February 1933, in support of the report which precipitated Japan’s withdrawal from Geneva.’ In October 1933 Germany itself broke with the League, and in the combined election and plebiscite that followed, Schnee returned to the Reichstag, now on the National Socialist ticket. He would still be there on 20 Febru-

aty 1938 to hear Hitler repudiate Germany’s vote of almost exactly five years earlier. The reaction of the outside world to the new German government was to a great extent the result of domestic events in Germany. The brutal suppression of civil liberties

49. Affidavit of General Wilhelm Adam, 5 March 1948, Nuremberg documents, Krupp Nr. 105; cf. Table Talk, Picker edition, No. 12, Trevor-Roper edition, No. 112. 50. G.D., C, 1, No. 87. For an earlier, similar, warning see von Hassell’s report I 395 of 25 February 1933, T-

120, 2700/5737/H 02863941. 51. Hitler’s worry in 1933 may be contrasted with his confident assertion five years later, on 18 June 1938, that no danger of a preventive war against Germany existed (IMWC, 35:445). 52. Von Neurath had endotsed the report in November 1932; see U.S. 1932, 4: 362. 53. G.D., C, 1, No. 28; see the reports from Keller in Geneva on the League discussions in the German foreign

minister’s file “China, Bd. 5, Jan. 1933—Juni 1935,” T-120, 1522/3086/passim; Documents diplomatiques francais, Ist. Series, Vol. 2 (hereafter cited as D.D.F., 1st, 2), No. 278.

Furst Steps of the New Regime

33

and the Opposition parties, the vehement attacks on the Jews, the dismissal of prominent university professors, the suppression of the trade unions, the public burning of books, the incipient church struggle, and the pitiful stories told by the first refugees to escape abroad all combined to bring about a drastic reversal of the tising world esteem for Germany. This was particularly significant because in several countties political movements inclined to the Left had been the most vehement advocates of treaty revisions in favor of Germany; these same groups were most drastically affronted by the policies of the new regime. At the same time, the hooliganism in the streets and the policy of extreme reaction proclaimed in public by the new regime were unlikely to inspire confidence among more conservative elements in countries like Great Britain and the United States. The strongly negative reaction abroad to the Hitler government did not go entirely unnoticed in Germany. Some members of the government were alarmed by the possible impact on Germany’s foreign relations and foreign trade, while Hitler and Goring were incensed at the publicly aired charges that they themselves had set fire to the Reichstag.*> Specific incidents emphasized the problem. Diplomats and other foreigners in Germany were repeatedly assaulted on the streets for imagined insults of one sort or another, as the police looked on benignly.*° While incidents in the demilitarized zone in the Rhineland excited the French,>’ a wild speech by Goring on air rearmament alarmed the British.°* The persecution of the Jews, generally viewed as the most spectacular sign of Germany’s intentional relapse into barbarism, aroused especially strong reactions abroad. The outgoing administration of President Herbert Hoover as well as the incoming one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt warned the German government of the disastrous effects of these activities on American public opinion.*® The British government was similarly alarmed and used Rosenberg’s visit to try to convey their concern to the highest quarters in Berlin. Even the Italians became concerned about the violence of their new-found friends. Italian fascism, as the National Socialists had regretfully noted in the 1920s, had not adopted the anti-Semitic line so prominent a part of German fascism; and Mussolini was apparently genuinely shocked at what he considered a temporary aberration in German conduct. His efforts to restrain the German government in this program of persecution were given greater emphasis by the personal feelings of Vittorio Cerruti, the Italian ambassador to Germany, who was outspoken on this subject

54, For a thoughtful report on this process in France, see Tyrrell’s report of 20 March 1933, in B.D., 2d, 4, No. 266; see also Otto Abetz, Das offene Problem (Cologne: Greven Verlag, 1951), p. 36. On the same process in England see the report of the Czech chargé in London, No. 3 of 21 March 1933,

Czech document in T-120, 1316/2376/D 496992-97 (tendentiously selected excerpts in Friedrich Berber [ed.], Europdische Politik 1933-1938 im Spiegel der Prager Akten (3d ed., Essen: Essenet Verlagsanstalt, 1942] [hereafter cited as Berber, Prager Aten], No. 5); and compare B.D., 2d, 5, No. 69 and G.D., C, 1, Nos. 146, 152, 193. The British ambassador to Berlin, Sir Horace Rumbold, was instructed to inform Hitler at their first meeting that in

two months Germany had lost the sympathy it had gained in the preceding ten years (B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 126, 139; G.D., C, 1, No. 223). For some acute observations on this turn in British opinion see the entry for 5 May 1933 in Harry Graf Kessler, Tagebiicher 1918-1937 (Frankfurt/M.: Insel-Verlag, 1961), pp. 716-17. Von Neurath wrote to Hindenburg about this subject from the London Economic Conference on 19 June 1933 (TMWC, 40: 465-68), and reported on it to the cabinet on his return (G.D., C, 1, No. 335; cf., ibid., No. 406).

Bruch The most recent treatment is in Charles Bloch, Hitler und die europaischen Machte 1933-34, Kontinuitat oder

(Hamburg: Europiische Verlagsanstalt, 1966), chap. 2. 55. Conference of ministers on 2 March 1933, G.D., C, 1, No. 44. a 56. The documentation on these incidents is almost endless; von Neurath sent a brief list to G6ring with request for some action on 10 March 1933, T-120, 2382/4619/E 197637-39. 57. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 69, 70; D.D.F., 1st, 2, Nos. 354, 402, 408. 58. Von Neurath Memorandum RM 238 of 14 March 1933, T-120, 2382/4619/E197641. 59. Some documents on this have been published in U.S. 1933, 2: 320, 322, 327, 330-33. 60. Graham to Vansittart, 24 March 1933, B.D., 2d, 5, No. 52.

34

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

and whose wife was Jewish.°! The Italian government thus joined the American and British governments in their efforts to prevent or at least restrain the great anti-Jewish boycott scheduled to start on 1 April 1933, which was in fact held but restricted to that day. This restriction was imposed partially in response to the outside pressure and the intervention of Hindenburg, brought about by von Neurath.

The regime thus modified its actions slightly in the face of the rising tide of antiGerman sentiment abroad. It also made some efforts to influence foreign opinion by overt and covert propaganda.” To reduce foreign fear of German rearmament, news stories and pictures of militaristic activities in Germany were restricted;®* furthermore, a

transparently fake incident involving the dropping of leaflets from airplanes was staged over Berlin to convince the world that Germany indeed needed warplanes to defend itself. In this and some other minor gestures made early in 1933, Hitler revealed some concern about opinion abroad;® but on the broad measures of domestic policy, there

would be no change, and hence a continued negative response in the world. An atea where the question of Germany’s position in the world was most immediately at issue in 1933 was the disarmament conference at Geneva. In the period just before Hitler came to power, Getmany’s temporary withdrawal from the conference had ended with a statement by France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the

United States that Germany and others disarmed under the peace settlement should be granted “equality of rights in a system which would provide security for all nations” provided Germany agreed to return to the conference to discuss the method of implementing this equality of rights.°’ The bureau of the conference met again on 23 January and the general commission on 2 February 1933. The issues facing the disarmament conference had been difficult enough; they were greatly complicated by the change of government in Germany. The Germans had been required to disarm to a level set by the Treaty of Versailles. Although they had violated the specifications in vatious ways, the effective strength of the German armed forces was in fact so close to the treaty provisions that in comparison with the military strengths of other countries it was not unreasonable to take the treaty’s fioures as a basis for comparison. It was the contention of the Germans that the other powers had an obligation to reduce their arms to a level commensurate with their own, 61. See Elisabetta Cerruti, Ambassador's Wife (New York: Macmillan, 1953). 62. Relevant documents have been published in U.S. 1933, 2:337ff. See further von Neurath to Hitler, 2 April 1933, TMWC, 35: 523-24 (the copy of this document in T-120, 784/1556/377615 carries the notation that it was submitted to Hitler); Memorandum by Moffat, “Record of Events in Connection with the Situation of the Jews in Germany beginning March 30, 1933,” 1 April 1933, State 862.4016/516; Gordon dispatch 2297 of 10 Aptil 1933, State 862.4016/619; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht vom 31. Marz 1933,” Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Sammlung Brammer (hereafter cited as Bundesarchiv, Brammer), Z.Sg. 101/26, f. 225.

63. On the covert propaganda abroad see the secret memorandum of 20 April 1933 by the AufklaérungsAusschuss Hamburg-Bremen (organized in 1923 and controlled by the German Foreign Ministry), with a covering letter to Alfred Rosenberg, Nuremberg document 134-PS. See also G.D., C, 1, Nos. 261, 359. The Aufklarungs-Ausschuss came under the control of the Propaganda Ministry; for an interesting, if not entirely reliable, account see Emil Helfferich, 1932-1946 Tatsachen, pp. 65-71. 64. See the circular of the Ministry of the Interior of 6 July 1933 in T-120, 1783/3650/D 813082-87; and the

SA order of 25 July 1933, TMWC, 35: 6-7. 65. For this incident and the ensuing argument over German air rearmament, see B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 179, 219,

222, 231, 233, 256, 259, 261, 262, 265, 267, 268, 275, 294, 277, 278, 280, 281, 282, 284, 286, 287, 289, 327; G.D., G 1, Nos. 359, 380; Gordon dispatch 2499 of 26 June 1933, State 862.00/3018.

66. This is probably the context for the account of an effort to use a member of a German nationalistic labor organization to calm the labor unions in France (Albert Krebs, Tendenzen und Gestalten der NSDAP (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1959], p. 148) and the attempt to use a Social Democratic member of the Reichstag to restrain the Social Democratic press in Scandinavia (Richthofen [Copenhagen] report 101.P of 26 Match 1933, T-120, 1517/3124/D 648903-4). See also B.D., 2d, 4, No. 248. 67. Five-Power Declaration of 11 December 1932, in U.S. 1932, 1: 527-28.

First Steps of the New Regime

35

both in size and in nature of armament. If the other powers were unwilling to do so, then they could not insist that Germany remain disarmed unilaterally—its disarmament had originally been intended as a prelude to the general disarmament thought necessary for peace; Germany’s remaining the only major power that had disarmed , however, was in fact an invitation to attack. By implication, therefore, Germany’s demand for equal tights meant that the others would have to disarm or Germany would be entitled to rearm. Both the realities of the world situation and the view other powers took of the situation were quite different. The fact was that the former enemies of Germany had disarmed to a very considerable extent. They had not only participated in a number of international naval disarmament arrangements, but they had drastically reduced their land forces as well. England and the United States, to all intents and purposes, had dissolved the huge continental armies they had built up in the world war. The American army in 1933 numbered 135,000; the British army had been reduced to about the same size. In both countries the vast armaments factories that once poured forth a flood of war materials had been either dismantled or converted to peacetime use. Only the olive-drab color of America’s mailboxes reminded the knowledgeable that its productivity had once outpaced the war’s seemingly insatiable requirements. In Eastern Europe, the great armies of the czar which Germany had once faced were no more. Several hundred miles further east, the Soviet Union was straggling to rebuild a military force, but dangers in

the Far East were likely to keep it preoccupied for years. If three of the four great armies that had brought down imperial Germany had either vanished or been drastically reoriented, the Germans were not much interested in this fact, focusing their attention on the fourth army—that of France—and the new forces of France’s allies, Poland and

Czechoslovakia. The French army had also been reduced substantially from its wartime level, the term of service reduced, and its equipment neglected. Perhaps more important in the long run was the nearly total mental ossification of its leadership. The burden of the war had been far greater for France than for Germany; its psychological aftermath was by no means over. The defensive mentality of the French would hang like lead weights on all their policies; the knowledge that their allies of the great war had left them would make France alternately stubborn and fearful; and the news they received of Germany’s secret rearmament, paramilitary formations, and agitation for further revisions in the peace treaties made them look to the future with apprehension. The Germans, however, saw a

very different picture. They saw that the French armed forces were several times the size of their own, that behind that French army stood large numbers of trained men who had passed through the army in the years when the long-term service requirement of the Treaty of Versailles had precluded a build-up of equivalent German reserves, that the French had heavy artillery and other weapons denied to them, and that their own frontier facing that formidable French army lay as open to invasion because of enforced demilitarization as it had at the time of the Ruhr occupation of 1923. In retrospect, it is clear that Germany was no more threatened by the French army of 1933 than were Luxembourg or Andorra—neighbors of France even weaker than Germany—but few people in Germany at the time recognized this fact. Added to the apparent preponderance, and hence in German eyes danger, of French military power was the military strength of the two neighbors of Germany who were allied to France, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. The Czech army was about the size of Germany’s, but with larger trained reserves. Nothing suggests that the Germans were concerned about it, except in combination with other potential enemies. Czech-German relations in earlier years generally had been untroubled, and there was no expectation in Germany that any change would be initiated by

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

36

the Czechs. Thete was greater apprehension about Poland. The Polish army was approximately twice the size of Germany’s and could call upon extensive trained reserves. Furthermore, the exposed position of East Prussia, the experience of the Polish uprising in Upper Silesia, and the continuing friction over trade and minorities questions predisposed Getmany to look for trouble from that quarter. The rising tide of nationalist agitation in Germany seemed to find an almost equally vehement echo in Poland, and the size of Poland’s forces—in spite of the dangers from Russia on Poland’s eastern frontier—obviously worried members of the German government. The relationship of this concern to the development of German-Polish relations will be reviewed in the next chapter, but it certainly also formed an element in Germany’s view of the disarmament conference. The

general German

negotiating position in the disarmament

conference,

that

unless the other powers disarmed to Germany’s level or below it—in view of their alliances with each other—Germany ought to be allowed some increase in its forces, had met with increasing sympathy, a sympathy reinforced by the general disillusionment with wat in general that had followed the years of war and upheaval. Such attitudes had been given an immediate and pragmatic turn by the desire of most governments during the depression to save the money being spent on armaments. The five-power declaration of 11 December 1932 was a symptom of this closing of the gap between Germany and the other powers, and the plans proposed at Geneva in January and March 1933 may be understood as further steps along this road. Hitler’s rise to power in Germany, however, initiated a drastic change in the situation. The other powers, especially France, were immediately alarmed by the new German regime. The bellicose tones of the new leaders, their past agitation against international reconciliation, the reports on an increase in the level of secret rearmament,” all reinforced the reluctance of France to make concessions to the German point of view, especially in the absence of guarantees from Britain of support against future German

aggression. The stiffening of the powers against Germany was also due to their reaction to the sight and sound of marching in Germany. The military value of the SA and other paramilitary formations so conspicuous on the German scene was undoubtedly exaggerated—even if sincerely feared—by Germany’s neighbors, but those fears cannot simply be dismissed as unrealistic. If the hundreds of thousands who marched on Germany’s streets were not yet trained reservists, this was obviously not because they lacked the will.” How did Hitler view the Geneva negotiations? For Germany to leave again when it had just returned was obviously too risky. Because it would publicly reveal the real aims of the new regime, such a step could provoke the preventive action of other powers that Hitler most feared. On the other hand, Hitler had repeatedly explained before 1933 his belief that the improvements Germany could expect to make in its armed forces as a result of international negotiations would be quite useless. The pocket battleships of which Admiral Raeder was so proud were “little boats” good only for training.”! Hitler’s speech to the industrialists on 27 January 1932 had been very pointed. If Germany “wanted to solve its space problem,” it would have to build up its-strength. “That can never be accomplished by introducing a motion in the Reichstag to negotiate for the 68. Important for this subject are Gerhard Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufriistung, 1933-1937 (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1959); and Burkhart Mueller-Hillebrand, Des Heer 1933-1945, Vol. 1, Das Heer bis xum Kriegsheginn

(Darmstadt: Mittler, 1954). 69. See Georges Castellan, Le réarmement clandestin du Reich 1930-1935 (Paris: Plon, 1954); and General Gauché, Le deusiéme bureau an travail (1935-1940) (Paris: Amiot-Dumont, 1953). 70. See Heinrich Bennecke, Die Reichswebr und der “Rohm-Putsch” (Munich: Olzog, 1964).

71. Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 147 and n. 1.

Furst Steps of the New Regime

SY

acquisition of a couple of heavy batteries, eight or ten tanks, twelve airplanes, or for all I

care even a few squadrons—that doesn’t add up to anything at all.”’”? It should be noted that the weapons mentioned were precisely those prohibited to Germany by the Treaty of Versailles. One can see here Hitler’s real attitude toward the subject of allowing Germany “samples” of these weapons, a matter discussed at great length in the disarmament negotiations in 1933. His attitude on this was consistent with his general outlook. He did not want a few weapons of the types prohibited Germany by the peace treaty because others had them, or because he thought Germany’s honor was at stake. He knew

that Germany would eventually need vast quantities of these weapons to win wats. The pteviously quoted comments of Hitler on the Geneva negotiations, made right after his accession to power, show that he understood that what he wanted could obviously not be attained in those negotiations. Similarly, his expressed plans for the reintroduction of conscription pointed in an entirely different direction from the aims of the disarmament conference. How then to proceed on the diplomatic stage where Germany was caught by the circumstances of the moment? The answer to this question is more likely to be obscured than found by tracing the actual course of the conversations and negotiations in Geneva and the various capitals through the tedious months that preceded the final failure of the disarmament conference.’? The nature of German policy can best be understood if the directives issued to the German delegation to Geneva are examined against the double background of German rearmament policy and the international setting. From the beginning, there were present in the instructions given to the German delegation certain elements that pointed to an eagerness to leave the discussions altogether. A revealing indication of this tendency was the instruction sent to Geneva on 25 February to walk out of the committee dealing with air force questions if it discussed a French proposal to internationalize civil aviation ahead of disarmament schemes. The delegation immediately replied from Geneva that these instructions were not in accord with established German policy and would produce an unfavorable reaction. A lengthy telegraphic and telephonic hassle produced a compromise;

but the exchange, in which

Goring and defense minister von

Blomberg played important parts, shows that the inclination to walk out was very strong indeed.” In this instance, as in the instructions given to the delegation for their conduct

in general, the emphasis was not on attempting to prevent a break or on finding solutions but on the purely propagandistic aspect. At the cabinet meeting of 8 February, at which Hitler had explained that rearmament had the first priority for the next four to five years, von Neurath and von Blomberg briefly discussed the expiring arms truce established by the disarmament conference. Every effort was to be made to avoid extension of the truce, but if no other power took this position, “we must not be the only

ones to do so, since our intention to rearm would thereby be manifested too soon.” Similarly von Neurath wrote to Nadolny on 15 February 1933 that “if a failure of the conference really proves inevitable, the lack of an intention to disarm on the part of France must appear as the cause.” 72. Domatus, 1: 85-86. 73. Key documents on these negotiations have been published in B.D., 2d, Vols. 4, 5, and 6; G.D., C, Vols. 1 rs and 2; U.S. 1933, 1 and 1934, 1; D.D.F., 1st, Vols. 2 and 3.

Until the Italian documents are published, a key source is Pompeo Aloisi, Journal (25 juillet 1932-14 juin ier 1936) (trans. by Maurice Vaussard, Paris: Plon, 1957). 74. The exchange of messages, starting with the instruction No. 96 of 25 February 1933, is in T-120, 1557/3154/D. 668575-593. Cf. the account in Paul Schmidt, Statist auf diplomatischer Bihne 1923-45 (Bonn: Athenaum-Verlag, 1950), pp. 259-61.

75a GoD GeeINos lh

76. Ibid., No. 20. Serial 7668, named as the source of this document, is not identified; for another copy, see T-

120, 1557/3154/D 668508-11.

38

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The specific terms of the various disarmament schemes therefore were examined from the point of view of how much they would hinder or favor the rearmament progtam that the German government had decided upon in any case. The proposal for standardizing armies, for example, was accepted eventually by Germany—with due publicity stressing the great concession thus made—because it could be made to fit into Berlin’s plan to change the recruitment policy of the German army, depending less on long-term service by professionals than upon short-term service by conscripts. As Nadolny expressed it: “The statements of [French air minister] Pierre Cot make it appear possible that the framework proposed for standardization will be so developed and transformed through negotiations that it will permit the measures deemed necessary by us.””’ On the other hand, any specific proposal that might seriously interfere with rearmament had to be avoided. An example of this was budget limitations. Obviously, an agreed budget limitation system, combined with widely publicized budgets, would automatically call the attention of the world to Germany’s real intentions as the stream of money poured into rearmament broke whatever limits might conceivably be established. On this subject there could be no compromise; and, although again the sharp tone of the instructions was slightly modified as a result of exchanges between the delegation and Berlin,’* the views Hitler expressed on 15 March 1933 were explicit and never repudiated, namely that Germany must avoid any limitation or control of the military budget.” The attitude of the German government can also be recognized in its handling of two other aspects of the disarmament conference early in 1933: the question of sending a cabinet member to Geneva and the possible reaffirmation of the Locarno Pact. The first of these may seem insignificant unless it is remembered that meetings at Geneva of prime ministers and foreign ministers had become an accepted part of the conduct of international relations. It is true that von Neurath finally did go to Geneva in September, but by then much had changed. In March, when the British decided to make one more great effort to secure an agreement, the British prime minister, Ramsay MacDonald, and

the foreign secretary, Sir John Simon, went to Geneva, hoping to meet there with von Neurath or possibly Hitler. Neither would go, to the great disappointment of the other powers.®° Since several other attempts to arrange high-level personal contact with Hitler and von Neurath also failed in the spring of 1933,°! one may be permitted to conclude that the German government was reluctant to give importance to negotiations it considered unlikely to produce agreements sufficiently favorable to itself, particularly if they threatened to lead to commitments it would prefer to break. This was especially obvious in the issue, incidental to other questions at the time but indicative as a harbinger of German policy, of including a reaffirmation of the Locarno agreements in the text of a no-force declaration discussed at Geneva. German wishes were respected in the formula finally adopted, and the documents

show that in excluding a reference to Locarno the

German government was trying to avoid reaffirming its obligations with regard to the demilitarization of the Rhineland before Germany was ready to demand “a material 77. Telephone message from Nadolny, 18 February 1933, G.D., C, 1, No. 23; cf. the resulting directive to the

delegation of 19 February, ibid., No. 26. 78. Ibid., Nos. 97, 106. 79. “A limitation on the budget is to be refused categorically,” Memorandum of Kreutzwald, 15 March 1933, T-120, 1557/3154/D

668746. See also G.D., C, 1, No. 94, and Werner Freiherr von Rheinbaben,

Viermal

Deutschland (Berlin: Argon Verlag, 1954), pp. 272-76 (Rheinbaben had been recalled to Berlin especially for the purpose of receiving instructions [von Neurath to Nadolny, tel. 124 of 7 March 1933, T-120, 1557/3154/D 668645].). 80. B.D., 2d, 4, Nos. 257, 285, 288, 289, 295; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 46, 49, 54, 56, 76; D.D.F., 1st, 2, No. 377; U.S. 1933, 1:22-25; the draft of Bulow to Koster, telegram 114 of 15 March 1933, T-120, 1388/2784/D 540153.

81. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 79, 92, 142, 255; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 134, 162, 163, 164, 169, 188, 191; U.S. 1933, 1: 410-11, 165, 165-66, 182; Memorandum of Bulow, 21 May 1933, T-120, 2371/4602/E 189067.

Furst Steps ofthe New Regime

39

change in the Locarno provisions.”®2 Determined to rearm, the Germans used the negotiations to secure whatever advantages they could without committing themselves to agreements they would have to break conspicuously and quickly. Cate was exercised, however, that Germany not give the appearance of sabotaging the conference: “Work for a positive conclusion is to be preferred to rearmament without a treaty.”®3 The developments of the spring and summer of 1933, however, made the other powers increasingly reluctant to consent to

the ever-growing German demands. Since neither Britain nor France was willing to take military action, Germany could continue to rearm secretly while publicly making concessions from time to time and offering promises of peace and friendship to all. Once Germany’s position seemed to allow more drastic steps, this policy would give way to an

even bolder one; in the meantime, the other powers faced the difficult problem of sal-

vaging something from a conference on which so many hopes were centered. The British thought it best to get some kind of agreement, hoping thereby to set at least some limit to German rearmament. They argued for this position consistently in 1933 and 1934. The French, on the other hand, insisted that the new developments

inside Germany that had given rise to increasingly extravagant demands both precluded further French disarmament and made concessions to German rearmament all the more dangerous.** This divergence in policies could not be bridged. The ingenuity exercised by the United States in trying to find a way out was of no help either.° The agonizing seatch for an answer to the dilemma continued unsuccessfully for months. In 1933 one major effort to break the deadlock was made inside the conference, and

one was made outside—the former by Britain, the latter by Italy. The effort within the conference was launched by the British government when Ramsay MacDonald on 16 March presented a plan for disarmament that included specific figures for the size of the army of each country as well as a number of other specific proposals.®° This last comprehensive attempt to meet as far as possible both the general desire for disarmament and the point of view of the various participants to the conference failed of general acceptance. As Eduard Benes, the Czech foreign minister, accurately predicted, each power tried to change that part of the MacDonald plan it did not like, thus making it worse for

all the others.*’ The new plan postponed but did not avert a crisis in the conference. Brought forward at almost the same time as the MacDonald plan for disarmament at Geneva was Mussolini’s project for a pact between the four powers, Italy, Britain,

France, and Germany, to settle certain key issues among themselves—and thus to some extent at least outside the League. Before this proposal, which came to be known as the Four-Power Pact, can be described, its place in Mussolini’s policy toward revision of the

peace treaties in general and toward Germany in particular first must be assessed.* 82. Neurath to Nadolny, 24 February 1933, G.D., C, 1, No. 37. See also ibid., Nos. 36, 38; B.D., 2d, 4, No. 282;

U.S. 1933, 1:14-16. 83. G.D., C, 1, No. 94. 84. These two approaches are well defined in B.D., 2d, 4, No. 299, and 5, No. 161.

85. B.D., 2d, 4, No. 294; U.S. 1933, 1:36. 86. B.D., 2d, 4, Appendix IV; U.S. 1933, 1:43-54.

87. Bene’ telegram to Czech Foreign Ministry, 20 March 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413891—

92 (excerpt in Berber, Prager Akten, No. 4). For other reactions to the MacDonald plan, see B.D., 2d, 4, No. 310; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 103, 106; Hoesch to Neurath telegram 69 of 25 March 1933, T-120, 1558/3154/D 668859-G0; Maj.-Gen. Arthur C. Temperley, The Whispering Gallery ofEurope (London: Collins, 1938), ae 12.

88. A summary of the negotiations on the basis of the published documents in Lothar Krecker,

“Die diplo-

a matischen Verhandlungen iiber den Viererpakt vom 15. Juli 1933,” Die Welt als Geschichte, 21 (l 961), 227-37; of more detailed account in Konrad H. Jarausch, The Four-Power Pact 1933 (Madison: State Historical Speen di Wisconsin, 1965); added details from the Aloisi papers in Fulvio d’Amoja, Declino e prima crisi dell’ Europa Versailles (Milan: D. A. Giuffré, 1967), chap. 4.

40

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The Italian leader was inclined to be impulsive and to place an intrinsic value on action, whether or not objectively warranted by the circumstances. This tendency gave to Italian foreign policy an erratic quality, an alternation of calmer periods with sudden experiments and extravagances. Perhaps this could be termed the outward manifestation of the inner conflict between Italy’s desire for great power status and its recognition of its lack of resources for this role, a conflict accentuated in the person of Mussolini by an emotional commitment to activism, a hope of glory and power, and a mind that was shrewd and calculating and not without insights when Il Duce was willing to use it. In the early 1930s, few would have guessed that his impulses would lead to disaster for his country and himself; most were impressed by the apparent success of his effort to provide Italy with a stable government that allowed for some opportunity of internal development and international respect. His previous adventures, like the Corfu incident

of 1923, had alarmed the world just as his repressive domestic policies had antagonized liberals everywhere; but Mussolini’s voice was heard in the world with respect, though not with affection.® Mussolini hoped that in a changing world Italy’s power and prestige would grow. The settlement of 1919 had left it dissatisfied in Africa and the Adriatic. He was, therefore, not interested in the maintenance of the European status quo. If there were changes in that status quo, Italy as one of the great powers would benefit, provided

certain conditions obtained. Of these the most important was that the changes could not be determined exclusively by the League of Nations, In that body, the doctrine of the equality of states and the combined pressures of the small would inhibit the aggrandizement of the great. Any changes should be the product of negotiations among the major powers, of which Italy was cleatly one. The more fluid the situation, the better for Italy,

and hence the support Mussolini extended to elements striving for a revision of the peace settlement. Here lay the origin of his contacts with the nationalist movement in Hungary in the 1920s, his support of Croatian terrorists and of the IMRO (Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization), and his relations with the nationalist right in Germany. There is considerable evidence, some of which will be reviewed chronologically, that Mussolini was afraid that unlimited German rearmament and unlimited German strength would be dangerous to Italian interests not only in regard to the Austrian and South Tyrol questions but also for Italy’s ambitions in Southeast Europe generally. On the other hand, he was also convinced that a stronger Germany would make a more adequate counterweight to France, the backer of the Little Entente, and would enhance the value of Italy’s friendship to both France and England. Mussolini was therefore willing to sponsor a degree of German rearmament as well as territorial revision in its favor. That the Hitler movement might provide a government aggressive in its foreign policy and more congenial to him in its domestic politics than the Weimar Republic had long been evident to Mussolini. If the National Socialists argued for the Amschluss of Austria like most other Germans,

they at least differed from the general position of

German nationalist groups on the subject of South Tyrol. Contacts with the National Socialist movement dated back many years, as has already been shown. Although the plans for a meeting between Mussolini and Hitler had never been realized, Mussolini had met other prominent National Socialists. At the time the von Papen government fell in 89. It might be said that this picture of Il Duce is unduly generous, as he had expressed himself as clearly in favor of wat—which would ruin Italy—as Hitler; but given Mussolini’s more cautious policies, one may be

allowed to wonder if he would have taken the plunge had Hitler not provided the opportunity. Even in the Ethiopian venture, he might well not have run the risks he did if it had not been for his knowledge that Britain and France wete worried about Getmany. But then the historian may be influenced by the fact that Mussolini is somehow a less unattractive figure in comparison with Hitler.

First Steps ofthe New Regime

41

November OBZ Goring, Rosenberg, and the rightist veterans’ leader Franz Seldte were

in Rome. Mussolini immediately conferred with Goring and provided him with a plane to return to Germany.” Mussolini’s special contact man to the National Socialists , Giuseppe Renzetti, congratulated Hitler on his appointment as chancellor on behalf of II Duce right after Hitler had seen Hindenburg on 30 January; and Hitler summoned Renzetti to the Chancellery on the next day.”! Hitler asked the Italian to tell Mussolini that he would follow a policy of friendship for Italy and wanted to talk to him personally, perhaps flying to Rome for a private visit. Renzetti replied that Mussolini had watched Hitler’s rise to power with favor and pleasure, and that Italy’s foreign policy was simple—cooperation of the four great powers. Italy, Germany, and Britain could get together with or without France, but cooperation would be impossible if any single one of them concluded an agreement with France.°? This reference to fout-powet cooperation reflected earlier pronouncements by Mussolini, echoed a speech Rosenberg had made in Rome with Hitler’s approval at the time of his visit the previous November,”

and was to become a major theme of European diplomatic discussion in the first half of 135: When the German ambassador to Italy, Ulrich von Hassell, saw Mussolini on 6 February, in reply to the special greetings sent the German chancellor, Il Duce expressed his pleasure at the formation of the new government and his anticipation that Germany and Italy would coordinate their policies closely after the German elections, scheduled for early March, had strengthened the newly formed coalition. These initial exchanges of greetings and congratulations were followed by several weeks during which there was some cooperation between the German and Italian delegations at the disarmament conference, but the main emphasis was on other matters. The Germans were not quite sure how closely to tie themselves to Italy; there was considerable internal division of opinion that appears not to have led to any clear conclusion®> and in which Hitler was not directly involved, perhaps because he was concentrating on the election campaign.

At this time the German advocate of closer cooperation between the two powers was von Hassell, while the Foreign Ministry was more cautious. A conservative whose subsequent break with the Hitler regime should not obscure his extreme nationalistic leanings,”® von Hassell wanted a closer relationship with Italy based on interests the two nations had in common but without entering into an explicit alliance. He was thus at first ahead and later behind official German policy. He was ahead at first because the German Foreign Ministry still had considerable influence on the conduct of current diplomatic relations and was unwilling to agree to what von Hassell suggested, in part apparently precisely because he was the man who suggested it.°’ He would be behind later when the 90. Von Hassell telegram 248 of 18 November 1932, T-120, 2700/5737/H 028592; Schubert, pp. 222-23. 91, Renzetti to Mussolini, 31 January 1933, T-586, container 491, frames 050275—76; the first page of Renzetti’s

report to Mussolini of 30 January is missing from the film, the other two pages are on the next two frames. 92. Renzetti went to Rome to transmit this message to Mussolini in person (Aloisi, Journal, 13 February 1933, p. 62). Almost simultaneously, Cerruti tried to get this unofficial contact ended, now that Hitler had secured power and could be dealt with through official channels (ibid., 14 February, p. 63). 93. See Schubert, p. 223. 94. G.D., C, 1, No. 12, note 3 states that no record of the Berlin instructions for this has been found; the

instructions are in T-120, 1388/2784/D 540129. 95. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 14, 27, 35, 40, 64.

ies

96. He belonged to the German Nationalist patty (DNVP) in 1918-19 and later joined the NSDAP. In December 1937, shortly before his dismissal, he was smuggling antiques out of Italy for Goring via the diplomatic pouch (Emessen, pp. 28-32)! Until far into World War I, he wanted to keep most of Hitlet’s conquestsfor a post-Hitler

Germany.

See the apt characterization

in H. R. Trevor-Roper,

“Hitlers

Kriegsziele,

' Viertelialirshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 8, No. 2 (April 1960), 126-28. himself, and 97, The documents are filled with quarrels between the Foreign Ministry, especially von Neurath

years of work in the files, the von Hassell; see, e.g., G.D., C, 1, No. 64, n. 2, p. 385, n. 3, No. 241, n. 4. After

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War ree

42

two dictators wanted to make the ties closer than von Hassell thought wise. In this early stage, however, other issues came to the fore. Discussion of a meeting between Hitler and Mussolini continued without definite result.°’ The new initiative this time came from Mussolini. In the first days of Match 1933, Mussolini decided to come forward with a plan that would simultaneously settle what appeared to be the most pressing and dangerous European problems and at the same time provide a mechanism for handling international disputes in the future. In the absence of the relevant Italian documents, it is not possible to present Mussolini’s plan in full detail, but quite enough is known to give a picture entirely adequate for an understanding of German policy and reactions to it.” The problems that seemed to call for immediate solution were certain demands of Hungary and Germany. Hungary was to receive forthwith certain territories of solid Magyar population that had been assigned to other countries by the peace treaty of Trianon. Germany was to receive a nattow

strip, five to ten miles wide, along the Baltic coast—including the city of

Danzig—in order to provide East Prussia with a land connection to the rest of Germany, for which Poland was to receive some undefined compensation.'° For the future handling of international disputes Mussolini visualized a sort of four-power directory, revising the peace treaties, arranging for German equality of arms by stages, and generally

cooperating in extra-European European issues. All this was Mussolini apparently assumed other countries would have no

matters—such as the colonial question—as well as intrato be accomplished within the framework of the League; that once the four great powers were in agreement, the alternative but to acquiesce in their decisions.

Mussolini broached these ideas, still in a tentative form, to the French by 2 March 1933! and told the Germans about them on 10 March;!°? but even as he prepared the

proposals in draft form, he began to have doubts about the proposals relating to immediate territorial revision. The first days of March 1933 brought a crisis in German-

Polish relations in which it became quite evident that Poland would fight rather than allow revision. It is at least possible that the Westerplatte incident of 6 March was in part the Polish answer to Mussolini’s territorial scheme.!° In any case, although he instructed author cannot avoid the impression that personal rivalry played an important part in this; von Neurath looked on von Hassell as his rival for the post of foreign minister, while von Hassell felt that he knew more about the proper policy to follow toward Italy (where von Neurath had once served). It is ironic that von Hassell and von Neurath were sacked on the same day in 1938; von Neurath had been a hardly innocent bystander when his other rival, Nadolny, was unceremoniously dumped in the summer of 1934. 98. G.D., C, 1, No. 64; Koster to Bilow No. 167 of 15 March 1933, T-120, 1388/2784/D 540152; Bulow to Késter No. 114 of 15 March 1933, ibid., frame D 540153; D.D.F., 1st, 2, Nos. 332, 339, 354, 424. 99. The account of Mussolini’s initial project is based on the following sources: B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 37, 44, 45, 216; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 68, 83, 109; U.S. 1933, 1:396-98; D.D.F., 1st, 2, Nos. 368, 382, 391; Aloisi, Journal, 4 March 1933, pp. 77-80; Garrett (Rome) telegram 14 of 20 Match 1933, telegram 17 of 21 March and dispatch 1853 of 24 March, State 740.0011 Four-Power Pact/5, 9, 24. Jarausch does not attempt to analyze the eatliest

aspects of Mussolint’s plan. For the British government’s reaction to the project, see the notes on B.D., 2d, 5, No. 37, in the Foreign Office records in the Public Record Office (hereafter cited as Foreign Office), C 2148/175/22. 100. It should be noted that Mussolini’s idea of a strip no more than 10-15 kilometers deep would have included the cities of Danzig, Langfuhr, Oliva, and Zoppot (to use the 1933 names) as well as the Polish port of Gdynia within the area to be ceded to Germany, but excluded at least half the territory of the free city as defined by the peace treaty. This scheme for partitioning the free city of Danzig meant drawing the border East-West, as contrasted with the North-South lines considered in 1938-39

(Gerhard L. Weinberg, “A Pro-

posed Compromise over Danzig in 1939?” Journal ofCentral European Affairs, 14, No. 4 (Jan. 1955), pp. 334-38). For geographical data see Nikolaus Creutzberg, Adlas der Freien Stadt Danzig (Danzig: Danziger Verlagsgesellschaft, 1936).

101. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 37. 102. G.D., C, 1, No. 68. 103. Until more

evidence from the French, Italian,

and

Polish archives becomes

available, it will not be

possible to state with any assurance how soon Mussolini’s scheme for the cession of a coastal strip became

Furst Steps of the New Regime

43

the Ttalian delegation at Geneva to support the Germans on the Westerpl atte incident,!% Mussolini began to think of deferring territorial change for some time, “since Germany was at present not even a match for the Polish army,” as he had his ambassad or explain to von Neurath.'°5 During the Rome visit of MacDonald and Sit John Simon, therefore, the plans for territorial change were first briefly touched on and then dropped from the discussion. This suited the Germans as well as the Poles, since Germany was not interested in any tertitorial compromise. “Territorial revisions can be broached only when Germany has become strong militarily, politically, and financially... . Our main objective remains revision of the eastern border. Only a total solution comes into question. Interim and partial solutions are to be rejected. Likewise a special solution for Danzig should be rejected,” von Neurath told the cabinet on 7 April Becausevor Mussolini’s changed approach, the Germans were not required in 1933 to explain their position publicly. Privately they had already waved off a slightly more generous French proposal. It was simply not yet time for Germany to get all it wanted: “there will be only one mote partition of Poland.”!7 The other portion of Mussolini’s program was to suffer a similar fate, though more

slowly. The proposed text of a Four-Power Pact drafted by Mussolini himself referred explicitly to cooperation for revision of the peace treaties, equality of arms for Germany by stages, and cooperation in regard to colonies. The Germans wanted to remove the

limitations on revision implicit in tying it to the League, and also to remove French influence on the stages of their rearmament.'°* The British argued for removing the reference to colonies, while the French were skeptical about the whole project and, in part in response to pressure from the Little Entente, insisted on modifications in the sections on revision and disarmament.!® The period between mid-March and early June therefore was one in which complicated negotiations led to a continuing redrafting of the pact, slowly reducing its significance, until the four powers signed a collection of generalities

that was neither ratified nor applied. The French government had insisted on changes that tied the pact to the League and the sanctity of treaties; and the Germans—at times

under pressure from Italy—found it expedient to agree to a text that promised them little.!!° Mussolini’s prestige was at stake, and he therefore pressed for some conclusion,

however devoid of concrete meaning. The negotiations themselves had an advantage for

known in Warsaw. The Westerplatte, of course, would have been included in such a strip. Cf. G.D., C, 1, No.

34. No reference to this facet of the issue is made in the articles on the Westerplatte incident and on the FourPower Pact by Josef Lipski, reprinted in translation in Waclaw Jedtzejewicz (ed.), Diplomat in Berlin, 1933-1939, Papers and Memoirs ofJosef Lipski, Ambassador of Poland (New York: Columbia University Press, 1968) (hereafter cited as Lipski Papers), pp. 46-70. See also D.D.F., 1st, 2, Nos. 227, 384; Hassell report I 170 (on Szembek’s Januaty 1933 visit to Rome), 25 January 1933, T-120, 3404/8820/E 614069-075.

104. Alois, Journal, 10 March 1933, p. 86. 105. G.D., C, 1, No. 83. 106. Ibid., No. 142. 107. Ibid., No. 18; cf. ibid., No. 19, with its reference to similar views of Hitler.

108. Ibid., No. 84. 109. The negotiations are summarized in Jarausch, chaps. III, IV, and V. Additional documents not published are von Neurath’s memorandum RM 490 of 7 April 1933, T-120, 2382/4619/E 197654 and the telegrams of Stefan Osusky, Czech minister in Paris, to Prague of 19 Match and 21 March 1933, Czech documents in T-120,

1041/1809/413889 and 413894—95. Important information on Romania’s role in the negotiations may be found in I. M. Optea, Nicolae Tituleson dy Diplomatic Activity (trans. by Andrei Bantas; Bucharest: Academy of the Socialist Republic of Romania, 1968), . 116-19. 110.The analysis of Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 18 vom 10. anil 933\% stresses the concessions made to avoid the isolation of Germany if she refused to sign. The German Foreign Ministry assumed that the

pact was to be taken seriously, hence its reluctance during the negotiations. Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

101/26, £. 429-33.

Z.Sg.

44

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Germany, at least in Mussolini’s view, by providing it with time to rearm unmolested.'” During the same period, Italy was also becoming stronger.'!” The difficulties of reaching agreement, however, precluded the meeting of the four heads of government mooted earlier in the negotiations. By the time the tortuous negotiations led to a conclusion in July, international attention had long since shifted elsewhere.'19 Another area in which Germany signed a treaty in the summer of 1933 was also one in which Mussolini had strongly urged Hitler to be conciliatory. In this case, consideration of domestic rather than foreign problems dominated German policy. The first major break in the atmosphere of hostility that surrounded Hitler’s Germany in its initial phase was the concordat signed by Cardinal Secretary of State Pacelli and Vice-Chancellor von Papen on 20 July 1933, following three and a half months of negotiations.'!* These negotiations took place while the Hitler regime was primarily interested in consolidating its hold on power inside Germany. The prior opposition to national socialism on religious grounds of the bulk of German Catholics posed a major obstacle to the enthusiastic enrollment of a large portion of the German population into what was to become the new mainstream of German life. The Center party and its Bavarian relative, the Bavarian People’s party, provided for the political representation and organization of Catholic interests. Hitler mounted an exceedingly clever attack on this potential source of opposition, weakening possible arguments against his movement on ideological grounds by pretending to support Christianity as well as undermining all political parties by a combination of terror and persuasion.!!> The negotiations for a concordat with the Vatican were initiated by the German government following the beginnings of a rapprochement between the new regime and the Catholic church inside Germany in late March. By promising concessions based on prior drafts but going beyond those the Weimar Republic had been willing to make, Hitler hoped to have Vatican backing withdrawn from the Center party. The removal of the Catholic clergy from any role in German political life would aid in the suppression of Catholic political parties, parties that could not yet be subjected openly to all the terrorist methods applied to Marxist patties. Once the Catholics had been deprived of the political organizations that might provide them with a potential defense against the government, whatever concessions might be made to the clergy in Germany and the Vatican in Rome could be vitiated in practice by an all-powerful regime.!!° The interest of Hitler in an agreement that would help him toward this goal is obvious; the intents and hopes of

the Vatican are not nearly so clear. In the years of the Weimar Republic, the Vatican had signed concordats with the three German states having the largest Catholic populations—Prussia, Bavaria, and Baden—and the overwhelming majority of German Catholics thus already had whatever UG: GripiNose37, 151): 112. Ibid., No. 122. 113. This point is obscured by the narrow focus ofJarausch’s book. 114. Summaries of the situation and negotiations leading to the concordat may be found in William M. Harrigan, “Nazi Germany and the Holy See, 1933-1936: The Historical Background. of Mit brennender Sorge,” Catholic Historical Review, 47, No. 2 (July 1961), 164-73; Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 341-45; Karl Otmar Freiherr von Aretin, “Kaas, Papen und das Konkordat von 1933,” Véierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 14, No. 3 July 1966), 252-79. Ernst Deuerlein, Das Reichskonkordat (Diisseldorf: Patmos-Verlag, 1956) is especially useful for its background material and for showing how the 1933 negotiations must be related to the prior efforts at a concordat between the Vatican and the Weimar Republic. 115. It should be noted that similar motives had suggested to Hitler his earlier attempted contact with the Vatican in 1931. See Deuerlein, p. 107, for a summary of this episode, and pp. 294-95 for the text of the report of the Bavarian minister to the Vatican of 11 May 1931 on Géring’s visit to Rome shortly before. 116. In the process, von Papen no doubt hoped to strengthen his position in the government by a diplomatic triumph and to take revenge on the Center party for its disdain of his imagined abilities.

First Steps of the New Regime

45

protection concordats might provide. There were, however, other considerations and possibilities. Any tefusal on the part of the Vatican to sign with the new regime a national concordat on what seemed very favorable terms, based on a draft worked out years before in negotiations with the government of the republic, might lead to the denunciation of the existing concordats. This must have seemed an especially dangerou s possibility because the National Socialists had voted against the ratification of those concordats in the respective state legislatures. Furthermore, there was the teal possibility that the new government of Germany would embark immediately on a violent campaign against the Catholic Church. An agreement signed by the new government itself might restrain such a campaign, or at least provide German Catholics with a clear position to

defend. And, of course, there was no way of knowing how long the new regime would last. There can have been few illusions in the Vatican about Hitler’s willingness to adhere to the terms of treaty commitments. Attached to the concordat was a secret protocol

that has not received the attention it deserves, not so much for its specific terms as for

its basic nature.'!7 It provided certain exemptions for German divinity students and othet special arrangements in “the event of a reorganization of the present German military system by the introduction of general military service.” The secret protocol of 20 July 1933 thus dealt with the contingency of Germany breaking its treaty commitment prohibiting conscription, an indication that the Vatican must have had a rather clear view of the new government’s lack of good faith. If the concordat was signed nevertheless, it

may be taken as a measure of the desperation with which the Vatican hoped to protect the continued existence of the religious institutions of Catholicism in Germany so that they might keep the sacramental structure available to the faithful.!!8 The same issue was to recur with increasing acuteness in later years; it would play an important role in the question of euthanasia in the winter of 1939-40 and the extermination of the Jews beginning in 1941, but here the Church faced it for the first time.!!°

The Hitler government, from its point of view, correctly thought the concordat its first major diplomatic triumph that both made Germany appear more respectable abroad and helped clear the way to total power inside Germany.'2° The government, as Cardinal Pacelli had anticipated, began to violate the terms of the concordat immediately; and the subsequent history of German-Vatican relations is one of continuing friction, in which

the Vatican based its protests on the written promises of the German government. The growing intensity of the National Socialist struggle against the Catholic Church inside Germany was restrained temporarily in 1934 by the approaching plebiscite in the predominantly Catholic Saar territory; but once the Catholic clergy and laity there had done what Hitler wanted them to do, swelling the vote for a return to Germany, the barriers

were down. The years 1935 and 1936 were a time of rising tension accompanying the increasing number of attacks on the institutions, organizations, and doctrines of German

Catholicism. The possibility of a public protest by Pope Pius XI against the persecution of the Catholic Church and the advance of the neo-pagan movement in Germany had been ventilated as early as December 1933, but was postponed as efforts were made 117. Text in G.D., C, 1, pp. 678-79. This aspect of the concordat was praised to the German cabinet by von

Papen as one of its great advantages (ibid., No. 362); there were discussions about the protocol in 1935 when conscription was introduced (T-120, 2673/5575/passim) and in 1939 when Germany mobilized for the attack on Poland (G.D., D, 7, No. 432). The British and French governments both found out about the protocol in 1933 (Foreign Office C 7995 and C 9602/3244/18). 118. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 342. 119. The best brief survey at present is Guenter Lewy, The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964). 120. See Hitler’s explanation to the cabinet in G.D., C, 1, No. 362.

46

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

toward negotiations to relieve the situation.!?! Repeated efforts by Mussolini, starting with a long talk at their first meeting in June 1934, failed to dissuade Hitler from his course.!22 The National Socialist regime was no more restrained in its religious policy by a treaty it had signed than in its rearmament policy in the absence of a treaty. As the tension within Germany mounted, the pope became increasingly alarmed. Pius XI was not a man to remain quiet indefinitely. In agreement with the German Catholic clergy, he decided to call public attention to the persecutions and their meaning for all Catholics in and outside Germany. Using a draft prepared mainly by Cardinal Faulhaber of Munich and Cardinal Pacelli, Pius XI issued the encyclical ‘Mit brennender Sorge” (With Burning Concern), which was read from the pulpit in all Catholic churches in Germany on 21 Match 1937.123 If Germany’s relations with the Vatican were clouded in spite of the concordat, its relations with Protestant countries, especially England and the Scandinavian nations, were gravely affected by the struggle within the German Protestant community.'** The National Socialist effort to integrate the German Protestants into one essentially antiChristian system at first appeared to have considerable success. In church elections on 23 July 1933 two-thirds of the Protestants voting heeded the call of the nominal Catholic Hitler by voting for the neo-pagan candidates to take over the Protestant churches. Opposition among the Protestant clergy was, however, beginning to be heard; and this opposition received further impetus from a great rally of the “Religious Association of Germanic Christians” (Glaubensbewegung Deutsche Christen) in Berlin in November 1933, when the public denunciation of the Old Testament, the demand for the removal of Paul from the New Testament, and the recasting of Jesus into a Germanic war hero opened

the eyes of many who had hitherto kept them firmly closed. The resulting accentuation of the divisions in German Protestantism and the attendant persecution of those ministers who formed the confessional church had widespread international repercussions. As the land of Luther, Germany was a center of attention for all Protestants, but

especially those in Scandinavia and England who looked to the German Reformation for their immediate spiritual origins. In these countries the reaction to the church conflict in Germany was most negative; the semi-open character of German society, readily accessible to travelers and reporters, and the international ties of the various national Protestant churches assured widespread knowledge of the developing situation.!%> The German Foreign Ministry used reports on the impact abroad of religious persecution at home in attempts to influence Hitler to moderate the struggle with the chutch.!26 Because the international uproar threatened to interfere with foreign acquiescence in German rearmament, Hitler made a tactical adjustment in the struggle with the Protestant churches late in 1934.!2” The public image was changed; the most offensive of 121. Harrigan, pp. 173-98. 122. For this aspect of the Hitler-Mussolini conversations see Mussolini to De Vecchi, 22 June 1934, T-586, container 491, frames 050279-80.

123. Two useful collections of material on this subject ate Johann Neuhdusler, Krenz und Hakenkreuz (2 vols. in one, Munich: Katholische Kirche, 1946) and [Walter Mariaux (ed.)], The Persecution of the Catholic Church in the Third Reich (New York: Longmans Green, 1942) (on this publication see Max Beloff [ed.], On the Track of Tyranny (London: Vallentine Mitchell, 1960], pp. 212ff; and Ludwig Volk, “Anonymous no Longer,” Wiener Library Bulletin, 18 [1964], 17). The diplomatic correspondence between the Vatican and the German government for 1933-37 has been published in Dieter Albert (ed.), Der Notenwechsel zwischen dem Heiligen Stubl und der Deutschen Reichsregierung, 1, Von der Ratifizierung des Reichskonkordats bis zur Enzyklika “Mit brennender Sorge” (Mainz: Matthias-Griinewald-Verlag, 1965). 124. A good introduction to the domestic aspect in Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 326-41. 125, For reports on such foreign reactions see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 18, 211, 218, 246.

126. Ibid., Nos. 15, 213, 225. 127. Ibid., Nos. 251, 252, 276, 279, 282; Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 338-39. The role of foreign policy con-

siderations in Hitler’s decision is made very clear in Klaus Scholder, “Die evangelische Kirche in der Sicht det

First Steps ofthe

New Regime

47

the government’s new clerical appointees were droppe d. Instead, the patty now pretended neutrality in the internal affairs of the Protest ant churches; and while continuin to persecute the confessional church, the National Socialis ts placed their main cee on the undermining of Christianity by quietly furthering the neo-pagan movement and restricting the religious training of the young. Such method s were less conspicuous and

therefore less offensive to the outside world, but all the more effective at home.!28 After

the Saar plebiscite of 1935, the road to new measures was open here as well, and the tegard of the government for opinion abroad steadily lessened.

nationalsozialistischen Fuhrung bis zum Kriegsausbruch,” Vzertelabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschiclite, 10, No. 1 (Jan. 1968), 23-25, and Ernst C. Helmreich, “The Arrest and Freeing of the Protestant Bishops of Wiurttemberg and Bavaria, September—October 1934,” Central European History, 2, No. 2 (June, 1969), 159-69.

128. Hitler apparently explained this course to the leaders of the party at a meeting on 23 November 1934. See Sekretér des Fulhrers, “Daten aus alten Notizbiichern,” entry for 23.11.1934 on p. 3 (Library of Congress, Manuscript Division), and the reference in Hans-Giinther Seraphim (ed.), Das politische Tagebuch Alfred Rosenbergs 1934/35 und 1939/40 (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1964) (hereafter cited as Rosenberg, Tagebuch),

entry under 24 February 1935, p. 72.

Chapter 3 Eastern Europe German Policy toward Poland, the Soviet Union, Lithuania, and the Ukraine in 1933

cya aaie of German-Polish relations in the early months of 1933 have already been referred to several times. Contemporaries, not without reason, looked upon them as particularly likely to touch off a new war. Much of the post-World War HU reseatch on this subject has been oriented around the question of whether or not the Polish leader, Marshal Pilsudski, considered or planned a preventive war on Germany in eatly March and late April 1933 and was held back by the reluctance of France to offer suppott.! This is, of course, a question of great intrinsic importance, but for an under-

standing of German policy in and after 1933 it must be viewed in a wider context. The German attitude toward Poland before 1933 has already been sketched. The propaganda for a change in the German-Polish border had gained substantial support elsewhere, and

there were signs by the end of 1932 and the beginning of 1933 that the possibility of territorial revision in favor of Germany was being given serious consideration in France and Italy. The German government, as has been shown, was not yet interested, because

the revision that might be attained was likely to be both limited and final. Nevertheless, the possibility of international pressure for some revision was sufficiently dangerous in Polish eyes to lead to a willingness to try new policies there; while at the same time Germany’s new government was headed by a man whose views on relations with Poland were, as has been explained, somewhat different from those of his predecessors. The Polish government had begun a reorientation of its foreign policy even before Hitler came to power. The relaxation of tension between Poland and the Soviet Union, signalized by their non-aggression pact of 25 July 1932, reflected the greater danger Poland seemed to face from Germany and the threat the Soviet Union appeared to face from Japan. Simultaneously, Poland began to conduct its foreign policy more independently of France, in part fearful of being let down by France, in part because of national pride, in part because the position of Poland was automatically strengthened by the weakening of Russia’s European position due to domestic travail in the early stages of 1. The most detailed argument that there was such an intention on Pilsudski’s part is found in Hans Roos, “Die

Praventivkriegspline Pilsudskis von 1933,”

Vzerteljabrshefite fiir Zeitgeschichte, 3, No. 4 (Oct. 1955), pp. 344-63, and

the same authot’s, Polen und Europa, Studien ur polnischen Aussenpolitik 1931-1939 (Tubingen: Mohr, 1957), pp. 65-71. The opposing position is taken in Boris Celovsky, “Pilsudskis Ey Pees, gegen das nationalsozialistische Deutschland (Entstehung, Verbreitung und Widerlegung einer Legende),” Die Welt als Geschichte, 14, No. 1 (1954), pp. 53-70, and by Zygmunt J. Gasiorowski, “Did Pilsudski Attempt to Initiate a Preventive War in 1933?” Journal ofModern History, 27, No. 2 (June 1955), pp. 135-51. These articles contain extensive footnotes to sources on the subject, and these are generally vot cited again here.

Eastern Europe

49

industrialization and collectivization and the threat of Japan.? The loosening of Polish ties with France was personified by the new Minister of Foreign Affairs, Josef Beck, who moved up from the post of state secretary in that Ministry on 2 Novembe r 1932. Young

vain, and with the reputation of having a slippery tongue, Beck was a coldly Spportinis:

tic follower of Pilsudski. His alignment with Germany was to leave him with a ptoGerman reputation, but this does not do justice to his views ot his policy. Like Pilsudski , he wanted Poland to observe a balance in its relations with Germany and Russia—t rying to keep its two neighbors from becoming so friendly that they might agree to divide Poland between them, or so hostile that they might force Poland to side with one against the other. Beck wanted Poland to play the part of a great powet—which he would tepresent on the international scene—and thought it possible to do so in the face of a Germany determined to redraw the map of Europe. Unwilling to recognize that the peace settlement following World War I could not be abrogated so soon without damage to Poland, he tried to work out Poland’s relations with Germany independent of other

countries and institutions. If he has been condemned as blind, that blindness was epidemic in Europe in the thirties and that was, had fewer choices than France and Britain. Thete can be hand, that Beck had a special anti-French bias, in part related to

he might have pleaded Poland, vulnerable as it no doubt, on the other his own expulsion from

that country a decade earlier as persona non grata, and this bias accentuated the cooling of relations between France and Poland. Although there are indications that Pilsudski and Beck thought Hitler as a man of Austrian background less immediately dangerous than his traditionally anti-Polish predecessors, they were certainly worried observers of the change of government in Germany.* At first there appeared to be good reason for concern. The election campaign that raged in Germany during February and early March saw the patties trying to outdo each other in appeals to nationalism and in these, the question of the eastern borders of

Germany always played a major role. In the middle of the campaign, the London Sanday Express of 13 February reported an interview Hitler had given on 6 February in which he claimed that the whole area of the Polish Corridor should be returned to Germany. The German government immediately denied the accuracy of the report and insisted that Hitler had referred to the corridor merely as a great injustice to Germany, but the denials were not particularly convincing.* On the same day that Beck replied to the Hitler interview in a moderate speech, the government of the free city of Danzig denounced the Danzig-Polish agreement about the harbor police.° The combination of this action with National Socialist agitation in Danzig and the demonstrations of the S. A. near the border during the German election obviously alarmed the Polish government. Rumors of imminent border revision were being spread among Germans within Poland, and these

of course came to the attention of the authorities. The German state secretary, Bernhard Wilhelm von Biilow, worried about the danger of Polish action, suggested an explanation 2. For the “new course” in Polish foreign policy see Roos, Polen und Europa, pp. 27-43; Roman Debicki, Foreign Policy ofPoland 1919-1939 (New York: Praeger, 1962), pp. 63-70. 3. For reports on this process by the Czech Minister to Poland see his report No. 10 of 2 February 1933 and ; No. 22 of 18 February, Czech documents in T-120, 1316/2376/D 497184-85 and D 49188—89. 4, The Polish minister in Berlin told von Biilow on 30 January that he had been called six times that day from Watsaw and Geneva with questions about the policy of the new government (Memorandum of Bulow, 30 January 1933, T-120, 1430/2945/D 575807). 5. G.D., C, 1, No. 22; Domarus, 1:201—2; Sackett (Berlin) dispatch 2194 of 14 February 1933, State 762.00/65.

6. On the Danzig issue see Hans L. Leonhardt, Nazi Conquest of Danzig (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,

Das 1942); John Brown Mason, The Danzig Dilemma (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1946); Ludwig Denne,

Danzig-Problem in der deutschen Aussenpolitik 1934-39 (Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1959); Ernst Ziehm, Aus meiner ‘politischen Free Arbeit in Danzig 1914-1939 (2d ed., Matburg/Lahn: Herder-Institut, 1960); Christoph M. Kimmich, The City, Danzig and German Foreign Policy, 1919-1934 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968).

50

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

for the origin of the rumors that reveals additional possible causes of Polish alarm. “Furthermore, I have the impression that some of the people assigned by us or on our behalf by the Ministry of Defense to collect information on possible ways to draw the boundaries in the future may not have kept complete security. It would be well to halt this collection of information entirely as long as the present tension continues.” The possibility of agreement to proceed to territorial revision by the four powers of Western and Central Europe may also have stimulated Warsaw to action. Under these circumstances, the Polish government decided to demonstrate its firmness on the Danzig—and by implication the corridor—issue. On the morning of 3 March, two days before the German election, the Polish commissioner general in Danzig told the high commissioner of the League of Nations at Danzig, Helmer Rosting, that to protect the Polish position in the free city the Polish gatrison at the Westerplatte, the depot at the harbor entrance, would be increased from

88 to about 200—clearly a token demonstration. This plan was carried out on 6 March over the objections of Rosting and the protests of the free city. The issue was taken to Geneva, where the Polish government, under general pressure from the other states,

agreed to withdraw its reinforcements. On 16 March this step was accomplished, and the Danzig government simultaneously agreed to revoke its action in regard to the harbor police. The Poles had made their point: they had shown their determination to defend their position in principle; in practice, of course, one hundred additional soldiers at the Westerplatte would have made no difference whatsoever. It was at this time, in the middle of March, that Pilsudski supposedly consulted France about a possible preventive military action against Germany. That he himself considered the possibility and discussed it with several Polish officials is certain; that he suggested it to the French is in dispute.’ The action against Germany, if one was seriously considered, was not a preventive war in the form of a general attack on Germany, but

the occupation of parts of Germany to make it conform to the provisions of the peace treaty, including disarmament; in other words, a repetition of the action of France in 1920 and 1923. If the proposal was in fact made, it was rejected in Paris, but whether made or not, the possibility of such a Polish move became known in Germany; and it may be that the motive behind whatever Pilsudski actually did was to let the German government know that the possibility existed. In that case they would have to decide on the policy to follow: accommodation to the status quo, at least temporarily, or war. The Westerplatte incident would fit into such a strategy by showing Germany that Poland would not tacitly accept a National Socialist coup in Danzig or any other fait accompli, while simultaneously showing its willingness to accept—but not provoke—broader risks. Hitler had to decide what to do in the face of this situation. He was at that time preoccupied with domestic developments in Germany right after the election—a period in 7. Memorandum by Bulow, 25 April 1933, T-120, 2371/4601/E 188730-31. See also the note of 30 June 1933, no author or file number, T-120, 2906/6176/E 463446.

8. In addition to the sources listed in n. 6 see Lipski Papers, pp. 46-59; Josef Beck, Dernier rapport (Neuchatel: Editions de la Baconniéte, 1951), p. 25; Jules Laroche, La Pologne de Pilsudski (Paris: Flammarion, 1953), pp. 120-21; Richard Breyer, Das Deutsche Reich und Polen 1932-1937 (Wiirzburg: Holzner, 1955), pp. 71-76; Zweites Weisshuch der Deutschen Regierung (Basel: Birkhauser, 1939) (hereafter cited as German White Book), Nos. 21, 22, 24; G.D., C, 1 (those documents initialed by Hindenburg are marked with an asterisk), Nos. 52*, 57, 59, 60*, 61, 65*, 71, 74, 82, 91; Thermann tel. 6 of 6 March 1933, T-120, 1468/3015/D 598248; Meyer tel. 258* of 15 March, T-120, 2954/6208/E 469483-84; D.D.F., 1st, 2, Nos. 376, 380, 407, 414; Gilbert (Geneva) dispatch 836 of 7 March 1933, State 760c.6212/31.

The dates usually given for the Westerplatte incident which place the initial Polish consultation with Resting on 5 March ate incorrect. Papée, the Polish commissioner general, raised the matter orally on 3 Match and in writing on 4 March (Papée to Rosting, 4 March 1933, T-120, 2954/6208/E 469389).

9. Vansittart, Mist Procession, pp. 468f., 536.

Eastern Europe

54

which he took a seties of drastic steps for the consolidation of his control, particularly the seizure of power in the German states of Bavaria, Baden, Saxony, and Wurttemberg

between 5 March and 10 March.!0 While other German military and political leaders worried about the military dangers of a Polish attack, dangers they feared Germany could not cope with successfully,'! Hitler’s attention was soon after drawn to the Danzig issue as a result of developments growing out of the political coordination just completed in the German states. The National Socialist Gaukiter for Danzig, Albert Forster, saw Hitler

on 10 March, just before the head of the Danzig government, Ernst Ziehm:!2 and while there is no record of their conversation, it apparently gave Forster the idea of moving forward with National Socialist agitation in Danzig, perhaps with the possibility of a take-over like those just accomplished in the German states. Immediately on Forster’s return to Danzig—while Zichm was negotiating about the Westerplatte incident in Geneva—troubles started in the free city. There was a series of incidents, started by the National Socialists, in which the German consul general in Danzig, Edmund Thermann,

intervened on behalf of the National Socialists and against the Danzig government which was trying to keep things quiet during the Geneva talks.!3 At this point the situation threatened to get out of hand and provoke Poland. Hitler immediately gave instructions that the party was to maintain the greatest reserve and was also not to push for a reorganization of the government, a subject Thermann!* and Forster had apparently been pushing.'> Géring gave orders to the S. A. near the Polish borders to avoid any provocative actions; and Ziehm, on his visit to Berlin en route from Geneva to Danzig,

found Hitler both more interested and cooperative.'6 The party in Danzig was temporarily restrained, but it was evident that only the danger of foreign complications had restrained Hitler. The pressure for an internal change in the Danzig government immediately resumed, but in behind-the-scenes political negotiations, not street demonstrations.'’ These negotiations culminated in the collapse of the political arrangement supporting the Ziehm government and the holding of new elections. When public agitation in the election campaign threatened to bring on international complications,!® Hitler again intervened to calm the situation; but nothing was to prevent the National Socialists from actually taking power in Danzig. The new government of the free city, however, 10. This is the explanation for the discrepancy between President Hindenburg’s close following of the Westerplatte incident (see n. 8) and Hitlet’s lecture to the astonished Danzig senate president, Ernst Ziehm, on 10 March about Martin Luther, the wars of liberation against Napoleon, and the nature of the National Socialist revolution (Ziehm, pp. 178-83). Ziehm was on the way to Geneva to defend Danzig’s position before the League council; Hitler was busy with the Prussian municipal elections scheduled for 12 March, getting Hindenburg’s approval for the unconstitutional change in Germany’s national flag, and breaking his promise to keep the 30 January coalition unchanged by adding Joseph Goebbels as another National Socialist to the cabinet. The subjective honesty of Ziehm’s memoirs is obvious at this point: fifteen years after the end of World War II he still did not understand that on 10 March Hitler was reheatsing his 11 March speech for the municipal elections; while Ziehm, naturally, was thinking about the free city’s presentation at Geneva. 11. Ziehm, pp. 164-66; Meinck, pp. 14-16, 19. 12. Ziehm, p. 179. 13. Thermann was acting without instructions from Berlin (memorandum

of Bulow, 24 March 1933, T-120,

2373/4603/E 19091213). He was kicked upstairs in July 1933 by being sent as minister to Argentina (G.D., C, 1, No. 384). Kimmich (p. 133) claims that Thermann was acting on otders ftom Berlin, but cites no such orders.

14. G.D., C, 1, No. 58.

;

15. The most spectacular of the incidents in Danzig was the raising of a swastika flag on 13 March; on 15 ; March Hitler told von Neurath that he had given the stated instructions to Forster (ibid., No. 85). (Ziehm, 16. Goring at the cabinet meeting of 20 March 1933 (IMWC, 31:415); Ziehm saw Hitler on 22 March — . 184-87).

30 March (Vd/kischer ae pemiens 189-91; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 96, 116, 127, 131. Hitler and Forster met again on

Beobachter, 31 March 1933). 18. G.D., C, 1, No. 155.

a2

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

was to assume power under circumstances and with policies far different from those of the crisis-laden days of early March. During March and April 1933, the German government received conflicting reports about a possible military move on the part of Poland, but it is not necessarily of great importance for an understanding of German policy whether the stories were true, false, or intentionally planted by the Poles. There can be no doubt that the reports came in and that the German government took them seriously in spite of the fact that the German minister to Poland thought there was no serious danger.’? Hitler, as has been shown, first

toned down the Nationalist Socialist agitation in Danzig and postponed the take-over of the Danzig government from the middle of March—tight after the analogous action in the German states—until a few weeks later. Second, he reexamined the whole problem

of Germany’s relations with Poland. Knowing that Germany was not ready for war, he decided to consider the possibility of a temporary rapprochement, perhaps impressed by the very determination Pilsudski had shown. In the last days of March there were signs of just such a reorientation in Hitler’s thinking, publicly reflected in the broad sweep of his appeal for peace with all of Germany’s neighbors in his speech of 23 March.?? At a cabinet meeting on 7 April, von Neurath argued for good relations with Russia while asserting that “an understanding with Poland is neither possible nor desirable.”*! Hitler made no comment at the meeting, but his policy was to be just the opposite of von Neurath’s recommendation. The basis of von Neurath’s intended policy, as is clear from his presentation and his other comments, was that only continued agitation for revision would secure for Germany a return of lands lost to Poland after the war. As the German Foreign Ministry argued, there could be only one more partition of Poland; all of Germany’s territorial aims in the East must, therefore, be attained at one time; and these

could be secured only if world opinion were prepared for such a revision while Germany built up its own strength and supported the German elements inside Poland.”? In this framework, the 1914 borders of Germany, with the exception of the Poznan area, were

the ultimate aims, and a concern for the people of German background living in Danzig and parts of the areas ceded to Poland may have been a genuine factor, at least in part.” Hitler’s territorial ambitions and ideas for the fate of the Poles, by contrast, went far beyond von Neurath’s wildest dreams, and his attitude toward the Germans involved

was entirely different: they would be used or sacrificed at will. If Hitler was prepared to consider a new relationship with Poland, Pilsudski was interested in exploring the possibility of a rapprochement with Germany.%* At the beginning of April, Pilsudski decided to send to Berlin Count Jan Szembek, who had had a considerable diplomatic career before assuming the post of Secretary of State in the Polish Foreign Ministry in November 1932.29 He was to see Hitler in person, without

19. Ibid., Nos. 77, 183, n. 3, 177, 180, 183, 184. It should be noted that at the cabinet meeting of 25 April von

Neurath distorted the reports from von Moltke to make the situation appear more critical than it really was (compare No. 184, n. 2, with No.183). 20. Roos, Polen und Europa, p. 71. 21. G.D., C, 1, No. 142. 22. Ibid.; Memorandum “TV Po 4070” of 26 April 1933, T-120, 2906/6176/E 463413-14. 23, The suggested boundary described by von Neurtath in his letter to von Papen of 9 February 1933 (G.D., C, 1, No. 18), is very similar to that outlined in von Dirksen’s memorandum of 29 December 1925 (G.D., B, 2,

Part 1, No. 21 and map at end of volume). It should be noted that on this subject von Neurath’s views resemble those expressed by Gustav Stresemann (G.D., B, 2, Part 1, No. 150).

24, Roos (pp. 80-82) mentions only those Polish measures in April that pointed to military action; the feelers for a rapprochement put out by Poland during the same period must be mentioned to complete the picture. 25. Jean Szembek, Journal 1933-1939 (Paris: Plon, 1952). A more complete edition of the Szembek diary is being prepared by Tytus Komarnicki; the volumes for 1935 and 1936 have appeared. The title of the French

edition is misleading in that there are only a few documents, not a diary, for the period before 1935.

Eastern Europe

re}

going through von Neurath, an idea inspired by Pilsudski’s accurate impression of von Neurath’s views, but immediately ruled out as impossible by Alfred Wysocki, since early 1931 the Polish minister in Berlin. Instead of sending a special emissaty ditctone the Polish government instructed Wysocki to seek an interview with Hitler, iaciss the sine tion in Danzig, warn of possible complications if agreement could not be reached, and suggest a public statement of some kind upholding Polish rights in the free city26The Polish minister thereupon began asking for a meeting with Hitler,2’ while feelers were put out by Beck in a talk with Hans Adolf von Moltke, the German minister to Warsaw,

in a conversation on 12 April.*8 Hitler delayed the requested meeting but evidently came to the conclusion that the meeting Wysocki had asked for was meant to improve relations between the two countries and: that the Polish intentions were sincere.2” He agreed to see the Polish minister, and their conference was finally scheduled for 2 May 1933.30 In their conversation, the Polish minister stressed the concern of his government over the possibility of trouble about Danzig. Hitler declined to recognize any special position of Poland in Danzig beyond that specified in the peace treaty but explained at length that, regardless of the mistakes made at Versailles, these could not be corrected by war.

He insisted that the German government had no intention of taking Polish territory by force.*! He agreed to the release of a press communiqué about the meeting, though striking a reference to Poland’s rights and interests in Danzig. As it stood, therefore, the communiqué mentioned Hitler’s intention of keeping the attitudes and conduct of the German government strictly within the limits of the existing treaties and expressed his wish that “both countries might review and deal with their common interests dispassionately.” Von Neurath was clearly unhappy about this outcome, but his efforts at obstruction resulted only in agreement to defer release of the communiqué until von Moltke had seen Beck and a similar communiqué could be released in Warsaw.*?

26. Gasiorowski, “The German-Polish Nonaggression Pact of 1934,” Journal of Central European Affairs, 15, No.

1 (April 1955), pp. 9-10. 27. G.D., C, 1, No. 168. 28. Ibid., No. 167. 29. Lipski Papers, p. 76. There is no record of a Hitler-von Moltke talk before the Hitler-Wysocki meeting of 2 May. The account in Roos (p. 82) is based on information supplied to that author by Otto Meissner, then chief of the Presidential Chancellery. Meissnet’s version is in conflict with the contemporary evidence on von Moltke’s views. Von Moltke reported that on balance he did mor think Poland would turn to preventive war on 23 Aptil (G.D., C, 1, No. 180), 25 April (ibid., No. 183), and 26 April (ibid., No. 192). The last of these reports was shown to Hitler, and von Moltke must have reckoned with the possibility that all of them would. He could not know that von Neurath would distort his views (see n. 19, above). Von Moltke believed that the Poles were trying to influence the League and the disarmament conference and urged that Germany exercise restraint and rearm quietly. It is very probable that von Moltke in fact did not go to Berlin before the Hitler-Wysocki meeting at all, and that Meissner’s reference to such a trip reflects a confusion with von Moltke’s visit to Berlin right after his meeting with Beck on 3 May (Laroche, p. 128; G.D., C, 1, No. 253). von Papen, and For a supposed 27 April meeting between Hindenburg, Hitler, von Blomberg, von Neurath,

Goring on the defense of the eastern border against any possible Polish attack see Dertinger’s “Informations-

bericht Nr. 8 vom 27. April 1933,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/26, f. 303.

Book), No. 1; Lipski 30. Weisshuch der Polnischen Regierung (Basel: Birkhauser, 1939) (hereafter cited as Polish White

127-28; Mastny report 32 of4 Papers, Nos. 11, 12; G.D., G,1, No. 201; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 116, 128; Laroche, pp. May 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413941—42.

never try to deprive any 31. According to both the German and Polish accounts, Hitler insisted that he would White Book—was a German the in xcised statement—e This customs. and language its of foreign nationality that Germany mean to read be could It Czechs. no wanted Germany that predecessor of his 1938 statement and this was the way it was generally repudiated foreign conquests and the forced assimilation of non-Germans, who had read Mein Kampf would interpreted at the time. It could mean something entirely different, as anyone population. Hitler’s non-German its exterminate or expel but land conquer would know, namely that Germany the truth, but spoke he them voiced he when and doctrines, racialist antiassimilationist views were a patt of his not the whole truth. 2 May 1933, T-120, 1431 /2945/D 575841. 32. Lipski Papers, No. 13; G.D., C, 1, No, 206; note by von Biilow,

54

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

These conversations and communiqués inaugurated a period during which GermanPolish relations were quiet and unspectacular, a prelude to more dramatic events later in the year. Conversations between German and Polish diplomats were civil, and Germany’s first military attaché to Poland, General Max Schindler, was promptly received in audience by Pilsudski.33 In spite of German fears, the Polish government made no attempt to intervene in the election campaign in Danzig as the Danzig National Socialist leaders followed Berlin’s instructions to keep the situation reasonably quiet. The Poles were willing to stand by while the National Socialists took over the property of the trade unions in Danzig;35 they were ready to give the new leaders a chance to prove their adherence to the promise to respect the status quo in the free city if power came to them as a result of the election.*° Hitler himself spoke to the people of Danzig on the day before the voting which brought the NSDAP a bate majority of the popular vote.37 Watsaw now calmly observed the accession of the National Socialists to power in Danzig, not only because of reassuring words from Hitler, but also because the person and views of the new president of the Danzig government were taken as tokens of Hitler’s sincerity. In his foreign policy speech to the Reichstag on 17 May, Hitler had referred publicly to Poland in words similar to those used with Wysocki two weeks before.*® The new German government was opposed to forcible germanization, and while the eastern borders drawn at Versailles were bad, they could not be improved by war. The simultaneous avowal of a peaceful foreign policy, willingness to sign non-aggression pacts, denunciation of the idea of sanctions, and threat to leave the League of Nations and the

disarmament conference if Germany were outvoted summarized the policy Hitler was to follow in 1933 and the immediately following years. While preparing for subsequent acts of aggression, the German government would proclaim its peaceful inclinations to reassute skeptics at home and abroad, and would substitute bilateral for multilateral obliga-

tions in the meantime. Not only the references to Poland in the speech but other evidence of the time points to Hitler’s willingness to think of Poland as a possible partner in a bilateral arrangement. Late in May 1933, the German ambassador in Moscow, Herbert von Dirksen, was in Berlin, trying to persuade the German government to keep relations with the Soviet

Union on tolerable terms. Von Dirksen was a vain and pompous man who believed strongly in German cooperation with whatever country he was assigned to at the moment.*? His memory was sometimes poor,*? and his predictions frequently erroneous,*! but his observations on the situation in countties to which he was accredited

were generally accurate. Hitler told von Dirksen that he wanted to come to an agreement with Pilsudski, a suggestion von Dirksen countered with the argument that this meant 33. G.D., C, 1, No. 221; Lipski Papers, No. 14; Gasiorowski, “German-Polish Nonaggression Pact,” p. 15. See

also Antoni Szymanski, “Als polnischer Militarattaché in Berlin (1932-1939),” Politische Studien, 13, No. 141 (1962), pp. 42-51. 34, G.D., C, 1, Nos. 213, 216, 253 (see also Wirth to von Bulow, 4 May 1933, T-120, 2832/6077/E 450643—

45); Laroche, p. 127. 35. Leonhardt, pp. 49-50. 36. Ibid., p. 57. 37. On German intervention in the campaign see ibid., pp. 47-50, 57-58; G.D., GC, 1, Nos. 205, 216; Baynes, 2:1060-62; Domarus, 1:279. It should be noted that the National Socialist percentage of the vote in Danzig was

lower than in adjacent East Prussia in the March election. 38. Domatus, 1:270-79.

39. See the essay on von Dirksen in Lewis Namiet, In the Nagi Era (London: Macmillan, 1952), pp. 44-62. 40. The trip to Berlin at the end of May was moved up to Match or April in his memoirs (Herbert von Dirksen, Moskau Tokio London [Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1950], pp. 122-23; cf. G.D., C, 1, No. 284, n. 3). This has confused authors who relied on von Dirksen’s memory.

41. This point will be discussed in connection with Germany’s Far Eastern policy.

Eastern E urope

55

recognizing the border with Poland, something all Germans had rejected since 1919, Like von Neurath, von Dirksen wanted to maintain tension with Poland to push for revision; Hitler preferred to wait until he was ready for wider schemes. Students of National Socialist Germany have too often suggested that Hitler first tried for tevision of the Treaty of Versailles and thereafter moved on to bolder plans of conquest. This is only a half-truth, and grossly misleading. Where his hopes for ultimate conquests and short-term revision collided, Hitler was quite capable of Opposing revision. In the only recorded instance before 1933 in which Hitler mentioned a specific size for the additional land area Germany could well use, that area was substantially greater than the fofa/ territory of Poland.” The trifling adjustments von Neurath and von Dirksen were thinking about were therefore irrelevant to Hitlet’s plans. In the short run, the traditional diplomats seem more radical than Hitler, whose soaring ambitions required postponement.*? In Danzig, postponement meant temporaty quiet, and the man to keep Danzig quiet was Hermann Rauschning, the man elected to succeed Ziehm as president of the Senate. Rauschning had studied the nationality conflict in western Poland, bought a small estate in Danzig in 1927, and became a leader of the Danzig Landbund which he took

with him into the National Socialist party.“ A conservative nationalist, Rauschning was to break with the National Socialists when he realized that their aims and methods were incompatible

with

his own,

which

included

a genuine

effort

at cooperation

with

Poland.** When Rauschning was in Berlin at the end of May and the first days of June 1933, he received instructions from Hitler appropriate to the sentiments the latter had

expressed publicly to the Reichstag and privately to von Dirksen.*° Hitler told Rauschning and Forster that the solution of the Danzig and corridor questions was a problem for Germany, not Danzig, to solve. They should work quietly in Danzig in a manner that would spare Germany international complications during the coming years. He was determined to get along with Poland; he would sign any treaty that might ease Germany’s position. The Danzig government should help in this by operating in a mannet that maintained the German character of the city with a minimum of excitement. As for the immediate future, the German government would help Danzig with financial assistance to meet its deficits and would try to release a specialist to aid the officials of the free city in their trade and economic negotiations with Poland. The new National Socialist government in Danzig accordingly initiated a policy of settling the outstanding difficulties with Poland by direct negotiations rather than complaints to the League as had been the prior custom.*” The new policy was announced 42. Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 102. 43. The superficial anomaly of the National Socialists in the cabinet representing the more moderate course in domestic affairs and, with the exception of Austria, in foreign policy as well is described with insight and accuracy in Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 16 vom 31. Mai 1933,” Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/

26, £. 403-409.

;

44, See the biography of Rauschning prepared before his 1 November 1933 audience with Hindenburg, T-120,

2787/6023/H 04455354.

45. Note Beck’s comment on the “attitude conciliante envers la Pologne” of the new Danzig government nine (Dernier rapport, p. 27).

No. 46, On Rauschning’s meeting with Hitler and his other conferences in Berlin on this trip see G.D., (Ge ila (Zurich: 273; Rauschning, Voice of Destruction, pp. 86-88; Hermann Rauschning, Dze Revolution des Nibilismus

Europa-Verlag, 1938), p. 440; Rauschning to the Minister of Finance, 2 June 1933, T-120, 2954/6211/E 469613-14. Hitler to Rauschning’s memory of the chronology is correct. Contemporary evidence dates his meeting with states that 1 June. In the Voice ofDestruction, p. 86, he tells of Hitlet’s attacks on Austria atthe same meeting and event, examined in this was just after the German currency barrier to travel in Austria had been instituted. That

to this period. chap. 4, had taken place on 27 May. The material in Voice ofDestruction, p. 102, may also refer

so that the com47. The opposition in Danzig henceforth had to complain to the League high commissioner,

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

56

publicly in Danzig by Gauleiter Forster when the new Senate assumed power on 20 June, with Rauschning making similar comments three days later.4* While consolidating their tule in Danzig, the new government began talks with Poland. These were conducted during July, and included a visit of Rauschning and Arthur Greiser, vice-president of the Senate, to Warsaw on 5 July.4? With a real desire for agreement on both sides, negotiations moved forward rapidly. To prevent interference with the course of the talks, the German ptess was ditected to avoid all polemics that might unfavorably affect DanzigPolish relations.5° The imminent change at the Polish legation in Berlin provided Hitler with an opportunity to stress his desire for peaceful relations with Poland to the departing minister, Wysocki, on 13 July.>! He told Wysocki that he had seen to it that there would be no trouble between Danzig and Poland and intimated that the fine atmosphere created there would have good results elsewhere. These good results would come later, but the immediate effects were soon evident.

A ratified Polish Danzig

series of agreements between Danzig and. Poland was initialed on 5 August and on 8 August. These dealt with a variety of questions, of which the volume of trade to be routed through Danzig and the position of the Polish minority in were the most important.5? Not all in the German government agreed with this

course,°3 but Hitler was firm.5+ The Polish government was satisfied that there was a real imptovement in Danzig-Polish relations, that Hitler had in fact given orders for the

Danzig government to be conciliatory—while he concentrated on the annexation of Austria—and that under these circumstances Poland could make some real concessions to the free city.°> That the Poles felt that Hitler with his Austrian background might be more interested in the Azsch/uss than the corridor is borne out by other evidence.*° The Polish policy may, therefore, be considered the converse of Italy’s emphasis on revision in the corridor to divert the Germans from Austria. With both Danzig and Poland willing to make concessions, agreements could be reached; and on 18 September the preliminary agreements of early August were included in a comprehensive settlement of the issues Outstanding between the two governments.°’ By this time the rapprochement plaints that reached the League from Danzig hereafter were against, instead of from, the government of the free city. 48. Schulthess europaischer Geschichtskalender 1933, p. 262. 49. On these negotiations see Beck, p. 27; Breyer, pp. 90-91; Leonhardt, p. 65; and the dispatches from the USS. vice-consul in Danzig, Johnson, and chargé in Warsaw, Crosby, of July 1933, State 760c.60K/279—284

passim. 50. “Mitteilungen an die Redaktionen,” 29 June 1933, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/1, f. 37.

51. The agreement for the new minister, Josef Lipski, had been granted on 3 July. On the Hitler-Wysocki meeting of 13 July see Polish White Book, No. 4; Lipski Papers, p. 90; Mastny report 55 of 17 July 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413946-48, 52. Schulthess 1933, pp. 263-64; Leonhardt, p. 65; Roos, pp. 100-01; Breyer, p. 91; German White Book, No. 179;

Johnson (Danzig) dispatch 298 of 22 August 1933, State 760c.60K/288. 53. See the comment of Consul-General Thermann in his report LG. 1118/33 of 10 August 1933, T-120, 1315/2371/D 495617-21. 54. On 8 August, the day of the Danzig-Polish agreement, Schacht was informed that Hitler wanted foreign exchange transferred to Danzig in spite of the large amount involved (G.D., C. 1, No. 387). About 30 million Reichsmark were needed (Schaefer [Bank of Danzig] to Schacht, 10 August 1933, T-120, 2915/6203/E 468423—31; Reich Minister of Finance to the Senate of the free city of Danzig, 18 August 1933, ibid., frames E

46843437). 55. See the comments of Count Michal Lubiénski, chief of the Danzig section of the Polish Ministry of Foreign

Affairs, to a member of the U.S. legation in Warsaw on 14 August (Cosby dispatch 320 of 16 August 1933, State 760c.60K/287). 56. Laroche, pp. 134-35, 57. Again the German Foreign Ministry had been doubtful, but since Rauschning saw Hitler before signing, it

may be assumed that the latter approved (G.D., C, 1, No. 417). See also Breyer, p. 91; Leonhardt, p. 65; Kimmich, pp. 142-46; Johnson (Danzig) dispatches 316 of 25 September 1933 and 322 of 7 October 1933, State 760c.60K/293 and 300; “Informationsbericht Nr. 25 vom 24. August 1933,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

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57

between the free city and Poland had advanced to a point where it definitely influenced the prospect of better relations between Germany and Poland. On 30 August, for example, von Moltke urged Berlin that the trade and tariff war between the two countries, then more than eight years old, might well be ended.5 8 The German government’s decision to go forward with economi c negotiations with Poland as von Moltke suggested was closely related to the develop ment of the international situation in September and October 1933, to be discusse d subsequently. The progress, or rather lack of progress, in the disarmament negotiations was about to lead to a major crisis in Geneva; and under these circumstances it would make sense to develop

better relations, or at least reduce tension, with Poland to offset any possible danger in the West. While von Neurath was preparing to go to Geneva for the League meeting, von Moltke was in Berlin, and the German government then decided to go forward with negotiations for an end of the trade war and the conclusion of a trade agreement with Poland.® The Polish government simultaneously reexamined its international position with the possibility of reorientation very much in mind. At Geneva, the German and Polish foreign ministers met in a friendly conversation followed by one in which the German propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, also participated.*! There was agreement that direct negotiations about matters of common concern and controversy pro-

vided the best approach to improved German-Polish relations, and the peaceful handling

of Danzig questions at this League session illustrated the new atmosphere that such a course could generate.“? The beginning of serious economic negotiations early in October gave each side an opportunity to assess the intentions and to test the sincerity of the other; the dramatic developments of mid-October would lead both powers to quick decisions on the basis of the assessments just made.% The German government’s announcement on 14 October that it was leaving both the disarmament conference and the League of Nations placed the developing rapprochement between Germany and Poland in a new light. While efforts would be made from Berlin to befuddle the French by suggestions of bilateral talks, the danger of

foreign action against Germany was considered by Hitler; and the available information suggests that it helped lead him to the decision for an agreement with Poland. At a meeting with von Neurath and Rauschning on 17 October, Hitler strongly urged Rauschning

to arrive at an understanding with Poland

while deferring, though not

rejecting, Rauschning’s suggestion that Hitler himself meet with Marshal Pilsudski.%+ On the same day, the new Polish minister to Berlin, Josef Lipski, had a most friendly talk with von Neurath who expatiated at length on the need to settle all outstanding probZS) 101/26, £533. 58. German White Book, No. 30. It should be remembered that the original German purpose in this economic

struggle had been to weaken Poland to such an extent as to force tertitorial revision as a condition for relaxation of trade barriers and German participation in the international economic assistance to Poland that would thereafter be feasible because of the reduced danger to Poland’s economic safety. 59. “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 21, September 1933,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003731—33.

The formal instructions of von Billow of 25 September (German White Book, No. 31) gtew out of this con-

ference. 60. Beck, p. 29; Gasiorowski, “German-Polish Nonaggression Pact,” pp. 17-19. 61. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 449, 451; Beck, pp. 30-31. Beck, who identified von Neurath (a Wiirttemberger) with the

traditions of Prussia, told the Belgian foreign minister, “j’aime mieux Goebbels que Neurath” (Documents diplomatiques belges 1920-1940, 3 [Brussels: Académie royale, 1964] [hereafter cited as D.D.B|, No. 55). 62. Breyer, pp. 93-94. It should be noted that the German Foreign Ministry was still reluctant to agree to ns Rauschning’s conciliatory course (G.D., C, 1, Nos. 491, 492). 63. On the economic negotiations in October see “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom D Oktober 1933,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 00373740; Cudahy (Warsaw) dispatch 52 of 18 October 1933 and ViceConsul Hugh C. Fox (Berlin) report 1107 of 18 January 1934, State 660c.6231/193 and 203. 64. G.D., C, 2, No. 11.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

58

lems.5> The next day, Hitler told the leaders of his party at a closed meeting that he would sign any treaty of any sort to postpone war until he was ready for it, and subsequently told Rauschning that he wanted a treaty with Poland—it could be broken at a convenient moment later.°° If, in the crisis precipitated by its departure from Geneva, the German government was ready for an agreement with Poland, the same event led to the same conclusion in Warsaw. Pilsudski and his associates canvassed the situation created by what they believed to be a weakening of Poland’s international position. Though he was anything but fond of the League, Pilsudski did value the minimal protection it had afforded

Poland; he doubted that France would take any action against Germany; and he did not believe that Germany was really dangerous as yet. There was, however, always the possi-

bility that the other powers would come to an agreement at Poland’s expense, as the Four-Power Pact negotiations had demonstrated all too clearly; and agreement with Germany might deflect its aggression elsewhere.°’ Early in November, Pilsudski instructed Lipski to sound out Hitler about some substitute for the security the League had pteviously provided,® and this possibility was discussed at the meeting between Lipski, Hitler, and von Neurath on 15 November.” Hitler responded to Lipski’s presentation of the Polish point of view by an extended discourse on the futility of war and the advisability as well as possibility of bilateral peaceful settlement of all differences. He welcomed Pilsudski’s initiative and agreed to the immediate release of a press communiqué expressing the intention of the two powers to take up the questions affecting them by ditect negotiations and renouncing the use of force in their relations with each other. The subsequent fate of the direct negotiations and of the no-force declaration showed to what extent the two powers were willing to give substance to their public professions. In late October, an impasse in regard to the subject of coal threatened the success of

all German-Polish economic negotiations. Although John Maynard Keynes had once predicted that the German economy could not function without Upper Silesian coal, the Germans had in fact made the exclusion of coal imports from Poland the key element in their trade war against that country. The Poles now insisted, for both economic and psychological reasons, that Germany annually accept a minimum quantity of Polish coal, and the Germans recognized that some concession on this point would have to be made if they wanted an agreement.”? Hitler met with several of his ministers on the evening of 16 November

1933, the day after the Hitler-Lipski talk; and it was decided to accord

Poland a coal quota if that wete needed for the conclusion of an economic treaty.”! Some technical questions remained, but the road was now open to a treaty ending the many

years of trade war between Germany and Poland.” 65. Polish White Book, No. 5.

66. 67. 68. 69.

Rauschning, Vorce ofDestruction, pp. 104-10; Breyer, p. 98; Domarus, 1: 317. Szembek, pp. 1-2; Breyer, p. 99; Laroche, pp. 136-37; Roos, pp. 106-07. Lipski Papers, pp. 94-98. Polish White Book, No. 6; Lipski Papers, p. 99; Mastny report 78 of 16 November 1933, Czech document in

T-120, 1041/1809/413957; G.D., C, 2, No. 69; Cudahy dispatch 87 of 18 November and Crosby (Warsaw) dispatch 88 of 21 November 1933, State 760c.62/214 and 215. The German briefing paper for von Neurath for

this talk deals with the economic and minorities issues that were in fact not touched upon (IV Po 8250 of 14 November 1933, T-120, 2906/6174/E 46294850). 70. Von Moltke discussed these issues in Berlin; see the minutes of the Handelspolitische Ausschuss (Foreign Trade Policy Committee, H. P. A.) of 30 October, 2 November,

and 9 November

003746-55; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 38, 52, 58.

1933, T-120, 2612/5650/H

71. G.D., C, 2, No. 73; H. P. A. meeting of 20 November 1933, T-120, 2612/5650/H 003761-62; Memoran-

dum by Ritter, 20 November 1933, T-120, 1431/2945/D 575884.

72. The treaty was signed on 7 March 1934 (Berthold Puchert, Der Wirtschaftskrieg des deutschen Inperialismus gegen Polen 1925-1934 [Betlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1963], p. 176), but led to only a minor increase in trade (Berthold Puchert, “Die deutsch-polnische Nichtangtiffserklirung und die Aussenwittschaftspolitik des deutschen

Eastern Europe

59

The same conference that removed the major obstacle to an economic agreement also produced a decision to pursue in specific terms the suggestion Hitler himself had originally mentioned to Lipski, that the agreement of the two powers not to use force be embodied in a treaty.’* Work on this subject was immediately initiated in the German Foreign Ministry.” In that office, in spite of the misgivings about any settlement with Poland, the assumption was that Germany would consider itself bound by any nonaggression treaty; a renunciation of the use of force in treaty form was, therefore, advo-

cated as the most desirable procedure. Hitler quickly agreed to this idea, and von Moltke

was instructed to present it to Pilsudski with Hitler’s greetings, care being taken to keep

the plan secret and to present it to the Poles before they could come up with a draft of their own.” Pilsudski received von Moltke promptly, promised a favorable but careful examination of the German proposal, and stressed his desire for a settlement with Germany. Calling attention frankly to the anti-German tradition in Poland, Pilsudski explained that all this would take some time. Another delaying factor, not mentioned quite so explicitly, was the special relationship of Poland to France. The very fact that the Polish government kept important parts of the negotiations with Berlin secret from France, however, shows the serious intentions of Pilsudski.”° The French government’s

own negotiations with the Germans at this time showed that country’s willingness to come to an agreement with Germany itself; and Hitler could play off the two allies against each other by manipulating the sincere but uncoordinated desire of each to secute peace.’ There were discussions of the provisions of the German draft during December, but the signal event in the negotiations was a meeting between Rauschning and Pilsudski in Warsaw on 11 December. Shortly before, there had been a dispute between Rauschning and Forster over the handling of affairs in Danzig, and both had gone to Berlin for a settlement of the issue. This had been decided in Rauschning’s favor on 8 December,

and on the same day there had been other discussions of the policy to be followed towatd Poland. When Rauschning went to Warsaw, therefore, he had a clear picture of

Hitler’s wishes.” The conversation between Pilsudski and Rauschning was frank and detailed. They canvassed the outstanding problems in Danzig-Polish and German-Polish relations; and it became clear that while some cooperation was possible and Pilsudski was

willing to recognize the German character of the free city, certain more far-reaching proposals that Rauschning had planned to raise were inopportune. Pilsudski was evidently of the opinion that any meeting between himself and Hitler would have to wait some time. Pilsudski knew that Hitler would be preoccupied with domestic affairs for several years. Combined with the need for security and a desire for a stronger position in world diplomacy, this factor contributed to Pilsudski’s willingness to come

to a settlement with

Imperialismus gegeniiber Polen bis 1939,” Jahrbuch fiir Geschichte der UdSSR. und der volksdemokratischen Lander Exropas, 12 [1968], 346-47).

WAGE C2 No.0 sea: 74. B.D., 2d, 6, No. 59, n. 1. 75. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 77, 79, 81, 82, 84, 87, 88, 90; Lipski Papers, No. 15.

76. Laroche, pp. 138-45; see also B.D., 2d, 6, No. 59; Vereker (Warsaw) telegram 45 of 10 November

1933,

Foreign Office C 9895/9895/18.

late Novem77. The German-French negotiations are examined in chap. 7. The release by the Quai d’Orsay in designed to ber 1933 of secret German documents revealing the real aspirations of Germany may have been of those documents first The chapter. same the in discussed is incident This government. Polish the warn the time being because tefers to the fact that “Germany has assumed a conciliatory attitude toward Poland for demands by other special efforts are being made in this direction to secure the attainment of the German the demand for the return means. These demands have, of course, not been given up in any way any more than of at least part of the former German colonies ovetseas.” 78. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 102, 109; Memorandum

by Meyer, 8 December

and a note by Rauschning of the same date in ibid., frames E 468618—21.

1933, T-120, 2915/6203/E 468615—-17

60

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Germany. He was also, however, quite explicit on one point that the Germans for many yeats refused to accept as a fundament of Polish policy, namely that Poland would not ally itself with Germany against the Soviet Union for the obvious reason that it would then lose its independence to Germany. As Rauschning reported on his return to Berlin, “Pilsudski also brought up in the conversation that Poland would never under any citcumstances respond to any German attempts to turn Polish efforts toward the Russian Ukraine.”” The subject of a German-Polish alliance against Russia was, as we know from Rauschning, on Hitler’s mind at the time, but it was not formally raised again by the Germans until later.8° The promising beginning that had been made on the immediate proposal for a treaty renouncing the use of force was carried forward relatively rapidly, considering the legacy of controversies and suspicions in the past. A new atmosphere was discernible in Berlin. As Lipski wrote to the director of Beck’s cabinet on 3 December, “As if by orders from the top, a change of front toward us is taking place all along the line. In Hitlerite spheres they talk about the new Polish-German friendship.”®! Agteement was reached on 26 January 1934. With a reservation that covered Poland’s obligations under its League membership and treaties with France, the two powers promised to settle all problems that might arise between them by direct negotiations and without recourse to force. The agreement was to run for ten years, subject to extension as long as this was mutually agreeable.” Poland had secured a degree of temporary security; Hitler had broken the ring of French alliances around Germany, both by the agreement itself and by the deliberate secrecy with which it was prepared.®? The first major settlement, except for the concordat, that Germany had signed was with the very country it was generally expected to be most likely to attack. At home and abroad the Hitler government could point to this diplomatic triumph as a sign of its peaceful intentions, while the Polish government reinforced the weakness of France that had contributed to Warsaw’s willingness to sign with Germany in the first place. There might be skepticism among both German and Polish diplomats. One diplomat with resetvations, the French ambassador in Washington, saw the meaning of the pact clearly: Germany merely wanted peace in the East for a few years to strengthen its position at home so that it might then dominate Europe.§+ The Italian ambassador to Berlin feared that the agreement might be accompanied by more far-reaching German-Polish understandings, would be followed by the annexation of Austria and a subsequent turning against Czechoslovakia that would produce a Germany most difficult “for any coalition, however powerful, to deal with without enormous sacrifice of life.”®° There can be no doubt, however, about the psychological and political 79. German Foreign Ministry Memorandum IV Po 9133 of 14 December 1933 (initialed by von Lieres), T-120, 3024/6601/E 49507277.

For additional information on the Pilsudski-Rauschning meeting see Rauschning,

Die Revolution des Nihilismus, pp. 428-32; Breyer, p. 94; Moltke telegram 79 of 13 December, T-120, 2915/6204/E 468613—14 (submitted to Hitler on 14 December, 1468/3015/D 598307); Crosby (Warsaw) dispatch 126 of 19 December 1933, State 760c.60K/304. 80. Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction, pp. 117-19.

81. Lipski Papers, p. 105. 82. On the course of the final negotiations see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 131, 168, 169, 186, 203, 211, 217-19; Lipski

Papers, Nos. 17-24; Cudahy dispatch 141 of 3 January 1934, State 660c.6231/202; Gilbert (Geneva) dispatch 836 of 7 March 1934, and Cudahy dispatch 410 of 6 September 1934, State 760c.6212/31 and 38.

83. For a good picture of the secrecy and of the lies Lipski told under instructions from Beck see Mastny’s telegram of 27 January and his report 6 of 29 January 1934, Czech documents in T-120, 1041/1809/413689 and 41358993. 84. Memorandum of Under Secretary William Phillips on a conversation with French Ambassador de Laboulaye on 27 January 1934, State 760c.6212/10. 85. Phipps (Berlin) telegram 30-Saving of 7 February 1934, Foreign Office C 929/138/18. The comment on this by Mr. Perowne in the British Foreign Office deserves quoting: “Signor Cerruti’s prognostications . . . may

Eastern Europe

61

impact at the time of a treaty that seemed to reconci le two countries most Europeans thought irreconcilable. The relations between Germany and Poland were henceforth by no means untroubled, but their alignment with each other drastically altered the situation in Europe. If Germany’s policy towatd Poland moved in new directions in 1933, its attitude toward the Soviet Union was also full of surprises. German - Russian relations when Hitler came to power were by no means as good as they had been some years earlier. In the last years of the Weimar Republic, relations between the two powers had deteriorated for a number of reasons, among which the apparent rapprochement between Germany and the Western Powers was of special importance. The Russians feared that a GermanFrench rapprochement might well lead to an alliance against itself, a fear that was exaggerated though not entirely unjustified. As Russia, therefore, drew a trifle closer to France and Poland, signing non-aggtession pacts with both countries, German interest in close relations with the Soviets decreased, and this in turn reinforced Russia’s desire to strengthen its ties, or at least ease tension, with France. Furthermore, the long-te rm pros-

pects for German-Russian cooperation were lessened by changes affecting precisel y those fields of practical cooperation that had done much to bring them together: military and trade relations. In the military field, Germany and the Soviet Union had long cooperated to the benefit of both and the worry of others.8° The moves toward rearmament in Germany, however, that were already under way before Hitler came to power, would make Germany less dependent on Soviet aid, while the emergence of the new cadres and leaders of the Red army reduced Russian interest in attendance at German training courses. In 1932 these trends were already bringing about a reduction in the level of military cooperation and hints that the German military training and experiment stations in the Soviet Union would be closed.®” Similarly, the build-up of Soviet industry had implications both for their interest in the skills of German technicians and the eventual level of German-Soviet trade. The economic partnership of the two countries was at least partially self-liquidating as the end of the first Five-Year Plan inclined the Russians to reduce the role of German technicians.§ Any large-scale armament boom in Germany, on the other hand, would reduce German interest in Russia as an export market for machinery and other goods produced in factories that but for Russian orders would have been idled by the depression. Whatever new policies the two nations might adopt toward each other, the basis of their earlier association was already weakening. Hitler’s attitude toward Russia has already been discussed. He intended to take as much territory as he could and as soon as possible, and he was of the opinion that the

well be fulfilled; but it may be hoped that the process of digestion will be longer and more difficult than he seems to fear. But the dynamism of the present rulers of Germany is something quite out of the common; and ordinary yardsticks are useless where they are concerned. Moreover this is a clear case where ‘L’appetit vient en mangeant.””

86. The best summary is in Hans W. Gatzke, “Russian-German Military Collaboration during the Weimar Republic,” American Historical Review, 63, No. 3 (April 1958), pp. 565-97.

87. The waning of German-Soviet military cooperation as a continuing phenomenon of the period 1932=33, without any significant acceleration as a result of Hitlet’s coming to power, is a main theme of chap. IX of Karlheinz Niclauss, Die Sowjetunion und Hitlers Machtergreifung (Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1966). A document dated 26 January 1933, published in Karl-Heinz Voelker, Dokumente und Dokumentarfotos zur Geschichte der deutschen Luftwaffe (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1968), pp. 78-79, indicates that the German air force station at

Lipetsk was scheduled to be closed down in the fall of 1933; at the beginning of 1933, the German military attaché in Moscow was told that the stations would be closed down and he himself was to resign as of 1 March (Hermann Teske, General Ernst Késtring [Frankfurt/M: Mittler, 1966], pp. 69-70). 88. Von Dirksen, p. 125.

62

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

rule of the Communists in Russia was advantageous for Germany in that it simultaneously weakened Russia’s powers of resistance and provided him with an excellent basis for propaganda inside and outside Germany. The realization of his ambitions, however, had to be deferred beyond the period of domestic consolidation and rearmament. During that period, Germany need have no fixed attitude toward Russia as long as rela-

tions were neither too close nor too hostile. For domestic political reasons and because of his personal preferences, Hitler did not want the relationship to be very close, and he was to forestall all efforts on the part of either his own diplomats or occasional feelers from the other side to make them so. On the other hand, because of his low estimate of

Soviet strength, Hitler was not particularly worried about Soviet hostility, though he would keep it within bounds if no great concessions were needed. This description of Hitler’s attitude toward the Soviet Union in the years from 1933 until the spring of 1939 is not based so much on explicit statements by Hitler as on a survey of the series of decisions about relations with Russia made by the German government in that period.®? The subject of German-Russian relations in those years was of far greater interest to the German professional diplomats than to Hitler. It may be that the foregoing description of his attitudes systematizes Hitler’s views to an unwarranted degree, but at least there is

no evidence to suggest alternative general perspectives. Certainly the inauguration of the new regime in Berlin boded ill for relations with the Soviet Union. Hitler’s views on expansion eastward, his publicly proclaimed and promptly implemented policy of suppressing the German Communist party, his close association with Alfred Rosenberg, all could be considered symbols of an anti-Russian policy. Nevertheless, the Soviet Union was at first quite cautious in the face of the new regime, partly for ideological, partly for practical reasons. The ideological reasons were similar to the miscalculation made by the German Communist party, namely that Hitler’s policy of destroying the republic, the Social Democratic party, and the trade unions would drive the German workers into the Communist fold and thus, by making the class conflict in Germany more acute, make the revolution and Communist triumph more nearly imminent.% It was also believed that the National Socialist regime would not last long and would hasten the collapse of capitalism in Germany. The practical reasons for Soviet reluctance to turn to new policies were of a different sort. In the first place, the Soviet, like many German soldiers and diplomats, hoped for a continuation of that cooperation between the two countries which had proved so advantageous for both and to which individuals on both sides would hark back nostalgically for years to come. Neither the German nor the Soviet “Rapallo generation” of soldiers and diplomats had any illusions about the domestic policies of the other country, but separated as they were by what they considered to be the common enemy of Poland, each felt able to deal with any domestic advocates of the other’s social and political system. In this regard, the National Socialist regime looked to the Soviets as simply mote vehement and ruthless than its predecessors. Such a situation had not prevented the Soviet Union from having good relations with Turkey and Italy, as German diplomats in Moscow were to be reminded quite frequently. In a similar way, the Moscow government was quite willing to give considerable aid to Chiang Kai-shek and the

Chinese Nationalists both before and after the Nationalists attempted to suppress the Chinese Communist party. As will be seen, there was one important difference between 89. For a general treatment see Jean-Baptiste Duroselle (ed.), Les relations germano-sovittiques de 1933 a 1939 (Paris: Armand Colin, 1954). This book is now partially replaced by the work of Niclauss. 90. Niclauss (pp. 96-100) holds the contrary view that the opinions expressed by Soviet and Comintern leadets to this effect were purely camouflage for Russian quiescence in the face of the destruction of the German Communist party.

Eastern Europe

63

these apparently analogous situations. The Soviet regime did not fear the military potential of Turkey or Italy. Once it had forcibly asserted its rights in Manchuria in 1929, it did not fear any action that might be taken by a China dominated by the Kuomintang. But Germany was different. As the Soviet leaders knew all too well, Germany had been capable of occupying huge stretches of Russian territory in World War I, and there was always the possibility that a re-armed Germany might try to do so again, perhaps with the tacit or even active support of the Western powers. That prospect, however frightening, lay in an uncertain future. In the meantime there were good reasons why Germany might follow a more moderate policy, of which the support given to the German economy by Russian orders formed a significant part. It was with reference to the interest in Russian orders evidenced by German industrialists, whom the Soviet leaders thought in charge of the new government, that they reassured themselves about the intentions of the Hitler regime.®! This illusory assessment of what the Russians believed to be the realities of the situation was probably more important than the hasty reassurances voiced by German diplomats.”2 As violent incidents against Soviet nationals and institutions in Germany increased, however, and as the election campaign brought forth a torrent of anti-Communist and anti-Russian oratory, the leaders of the Soviet government became worried and insisted that the private words of diplomats be matched by a public pronouncement from the new chancellor. The public repetition of Hitler’s assurance to von Neurath that he wanted to maintain “our previous political, economic-political, and military-political line” and would

“not allow any sort of changes to occur in German policy toward Russia”’* had to wait until after the election, as would the equally spectacular gesture of ratifying the 1931 protocol extending the Berlin treaty that had never been submitted to the Reichstag. A vehement anti-Communist political campaign inside Germany, designed to help secure National Socialist control of the government, was obviously not the time for Hitler to make speeches assuring the Soviet Union of his goodwill.?> The one gesture that could be made as an earnest sign of German intentions was a quiet extension—with Hitlet’s approval—of a special credit of 140 million reichsmark, deferring repayment of a portion of earlier credits granted by Germany to Russia.°® Otherwise the Germans temporarily partied Soviet worries by referring to their own concern about Russia’s closer relations with France.’ Continued incidents within Germany, however, exacerbated the situation. The Soviet regime, with its extensive experience in organizing “spontaneous” demonstra-

tions, was not easily convinced that the attacks on Soviet citizens in Germany were without government authorization. This was particularly true in regard to the interference with the operations of DEROP (Deutsche Vertriebsgesellschaft fiir russische Olprodukte A.G.), 91. Thus Ktestinskii to the Czech chargé d’affaires ad interim in Moscow on 4 February 1933 (Kosek report 6, Czech document in T-120, 1316/2376/D 497059). 045372; 92. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 6, 10; Meyer to von Dirksen tel. 17 of 9 February 1933, T-120, 2789/6025/H

Niclauss, p 86.

D.D.F., 1st, 93. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 29, 41, 55; von Dirksen note of 7 Match 1933, T-120, 1071/1908/429509-18; 2, Nos. 398, 416. 94,,G-Ds G 1,.Nos 10, 255: : : 95. Ibid., No. 43. der Kreml (Bonn: Athenaum, 96. Ibid., n. 7; von Dirksen, p. 122; Niclauss, pp. 87-88; Gustav Hilger, Wir and

W. Kliefoth of the 1964), p. 269; Sackett (Berlin) tel. 34 of 11 March 1933, State 661.6231 /132. Alfred

had informed him that the American embassy in Berlin recorded on 7 March that Consul General Schlesinger mined that year, “furs on me backs Germans had told the Russians that they would take as security gold to be

fish from the Volga” (State of the foxes still running wild in the forests of Siberia,” and “uncaught : ; ). 661.6231/134 or a necessity financial of result the was extension credit this for request It is not known whether the Soviet

test of German intentions; Niclauss assumes the former.

SGI

RGA

Nos, 29893, 41), 73.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the agency that sold all over Germany petroleum products imported from Russia and formed a key element in the structure of German-Soviet trade. These and other types of difficulties created for Soviet nationals and institutions in Germany were to provide a continuous source of aggravation in the coming months.”® The German government eventually did make a public effort to keep relations with Russia on a reasonable basis. In his speech to the Reichstag on 23 Match, Hitler followed

a text tecommended by the Foreign Ministry with the exception of a reference to the Berlin treaty. He promised the continuation of a mutually profitable policy of friendship, mote easily conducted by a nationalistic regime, and in no way affected by the fight against communism inside Germany, which was a purely internal affair.” Furthermore, the German government tried to reassure Moscow about the Four Power Pact negotiations and promised that the passage of the Enabling Act would now empower the German govetnment to proceed to ratification of the protocol extending the Berlin treaty. This step was finally agreed to by the cabinet on 4 April but was not announced for some time while minor questions were being settled. An additional delay before Hitler saw the Soviet ambassador, Leo Khinchuk, on 28 April and until ratifications were

exchanged on 5 May undermined the value of any such gesture.! Nevertheless, there was at least a temporary relaxation in response to the German action. The constant recriminations

about

incidents

involving

harassment

of Soviet

nationals,

however,

showed that the Russians were by no means entirely reassured by Hitler’s soothing words to Khinchuk. More important in keeping the Soviet. Union from completely turning its back upon Germany were Russian troubles with Japan and the strain imposed on AngloSoviet relations by the Metropolitan-Vickers trial then in progress.'°! Simultaneously, moreover,

the Soviet leaders looked more

closely at their relations with Poland and

France. As to Poland, the publicity attendant on the Hitler-Wysocki conversation of 2 May suggested to Moscow the possibility that Germany might reverse its traditional alignment with Russia against Poland.'°? In regard to France, for the first time since Russia left its world war alliance, a French military attaché arrived in the Soviet capital on

8 April 1933.1°° German-Soviet military contacts were still continuing, but in April and May serious rifts were discernible.!% The Soviet Union was publicizing a change in its official line on the Treaty of Versailles, arguing now that revision meant war.!% Hitler told von Dirksen at the end of May that he still wanted friendly relations with the Soviet Union; but the continuation of incidents in Germany and the mission of Rosenberg to London, which indicated that the apostle of eastward expansion was still in Hitler’s

98. Ibid., Nos. 43, n. 3, 104, 134, 137, 140, 157, 166 (the missing words can be supplied from the copy in T-

120, 2372/4602/E 189416), 197, n. 4, 186; Note by von Biilow, 16 March 1933, T-120, 2372/4602/E 189414: Niclauss, pp. 100-05, As a man whose interests were in the economic field, Khinchuk was especially concerned

about DEROP (see Lionel Kochan, Russia and the Weimar Republic (Cambridge: Bowes & Bowes, 1954], p. 149). In retaliation for the German actions against DEROP, the Soviet government forced the closing of DRUSAG, the German agricultural concession in the North Caucasus (von Dirksen, p. 124). 99. The

speech is in Domarus,

1: 229-37;

the Foreign Ministry draft of 18 March

2789/6025/H 045451.

1933, in T-120,

100. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 121, n. 6, 136, 140, 147, 166, 194, 197, 198; Hilger, p. 255; Niclauss, pp. 88-89.

The Italians had been urging Berlin to try for better relations with Russia (G.D., C, 1, No. 403; von Dirksen note of 6 April 1933, T-120, 1071/1908/429581; von Biilow memorandum of 19[?] April 1933, T-120, 2371/4602/E 189237). 101. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 204, 212, 232; Czech chargé a.i. Moscow report 23 of 15 May 1933, Czech document in

T-120, 1316/2376/D 497081-82. 102. G.D., C, 1, No. 342.

103. William E. Scott, Adiance Against Hitler (Durham, N. C.: Duke University Press, 1962), p. 106.

104. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 147, 197, 252; U.S. 1933, 1: 120; Hilger, pp. 256-57. 105. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 212, 232, 245.

Eastern Europe

65

favor, left the Russians doubtful and suspicious.!% If Rosenberg’s

London

mission in May touched a sensitive Russian

nerve, the

London memorandum of Alfred Hugenberg in June was to have even greater repercussions on German-Soviet relations. Hugenberg, who had been a bitter opponent of the Weimar Republic, played a key role in aiding Hitlet’s rise to power. He had imagined that with the backing of President Hindenburg and the army he would exercise great influence in the new government; but his abilities did not match his imagination, and he received no support from the army, the president, or the other non-National Socialist members in the cabinet who were all willing to go along with Hitler even when slightly unhappy about some aspects of his policies. Holding several ministerial portfolios in the economic field, Hugenberg went as a member of the German delegation to the World

Economic Conference which opened in London on 12 June 1933, while inside Germany the National Socialists were rapidly demolishing Hugenberg’s political party, the German Nationalists (DNVP).'°7 For short-term advantages, Hugenberg was pushing a foreign trade policy even more isolationist than that of Hitler and Schacht, and he presented his

ideas to the conference in the form of a memorandum. With its demand for high protective tariffs, its call for continued

struggle against the Untermensch for colonies and

living space for Germany and an end to existing conditions in Russia, the memorandum did not have the full support of the German delegation but did have a deplorable effect on world opinion.'°8 It provided the occasion for Hitler to rid himself of a partner he no longer needed, but it also created new problems in Germany’s relations with Russia. Most of what Hugenberg had said could be subscribed to by his colleagues and by Hitler, but it was certainly inopportune to flaunt such ideas in public. The Russian government had been suspicious of Hugenberg from the beginning,

and they found it hard to believe that his statements had been made without at least the tacit authorization of Hitler.! Soviet fears were aroused; and though Hugenberg really was acting on his own, the suspicion that he voiced actual German aspirations was quite

warranted. It was the inopportune publicity that Hitler found inexpedient. There was a considerable uproar in Moscow, and the Germans were to find it difficult indeed to dis-

pel the doubts that this incident left behind. The fear in Soviet circles was real.!!° The German military bases in Russia were closed, and visits by Soviet officers to Germany were canceled.!"! To justify these actions, the Russians asserted that von Papen had told the French about German-Soviet military cooperation,'!? but in fact by this time the

106. Ibid., Nos. 232, 245, 284; von Dirksen, pp. 122—23.

107. The best summary is in Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 208-14; important, but strongly apologetic in tone, is Anton Ritthaler (ed.), “Eine Etappe auf Hitlers Weg zur ungeteilten Macht, Hugenbergs Rucktritt als Reichsminister,” Vierteliabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 8, No. 2 (April 1960), 193-219; a very detailed account is in John L. Heineman, “Constantin von Neurath and German Policy at the London Economic Conference of 1933: Backcf. erounds to the Resignation of Alfred Hugenberg,” Journal ofModern History, 41, No. 2 (June 1969), 160-88; 301-14. Niclauss, pp. 115-17; Klaus Hildebrand, Vom Reich zum Weltreich (Munich: Wilhelm Fink, 1969), pp.

108. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 312, 335, pp: 266-67. Important details National Socialists to discredit Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. memoirs (p. 212).

338; Hey to von Dirksen, 20 June 1933, T-120, 3082/6609/E 497091; Schmidt, on the attendant intrigues within the German delegation, especially by the

Hugenberg, are to be found in a series of reports of 17—21 June 1933, in 101/26, f. 463-79. Hanfstaengl is charactetistically silent on this matter in his

109. G.D., C, 1, No. 6; von Dirksen, p. 127. of 22 June 1933, T-120, 2789/ mG aGu ieNiasa 92510 52/59581 7356" 361s vou Dirksen teport A/1245 1071/1908/429650-60; Memo6025/H 045811-16; Memorandum of von Dirksen, 22 June 1933, T-120, tandum

of von

Neurath

RM

903 of 30 June 1933, ibid., frames 429673—74;

Report of the Czech legation

T-120, 1316/2376/D 49709196. Moscow for April, May, June 1933 of 30 June 1933, Czech document in

(Hartmann report 154/33 of 1 August 111. G.D., G, 1, Nos. 439 (p. 822), 339. The Germans replied in kind 1933, T-120, 2760/5892/E 432509). 112. GD) |G. 1, No: 403:

66

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Russians themselves were already receiving French officers.!!? The German government was interested in keeping the situation from getting out of hand, and the press was instructed to reftain from attacking the Soviet tegime on 5 July.!!* Contacts between the two countries in the summer of 1933 show a continued interest in preventing an excessive deterioration of their relations.!15 There was evidence of this in the friendly tones and fond farewells accompanying the closing of the German bases in the Soviet Union,!"6 and in the efforts made, though unsuccessfully, to reach some agreement on the current problems in German-Russian trade.'!” Clearly there was great reluctance overt the parting of the ways in both Berlin and Moscow. A further attempt was made to reopen the possibility of good relations between the two powers by arranging a meeting in late October between Hitler and Nikolai Krestinskii, the Soviet deputy commissar for foreign affairs, former Soviet ambassador to

Germany, and a man considered by the German embassy in Moscow to be a continuing advocate of close relations between the Soviet Union and Germany. The efforts of the German embassy staff, supported by the German Foreign Ministry, came to naught.'!8 The failure to hold the meeting could be blamed formally on the Russians, since Hitler did finally agree reluctantly that he would receive Krestinskii; but a series of new incidents, clearly provoked by the German government itself, was both responsible for the failure of this effort and an obvious indication that Hitler did not want a rapprochement. The most serious of these incidents, the threatened rupture of press relations between the two nations arising out of the arrest of the representatives of Tass and Izvestia when they tried to cover the Reichstag fire trial in Leipzig, was the result of orders Hitler himself had given.!!? As this and other related questions were placed before him, Hitler stated categorically that “a restoration of the German-Russian relationship would be impossible.’’!2° He was willing to receive Krestinskii, and he did not favor breaking off relations with Russia or providing the Russians with a pretext for doing so; but he made it clear that the steps he was willing to take to meet complaints about incidents were of a tactical and temporary nature.'*! Whatever hints the Russians might give, this policy line provided merely a framework for reducing unnecessary tension but no basis whatever for a new tapprochement.!”2 It is not surprising that under these circumstances, and in view of the GermanPolish rapprochement, the Soviet Union should have continued its search for potential allies elsewhere. In the summer

of 1933, Soviet relations with Poland improved, and

feelers for an alliance were extended to France.'?? Former 113.

German

Military

Attaché

Hartmann,

“Beilage

IV

zu

Bericht

6/35,”

French prime minister 11

February

1935,

'T-120,

2760/5892/E 43298689. 114. Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/1, f. 44. 115. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 389, 404; von Dirksen to von Billow. 17 August 1933, T-120, 1071/1908/429729-36. 116. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 409, 439, 460; Hartmann report 164 of 17 October 1933, T-120, 2760/5892/E 432697.

117. G.D., C, 1, No. 421; Minutes of the H. P. A. for 12 and 13 July 1933, T-120, 2612/5650/H 003695—96 and H 003699; Dodd (Berlin) dispatch 37 of 29 July 1933, State 861.51 German credits/36. For a valuable analysis of one key element in German-Soviet trade see U.S. Consul John H. Morgan (Berlin), “The Tendency of the Import of Soviet Oil into Germany to Decline during 1933 and the Possible Significance of this Decline with Regard to General German-Russian Trade Relations,” 21 December 1933, State 662.61/10. 118. Twardowski to Hey, 22 August 1933, T-120, 2790/6025/H 046103; G.D., C, 1, No. 438; Dirksen, p. 128. 119. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 428, 455, 458, 467, 476, 477; German press instruction of 26 September 1933, Bundes-

archiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/1, f. 110. The incident over the Leipzig trial was settled by the direct intervention of Goring (the most recent account in Niclauss, pp. 142-46). 120. G.D., C, 1, No. 457. 121. Ibid., No. 456. 122. Ibid., 1, Nos. 461, 462, 470, 487; 2, Nos. 12, 14; Hilger, p. 261; von Dirksen, p. 130; Niclauss, pp. 13441.

Von Dirksen’s transfer from Moscow at this time appears not to have been related to Hitler’s policy decision. 123. G.D., C, 1, No. 379; Scott, p. 121.

Eastern Europe

G7

Edouard Herriot and French ait minister Pierre Cot were greeted in the Soviet Union with much emphasis and publicity in August and September.!24 The crisis in GermanSoviet telations brought on by the September incidents gave the Soviet government the Opportunity to warn Germany that it was obliged to turn to France and Poland in the face of Berlin’s policy. As these warnings and the friendly farewells to the Germans who had run German military installations in the Soviet Union indicate, the Russians were still interested in cooperation, but under the circumstances Germany would have had to take the initiative in mending the fences.!25 Any such step was precluded by Hitler’s policy directives. Two other East European areas with which German policy was directly concerned in 1933 and the following year were the state of Lithuania and the movement for Ukrainian independence. As an immediate neighbor of Germany, as a country exercising control over the Memel territory lost by Germany at the end of the war, and as a neighbor of Poland, Lithuania was a country whose importance for German diplomacy in the 1920s and 1930s was vastly greater than that of any of the other Baltic countries carved out of Czarist Russia.!2° German concern over the treatment of the German population in the Memel area, and in particular, Lithuanian observance, or rather frequent nonobservance, of the statute governing that territory were continuing factors in German-

Lithuanian relations. The possible strain imposed on their relations was generally outweighed by the fact that Poland’s occupation of the Vilna area led Lithuania to share Germany’s enmity to Poland and thereby forged an anti-Polish triangle with Russia.!?” In addition

to the Memel

dispute,

an

occasional

shadow

was

thtown

over

German-

Lithuanian relations by periodic talk of an arrangement under which Poland would yield to Germany Danzig and the Polish Corridor, or at least the northern part of the corridor, and would secure an alternative outlet to the sea by gaining control over Lithuania.'*8 There is nothing to suggest that Hitler was in any special way concerned about Lithuania before 1933, and he was to pay relatively little attention to it thereafter. In his eyes, it was included in the areas suitable for Germany’s Lebensraum—Russia and its border states!29—but that was a project for the future. In the first years of National Socialist rule, German-Lithuanian relations were affected by two developments. The improvement of Germany’s relations with Poland and the deterioration of its relations with Russia removed a significant tie between the two neighbors, but the impact of this change was felt slowly and did not manifest itself clearly for over a year. In the meantime, Germany tried to keep relations from deteriorating, even at the expense of some economic concessions to Lithuania, especially in regard to the pig exports that were of great importance to the Lithuanian economy.!*° While Hitler wanted no publicly con124. In part this was probably for the benefit of the Germans as well as the French (G.D., C, 1, No. 439); but Germany’s departure from the League in October would make the French receptive to the alliance suggested by Moscow (Scott, pp. 134ff.). 125. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 444, 460. 126. There ate no satisfactory treatments of German-Lithuanian relations in this petiod. Two important bei der studies based on archival materials are Felix-Heinrich Gentzen, “Die Rolle der ‘Deutschen Stiftung’ UdSSR und der der Geschichte fiir Jahrbuch 1939,” Marz im Memellandes des Annexion der Vorbereitung (Wurzburg: Volksdemokratischen Lander, 5 (1961), 71-94; and Ernst-Albrecht Plieg, Das Memelland 1920-1939 zone of Germany; Holzner, 1962). The first of these is limited to the perspectives then authorized in the Soviet the second reads like a Pan-German propaganda tract. ' 125. 127. For an interesting report on the nature and history of this triangle see G.D., C, 2, No. indication that it was ever 128. References to this plan recur from time to time in the sources, but there is no minister in Warsaw of 26 considered seriously. A good summary of the whole idea is in a report of the Czech January 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1316/2376/D 497176—82. 129. Mein Kampf, 2:742. 130. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 45, 47, 48, 354, 373; Memorandum

by Meyer, 17 July 1933, T-120, 1466/3015/D

68

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

spicuous agreement with Lithuania, he did approve trade concessions and authorized an informal agreement on the handling of other current problems in August 1933.'>! The second factor, which was to have more dramatic implications for GermanLithuanian relations, was the interaction between the activities of the new movements of

a National Socialist character among the Germans of the Memel area and the interference with the rights of the Germans by the central government of Lithuania, partly in continued pursuance of national aims, partly in response to German agitation.'*? In 1933 two National Socialist parties competed with each other in Memel.'*? The first was the “Christlich-Soziale Arbeitsgemeinschaft” (CSA) of Theodor von Sass. This was the pre1933 Memel National Socialist party, appearing publicly for the first time in the munici-

pal elections of May 1933. The personal peculiarities of von Sass and the extreme character of CSA agitation threatened to discredit national socialism and provoke Lithuanian reprisals against which Germany could not yet defend the Memel Germans. Some groups within the Memel area, with the support of state and party offices inside Germany, there-

upon organized another National Socialist party, the “Sozialistische Volksgemeinschaft” (Sovog) of Ernst Neumann. There was a short but noisy struggle between the two patties, in which the Sovog won out.!*4 Von Sass had appealed to Hitler himself, as well as to his party friends in adjacent East Prussia, but the German National Socialist party including its foreign policy office (APA) and the agencies of the German government sided with Neumann and, in fact, helped finance his party almost from its formation in

the middle of June.'*> Such taking of sides between rival National Socialist groups may well have been an indication of a policy decision that the less frenetic appeal of Neumann’s Sovog better suited the long-term aims of the National Socialist regime. This choice should be considered analogous to Hitler’s previously examined instructions to the Danzig National Socialists at about the same time that they avoid complications with Poland and to his initial siding with Rauschning against the more impulsive Forster; the ultimate settlement of the Memel issue, like the Danzig issue, would come not from the

local National Socialists but from a rearmed Germany. The Lithuanian government, however, was disturbed by the appearance of these National Socialist movements, whatever their tactics and orientation. In the face of the

rising nationalistic agitation in Germany, more rigorous measures were taken against the 596290-91. 131. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 281, 405; Memorandum by von Bilow, 1 June 1933, T-120, 1466/3015/D 596287. 132. Of the two studies cited in n. 126, above, that of Gentzen concentrates on the German agitation, that of

Plieg on the Lithuanian measutes of repression. 133. A brief summary by Martin Broszat in Gutachten des Instituts fir Zettgeschichte, 1 (Munich: Selbtsverlag, 1958),

395400. 134. Gentzen, pp. 76-79; Plieg, pp. 108-15. Most of the documents seized by the Lithuanian authorities and used as evidence in the later trial of Memel Germans gtew out of this feud between the two National Socialist movements. Extensive

French translations German

documentation

of a group of these documents on

the trial may

be found

are in Foreign Office N 3515/96/59.

in T-120,

3475/8923/E

625227-798

am

3498/8959/E 628124206. 135. Plieg (p. 111) cites the founding proclamation from a Memel newspaper of 18 June 1933. The earliest reference to financial support from the German Foreign Ministry that I have been able to locate is a marginal note, referring to a payment of 3,000 Reichsmark on 15 July 1933, on telegram 47 of 4 September 1933, from this German Consul General Toepke in Memel (T-120, 3070/6606/E 496448). The telegram requests a further installment out of a previously established fund, so that the decision to support the Neumann party must have been made in the German Foreign Ministry at least by the middle of July. It is noteworthy that just as Gentzei cannot find evidence of Lithuanian violations of the Memel Statute, Plieg’s research in the German Foreign Ministry archives failed to turn up any of the numerous telegrams on Neumann’s financial support (ibid., frames E 496449—53). That these payments represented a clear choice, not simply the financing of another

German group abroad, is shown by the intended use of a subsequent payment: “Special action against the Volkskurier,” the newspaper of the CSA (Halem [Vice-Consul Memel] telegram 61 of 25 September 1933, ibid., frame E 496450; cf. Plieg, p. 114).

Eastern Europe

69

Memel Germans. In the fall of 1933 and the following winter, a series of steps ranging from the dismissal of officials to the arrest of many leaders of both National Socialist gtoups created resentment in the Memel territory, aroused objections in Betlin, and led the German government to take economic reprisals.!°° Neither these reprisals nor the diplomatic warnings of Great Britain and the other powers that had signed the Memel Convention restrained the Lithuanian government from mote drastic action.!37 The president of the Memel Directorate was dismissed on 28 June, and the National Socialist patties were prohibited on 13 July 1934. In December, the trial of those National Socialist leaders arrested in February was begun in Kovno. There was, as a result, con-

tinued friction between Germany and Lithuania. Having left the League and thus without

a direct basis of intervention, Germany repeatedly asked the signatories of the Memel Convention to intervene with the Lithuanian government. In spite of repeated warnings,

especially from Great Britain, the Lithuanians proceeded on their course, and beyond the maintenance of their economic reprisals—which hurt the Memellanders too—thetre was little that the German government could do. Until the crisis in 1935, there would be little

change.138 The other East European area of significance for early National Socialist diplomacy was the Ukraine. A people divided territorially in 1933 between the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Romania, the Ukrainians were represented in Germany by several varieties of feuding nationalist organizations, some of which maintained close contact with right-wing circles.'5? Some of these groups were in touch with the National Socialists, especially with Rosenberg, whose vision of an alliance between Germany and the Ukraine after the disappearance of Poland and the destruction of the U.S.S.R. seemed congenial to Ukrainian nationalist agitation.'4° The ideological affinity toward

national socialism of the integral nationalism of many Ukrainian émigrés appears to have blinded them to the fact that Hitler’s agrarian expansionism was in reality the gravest threat to any and all Ukrainian aspirations. Their naive belief that this expansionism could be diverted from the rich farm lands of the Ukraine to the food deficit areas fur-

ther north is otherwise difficult to understand. The first disappointment of the Ukrainian 136. G.D., C, 1, No. 405, n. 3; 2, Nos. 142, 214, 215, 348; Stafford (U.S. chargé a.i. Kovno) dispatch 6 of 9

January 1934, State 760M.62/92. 137. Stafford dispatch 281 of 16 October 1933, State 860M.01-Memel/251;

G.D., C 2, No. 388; Preston

(British chargé Kovno) dispatches 158 of 1 September 1933 and 178 of 12 October 1933, Foreign Office N 6955 and N 7691/541/59. 138. On the difficulties in German-Lithuanian relations in 1934 and the interventions of the signatory powers in Kovno see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 67, 75, 68, 80, 131, 142, 144, 193, 196, 199, 203, 205, 209, 219, 230, n. 7, 266, n.

9, 312, 314, 381, n. 2, 384; Dodd dispatch 1064 of 23 July 1934, State 860M.01-Memel/293; Stafford dispatch 133 of 26 September, 1934, ibid., /308; Stafford dispatch 155 of 4 December 1934, ibid., /323; Memorandum by von Bulow, 22 December 1934, T-120, 2372/4602/E 189935-936; Speaight (British Foreign Office), “Memorandum respecting the Situation in Memel,” 13 March 1934, Foreign Office N 1618/96/59; Memo-

tandum by Collier (London), 6 April 1934, and Sir John Simon to Knatchbull-Hugessen (Riga), 11 April 1934, Foreign Office N 2146/96/59; Memorandum by Collier, 6 October 1934, Foreign Office N 5658/96/59; Note

by Grey (London), “Situation in Memel,” 4 December 1934, Foreign Office N 6735/96/59. From the records it is evident that the British government made the most determined efforts to find a settleproment, while France hung back and Italy—annoyed with Germany over Austria—gave little support to the and made tests. Japan, the fourth signatory power, was still represented by Britain in the October 1933 protests N 6084/96/59; Plieg, p. some inquiries in July 1934 (British Foreign Office Minutes of 25-26 October 1934,

157). Ukrainian ea The best survey of Ukrainian nationalist activities and organizations is John A. Armstrong, Nationalism 1939-1945 (2d. ed., New York: Colombia University Press, 1966). pp: 97-98; Jacobsen, 140, Alfred Rosenberg, Der Zukunfisweg einer deutschen Aussenpolitik (Munich: Eher, 1927), Koch as Reich Erich with quarrels Rosenberg’s that noted be should It 109. p. Niclauss, pp. 449-50; positive attthis of estimate exaggerated an to led often have II War World commissat for the Ukraine during had been Fritz Sauckel, an equally tude toward the Ukrainians. Rosenberg’s own candidate for the position Ukrainian suffering. ruthless fanatic whose slave-labor program was to be one of the main sources of

70

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

nationalists—though it did not disillusion them entirely—came in 1933. By the summer of that year, they recognized the signs of a détente in German-Polish relations. Since the bulk of Ukrainian nationalist activity at this time was directed against Poland, hopes for help from Germany were evidently premature.'*! Through Rosenberg and the army, however, the German government maintained contact with several émigré groups, expecting to use them at the appropriate time against either Poland or the Soviet Union ot both. The Ukrainians in turn hoped to use the Germans. As in the case of Memel, major policy developments lay in an uncertain future. Meanwhile, the National Socialist contact with Ukrainian groups was unlikely to ease suspicions of Germany in the Soviet Union, the country in which the vast majority of Ukrainians lived.

Hitler’s policy toward Eastern Europe in the first year of National Socialist rule is thus a more coherent whole than might appear at first sight. The reversal in the relationships with Poland and the Soviet Union as well as the soft-pedaling of German interests in Memel and the Ukraine fall into a general pattern, a pattern in which relaxation in the present and immediate future could lay the groundwork for an attempt at extensive conquests later, in contrast to the previously well-established German policy of operating with current tensions for immediate but limited gains. The old policy fitted into a vision of an Eastern Europe in which Germany played a greater part; the new policy was designed to provide the basis for an Eastern Europe under German domination. The implication of revisionist agitation was change, significant but measured; short-term quiescence, on the other hand, might lay the groundwork for later revolutionary upheaval.

141. There is a useful summary in Roos, pp. 89-94. It is based heavily on intelligence reports of the Polish goyernment, which was obviously well informed about the activities of Ukrainian nationalist groups. See also Lipski Papers, pp. 135-36, for evidence that German army intelligence warned Poland of a planned assassination attempt by Ukrainian nationalists in June 1934.

Chapter 4

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe Austria he policy of Hitler’s Germany toward Austria was, at the beginning, significantly different from the treatment accorded other countries and problems. Hitler himself came from Austria, planned to include it in Germany, and in the meantime included the National Socialist party of Austria in his own. Austrian sentiment for a union with Germany had been strong since the Habsburg empire fell apart in the closing weeks of the first world war, and these feelings had been reciprocated in Germany.' The coming to power of the National Socialist regime in Germany increased the German but decreased the Austrian interest in the Axsch/uss, as inclusion of Austria in Germany had generally come to be known. Hitler proceeded as if little had changed. He applied his concept of consolidating power to Austria in terms of domestic politics similar to the procedures he had already followed in Germany. Election campaigns alternating with negotiations for government coalitions would increase the size and role of the Austrian National Socialists until by pseudolegal means a position of growing authority in the government could be exploited for the subsequent attainment of total power. This would later enable Hitler to effect the Anschluss at whatever moment seemed opportune and reasonably safe. It should be noted that this policy was opportunistic as to means, and could be carried forward with disclaimers about expansionist intent for some time but had a clearly defined ultimate goal. On the road to the eventual goal of annexation, the methods Hitler had used in

Germany could be applied, modified by two characteristics of the Austrian situation that

differed from the German experience. The first difference was, of course, the very fact

that there was already a National Socialist government in Berlin in a position to exercise influence and pressure from the outside. Hitler had explained two years eatlier to

Waldemar Pabst,? a key figure in organizing coups of all sorts in Austria, that when he

1931— 1. Though hardly definitive, the most useful summary is Jurgen Gehl, Austria, Germany, and the Anschluss, 38 (London: Oxford University Press, 1963). Poland so 2. Waldemar Pabst was an international adventurer who had been involved in efforts to bolshevize Rauschenbusch, that Germany could demand a larger army (Wilhelm Breucker, Die Tragik Ludendorffs [Stollham: (Hans Gatzke, Sirese1953], p. 179, n. 3); represented Gustav Stresemann in various illegal activities in Austria Der Deutsche Imperialismus mann and the Rearmament of Germany (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1954], pp. 51-53;

in spite of a temporary und der zweite Weltkrieg, 2:465-68); and played a key role in right-wing politics in Austria

a society for the study of deportation (G.D., C, 1, No. 357; 2, No. 289: 3, No. 124). For his part in establishing Gotha to von Neurath, und Coburg von Herzog Eduard Carl and 297-303, pp. Hoepke, fascism in Berlin see November

1933, T-120, 2700/5737/H

02878186.

For his role in the Heimwehr

see Lajos Kerekes,

15 Verlag, 1966) (hereafter cited as Abendddmmerung einer Demokratie (trans. by Johanna Till, Vienna: Europa Kerekes, Abendddammerung).

Hitler's Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

a2

himself came to power in Germany he would send his best speakers and plenty of money in order to attain the same success in Austtia.3 One of the major characteristics of the struggle for control of Austria’s destiny, therefore, was to be Germany’s controlled intervention into that struggle. The second difference related to the general nature of politicians and the political process in Austria. Among the leaders or would-be leaders of the tight—the Christian Socials, the fascist-oriented Heimwehr, the Greater German party, and the Peasants’ party (Landbund)—there was a general belief that politics consisted of betraying your friends and associates at every opportune moment. There were a few individuals in the groups named who did not shate this belief, otherwise acted upon with vigor and frequency, but it certainly was a key tenet of the Austrian National Socialists. The history of the Austrian party from 1933 to 1938 is to a very large extent a tedious record of factional struggles, mutual betrayals, and endless recriminations.

After the

Anschluss, many of the Austrian National Socialists were to have plenty of leisure to continue these rectiminations, and the apologias produced in that process provide a substantial proportion of the interesting, if not always reliable, evidence on the events of the 1930s. The government

of Chancellor

Engelbert Dollfuss, in power

in Vienna

at the

beginning of 1933, was based on a coalition of parties and groups with a bare majority of one vote in parliament. Because local elections in 1932 had shown an increase in National Socialist votes, and because events in Germany suggested that more gains were coming, the Austrian National Socialists and their.German mentors insisted on the holding of new elections and participation in the governing coalition with or without such elections. The Social Democratic opposition also expected gains from new elections and did what it could to embarrass the government, including the revelation of Italian arms shipments through Austria to Hungary and to Austria for its Heimwehr opponents. The uproar over this incident, the Hirtenberg arms affair, was soon settled by clever maneuvering,»

and

in March

the Dollfuss

government

dispensed

with

parliament

altogether by taking advantage of a procedural technicality. But if the Social Democratic opposition could be put on the defensive so easily, the National Socialists could not. The agitation of the National Socialist party in Austria increased as it, as well as the

Greater German party, recetved support from Germany.® The German National Socialist leadership, from the fragmentary evidence available, appears to have thought that the

process of Glechschaltung, political coordination, that was being applied to the German state governments early in March 1933 might be applied to Austria just as it would be applied, with some delay, to Danzig. Thus Hans Frank, the new minister of justice of the National Socialist regime installed by Franz Ritter von Epp’s coup in Bavaria on 9 March, watned the Austrian government not to suppress the National Socialist movement in that country, lest their German comrades “take upon themselves the task of assuring the freedom of their fellow Germans in Austtria.”’ The Austrian protests against 3. Memorandum [by Gabor Apor], 25 January 1931, Lajos Kerekes (ed.), “Akten zu den geheimen Verbindungen zwischen der Bethlen-Regierung und der dsterreichischen Heimwehrbewegung,” Acta Historica, 11, Nos. 14 (1965), p. 338; cf. Apor’s note of 15 December 1930, ibid., p. 331. Pabst also recounted that Hitler told him he expected to come to power in the framework of a coalition, would never leave office, and

would either subdue or force out his coalition partners. 4. Helpful, though somewhat biased in favor of Dollfuss, is Gordon Brook-Shepherd, Macmillan, 1961).

Dollfuss (London:

5. G.D., C, 1, No. 81; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 38, n. 1; Gehl, pp. 48-49. 6. G.D., C, 1, No. 25; D.D.F., 1st, 2, No. 267.

7. The German official text is in Beitrage zur Vorgeschichte und Geschichte der Julirevolte (Vienna: Bundeskommissariat fiir Heimatdienst, 1934) (hereafter cited as Beifrdge), p. 20. This official brochure published by the Austrian government is accurate as far as it goes but leaves out a great deal to avoid inctiminating certain Austrians and some Germans.

Austria, Czechoslovakia,

Southeast Europe

73

this speech were met with a variety of excuses, but no regrets. Protests entered by the Italian government were no mote successful.’ Il Duce was concerned about the danger of an Auschluss as it would affect Italy’s interests in southeastern Europe as well as South Tyrol and wanted the Berlin government to give support to Dollfuss. Similar pleas for support of Dollfuss were made by the Hungarian prime minister, Julius Gombés.° This was, of course, the one thing the Hitler

regime was not prepared to do. Hitler would not support Dollfuss in Austria any more than he had supported the von Papen government in Germany. What he wanted was a major role for the Austrian National Socialists in the government, and in view of his own

concept of that role, he could safely tell the Italians that he did not wish the Axschluss at that time.'? Some caution was indicated, however. Clearly internal steps leading to National Socialist seizure of power in Austria were less dangerous than excessively obvious external pressures that could only lead to foreign intervention. But this could be applied to official state, not party, affairs. The “channels opened up by the ideological

and organizational bonds between the National Socialist movements in the Reich and in Austria” would have to be sufficient.!! In mid-April, both the National Socialists and Dollfuss tried to get support for their policies from Mussolini. The German emissaties, von Papen and Goring, accompanied

by Renzetti, discussed the whole range of international subjects with Il Duce and also took a hand in the concordat negotiations with the Vatican. Mussolini replied to Germany urging for a National Socialist government in Austria with warnings against the Anschluss, while he promised Dollfuss support in his struggle for Austrian independence if he would seriously begin the transformation of his country into a Fascist state on the Italian model.!? Dollfuss, who preferred reasonably good relations with Germany if that were possible, took advantage of the opportunity to send to Berlin via von Papen an indication that he was willing to come to Berlin himself to sign a German-Austrian trade agreement. Such an agreement had been under discussion for some time, and Dollfuss

was willing to make the concessions necessary to bring about a conclusion.? In spite of the economic advantages to Germany, the German government decided not to conclude

an economic agreement with the Dollfuss government and most assuredly did not wish to welcome Dollfuss himself to Berlin." Far from being willing to consider an economic agreement, Hitler was in fact examining ways to put the Austrian government under economic pressure. When he

raged at the Austrian minister to Berlin on 10 May over the audacity of Austria in protesting German press slanders of Dollfuss, Hitler warned that Germany might stop all tourist traffic to Austria.!5 This plan for greater German pressure was related to the failure of negotiations between Dollfuss’s Christian Socials and the National Socialists led by Theo Habicht, a German Reichstag deputy whom Hitler had placed in charge of 8G. DE

INo. 112.

9. Ketekes, Abenddammerung, pp. 131-37.

Neurath’s memoran10. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 112, 128, 206; von Neurath to von Hassell, 27 March 1933, and von

dum RM 411 of same date, T-120, 2832/6077/E 450623 and E 450629. 11. G.D., C, 1, No. 107; see also Memorandum

by Kopke, II Oe 342, 28 March 1933, T-120, 2832/6077/E

45084547.

173, 176, 403; 4, No. 61, p. 12. For information on these conferences see G.D., C, 1, Nos. 154, 162, 164, 171, to Rome see the documission Géring’s on background for 90; 89, 85, 81, 80, 77, 106; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 73, 75,

ments in T-120, 1388/2784/D 540156-60. 13. Note by von Bilow, 20 April 1933, T-120, 2373/4603/E 190930. Leibniz-Verlag, 1966), pp. 31-32. 14. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 187, 191; Dieter Ross, Hitler und Dollfus (Hamburg:

i

be noted that the evidence ofthe British 15. G.D., C, 1, No. 219; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 147; Beitrage, p. 22. It should

on before Frank’s trip to Austtia documents here leaves no doubt that the subject was under active considerati on 13 May.

74

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the Austrian branch of the NSDAP.!6 Action on the German plan was precipitated by an incident provoked by Frank. Together with such judicial luminaries as the Prussian minister of justice, Hanns Kerrl, and the state secretary, Roland Freisler, Frank flew to Austria to bring messages of greeting to the local National Socialists and voice threats against the Dollfuss government. The Dollfuss government indicated its displeasure at the beginning of the visit and strongly urged a more speedy termination near its end.'” Hitler saw no reason for restraint at this point and decided to use the occasion for the next blow. While Goring was in Rome again, reassuring Mussolini about Germany’s Austrian policy,'® new measures against Austria were under consideration in Berlin. Although there was some reluctance on both measures in the Foreign Ministry, the German government took two major steps.' The first of these was a tourist boycott of Austria, arranged by charging Germans the prohibitive sum of 1,000 marks for a visa to Austria. It was assumed that this measure would strike such a blow to the Austrian economy, already weakened by the depression, as to force the Dollfuss regime into line very quickly. Hitler expressed the opinion that the Dollfuss government would collapse and that new elections would follow. These elections, for which the NSDAP

would

make tremendous propaganda, would bring about the Géeichschaltung of Austria and thereby obviate the need for an Axschluss. There would be economic costs for Germany as well, but not for long; before the end of the summer the contest would be decided. This explanation, which Hitler gave to his ministers on 26 May, was repeated to Rauschning and another delegate from Danzig a few days later.?? Hitler thought the decisive moment was imminent; success would follow the tourist boycott. He brushed aside efforts at mediation as he aimed for a National Socialist takeover in Vienna. The procedure in Bavaria that had so alarmed the Austrians would soon be applied to them.?! At the same time as the tourist boycott was to bring down the Dollfuss government, Hitler was counting on another measure to provide a way of capitalizing on that situation. Habicht himself, together with an assistant, was to be made a member of the staff

of the German legation in Vienna. This step, of which the Austrian government was informed on the same day as the 1,000-mark rule was promulgated,” can be understood only if it is assumed that Habicht was to play in Vienna the role that von Epp had performed in Munich and that Rauschning and Forster were about to play in Danzig—as the representative of Hitler whose task it was to set up locally a government entirely subservient to the dictates of Berlin. The Austrian government, to the great annoyance of Berlin, declined to accept its executioners as diplomats. In fact, they searched Habicht’s apartment and began to talk about deporting him.?? Following some terroristic acts in Austria, the authorities arrested Habicht and his associate and proceeded to ship Habicht

back to Germany. Hitler retaliated by ordering the arrest and subsequent expulsion of 16. Gehl, pp. 55—56; Ross, pp. 34-36. 17. The account in the memoirs of Hans Frank, Im Angesicht des Galgens (Munich: Friedrich Alfred Beck Verlag, 1953), pp. 284-89, is interesting but quite unreliable. See G.D., C, 1, Nos. 234, 249; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 147;

Beitrage, pp. 20-21; U.S. 1933, 1:428-32; Ross, pp. 38-40; Note [by Menshausen?], RM 698, 18 May 1933, T-

120, 2832/6077/E 450689. 18. G.D., C, 1, No. 258.

19. On the internal discussions see ibid., Nos. 249, 256, 262; Memorandum

by Ritter, 20 May 1933, T-120,

2832/6077/E 450707—10; Ross, pp. 43-49. 20. Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction, pp. 86-88. 21. G.D., C, 1, No. 270; cf. ibid., No. 130. 22. Ibid., No. 267; Beétrage, p. 23; Ross, pp. 41-43, 51-53. 23. It was not until 22 June, more than a month after Hitler had decided to appoint Habicht, that von Bilow

learned of a 1927 decision by Germany’s highest court, the Reichsgericht, that a diplomat acquired immunity and extraterritoriality only afer he had received the agrément (Note by von Biilow, 22 June 1933, T-120, 2374/46037 E 190961). In the meantime, the German minister in Vienna was dreaming up ingenious schemes to forestall Habicht’s deportation (Rieth report A.603 of 3 June 1933, T-120, 2494/4938/E 268337).

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

75

the press attache at the Austrian legation in Berlin, the significant differenc e being that the attaché really did have diplomatic immunity.*4 The resulting international uproar was accentuated by the fact that Dollfuss and von Neurath were both in London at the time for the World Economic Conference, so that the whole issue was immediately placed on the world stage where Germany was already both despised and isolated.25 The possibili ty of international intervention increased the danger for Germany; the Austrian governm ent felt able to act. On 19 June 1933 the Austrian National Socialist party was outlawed, and the struggle became mote bitter than ever. The great propaganda campaign Hitler had planned was now launched, and Habicht with the full confidence of his master directed it from Munich.26 In speeches on the radio and in leaflets dropped by plane over Austria, the Dollfuss regime was assailed and the

Austrian people were called on to rise against a government which would soon collapse.’’ All Austrian protests were rejected; so were last-minute Austrian efforts to im-

prove relations.?8 To make certain there could be no smoothing out of the conflict, the

German minister to Vienna was instructed not to meet Dollfuss for the time being at all.29 As the situation became mote critical, Dollfuss looked to other powers for backing.

The Italian government was increasingly concerned and began to demonstrate its displeasure at Germany’s actions by reducing its support of the German negotiating position in Geneva, a shift that was becoming evident by 11 May. In spite of reassurances from Berlin, Mussolini took a growing interest in aiding Dollfuss.3! He promised Dollfuss his support and tried to have the Hungarian leader G6mbés do likewise.*? If Dollfuss would suppress the Social Democrats and thus deprive the National Socialists of the anti-Marxist argument, he would strengthen his position at home and be in a

better situation to arrive at a settlement with Germany. If this advice from the Italian dictator pointed in one direction, the other possible sources of support—Britain and

France—were unlikely to be pleased by further repression of the democratic forces in Austtia. Dollfuss, therefore, informed Mussolini that he would have to move towatd a corporative state at his own speed,*? while he tried to secure assistance from the League,

Britain, and France.*4# As the German campaign continued, international alarm increased; and Britain and France considered joint intervention with Italy in Berlin.*> The Italian government, wishing to maintain good relations with Germany while still defending Austria, told the Germans of the forthcoming demarche in which they themselves

24. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 298, 305, 306, 307; Beztrage, p. 24; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 215. 25. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 310, 313; von Neurath to von Bulow, 14 June 1933, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197687.

26. Waldeck note for Képke, 19 June 1933, T-120, 2836/6111/E 452501. 27. Heinz Pohle, Der Rundfunk als Instrument der Politik (Hamburg: Hans Bredow-Institut, 1955), pp. 400ff.; Beitrage, pp. 26-30. See also the leaflets enclosed with Stockton’s (Vienna) dispatch 905 of 12 September 1933, State 762.63/114. 28. G.D., C, 1, No. 346; Beitrage, pp. 46-48; Ross, pp. 57-59. 29. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 364, n. 10, and 376, n. 7; Bestrage, p. 29. 30. Nadolny to von Neurath No. 358 of 11 May 1933, T-120, 1558/3154/D 669074; Wilson (Geneva) to Hull,

11 May 1933, U.S. 1933, 1:136-38; G.D., C, 1, No. 239, p. 439 and n. 13. 31. G.D., C, 1, No. 343. 32. Mussolini to Dollfuss, 1 July 1933, in Julius Braunthal, The Tragedy ofAustria (London: Gollancz, 1948), pp. 184-87; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 246; Mussolini to Gémbés, 8 July 1933, excerpt in Lajos Kerekes (ed.), “Akten des

ungarischen Ministeriums des Ausseren zut Annexion Ostetreichs,” Acta Historica, 7, No. 3-4 (1960) (hereafter

cited as “Akten zut Annexion Osterreichs”), 361.

5, No. Gémbés, whose previous visit to Berlin had disturbed Dollfuss, visited Vienna on 9 July (B.D., 2d,

245; G.D., C, 1, No. 363). 33. Dollfuss to Mussolini, 22 July 1933, Braunthal, pp. 187-92; Ross, pp. 55-56.

34. B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 210, 211, 213, 214, 233, 236, 237, 245, 260. 35. Summaries in Gehl, pp. 62-68, and Ross, pp. 68-69.

76

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

refused to participate. The German government made some vague promises to Italy, rudely rejected the 7 August intervention of Britain and France, and proceeded on its own coutse. In the face of continued firm and successful resistance by the Austrian government and the threat of further foreign intervention, the German government in late July and eatly August 1933 did find it necessary to reformulate its policies, or at least its procedures. The struggle had not ended as quickly as Hitler had anticipated, but he was not prepared to call it off. He made it perfectly clear that Germany would not deal with the Dollfuss government. Furthermore, even though he promised the Italians to tone down Habicht’s campaign, he allowed Habicht to continue broadcasting attacks on Austria from the Munich radio, rejecting all Italian protests against such speeches, and also declining to provide a written renunciation of an Axsch/uss. There was, in other words, to

be no basic change in policy. Certain limitations on the campaign against Dollfuss, however, seemed wise. Hitler did not want to give either Italy or other powers any more opportunity to intervene than necessary, and he did not relish the prospect of having the dispute brought before the League. As the state secretary, von Bulow, explained to Habicht, Germany was reluctant to use on the Austrian question the threat of leaving the League that it preferred to save for more important issues—disarmament or the Saar.*° The dropping of leaflets from airplanes was accordingly halted, Habicht was told to tone down his speeches a little, and some controls were imposed on the Austrian legion, a paramilitary organization of Austrian cutthroats who had found it expedient to seek refuge in Germany and were encamped not far from the German-Austrian border.*’ But with such limitations, pressure on Austria was to continue until the Dollfuss government yielded or collapsed.** Tension rose during August and September as incidents near the border suggested that a coup by the Austrian legion might be imminent.*? The National Socialist party in Austria had been declared illegal in June; it continued its activities underground. On 14 August the Austrian government, through a brochure issued by the semiofficial newspaper Rezchspost, published a number of documents on that illegal activity and plans for a coup, documents that implicated the foreign policy office (APA) of the NSDAP as well as the German Foreign Ministry.*° Little had changed. In the face of this situation, Dollfuss tied himself more closely to Italy. Having covered himself with the Reichspost revelations, he saw Mussolini again on 19-20 August.*! Il Duce made it clear to Dollfuss that in return for continued support he expected him to reorganize his government with a greater role for the Heimwehr, followed by crushing of the Social Democrats. Under continued pressure from 36. Memorandum by von Heeren, 31 July 1933, T-120, 2838/6113/E 45373742.

37. The Austrian National Socialist who was to become most notorious after his flight to Germany was Adolf Eichmann. There is extensive material on the legion in Beitrage, pp. 30-39; see also B.D., 2d, 5, No. 398; G.D.,

C, 1, No. 427; Memorandum by Hiiffer, II Oe 1470 of 23 September 1933, T-120, 2890/6115/E 454769-70, 38. For evidence on German policy at this time see G.D., C, 1, Nos. 385, 390, 391, 398, 401, 402, 407, 411; Beitrage, pp. 27-29; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 308, 309; U.S. 1933, 1:443—46; Ross, pp. 70-76; Memorandum

by von

Bulow, 27 July 1933, T-120, 2372/1602/E 189333-35; Smend (Rome) to the Foreign Ministry No. 199 of 12

August 1933, 778/1549/376403-04; Lammers to the Foreign Ministry, 16 August 1933, 2700/5737/H 028711. 39, B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 335, 338, 339, 340, 343, 349, 355, 363, 377. 40. A copy of the brochure was attached to a report of the U.S. legation in Vienna of 28 August 1933, and is in State 762.63/119: “Die Verschw6rung gegen Osterreich, Dokumente und Akten.” See also B.D., 2d, 5, No. 345; G.D., C, 1, No. 407. The Foreign Ministry had just stopped allowing the Austrian party to use its diplomatic pouch (Rieth to von Bulow, 19 August 1933, T-120, 2836/6111/E 452517—24).

While the Austrians had access to German documents, the Germans were reading many Austrian ones. The German military attaché in Vienna regularly saw the reports of the Austrian military attaché in Berlin; see the supplement to Muff report 47 of 16 August 1933, T-120, 2695/5705/E 414183.

41. U.S. 1933, 1: 437, 439-40, 442; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 353, 354, 365, 367, 374; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 398, 408; Braunthal, pp. 192-94; Brook-Shepherd, pp. 203-206; Ross, pp. 77-81.

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

aT

Mussolini, Dollfuss did rearrange his government and move in the direction of a corporative state, but he was still reluctant to go all the way in meeting Mussolini’s and the Heimweht’s demands, knowing that he would then be totally dependent upon Italy. Dollfuss therefore decided to try negotiations with the National Socialists for a coalition in which he hoped to balance them against the Heimwehr while he himself remained in control. There

can, furthermore, be little doubt that the strong German

feelings of

Dollfuss were an important factor in leading him to make one more attempt at a tapptochement with Germany before throwing himself completely on the mercy of the Heimwehr. Simultaneously, the inability of the Austrian National Socialists to topple the Vienna government as rapidly as they had hoped, the decreasing prospect of success, and the fear of a Heimwehr dictatorship inclined at least some elements in the Austrian NSDAP to the idea of an accommodation. In the fall of 1933, therefore, a variety of feelers were put out to Germany from Vienna, some directly through diplomatic channels and some through individual members of Austrian political movements outside the government. These complicated maneuvers, punctuated by the mutual betrayals characteristic of Austrian politics of the day, led to no concrete results; but they do serve to shed some light on German policy toward Austria in the critical period just before and after Germany’s departure from the League. Hitler continued to back Habicht. He insisted on Habicht as his own representative against other National Socialists like Hanfstaengl who wanted to dabble in GermanAustrian relations. Similarly he insisted to Dollfuss as well as other Austrians trying to negotiate alongside Dollfuss or behind his back that Habicht was the man they were to deal with.

Under

these circumstances,

Habicht’s

demands,

which

included half the

cabinet for his associates and the vice-chancellorship for himself, must be assumed to have had Hitler’s backing.** To hold the office he demanded, Habicht would have had to become a naturalized Austrian citizen, a form of poetic justice in view of the ex-Austrian

Hitler’s naturalization in Germany the preceding year.*? Clearly Hitler was still pushing towatd Gkichschaltung in Austria through internal change supported by outside pressure. Since victory had not come as quickly in the summer as Hitler had predicted, he was now willing to have Habicht

ask for less than some

months

earlier, even

though these

demands still seemed outrageous to Dollfuss. Hitler, furthermore, was firm in insisting that the National Socialist party must again be legalized in Austria,’ but he could reassure Mussolini that the Azschluss was not imminent.” When the Italian undersecretary of state in the Foreign Ministry, Fulvio Suvich, who had been born in Trieste, met Hitler on 13 December, the two ex-Austrians discussed

the present situation in Austria, agreeing that it should not be allowed to harm relations 42. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 414; Braunthal, pp. 195-98, 210-12; Gehl, pp. 70-73. 43. Summary of the evidence in Gehl, pp. 72-77, and Ross, chap. 2.

44, It should be noted that in late October or early November 1933, Hitler was informed of plans for a National Socialist coup in Austria, originally scheduled for 15 October but then postponed. Hitler refused to approve the action (Ludwig Jedlicka [ed.], Die Erhebung der Osterreichischen Nationalsoxialisten im Juli 1934, Bericht der Historischen Kommission des Reichsfiibrers SS [Vienna: Europa Verlag, 1965] [hereafter cited as Die Erhebung|, p. 67). 45. A closer analogy would perhaps be Forster, like Habicht a member of the German Reichstag, who had been made gauleiter of the party in Danzig though not a Danzig resident. A semiofficial biography is Wilhelm Lobsack, Gauleiter Albert Forster, Der deutsche Angestelltenfiibrer (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsgesellschaft, 1934).

6, 46. See the meeting of Hitler and Frangois-Poncet on 24 November 1933, in G.D., C, 1, No. 86; B.D., 2d, No. 79; Mastny’s report of 29 November 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413961-62. Was. 1939, 1:253=55: 47. For Mussolini’s attitudes see especially B.D., 2d, 5, No. ALG, DirCe2aINows. pi; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 10, Géring reassured Mussolini while in Rome on 6 November 1933 (G.D., C, 2, Nos. 50, 78;

20, 29). 1933, assertsa Germans had the report of the Austrian military attaché in Berlin (Jansa) of 21 September Britain and but Austria, invaded legion the or Germans the if fight would Italy knew army German ing that the France would not (Muff report 64 of 16 October, T-120, 2695 /5705/E 414200-06).

78

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

between the two great powets.‘® Hitler, nevertheless, was insistent on drastic changes in

Austria and on Habicht as his man to have those changes made, just as his own repre-

sentative had made them in Danzig. Since Suvich was scheduled to go to Vienna in the

middle of January, Dollfuss had to use the time left before that visit to make the best

bargain he could with the National Socialists or find himself obliged to go along with whatever the Italians desired. Reluctantly, Dollfuss now agreed to see Habicht to negotiate a settlement in person. Habicht, on the other hand, saw in negotiations with

Dollfuss an opportunity to reassert his own role in the face of a possible German-Italian agreement to push the dispute over Austria into the background, while the Austrian National Socialist movement drifted into desperation or oblivion. With Hitler’s approval, it was agreed that Habicht should fly to Vienna and confer with Dollfuss on 8 January 1934. When information about this got out in Vienna, direct pressure from the Italian government, as well as indirect pressure through the Heimwehr, forced Dollfuss to cancel the planned meeting. Only a radio call with an order

from Hitler caused Habicht to have his plane turn back before landing in Austria.” Habicht was disappointed and angry at his failure to make direct contact with the Austrian government; and with the approval of both Hitler and von Neurath, Prince

Josias von Waldeck und Pyrmont of the German Foreign Ministry went to Vienna without notification to the Austrian government to confer with Austrian National Socialist leaders on the next steps. Those with whom Waldeck conferred were arrested; he himself was politely encouraged to return to Germany.° As terrorist incidents in Austria increased, the Dollfuss government threatened to take the issue to the League, while the

German govetnment continued to profess its own anger over the cancellation of the Dollfuss-Habicht meeting.>! By now time had run out for Dollfuss’s maneuvers. The 8 January incident had already shown how limited his freedom of action really was. When Suvich came to Vienna on 18 January, he reminded the Austrian chancellor of his promise to crush the Social Democrats and move closer to Hungary as well.° Dollfuss still tried to secure some support from the League powers other than Italy and to keep up contacts with the Germans. But there was no strength in the League, and all he could get from the Western powers was a platonic statement of interest in the maintenance of Austrian independence.* By the time this statement was issued on 17 February 1934 by England, France, and Italy, the situation had been changed by events

inside Austria. Dollfuss allowed the Heimwehr to incite a violent campaign against the Social Democrats which culminated in the destruction of the Social Democratic stronghold in Vienna under the thunder of Austrian artillery and Heimwehr bullets. The policy of the German government and the Austrian National Socialists in the face of the Austrian civil war of 12-14 February was to stand aside while the Dollfuss government destroyed one of the main bastions defending the country against the National Socialists. The National Socialists hoped that the stress of civil war would push many of the 48. This visit will also be discussed in connection with othet aspects of German foreign policy in the winter of 1933-34. For references to the subject of Austria see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 126, 145; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 137, 142, 143, 144; Ross, pp. 131-33; Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 31 vom 31. Dezember 1933,” Bundesatchiv,

Brammet, Z.Sg. 101/26, f. 619-21. 49. Beitrage, pp. 18, 50-51; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 160, 166; 50. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 167, 179; Bestrage, pp. 52-53. 51. G.D., C, 2, No. 188; Beitrage, p. 27; B.D., 2d, 6, January 1934, T-120, 778/1549/37643-46. 52. B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 194, 205; G.D., C, 2, No. 225; tole of M. M. Rost van Tonningen as intermediary

Ross, pp. 140-53; Kerekes, Abenddammerung, pp. 174-76. Nos. 186, 201; Memorandum by von Neurath RM 41, 11

Braunthal, pp. 199-201, 203-4; Ross, pp. 166-68. For the between Dollfuss and Mussolini in 1934 see the excerpts from his diary in Correspondentie van M. M. Rost van Tonningen, 1 (’s-Gravenhage: Nijhoff, 1967), 288-97. 53. B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 213, 221, 222, 238, 246, 254, 259, 261, 263, 265-70, 273, 274, 276, 277, 280, 282-84, 288— 90; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 213, 242, 255, 261.

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast E urope

79

workers into their camp and pethaps force Dollfuss into a coalition with themselves. They indicated a willingness to enter the government under the conditio ns set forth in the preceding year; but although Dollfuss maintained contact with the Austtian National Socialists, he had neither the inclination nor, after the new triumph of the Heimwehr, the

Opportunity to agree to Habicht as vice-chancellor.54 While Dollfuss did what he could to secure support for his position by closer ties with Italy and Hungary,®> the National Socialists made a final effort to pressure him into negotiations. Berlin continued to adhere to the view that there could be no direct negotiations between the German and Austrian governments as long as Austtia suppressed the NSDAP.°¢ Habicht maintained pressure on the regime by means of spoken threats over the Munich radio alternating with acts of terror inside Austria.57 As the Austrian government

now

refused to deal with him at all, the whole

situation became

more

critical, The rivalries within the Austrian National Socialist movement and within the Heimwehr led both to negotiations for agreement and plans for various types of coups in Vienna that were generally at cross-purposes with each other and also threatened to explode into open and large-scale violence.58 There had been indications of this possibility earlier in the year.°° While the Austrian internal situation drifted more and more in the direction of a violent solution, what was Hitlet’s policy? In his Reichstag speech of 30 Januaty, Hitler had attacked the Austrian government while denying any past and forswearing any future intervention in Austrian internal affairs.” There can be no question, however, that he

continued to provide the Austrian National Socialists with support from Germany. As the plots and counterplots

continued,

Hitler adopted a stance

of watchful waiting,

allowing the situation to develop but not taking the lead himself.o! Since the Rome meeting of Mussolini, Dollfuss, and Gémbos culminated in the consultative protocol of

17 March—as part of the so-called Rome protocols—caution was clearly indicated. Hitler did not wish to push closer together the three countries they represented and was now inclined to think of the Austrian conflict in long-range terms. The party should build up its strength inside Austria; time was on its side. He tried to restrain the exuber-

ance of his Austrian party comrades at the same time he hinted at restraint to those who wished to push the revolution in Germany more rapidly. Temporarily, he was becoming as reluctant to move quickly in Austria as he was in Germany; with many possibilities open, he preferred to await developments and then take advantage of those

that came closest to combining the greatest probability of success with the least risk. Since the first year of pressure had failed to topple Dollfuss, Hitler was less sure of

himself. 54. G.D.,

C, 2, Nos.

253, 254, 260, 263; 264; B.D.

2d, 6, Nos.

275, 279, 286, 293, 294; Kerekes,

Abenddammerung, pp. 178-86. 55. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 257, 296; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 321, 332. 56. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 282, 290; Memorandum

of von Neurath RM 164, 9 February 1934, T-120, 2838/6113/E

45392425. 57..G.D., C, 2, No. 278, n. 3; Beirage, pp. 12-13; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz vom 20.2.34, Anweisung Nr. 293,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/3, f. 88, and Dr. Kausch, “Information uber das Angebot Habichts,” 20 February 1934, in ibid., Z.Sg. SMO PAs ville

58. Summary in Gehl, pp. 87-96. See also [Major Kaltenboeck?], “Der 4. Mai 1934, Starhemberg und die

Nationalsozialisten,” T-120, 2500/4939/E 272839-61. 59. G.D., C, 2, No. 229; TMWG, 34:56.

he (Huffer passage violent less and shorter a suggested had Ministry Foreign German the 1:358-59; Domatus, 60. note of 26 January 1934, T-120, 3836/6111/E 452704). 61. G.D., C, 2, No. 247. 62. See Gehl, pp. 84-86, for background on the Rome protocols.

63. G.D., C, 2, No. 328.

101/27, f. 35-39. 64. See also the account by Habicht on 7 March 1934, in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

80

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler was particularly concerned about the drift of Italian policy which suggested that not merely the Axsch/uss but even a purely internal National Socialist takeover in Austria was totally unacceptable to Rome. It was under these circumstances that talk of a Hitler-Mussolini meeting was revived and eventually led to their coming together in Venice. In part, the motive for this meeting from Berlin’s perspective was to offset the three-power meeting in Rome that had alarmed the German government, even though the Hungarians, at least, looked forward to Germany joining the three in one grouping.°” While the German foreign minister recommended that the economic struggle with Austria be settled before any Hitler-Mussolini meeting, Hitler himself preferred a continuation of the tourist boycott and the addition of other economic pressures, with only more drastic measures being postponed for some time.®* This meant, in effect, that Hitler would tolerate the continued excesses of Habicht’s followers in Austria, though public displays and demonstrations were to be reduced. The clearest indication of the general thrust of Hitler’s policy was his refusal, in spite of both internal and external urging, to take action to restrain the Austrian legion in Germany or to remove its units from camps in the vicinity of the Austrian border.® The increased terror campaign against the Austrian government in May 1934 must therefore be regarded as tolerated, if not directly authorized, by Hitler. The repercussions of this policy worried the German Foreign Ministry, but the evidence shows that even von Neurath’s personal interest in the subject failed to produce any results.”? While German economic measures weakened the Austrian economy in some areas, terroristic acts to scare off non-German tourists wete expected to undermine the Dollfuss government even more.”! The available evidence on German policy toward Austria in the eight weeks from the end of May to the July uprising is fragmentary. There were plans for the HitlerMussolini meeting, which was finally held on 14 June. There were the murders of 30 June that Hitler ordered to forestall any future challenge to his authority from the SA— by literally beheading that body—and from the army by implicating it in the beheading process. Other foreign policy aspects of that event remain to be considered; its relation to the Austrian issue was its deepening of the split between the Austrian SA, led by Hermann Reschny, and the Austrian SS and party administration headed by Habicht. Then, on 25 July, an attempted coup in Vienna led to the murder of Dollfuss but failed to establish a National Socialist regime. It is clear that during this period the situation was coming to a head. Many of the National Socialists in Austria felt abandoned by Berlin and were becoming increasingly desperate. Their acts of violence were bringing on strong police reactions from the 65. G.D., C, 2, No. 258. 66. See the account in Hanfstaengl, pp. 35-39; cf. William E. Dodd, Jr., and Martha Dodd (eds.), Ambassador Dodd's Diary (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1941) (hereafter cited as Dodd Dian), pp. 132-33. 67. See the excerpt from the record of the Gémbés-Mussolini meeting, in Kerekes. “Akten zur Annexion Osterreichs,” p. 361. For German reaction to the meeting, see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 333, 334, 338, 339, 344.

68. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 389, 393, 409, 431, 451, 479. 69. On dnaproblems presented by the Austrian legion at this time see Wehrkreis VII, Ic (Adam), “Nr. 2172g.K. an Reichskriegsministetium, Betr.: Osterreichische SA,” 30 March 1934, T-79, roll 207, frames 489-90; G.D.,

C, 2, No. 394. 70. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 462, 492; von Neurath to Frick, 24 May 1934, T-120, 778/1549/376560-63; G.D., C, 3,

No. 3 (n. 9 to this document shows that as of 22 June the situation on the German side of the border had not changed). To the Austrians, of course, all the incidents were denied (Memorandum of Renthe-Fink, 2 June 1934, T-120, 2890/6115/E 454864-66). See also B.D., 2d, 6, No. 449; U.S. 1934, 2:26-27; G.D., C, 2, No. 501; Ross, pp. 166ff., 212-14. The account in Ross, pp. 189ff., assumes that Hitler seriously wanted to restrain all acts of terror but fails to reconcile this with his attitude toward the Austrian legion. 71. Beitrage, p. 14; U.S. 1934, 2:25; von Hassell report I 580, 11 May 1934, T-120, 2836/6111/E 452828-29 (which was submitted to Hitler).

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

81

Austrian government, and these in turn brought further acts of terror. Under these circumstances, Habicht and one of his chief assistants went to Berlin at the end of May. Habicht saw Hitler both then and on 6 June.’ Since the date for the meeting between Hitler and Mussolini had been fixed for the following week, and because it was undetr-

stood that the Austrian problem would be one of the main subjects discussed, one may speculate in the absence of any evidence on the Hitler-Habicht meetings that no new decisions were communicated to Habicht. Clearly the outcome of the meeting with Mussolini would provide Hitler with a basis for new guidelines. Before the meeting, Mussolini had been informed by Renzetti that the alternatives in regard to Austria might well be a German-Italian agreement for a new government in Austria under Anton Rintelen and with National Socialist participation—or a revolution.73 Rintelen had been sent to Rome as Austrian minister in August 1933 because of his hostility to Dollfuss, and he had continued plotting against his own government from the new post.’* He was in close and continuing contact with emissaries of Habicht, was scheduled to be the head of a government in which the National Socialists would be included, and was to play a key role in the abortive July coup. Though unnamed, he also figured in the HitlerMussolini talks on 19 June. In his meeting with Mussolini in Venice, Hitler asserted that the Amschluss was not

an acute question. He insisted that a person not tied to any political party should head the Austrian government; Rintelen was not named, but he was apparently the person meant. The new government would call for elections and then take the National Socialists into the government in proportion to their showing in the election. Germany and Italy would handle their economic relations with Austria in close consultation. Hitler further asked Mussolini to withdraw his protecting hand from Austria.” It is quite obvious from the evidence now available that the two men left the meeting with a very different understanding as to their respective views on this subject. Hitler was convinced—and apparently sincerely so—that Mussolini had been in general agreement with his position and that there would be no trouble with Italy as long as there was neither an Anschluss nor an entirely National Socialist government in Vienna.’° This meant, in other words, that he could continue to support Habicht’s pressure on the Dollfuss regime, and even that regime’s replacement, provided that there was neither an immediate Axschluss nor a full National Socialist government as a result of that replacement. Mussolini, on the other hand, as well as Suvich, were of the opinion that it had been made clear to Hitler

that negotiations to accomplish what Hitler had postulated were not to come during the present conditions of conflict in Austria, during which Italy still backed Dollfuss. If there wete to be changes, they lay in an indefinite future.” The German government became aware of this difference in interpretation, but Hitler preferred not to have the difference clarified.”* He gave as reason that there was 72. G.D., C, 2, No. 469; Memorandum by Képke, 31 May 1934, TMWC, 35:617-19. 73. Renzetti to Mussolini, 12 June 1934, T-586, container 419, frame 009466.

74. G.D., C, 1, No. 416; 2, No. 308; Ross, pp. 197-99, 208-09.

;

75. G.D., GC, 3, Nos:5; 7; Rossypp. 223—25.

76. Of key importance is an entry in the diary of Alfred Rosenberg in which he records Hitler's version of the conversation (Rosenberg, Tagebuch, pp. 39-41). The Hitler-Rosenberg meeting recorded in the diary must taken place on 19 June, for on that day the Volkischer Beobachter carried Rosenberg’s answer to von Papen’s went to speech at Marburg. Hitler refers to Rosenberg’s article as appearing “today” (heufe). On 20 June, Hitler Beobachter, 22 Neudeck; the announced reason was to report on the Venice meeting to Hindenburg (Volkischer

Most affected was Mussolini . Members of Dollfuss’s family were already with him, and instead of welcoming the Austrian chancellor, Mussolini had to break the sad news to his widow. Several Italian divisions were

moved to the border, and this fact became generally known; but they did not move into Austria, partly because the Italian government quickly found out that the coup had failed, partly out of concern that Yugoslavia would then send its troops into Carinthia.% Although military complications were thus avoided, Italian policy for a time turned sharply against Germany, and this was made most obvious by bitter polemics in the government-directed Italian press. It would take considerable time for Italian press attacks to die down.°” In the face of international repercussions, the German government took drastic action to disclaim any connection with the coup. While no one outside Germany believed the denials about the past policy of Berlin, there was a real change in the policy Hitler intended to follow thereafter. Once the initial shock and excitement had worn off,°8 Hitler formulated a new policy toward Austria. Both G6ring and Goebbels were

with Hitler at Bayreuth at this time, and von Neurath even interrupted his vacation to join them briefly. Hitler decided to drop Habicht, dissolve the headquarters of the Austrian NSDAP in Munich, hold down the Austrian legion, and tell the National Socialists in Austria to behave with more restraint in the future.” The effort at a takeover as in Danzig had failed in 1933; the attempt to seize power by force had failed in 1934; clearly the concept of treating the Austrian situation like a part of the German domestic scene would not work. The role of the Austrian party henceforth would not be to take overt power inside the country but to provide a vehicle for taking over from the outside by force or under the threat of force. Such an approach meant postponement. Hitler has been quoted as explaining in 1933 that foreign expansion would come only after four or five years of tearmament. He had hoped to exclude Austria from the timetable, but now realized that this could not be done. While Poland had been willing to let the National Socialists take control of the government of Danzig, Italy was unwilling

to see the National Socialists follow the same route in Austria. Instead, Italy supported other elements in Austria, and change would therefore have to await the strengthening of

Germany cult one, necessary Von

until it could impose a solution from the outside. The interval would be a diffiand in the interim Hitler had just the man to send to Vienna to carry out the intrigues: Franz von Papen. Papen’s assistants had been murdered on 30 June, and he had barely escaped

death himself.

A schemer without much talent, a bother to Hitler as vice-chancellor, and

a professing Catholic, he was just the man for the job of bamboozling the Austrians until they could be pressured or intrigued into the Reich. Hitler was so thrilled with this brilliant solution to the twin problems of how to get rid of von Papen—who was still asking embattassing questions about 30 June—and who should replace the hapless Rieth that he announced the new appointment before asking the Austrian government for its

95. See the comment

by Neville Chamberlain, in Keith Feiling, The Life of Neville Chamberlain (London:

Macmillan, 1946), p. 253. 96. G.D., C, 3, No. 128; Fischer (German military attaché Rome) report 21, 2 August 1934, T-120, 27 2676/5609/E 402126-30, and report 24 of 31 August, ibid., frames E 402139-47; Memorandum by Kordt,

July 1934, T-120, 1488/3086/D 617271. 97. G.D., C, 3, pp. 242-43, No. 122, n. 6; B.D., 2d, 6, No. 530. p . 259-62. 98. Hanfstaenel, 99NG.D..¥C; 3 Now 122, 134, 149; TMWC, 40: 500-01; Memorandum 909/1575/381293-94; Gehl, pp. 101-104.

of von Biilow, 26 July 1934, T-120,

86

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

agreement.!00 The Vienna authorities were by no means pleased by the appointment itself or the curious circumstances surrounding it but yielded to German pressure to receive the special and extraordinary envoy.!°! While in Germany the press campaign against both Austria and Italy was toned down, the new envoy went to his mission in Vienna.'0 As the American minister records him as explaining, “It was his business to see that the Anschluss was brought about peacefully.’”! That program would take several years. Czechoslovakia Germany’s relations with Czechoslovakia had been reasonably good in the years of the Weimar Republic.!* There were, however, two related sources of potential conflict

and both of these were eventually to cast their shadow over the future of the two countries. These were the geographic relationship of Czechoslovakia, and especially its Bohemian portion, to Germany, and the presence inside Czechoslovakia of over three million people of German descent who since the seventeenth century had looked upon themselves as the ruling nationality in the Bohemian lands of the Habsburgs. The maintenance of the historic borders of Bohemia when the boundaries of Czechoslovakia were established at the Paris peace conference left these people in a state ruled by the Czechs. The policies followed by the predominant Czech element toward their Germanspeaking fellow nationals in the following years were.at times almost as shortsighted as those pursued toward the Czechs by the Germans for most of the preceding two and a half centuries. There were, however, several exceedingly important differences in the situation. In the first place, Czechoslovakia was a democracy in which the cultural rights of the Germans were largely respected and their political wishes could receive public expression as long as they were not clearly treasonous. Secondly, with the reduction of the great Habsburg empire to a small Austrian state, the Germans in Czechoslovakia would look increasingly to Berlin, rather than to Vienna. Finally, and perhaps most important of all, the concept of national self-determination which provided the justification for creating a Czech state on the ruins of the Habsburg empire constituted a challenge to the leaders of the new state that included millions of non-Czechs within its borders. They did not master this challenge in the 1920s, and they could not master it in

the 1930s. The failure in the 1920s was partly due to the obduracy of the Germans but to a considerable extent their own responsibility; that in the 1930s a result of German policy which took full advantage of the difficulty of Czechoslovakia in reconciling to the new state those it had insisted should be included in its territory. By 1933 the Germans of Czechoslovakia, later often called Sudeten Germans after a

mountain range between Bohemia and Silesia, were to a considerable extent dissatisfied 100. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 123, 167, enclosure 2. Von Papen later claimed that on 15 July Hitler had offered him the

German embassy at the Vatican (Der Hochverratsprozess gegen Dr. Guido Schmidt vor dem Wiener Volksgericht (Vienna: Osterreichische Staatsdruckerei, 1947] [hereafter cited as Guido Schmidt Trial, p. 351). 101. B.D., 2d, 6, No. 539; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 136, 146; Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 893, 4 August 1934,

T-120, 778/1549/376621—22. 102. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 1.8.34,” and “vom 17.8.34,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/4, £. 45, 62; G.D., C, 3, No. 151; Renzetti to Mussolini, 3 August 1934, T-586, container 419, frames

00947980. 103. George S. Messersmith, “Conversations with von Papen in Vienna,” p. 4, University of Delaware Library, Messersmith Papers. 104. The most comprehensive survey is in Johann W. Briigel, Tschechen und Deutsche, 1918-1938 (Munich:

Nymphenburger Verlagshandlung, 1967). There is a fine review of this problem in Dagmar H. Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State (Leyden: rill, 1962).

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

87

with their lot, a dissatisfaction that was greatly intensified by the depression which hit their industries particularly hard. Even those elements among them who had cooperated actively in the government of Czechoslovakia and hence were called “activists” were increasingly disillusioned, while many of their followers were inclined to desert them fot other movements. Included among the other groups of Sudeten Germans were a National Socialist party and several additional right-wing organizations. With the growth of the National Socialist party in Germany, these movements became more attractive to young Sudeten Germans and more obviously dangerous to the Czech state. In the fall of 1932 the Czech government had begun legal proceedings against some leadets of these groups, and the sentences issued in that trial were to be one focus of discussion between

Germany and Czechoslovakia in 1933. The German government was aware of the military and diplomatic strength of Czechoslovakia;

the former embodied

in its army and fortifications, the latter in its

alliances with France and the Little Entente. From the very beginning, therefore, Czechoslovakia—unlike Austria—belonged in the category of those areas that Germany could do little about for several years until it had rearmed. That meant that although German-Czech relations after 30 January 1933 were no longer as friendly as they had once been, the time of danger still lay in the future. There was a considerable amount of discussion about the trials of German nationals and people of German descent in Czechoslovakia, about the arrests of Czechs in Germany, about press attacks on each

other, and about the activities of the numerous refugees from Hitlet’s Germany who escaped to Czechoslovakia, but all such matters caused no major tensions.!° The disruption of the Sudeten German National Socialist party, culminating in its almost simultaneous self-dissolution and banning by the government in October 1933, opened the

way for a new organization among the Sudeten Germans. Out of the urging of some former members of the National Socialist party, a small elitist group of ultra-rightist advocates of a dictatorship called the Kameradschaftsbund, and some independent elements, a new movement emerged, known originally as the Sudeten German Home Front and eventually as the Sudeten German party. This new party was led by Konrad Henlein.!°” The man who was eventually to lead the Sudeten Germans home into the Reich in a manner none of them anticipated was a thirty-five-year-old veteran of the wat who had achieved prominence in a racist athletic organization in the Sudeten area. He now rallied around himself a motley assortment of elements that were long involved in internal feuds but were eventually to be uniformly utilized by Berlin to bring disaster upon the Czech state as well as themselves. The new government of Germany was unwilling to take inside Czechoslovakia the risks they readily took in Austria. Hitler’s directive to the Sudeten German National Socialists as conveyed to one of their longtime leaders, Hans Knirsch, before his death in

December 1933, was that they “should make their own policy; the Reich could not help

them for a long time.””!8 Berlin, therefore, at first stayed out of the internal problems of

the Sudeten Germans.’ At Hitler’s insistence, some financial assistance was provided to 106. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 31, 334, 364, 366, 429; 2, No. 56; Domarus, 1: 275; Mastny report no. 9 of 9 February

1933, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413928-930 (part in Berber, Prager Akien, No. 2), Mastny report

report Diy 13 of 16 February, ibid., frame 413931, Mastny report 19 of 22 February, ibid., frame 413932, Mastny

May, of 25 Match, ibid., frames 413933-935 (excerpts in Berger, Prager Akien, No. 6), Mastny report 39 of 23

of Kopke, 15 ibid., frames 413943-944, Mastny report 55 of 17 July, ibid., frames 413946—948; Memorandum

Gajan and July 1933, T-120, 1488/3086/D 618260-61; Cermak (Berlin) report of 18 August 1933, in Koloman Robert Kvacek (eds.), Germany and Czechoslovakia, 1918-1945 (Prague: Orbis, 1965), No. 18. 1958), pp. 108-11; 107. Boris Celovsky, Das Miinchener Abkommen von 1938 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Brigel, chap. 12. 108. G.D., C, 2, No. 132. 109. Ibid., 1, Nos. 110, 326, 483; 2, No. 51.

88

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

individual Sudeten National Socialists and members of their families affected by prosecution under the Czech law for the defense of the republic, great efforts being made to avoid compromising the recipients of such aid.'!0 The contacts of the Sudeten Germans with Germany were to be controlled by a new organization, the Volksdeutsche Rat, a council supervised by Hitler’s deputy Rudolf Hess who tried to restrain from rash actions the Sudeten Germans and their supporters inside Germany.'!! There was plenty of time for them to work out their internal difficulties. The last months of 1933 and the first half of 1934, in fact, saw a reduction in the in-

cidents affecting German-Czech relations. In this period there were soundings for a noforce declaration or nonaggression pact analogous to that concluded in the same months between Germany and Poland. The evidence on these soundings remains tenuous, but beyond the fact that they led to no agreements, certain conclusions can be drawn.!!* There was an interest on both sides in a reduction of both incidents and tension.'!? The feelers for a nonaggression pact were handled by National Socialist party officials outside diplomatic channels and, whether authorized by Hitler or not,'!* were neither welcomed by the Czechs nor pursued seriously by Berlin. The proposal was not welcomed in Prague because the Czechs were reluctant at this time to replace multilateral agreements with a bilateral arrangement. The German government, as von Neurath explained to Vojtéch Mastny, the Czech minister in Berlin, did not think that the time was ripe for a German-Czech nonaggression pact.!!5 By Match 1934 the German government felt sufficiently secure to look for any excuse to avert future Czech soundings for a treaty.'!° During the remainder of 1934, Berlin quietly observed

developments

in Czechoslovakia,

keeping in touch with the

Sudeten Germans but without as yet engaging German policy directly in their affairs.!!7 There was some friction over the attacks on Germany by the émigré press in Czechoslovakia,''8 while the Czech government was already of the opinion that Henlein was supported financially by Berlin. On key issues, the two countries would stay at atm’s length, as was particularly obvious in Germany’s unwillingness to join Czechoslovakia and other countries in the proposed Eastern Locarno Pact, to be discussed subsequently.!2° Certainly Germany would assume no commitments to a Czech state that Hitler planned to include within his empire and to transform into an area of purely 110. Ibid., 2, Nos. 128, 132, 137: 111. Ibid., No. 180. On the Volksdeutsche Rat, see ibid., Nos. 31, 140, 330; Jacobsen, pp. 160ff.; Robert Ernst, Rechenschaftsbericht eines Eilsdssers (2d ed.; Berlin: Bernard & Graefe, 1955), pp. 191ff. 112. Celovsky, p. 88, n. 3; Briigel, pp. 348-49; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 15, 68, 83, n. 3, 293; B.D., 2d, 6, No. 70; Benton (Prague) dispatches 50 of 7 December 1933, and 119 of 20 March 1934, State 760F.6211/1 and 4; Mastny report of 29 November 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413961-962, and report 46 of 25 June 1934, ibid., frames 413614-615; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 31. Januar 1934,” Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/3, £. 48. 113, Note by Waldeck, II Ts 1678 of 8 December 1933, T-120, 2899/6143/E 459515; G.D., C, 2, No. 355. 114. One of the intermediaries, Hohen-Aesten, was put in a concentration camp for his troubles. 115. G.D., C, 2, No. 83; Mastny report 93 of 30 December 1933, Czech document inT-120, 1041/

1809/413973-974. 116. Memorandum of von Bulow, 22 March 1934, T-120, 909/1574/381247. 117. G.D., C, 2, No. 361; 3, No. 16; Mastny report 22 of 25 February 1934, Czech document

in T-120,

1041/1809/413601-603 (excerpts in Berber, Prager Aten, No. 20). 118. G.D., C, 2, No. 453. Large numbers of Germans had fled from the National Socialist terror into Czechoslovakia; one would have thought that their reports might have suggested to those of German descent in that

country that they were best off where they were. See Bohumil Cerny, “Der Parteivorstand der SPD im. tschechoslowakischen Asyl (1 933-1938), ” Historica, 14 (1967), 175-218. 119. See the note on Bene’’s views attached to a memorandum of 15 May 1934 from the chancellery of the

Czech president, in Vaclav Kral (ed.), Die Deutschen in der Tschechoslowakei, 1933-1947 (Prague: Nakladatelstvo Ceskoslovenské Akademie Véd, 1964) (hereafter cited as Kral, Die Deutschen), No. 10.

120. G.D., C, 3, No. 33.

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

89

German settlement. As the British minister in Prague suggested in March 1934, the Czechs were aware of the fact that their turn would come after the Anschluss, that then

only the aid of France could avert disaster, and that when the time came, such aid might well not be forthcoming.!2! Until that moment, the Czech government could only wait and hope.

Hungary With the exception of Italy, there was no country with which Germany’s relations in the 1930s were both as close and as difficult as Hungary. Germany and Hungary, allies in World War I, both objected violently to the peace treaties imposed upon them by the victors. Beyond this tie, there were several others. Both countries looked protectively to their respective national minorities within Czechoslovakia,

and these minorities were

located at different ends of the Czech state. In 1933, both countries were ruled by rightist regimes which

stressed their ideological affinities, though the government

of

Julius Gémbés had muted in practice its publicly pronounced anti-Semitism. There were, furthermore, at least potentially important economic ties between the two countries. Their trade with each other had been small, but the possibility of expanding an exchange of agricultural for industrial products was certainly present. There were, on the other hand, several sources of potential difficulty. Tactical con-

siderations in the expansionist policies of Germany at any particular point might involve a sacrifice of Hungary’s ambitions, a sacrifice easier for Germany than Hungary. In other situations, in pursuit of similar interests, Germany might well take risks that Hungary could not afford, a complication that was to arise in 1938. The economic policies of the new German government had a strongly autarchic character, especially emphasized in its first months by Hugenberg, that could spell trouble for Hungary’s trade. The German minority inside Hungary constituted an additional source of possible friction. Their resistance to magyatization received a powerful stimulus from the National Socialist rise to power, while the emphasis the new regime in Berlin placed on racial ties of kinship across state borders accentuated Hungarian fears. Especially annoying to the Hungarians in connection with this issue was the obvious reluctance of the German minorities in territories Hungary had lost to the successor states to join in revisionist agitation for a return to Hungarian rule. Whatever their difficulties in the face of the nationalism of the new states of Southeast Europe, nothing in prior or contemporary Magyar practice suggested that they would be better off if returned to control from Budapest.’ These considerations, both positive and negative—trevision of the 1919 borders, ideological affinity, trade relations, the German minorities in Hungary and the successor states—

would be the themes of German-Hungarian relations. In his letter to Hitler congratulating him on his assumption of power, Gdmbos alluded to their “common principles” and “common ideology”; urged closer trade relations, especially a greater German willingness to accept Hungarian agricultural products; and asked Hitler to bring about closer cooperation between the German and Magyar minorities in the successor states.!23 Simultaneously, National Socialist party circles in Berlin were intimating that the German element in Hungary would not be allowed to

121. B.D., 2d, 6, No. 328.

Swabians, German Populations 122. See G.D., C, 1, No. 345. For a detailed account see G. C. Paikert, The Danube

1967). in Hungary, Romania and Yugoslavia and Hitler's Impact on their Patterns (The Hague: Nijhoff, 123. Gémbés

to Kanya, 1 February 1933, Elek Karsai, “The Meeting of Gémbés

Hungarian Quarterly, 3, No. 5 (Jan.—Matr. 1962), p. W2:1G:D Gal, Nols!

and Hitler 1933,”

.

New

90

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

disturb German-Hungarian relations.!*4 In Gémb6s’s eyes, agreements on the two subjects of trade relations and minorities problems were the prerequisites for any political cooperation.!25 He appealed to Hitler to help Hungary market its surplus agricultural products, an appeal that met with a ready response whose implementation was delayed only because of the intransigence of Hugenberg.'!”° Trade and compensation agreements were

concluded

on 2 June 1933; they constituted the first small step towatd a new

German economic policy toward Hungary and all of Southeast Europe. Before measures in that economic policy can be examined, two facets of the economic tions of the spring of 1933 require special attention. It should be noted that economic considerations played an important Hungary’s policy toward the Anschluss question. Not only close personal and

further negotiarole in political

relations with the Dollfuss government, but also the fear that the Amsch/uss might lead to the exclusion of Hungary from the Austrian market, which was of such great importance

for it, made the Hungarian government sensitive to any possible upheaval in Vienna.'?’ Partly for this reason, partly out of regard for the views of their Italian friends, the Hungarian government had vainly urged Hitler to direct the Austrian National Socialists to support the Dollfuss regime. Hungarian efforts to improve German-Austrian relations wete to recur subsequently, though never with any greater results. A second aspect of the economic negotiations was the appearance on the scene of one of the many curious figures of National Socialist diplomacy, Werner Daitz. Active in the party since 1931, he found representing the city of Liibeck in Berlin an insufficient use of his diplomatic talents and became head of the foreign trade section of Rosenberg’s APA. More prolific than lucid, he poured forth articles explaining how the living space of various peoples ought ot ought not to be organized, with special emphasis on the economic sphere in

which regional autarchy should replace world trade and interdependence. !*8 Such ideas provided a perfect framework for a lecture Daitz delivered to an attentive audience of Hungarian officials in Budapest on 29 May 1933.1! His advocacy of the reorientation of Germany’s trade from overseas to Southeast Europe gained him an extended audience with Gémbés in which a visit by Gémbés to Hitler was discussed.!3° The possibility of a

124. [German Foreign Ministry, Abteilung VI, A], “Aufzeichnung tiber die Frage der deutschen Minderheit in Ungatn,” 6 March 1933, T-120, 1435/2980/D

580453. These comments were made to Kanya before he left

Berlin in February to become Hungarian foreign minister. 125. See the comments of G6mbés at the Hungarian cabinet meeting of 18 March 1933, in Miklés Szinai and Laszlé Sztics (eds.), The Confidential Papers ofAdmiral Horthy (Budapest: Corvina Press, 1965) (hereafter cited as Horthy Papers), No. 15, p. 63. 126. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 179, 195, 247; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 8. Mai 1933,” T-120,

2612/5650/H 003665. 127. Carlile A. Macartney, October Fifteenth,

A History of Modern Hungary (Edinburgh: University Press, 1956),

1:137; Schoen (Budapest) to Kopke, H Oe 448 of 17 April 1933, T-120, 2832/6077/E 450635—642.

128. The ideas of Daitz were certainly similar to those of Hitler (Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 219), but he appears not to have been personally close to his leader. There is as yet no study of Daitz’s career in the secondaty literature.

Lothar Gruchmann,

Natonalsozialistische Grossraumordnung (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt,

1962) only

touches on his work. There is a collection of articles by Daitz from the files of the APA in T-81, roll 11, serial 32, item 250-d-18-05/5. Documents pertaining to Daitz’s diplomatic ventures will be cited where relevant. Publications containing collections of his pieces are Der Weg zur vilkischen Wirtschaft und zur europdischen

Grossraumwirtschaft (Dresden: Meinhold, 1938 and 1943); Lebensraum und gerechte Weltordnung (Amsterdam: De Amsterdamsche Keurkamer, 1943); Waedergeburt Huropas durch europdischen Sozialismus (Amsterdam: De Amsterdamsche Keurkamer, 1944); and the yearbooks and reports of Daitz’s Gesellschaft fiir europaische Wirtschaftsplanung und Grossraumwirtschaft published by Meinhold, Dresden, 1940-1943. There is a thoughtful but purely theoretical analysis of Daitz’s ideas in the 1962 Erlangen-Nuremberg dissertation of Achim Bay, Der nationalsozialistische Gedanke der Grossraumwirtschaft und seine ideologischen Grundlagen, Darstellung und

Kritik. See also Jacobsen, pp. 61-62. 129. Karsai, pp. 172-73.

130. Schoen telegram 22 of 1 June 1933, T-120, 1435/2980/D 580455; G.D., C, 1, No. 280.

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast E urope

ah

trip by Gémbés to Berlin had arisen even before Hitler came to power.!3! Now that the two governments were on the same ideological track the idea was even more attractive, and direct contact between Gémbds and Hitler, so it seemed, could be arranged quietly through party rather than diplomatic channels, with Andr4s Mecsét, once Hungarian military attaché in Berlin, playing the role of contact man for Gémbés that Daitz played for Hitler.!32 An unofficial trip to Germany was arranged for Gémbés, and Hitler was to receive on 17-18 June the first head of a foreign government. In the meantime, with the

help of Daitz, the economic agreements of 2 June had been signed, and other questions

could be discussed by the two chiefs of government. The public trappings surrounding Gémbés’s June visit were unimpressive and confused, a result of the unofficial character of the trip which, furthermore, was arranged by

a party agency whose chief, Rosenberg, wanted to make up for his May fiasco in London

but had not increased the administrative competence of his office.!33 The talks themselves, however, ptovide some very important insights into the conduct of German foreign policy not only in 1933 but also in subsequent years as Hitler, partly in response to questions raised by Gémbés, explained his view of present problems and future prospects. GOmb6s

was

concerned

about the tension in German-Austtian

relations, the

development of German-Italian relations, the further improvement of German-Hungarian trade, the activities of the German minorities in Hungary and the successor states,

and the basic problem of peaceful or violent change in the status quo. In response to such questions, Hitler explained his views with considerable frankness. He made some

general promises but no specific commitments on the economic and minorities questions; these practical issues would recur in German-Hungarian talks during the following months. In regard to Austria, he explained to Gdmbos his distaste for Dollfuss and his

refusal to have anything to do with the Austrian chancellor. Hitler reassured his guest, however,

that what he wanted was

not an immediate Azschluss but a government in

which the Austrian National Socialists entitled as the result of new elections. come about only by force; there could Hitler was quite explicit that regardless

would have the position to which they would be As for revision of the peace treaties, this could be no peaceful solution. The evidence shows that of any concessions extorted without recourse to

arms, his real aims required war, which, at that time, he tied to the destruction of

Czechoslovakia. Hitler knew that Hungarian and German revisionist aims coincided most closely in tegard to Czechoslovakia and began at this time an effort to have Hungary give priority over all others to revisionist claims on the Czechs, a policy he was to follow consistently until the fall of 1938. The war Hitler’s plans envisioned was, of course, to be fought against France: “I shall utterly crush France,” Hitler vowed.'34 Gombés, suitably

impressed, returned to Hungary to face an uproar in the press and parliament over his trip and with the necessity to reassure Mussolini and Dollfuss, Hitler was pleased by the demonstration that Germany was not entirely isolated in the world, and retained a favorable memory of the Hungarian leader who had had the courage to make the gesture.!%° 131. Memorandum by von Bulow, 28 January 1933, T-120, 2371 /4602/E 189155. when the 132. G.D., C, 1, No. 329; Macartney, 1: 112, 138. Mecsér eventually served as minister in Berlin

Germans installed the Arrow Cross party in Budapest in 1944. by Karsai. See 133. The most useful source on the visit is the collection of Hungarian documents published

2497 of 24 June also G.D., C, 1, Nos. 324, 329, 330, 344; D.D.F., 1st, 2, No. 395; Gordon (Berlin) dispatch

Hoensch, 1933, State 864.001/11; Williamson (Budapest) dispatch 459 of 5 July 1933, State 762.64/14; Jorg K. pp. 29-31. Der ungarische Revisionismus und die Zerschlagung der Tschechoslowakei (Tubingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1967), p. 193. Baron 134. “Ich werde Frankreich zermalen” is the phrase recorded by Gémbés published in Karsai, Affairs, remembered Foreign of Ministry Hungarian the of department political the of chief then Apor, Gaébor

n. 6). the phrase after the war as “ich werde Frankreich zermalmen” (Macartney, 1: 139, his extensive recotded 135. Thete is no evidence for Hitler’s comments on Gémbés that compares with

92

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The visit of Hungary’s prime minister was returned by the German vice-chancellor, Franz von Papen, who made an unofficial trip to Budapest in the middle of September. The reception given him was most friendly,'*° but its warmth was insufficient to resolve one important subject discussed, that concerning the German minorities in pre- and post-Trianon Hungary.!3’7 To avoid embarrassing German-Hungarian relations, the German minority in Hungary was instructed to refrain from public hostility to the Hungarian government; Germany sympathized with them but would not exert pressure on their behalf.138 Nevertheless, this issue remained an irritant in the relations between

Berlin and Budapest. Repeatedly in late 1933 and early 1934 the Hungarians urged the German government to instruct the German minorities in the successor states to cooperate with the Hungarian minorities, and—in partial contradiction—to end the contacts between the German minority in Hungary and the Volksbund fir das Deutschtum im Ausland (VDA), an agency through which cultural and political ties were maintained with German minorities in other countries. Just as frequently, the Germans countered by suggesting that the Hungarian government make concessions to its German and other minorities in order to reconcile them and to make Hungarian rule attractive to those living in the lands Hungary wished to recover.'*? Continued difficulties over this issue contributed to Germany’s unwillingness to commit itself to Hungary in the winter of 1933-34 when the Hungarians anxiously inquired about the rumors of German nonageression pacts with Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia.'40 When Gombos finally wrote Hitler a long letter on the subject, the German

government after considerable delay

finally decided not to answer at all.!*! If the problem of national minorities provided a continuing irritant, in the area of economic relations a series of negotiations, trips of experts, and policy conferences led to

agreements that marked a significant step in a new direction. The desire to preclude a customs union between Hungary and Austria or Hungary, Austria, and Italy; the desire to

strengthen Hungary vis-a-vis the Little Entente as well as French and Italian ambitions in the Balkans; and some hard economic realities all contributed to Germany’s development

of a trade policy later applied to other countries of Southeast Europe.!42 On 21 February 1934 the two countries signed a group of agreements, most of them kept secret, by

which they exchanged trade concessions worked out to circumvent the most-favored nation clause still embodied in many of their trade treaties with other countries. Germany would accept more Hungarian agricultural products at prices above those of the world market, while Hungary would take more German manufactured goods.'43 The special preferences, some leading to an increase in trade, some simply diverting trade at the comments on Mussolini. Hitler’s obsession with his own and Mussolini’s age and possible death was of great importance in 1938 and 1939. One cannot help speculating whether Gémbés’s death at the age of 50 while under medical care in Germany in 1936 contributed to this preoccupation. 136. Von Papen to Hitler, 21 September 1933, in Budapest telegram 48, T-120, 1436/2980/D 586488. 137. Subsequent references to his conversation with von Papen by Gémbés show that the latter considered this one of the key topics discussed at the time (G.D., C, 2, Nos. 129, 252). The marginal note by Gombés that he

discussed with von Papen the procedure for taking up such matters (Karsai, p. 193) may well have been made by him in this connection. The American minister in Budapest noted that von Papen met with Jacob Bleyer, the leader of the German minority in Hungary (Montgomery dispatch 24 of 4 October 1933, State 762.64/17).

138. G.D., C, 1, No. 400. 139. Ibid., No. 440; 2, Nos. 42, 129; cf. Macartney, 1: 168~71.

140. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 95, 175, 192, 216. 141. Ibid., Nos. 252, 288, 371; 3, No. 400. 142. The negotiations may be traced in ibid., 1, No. 464; 2, Nos. 175, 182, 189; Williamson (Budapest) dispatch

467 of 17 July 1933, State 762.63/90; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 23. Januar 1934,” “. . . vom 25. Januat 1934,” “. . . vom 13. Februar 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003818-819, 822-823, 836-838; Memorandum of von Bulow, 15 February 1934, T-120, 909/1574/381236.

143. G.D., C, 2, No. 322; 3, No. 13, p. 36.

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

5)

expense of other countries such as the United States, would tie Germany and Hungary mote closely together. This process of economic integration continued in subsequent years, was well advertised publicly, and had important political ramifications.!44 Germany’s push toward hegemony over Southeast Europe was largely to follow pathways prepared by agreements in the economic field that tied those countries closely to it, a process greatly aided by the desperate situation of the Southeast European countries under the impact of the depression. Hungary was the first country to which this policy was applied, while

Yugoslavia was soon to follow. It is, therefore, quite understandable that in looking back

over past German trade policy toward the Danube area in November 1937, the German Foreign Ministry should point to the German-Hungarian secret arrangement of 21 February 1934 as the first major step on the new road.!45

Yugoslavia A similar step was soon to be taken in Germany’s relations with Yugoslavia, but this required something of a reorientation in German policy. Hungary had been on Germany’s side in World War I; the Serbian element dominating postwar Yugoslavia was essentially the same group that had led Serbia on the side of the Entente in the war. Furthermore, unlike Hungary, Yugoslavia had grown greatly as a result of the peace settle-

ment, and this process of expansion had precipitated a conflict with Austria in Carinthia which received considerable public attention in Germany. The German

government,

nevertheless, was to follow a policy towatd Yugoslavia that at least temporarily would improve relations between the two countries. This policy was designed to give Germany a foothold in the Little Entente of which Czechoslovakia was considered Germany’s enemy, and Romania, as will be explained, would be a dubious partner. German conflicts of interest with Yugoslavia were in fact few; and the Berlin government decided to move in this case, as had been done in regard to Hungary, in the economic sector. Major

developments in the economic as well as political field were not to come until 1935 and 1936, but the first signs pointing in this direction could be noted earlier.

During 1933 there were no significant political issues dividing Germany and Yugoslavia, nor was Germany backing Hungarian revisionist aspirations against Yugoslavia, which in turn was less concerned about a possible Axsch/uss than other countties.'#° The German government, partly in response to Yugoslav requests, did inaugurate talks for better trade relations.'4” In March and April 1934 these negotiations were pushed by the Germans, who were willing to make concessions “to obtain a strong trading base within the economic sphere of the Little Entente,” and to block both Italian and French in-

fluence in Southeast Europe.'48 The treaty eventually signed on 1 May 1934 was designed to tie Yugoslavia more closely to Germany, and undoubtedly provided the Germans with political leverage in exchange for special arrangements for Yugoslav exports to Germany

144. Macartney, 1: 141-42. 145. Documents secrets du Ministére des affaires étrangéres de I’Allemagne, 2, Hongrie, La politique allemande 1937-1943 (trans. by Madeleine and Michel Eristov, Paris, 1946), No. 1.

146. See G.D., C, 1, Nos. 279, 345; B.D., 2d, 6, No. 331. zum 147. G.D., C, 2, No. 309 (parts of this document appeared in the German White Book No. 7, Dokumente 478-79. 2: 1933, U.S. also see 14); No. as 1941], Eher, (Berlin: Griechenland und Konfliket mit Jugoslawien Ausschusses vom 148. G.D., C, 2, No. 318. For details on the negotiations see “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen 1934,” 7p 10. Marz 1934,” “... vom 24. Marz 1934,” “. . . vom 29. Marz 1934,” “... vom 19. April

nz vom 2612/5650/H 003848-50, 861-63, 864, 868-69; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonfere Bundesarchiv, Brammer Z.Sg. 101/3, f. 121.

15. Marz 1934,

94

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

that were granted in secret supplements to the published agreement.” Furthermore, Germany gained new export possibilities of its own; and both these economic opportunities and bases for future pressure on Yugoslavia were expected, at least by the German government, to be susceptible of further development in later years.'°° As yet, there could be no clear political agreement between the two countries,'*! but marking both the new spirit in German-Yugoslav relations and pointing to his future special interest in this field, Hermann Goring visited Belgrade briefly in the middle of May 1934, leaving behind what King Alexander of Yugoslavia called “an agreeable impression.”!°? By early 1934, the German government had also taken steps to reduce the one area of possible friction in which the Yugoslavs were especially sensitive, the problem of Croatian émigrés. The terrorist Right-wing of the Croatian nationalist movement, Ante Pavelié’s Ustasha, had small groups in various European cities engaged in activities directed against the government of Yugoslavia. Among these were some in Germany who had contacts with the German armed forces and with Rosenberg’s APA.'*? The Yugoslav intelligence service had penetrated the Ustasha and was well-informed about its Berlin operations.!*+ The Belgrade government accordingly protested to the Germans. In Berlin, the Foreign Ministry was opposed in its endeavor to restrain the Croatian émigrés by the APA which wished to continue political contacts with them and by the War Ministry which wanted to keep open a source of intelligence and a potential ally in case of a future war in which Yugoslavia, it was assumed, would be on the other side. The problem was not unlike that of German dealings with the Ukrainian nationalists, with the difference that the Yugoslav government raised the question in official channels. Hitler decided that as long as German interests demanded friendly relations with Yugoslavia, there should be no active intervention in its internal affairs. Ustasha newspapers that had been published in Germany were now banned, and what contacts remained were maintained without public fanfare.!° The Ustasha’s role in German policy toward Yugoslavia was temporarily relegated to the background. The short-run advantages were all on the side of building up a good relationship with the existing authorities in Belgrade. Romania If Germany’s relations with Yugoslavia began to develop along new lines of cooperation, its relations with Romania were tenuous in spite of attempts at a rapprochement. Having broken its ties with Germany in the war, Romania gathered a rich harvest from the collapse of the Central Powers, and its policy was directed primarily toward keeping what it had won by good fortune more than military prowess. In spite of the obvious interest of Germany in a revision of the peace settlement, the Romanian government made a number of efforts toward a closer relationship with Germany in 1933. Perhaps the old ties to Germany of the ruling dynasty, the fear that Germany might back Hungatian revisionist aspirations in Transylvania, and the hope for better trade relations in 149. G.D., C, 3, No. 13; Jacob B. Hoptner, Yugoslavia in Crisis, 1934-1941 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1962), pp. 101-102. A good summary of the political as well as economic significance of the treaty may be found in “Informationsbericht vom 5. Mai 1934, Der deutsch-jugoslawische Handelsvertrag,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer Z.Sg. 101/27, f. 121-23.

150. G.D., C, 3, No. 23. 151. Ibid., 2, No. 381.

152. Ibid., 3, No. 27. 153. Ladislaus Hory and Martin Broszat, Der kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 1941-1945 (Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1964), pp. 22, 26. 154, Vladeta Mili¢evié, Der Kénigsmord von Marseille (Bad Godesberg: Hohwacht, 1959), pp. 43-44. 155. On this issue see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 43, 72, 91, 92; Schumann

Nuremberg document 006-PS.

(APA) to Lammers, 15 December

1933,

Austria, Czechoslovakia, Southeast Europe

hs)

the face of depression contributed to this policy. Whatever the motives, repeated soundings were made by Romania.'5° The German government was not convinced that the Romanians

were

sincere; the policies of the Romanian

foreign minister, Nicolae

Titulescu, wete too obviously anti-German. Parallel efforts to build on the ideological affinity between the National Socialists of Germany and similat movements in Romania did produce some contacts. Hitler met the Romanian National Socialist leaders Stefan

Tatarescu and Octavian Goga, but little came of this except for pleasant memories for

Goga to recall when he was prime minister for six weeks in the winter of 1937—38.157 For the time being it seemed too dangerous for Germany to dabble in internal Romanian politics, and not only was the idea of financing Romanian National Socialist politicians abandoned, but the National Socialists among the German minority in the country were instructed to be most cautious.!58 The Romanians were not put off entirely, however. The need to export their products to Germany led them to press Berlin repeatedly on this subject; and for a whole year, from May 1933 to June 1934, they tried to convince the German government that a trade agreement would be mutually beneficial. The Germans were skeptical, partly for

economic, partly for political reasons.'*? In spite of these difficulties, limited agreements were reached. In the summer of 1933, the great German chemical trust, I. G. Farben,

atranged a trade contract involving Romanian grain and oil seed exports in return for imports of I. G. Farben products and political contributions inside Romania.'©° Furthermote,

on

5 June 1934, a German-Romanian

trade agreement was

signed.’

It was

restricted to a relatively small scale—five million marks—but would set a precedent as well as an encouragement for later expansion. The other countries of Southeast Europe—Albania, Greece, Bulgaria, and Turkey—

played no great role in German foreign policy in the first year of National Socialist rule. Germany was interested in promoting its economic position in these countries,’ and for

sentimental as well as practical reasons maintained good relations with its wartime ally, Bulgaria,'!® but none of this was as yet of special importance. On only one subject was Germany clear in its perception of policy toward all the countries of Southeast Europe: it wanted no regional grouping that included all of them, for any such grouping might exclude Germany from pursuing a policy of economic and political penetration.'“

156. G.D., C, 1, Nos.

32, 118, 189, 264, 328, 395. The soundings had included a scheme, promoted by

Rosenberg, for a private meeting between Hitler and Titulescu analogous to that between Hitler and Gombos. 157. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 468, 496; D, 5, No. 157; Rosenberg Tagebuch, 29 May 1934, p. 36. 158. G.D., C, 2, No. 36; Jacobsen, pp. 80-83. 159. On these talks, see G.D., C, 1, No. 264; 2, Nos. 468, n. 3, 486; 3, No. 285, n. 1; Memorandum

of von

Biilow, 8 June 1933, T-120, 1437/2980/D 581383-84; Schulenburg (Bucharest) telegram 25 of 11 July 1933,

ibid., frame D 581380; Memorandum of von Neurath RM 1016 of 13 July 1933, ibid., frames D 581390-91; Memoranda of von Biilow of 13 October and 28 November 1933, ibid., frames D 581392-97.

160. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 414, 415. 161. Ibid., 2, No. 468, n. 5: 3, No. 285, n. 1.

i

162. An interesting document on a German effort early in 1934 to gain control of the Turkish copper mining industry, in Office of Military Government for Germany (U .S.), “Report on the Investigation of the Deutsche

week Bank,” November 1946, Exhibit, 111. und die Tiirkei im 163. On Turkey see G.D., C, 2, No. 22, n. 7; 3, No. 371, n. 1; Lothar Krecker, Deutschland

vom Zweiten Weltkrieg (Frankfurt/M: Klostermann, 1964), p. 23; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses 291, 411; Bentinck 14. April 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003866-67. On Bulgaria see C. D., C, 2, Nos. 22,

14 September (Sofia) dispatch 75, 10 April 1934, Foreign Office R 2113/112/7; Balfour (Sofia) dispatch 228,

6740/112/7. On Greece 1934, Foreign Office R 5148/1400/7; Bentinck dispatch 283, 24 November 1934, R see G.D., C, 2, No. 289.

164. G.D., C, 1, No. 5; 2, No. 246.

Chapter 5

The Far East to the Summer of 1935

he Far Eastern crisis precipitated by the Japanese occupation of Manchuria had commanded a latge share of the world’s attention before 1933, but this was by no means true for Germany’s new leaders. The new rulers of Germany were neither systematic in their work habits nor comprehensive in their interests, with the result that attention was given to the Far East only sporadically.! This lack of interest meant that the initiative of enterprising individuals and the frequently differing policies advocated by different German officials or agencies were allowed an astounding opportunity to move forward without much plan or coordination. In a regime that has been very aptly characterized as an “authoritarian anarchy,”? the area furthest removed from the center of authority in Berlin was to provide some of the most extraordinary crosscurrents. The initial stages of the crosscurrents will be described in this chapter, but it should be made

clear at the outset that until 1938 there was no general plan or policy whatever. The contradictions that may have looked like the surface manifestations of some grand design, all the more dangerous because its nature was concealed from view, were in fact something quite undramatic: the pet schemes of various individuals and organizations, occasionally brought into temporary harmony either when they threatened other interests of the

regime or when the conflicts between them became too extreme for Hitler to tolerate. An immediate problem created for Germany by the advent of national socialism was inherent in the public ideology of the new government. The loudly proclaimed racialist ideology of national socialism was certain to arouse hostility to Germany in Asia, just as it would reinforce preoccupation with the “Yellow Peril” in Germany itself.* This problem arose in 1933 and was to plague the German government from then on. Proposals for a reform of the German penal code to prohibit interracial marriage and even social contact produced an especially violent reaction in the Far East.4 As a symbol of Germany’s evaluation of the peoples of Asia, these proposals precipitated very strong complaints from the Chinese and Japanese governments.? These complaints in turn led 1. In some respects the ignorance of the National Socialist leadets may haye been a blessing in disguise; what if they had known that the Ainu, the primitive people of Japan, wete white? 2. Walter Petwaidic, De autoritare Anarchie (Hamburg: Hoffman und Campe, 1946). 3. The discussion in chaps. 1 and 3 of Ernst L. Presseisen, Germany and Japan, A Study in Totalitarian Diplomacy, 1933-1941 (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1958), refers only to Japan; but much ofit is applicable to Asia as a whole. 4, Hanns Kerrl, Nationalsozialistisches Strafrecht, Denkschrift des Preussischen Justizministers (Berlin: Decker, 1933). To the embarrassment of the Germans, news of these proposals came out just when the German ctuiser Koeln was visiting Colombo; an uproar over the social functions for the crew planned by the German consul immediately ensued (Buell [Colombo] dispatch No. 20 of 10 October 1933, with numerous clippings attached, State 862.4016/1318). 5. For reports on the excitement in Japan and Japanese protests see Memorandum of von Biilow, 11 October 1933, T-120, 1520/3080/D 623166; Voretzsch (Tokyo) telegram 108 of 20 October, ibid., frame D 623165;

The Far East to the

Summer of 1935

97

to instructions to the German press not to refer to the “Yellow Peril,”° and a public Statement designed to reassure the offended countries was issued by the German government.’ Efforts to persuade foreign diplomats that Germany’s official differenti ation between races should not be construed as a value judgment did not, however, persuade everyone. Incidents involving Orientals in Germany periodically revived the issue on which the Japanese were especially sensitive. Attempts were made to reduce the negative impact on German foreign policy by providing for special treatment of cases involving Orientals (as contrasted with Jews and Negroes), but the difficulties continued. Nor were these restricted to foreign reactions to German racial policies. The National Socialists themselves were uneasy about the matter, and as the idea of an alignment with Japan developed, the racial contradictions implicit in it would trouble many in Germany. Germany’s economic and political interests in the Far East at the beginning of Hitler’s chancellorship, however, were heavily concentrated

on China.? Germany had

made a substantial comeback in the China trade during the 1920s. In spite of internal dissension in China, the opportunities for the continued expansion of that trade looked good. A significant facet of Germany’s economic relations with China was its possible telationship to the German military advisers to Chiang Kai-shek.!° This group of German officers was working under individual contracts to help train and organize the Chinese army; they were at this time under the command of General Wetzell, who had succeeded another World War I assistant of General Erich Ludendorff, Max Bauer. The

Chinese had tried to replace Wetzell in 1932 with the former German minister of defense,

General

Groener;

in view of his declination, they were

now

interested in

General von Seeckt, the man who had played a key part in rebuilding the German army in the early 1920s. Von Seeckt did go to China in the summer of 1933, conferred with some of the German officers there, met General and Madame Chiang Kai-shek, and left

behind a detailed memorandum on the reorganization of China’s army.'! The question of von Seeckt taking charge of the German military advisers was not formally raised until after he had returned to Germany; but while in China, von Seeckt had already become involved in a project that was to play a major, and by no means entirely happy, role in German-Chinese relations. Memorandum of Volckers (Berlin), 20 October, ibid., frame D 623164. For Chinese complaints see the protest

of 2November 1933, in T-120, 2787/6022/H 044372; and G.D., C, 2, No. 48. 6. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom

1. November

1933,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/2, f.

24; the topic was apparently so popular that these instructions had to be repeated on 4 February 1934 (ibid., 101/5, f. 30). 7. G.D., C, 2, No. 123. It should be noted that this document was prepared in response to an expression of

concern by President Hindenburg; the reference to Ceylon presumably covers the incident mentioned in n. 4, above. 8. GD., C, 3, Nos. 182, 331, 486; 4, No. 69; John P. Fox, “Japanese Reactions to Nazi Germany’s Racial

Legislation,” Wiener Library Bulletin, Vol. 23, Nos. 2 & 3 (1969), 46-50. 9. A good survey, though now dated in parts, is Kurt Bloch, German Interests and Policies in the Far East (New York: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1940). 10. A useful folder on these advisers for the period 1928-34 is in the U.S. War Department Records, National Archives, File 2657-1-357. In connection with the possible replacement of General Wetzell as chief of the

German group see the comment on him in Report 8517 of 27 February 1933, by the U.S. assistant military attaché in China (ibid.). Considerable insight into the life of the advisers may be secured from the memoirs of Fritz Lindemann, Im Dienste Chinas, Erinnerungen aus den Jabren 1929 bis 1940 (Peking: Selbstverlag, 1940). For a

survey of the activities and impact of the German military advisers in the development of the Chinese army see Chih-pu Liu, A Military History ofModern China, 1924-1949 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956), chaps. 7-10 passim.

11. Friedrich von Rabenau, Seecki, Aus seinem Leben, 1918-1936 (Leipzig: Hase & Koehler, 1940), pp. 677-701; Lindemann, p. 334; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 156, 412; U.S. 1933, 2: 320; Hans Meier-Welcker, Seeckt (Frankfurt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1967), pp. 649-66.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Before leaving Germany, von Seeckt had been visited by a representative of the South China military regime centered on Canton.!? During his stay in China, von Seeckt stopped in Canton, meeting the local war lords in the company of two other Germans, Hans Klein, a businessman who had been active in Africa before 1914 and had shifted

his interests to China, and Major Preu of the German Ministry of War.'? With the support, apparently, of von Seeckt and the German War Ministry, Klein and Preu devel-

oped elaborate plans for the construction of an arsenal and other military installations in the Canton area as well as for the detailing of German military advisers to the Canton regime. In view of Canton’s tenuous relationship to the central government in Nanking, such projects cteated the prospect of German intervention into Chinese internal affairs against the government of Chiang Kai-shek. The German Foreign Ministry for political and economic reasons opposed this move, while the German army, partly to build up the arms export business, backed the scheme. The compromise reached in practice was that the military advisers were not sent but the construction work went ahead. Although the central government alternately objected and approved Klein’s projects, one might fairly draw the conclusion that Chiang was not sorry to have Germany build up the resources of the Canton area that his regime would eventually swallow—as it did in 1936—as long as German activities did not unduly strengthen the local war lords in the interim. The endless correspondence on the subject certainly points in this direction, but it also shows that the German government was about as divided internally as the Chinese.'4 In spite of all sorts of trouble both in China and Germany, Klein’s project in Canton moved forward, no doubt aided by the fact that one of the three engineers supervising the work was a brother of General Walter von Reichenau, one of the most adamant sponsors of Klein in the Ministry of War.'5 In fact, in the summer of 1934, Klein made a

seties of new agreements with the Canton regime providing for the exchange of Chinese raw materials for German industrial products, and also made a similar agreement with the central government in Nanking.!° These agreements, which opened a new chapter in

German-Chinese relations, were negotiated by Klein under the supervision of von Seeckt himself. Both the latter’s return to China and the steps in German-Chinese trade that paved the way for these agreements must first be explained. The new regime in Germany was interested in building up its armaments industry and acquiring foreign exchange for the purchase of raw materials needed by the arms industry. The exportation of armaments looked like an ideal way to accomplish both objectives; the export contracts would lead to expanded capacity at home, the payments to greater purchasing power abroad. That such actions were illegal under Germany’s treaties and domestic laws hindered no one; the oath German officers and officials took

to uphold their country’s laws rested very lightly on their consciences. The visit of the Chinese minister of finance, T. V. Soong, to Germany in July 1933 provided an excellent opportunity to make arrangements for arms exports to the government of Nationalist China. Although not all the details of Soong’s negotiations with German firms and agencies are clear, the evidence indicates that he made several agreements with the Krupp arms firm and with Rheinmetall-Borsig, an armaments firm controlled by the Ministry of War and which in turn controlled a firm named Solothurn in 12. Rabenanu, p. 687, n. 2. Meier-Welcker is most reticent on this aspect of von Seeckt’s trip (see p. 658). 13. G.D., C, 1, No. 436; Lindemann, pp. 386-87; Emil Helfferich, 1932-1946, Tatsachen (Jever, Oldenbourg: C.

L. Mettcker, 1968), pp. 111-12. 14. For documentation on the original Klein project see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 89, 235, 262; Lindemann, pp. 387-88; German legation Peking report 3 of 2 January 1935, T-120, 2988/6680/H 096053. 15. German

consulate general Canton to legation Peking, report 856/34/4101

2991/6691/H 098359. 16. G.D., C, 3, No. 180.

of 20 October 1934, T-120,

The Far East to the Summer of 1935

2)

Switzerland that could conveniently provide a cover for illegal or politically dubious transactions.'? These schemes, and the related proposal that the German governmen t guatantee the German suppliers against losses on the transactions, were viewed with great doubt by the German Foreign Ministry and strongly opposed by the German minister to China, Oskar Trautmann. In long arguments against the Ministry of War, where Reichenau continued to be the leading advocate of such projects, the Foreign Ministry for once secured a decision from Hitler somewhat favorable to its own position. By the time that decision was given in October 1934, however, the Chinese central government was growing so rapidly in strength that the Foreign Ministry withdrew its objections; and the project went forward after all.'8 In this unusually clear example of how policy could be made in National Socialist Germany on a subject not directly engaging Hitlet’s interest, we can observe a lengthy dispute between several ministries in which the matter is referred to Hitler for a decision after more than a year of squabbling. Hitler makes his decision on the basis of the arguments presented; but when it comes to implementation, the situation has changed to such an extent that the original difference between the contending parties has disappeared. All now move forward in a direction contrary to that determined by Hitlet’s decision, evidently secure in the knowledge that as long as they agreed, he would not much cate. In the meantime von Seeckt had been asked to return to China, it being clearly understood that he would replace Wetzell as chief adviser.'? When this question arose in October 1933, von Seeckt had first refused, partly in response to the German Foreign

Ministry’s worries about repercussions from Japan if so prominent an individual were assigned to the position. The first thoughts of a German-Japanese rapprochement in late 1933 soon evaporated, and Chiang’s threat to replace the Germans with French military advisers helped persuade the German government to approve von Seeckt’s trip. He therefore went out in March 1934; accompanying him was General Alexander von Falkenhausen who would succeed von Seeckt after what was anticipated would be only a short period of time.”? The objections of Japan were not allowed to interfere with the maintenance of Germany’s position in China. While in China, von Seeckt worked with Chiang on the organization and training of the Chinese army. He was to prepare General von Falkenhausen to assume the role of chief military adviser, but in reality von Seeckt practically turned the military activities over to von Falkenhausen from the beginning of his mission while devoting his own

17. On Soong’s visit and the agreements made see G.D., C, 1, Nos. 357, 373, 435, 463; Soong to Krupp von Bohlen, 24 July 1933, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197748-50; von Neurath memorandum RM 1307 of 16 September

1933, ibid., frame E 197747; Dodd (Berlin) dispatch 100 of 26 August 1933, State 693.6215/1; Newton (Berlin)

dispatch 729, 21 July 1933, Foreign Office F 4997/2717/10. 18. The course of this argument may be followed in G.D., C, 1, No. 410; 2, Nos. 412, 454; 3, Nos. 220, 232, 253, 258. The last of these documents deals with Hitlet’s decision; for information on the subsequent reversal

of the Foreign Ministry’s position and the cooperation of the German Ministries of Finance and Economics in

carrying the project forward without reference back to Hitler see Memorandum by Kiuhlborn, 4 April 19355 te

120, 2991/6691/H 098419-420; 098440; Ministry of Economics

Foreign Ministry to Ministry of Economics, 18 April 1935, ibid., frame H to Foreign Ministry, 1 November 1935, ibid., frame H 098572; cf. Peck

(Nanking) dispatch D-588 of 23 January 1934, State 893.20/473.

.

It should be noted that Waldemar Pabst, while unable to plot the overthrow of the Austrian government

the arms because of his temporary deportation from that country, played a part in handling the Berlin end of sales to China. not commanded 19. One concern of von Seeckt on his return from his first trip had been that he had Pharaoh’s army at the time of Moses (Rabenau, p. 693)!

Liu, pp. 99ff; Meier-Welcker, pp. 20. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 16, 48, 63, 80, 157, 199, 243, 323; Rabenau, pp. 701ff.;

667-84.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

time primarily to economic questions.?! The major development in the economic field was a series of new agreements made by Klein with the Chinese authorities at Canton as well as the central government. These agreements foresaw the exchange of Chinese raw materials for German military and railway construction projects and for industrial products. Included in the provisions were promises by Klein to secure credits of two hundred million marks for Canton and one hundred million for the central government.22 These commitments seemed to go too far for the German diplomats both in China and Berlin and gave rise to a controversy that continued for some time. Hitler had supposedly approved the idea—an argument often used in such disputes in the Third Reich—but the course of subsequent discussions in Germany suggests that such approval, if really given, was very limited in scope. The intricate negotiations with various groups in China and between the different agencies of the German government need not be recounted here, but their main themes and their outcome ate revealing.*? The German government was keenly interested in imports of tungsten, tin, and other ores; on this Hitler, Schacht, von Neurath, and the military were in full agreement. They were in disagreement on the amount of financial and political risk to take. The financial risks were eventually reduced to a very modest level, about twenty million marks to be exact. The political risks of antagonizing Japan and becoming involved in the difficulties between Nanking and Canton also operated as restraining factors, and in this regard the German

involvement was also held down, especially at Canton.”4 In spite of the limitations imposed in Berlin, by the summer of 1935 GermanChinese trade had been increased, and the German military mission was supplemented by an air mission.2° The air mission was especially interested in an airplane factory German industrialists had erected for Chiang near Hangchow, an installation that provided an additional focus for German influence in China.”° Even if Klein had not been able to carry out all the extravagant schemes he had hoped for, German

interests in

China were clearly growing in 1934~35, in spite of Japanese objections.”’ Whatever the real economic benefit these interests might actually have had for Germany had war not subsequently broken out in the Far East, they did give Germany a stake in China sufficiently great to restrain the first venture into pro-Japanese policy that began to be advocated in some quarters, beginning in 1933. Aside from publically expressed admiration extended to Japan by some elements in National Socialist Germany in 1933, the first real involvement of the two powers was to

21, Rabenau, p. 705. Rabenau adds that “it is unfortunately impossible to cover the economic questions in detail.” The year 1940—when Rabenau’s book was published—was not the time to discuss the projected German loan to Chiang Kai-shek. 22. The televant documents ate in T-120, 2988/6680, with a summary in G.D., C, 3, No. 180. 23, Key documents in T-120, 2988/6680. Published items in G.D., C, 3, Nos. 301, 366, 472, 476, 488, 508, 504, 554; 4, Nos. 1, 40, 76; cf. Memorandum of General Thomas, 20 July 1945, Nuremberg document 436-PS. The

account in Helfferich, pp. 107—40, is useful but one-sided. 24, The reduction of Germany’s involvement at Canton was in part the result of a direct plea from the German consul general at Shanghai, Hermann Kriebel, an associate of Hitler from the time of the Munich putsch (G.D., C, 4, Nos. 94, 101; cf. the excerpts from von Falkenhausen’s letter to Lt. Colonel Brinckmann, 19 May 1935, T-

120, 2991/6691/H 098512-518). 25. In the margin of a report by General Streccius, the German air adviser, State Secretary von Biilow raised the question whether the German Air Ministry was now also making its own China policy (Irautmann report 497 of 16 May 1935, T-120, 2988/6680/H Foreign Office F 753/753/10.

096293). For information on a German

naval officer in China see

26. This project was carried forward by the Junkers Works and by the industrialist Otto Wolff (G.D., C, 3, Nos. 373, 379, 404; Memorandum by Frohwein, 8 June 1935, T-120, 2988/6680/H 096308). Otto Wolff was also to construct some railways and carry out other projects; see the excerpts from the letter of von Falkenhausen to Brinckmann, 13 March 1935, T-120, 2991/6691/H 098462466; U.S. 1935, 3: 583. 27. G.D., C, 2, No. 358.

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be occasioned by economic interests in a third area, namely Manchuria.*® A key role in the Manchurian drama was to be played by a product Germany needed—soybeans—as well as by an adventurer who seemed perfectly suited to the new German government, Ferdinand Heye. Soybeans were imported into Germany to help meet the need for cattle fodder and vegetable oils. The threat to Germany’s domestic economy by the scarcity of these staples had been brought dramatically home to the regime in World War I; at various times during the National Socialist petiod attempts were made to assure a steady supply. In addition to the episode taken up here, there were such other efforts as schemes to grow soybeans in Southeast Europe and, later, to obtain Soviet aid in trans-

porting the precious product from Manchuria over the Trans-Siberian Railway in the years of the German-Soviet nonageression pact.2? Ferdinand Heye was a German businessman who had been in Manchuria in 1925— 27. The business activity in which he participated involved the smuggling of narcotics, led to the suicide of one member of the firm, and ended in bankruptcy following an embezzlement.*° As early as 1931 Heye contacted Fritz Thyssen, a German industrialist who strongly supported the National Socialists at that time and who referred him to his friend Goring. In anticipation of a National Socialist takeover in Germany, Heye prepared some elaborate projects for German-Manchurian trade which, on Géring’s advice, he took to the Foreign Ministry in March 1933.3! Heye claimed the support of both Goring and Hitler and soon enlisted the aid of Rosenberg’s foreign policy office, where Werner Daitz, the head of the APA’s foreign trade office, came to be Heye’s main party sponsor. The Foreign Ministry was most dubious about the whole project; but financed by Thyssen, and with some sort of government encouragement, Heye went to Manchuria

in August 1933, returning to Germany in late September.*” Heye’s stay in Germany coincided with the change in Germany’s embassy in Tokyo and thus looked like an opportune moment for new departures in foreign policy. Heye saw the newly appointed German ambassador, Herbert von Dirksen, whom the Foreign Ministry promptly enlightened on Heye’s background.*? From here on, the conflict between the Foreign Ministry and Heye was to evolve until it wrecked the chances for the policy change that Heye (and the National Socialist circles behind him) wanted and that von Dirksen himself soon came to advocate, namely the recognition of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo as both a token of closer German-Japanese relations and an opening for a special German economic role in Manchuria. Heye wanted to become special trade commissioner in Manchukuo with an appointment as consul-general there. He was supported in this by the APA as well as by Thyssen and, for a while, Hitler’s special economic

adviser, Wilhelm

Keppler. Hitler himself

28. On his return to Japan after walking out of the League over the vote to approve the report of the Lytton

commission, Yosuke Matsuoka stopped in Berlin in March 1933 (D.D.F,, 1st, 2, No. 393; cf. ibid., No. 375);

but there is no evidence that important matters were discussed. 29. For early attempts to grow soybeans in Romania and Bulgaria see Wilmowsky to Knoll, 10 July 1935, T-

the 120, 3502/8987/E 630288289; on transit across the Soviet Union see Gerhard L. Weinberg, Germany and Soviet Union, 1939-1941 (Leiden: Brill, 1954), pp. 72-73. When 30. German consul Harbin to the Foreign Ministry, 10 March 1933, T-120, 2992/6693/H 098873—885.

Heye’s background later became a subject of dispute in the German government, Karl Ritter of the Foreign of Ministry could refer to Heye’s own reference in the correspondence to 21 kilograms (about fifty pounds) ' morphine (Memorandum of Ritter, 21 November 1933, ibid., frames H 098926—929).

Heye’s earlier dealing with 31. G.D., C, 1, No. 50. The correspondence referred to in ibid., n. 3, concerns

memoirs, [ Géring and Thyssen going back to 1931. There are no references to the whole episode in Thyssen’s id Hitler

(New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1941).

eerie tin (Tokyo) telegrams 89 of - August and 93 of 13 September 1933, T-120, 2992/6693/H 098898899. 1933, T-120, 2992/6693/H 33. Von Dirksen, p. 159; Altenburg (Berlin) to von Dirksen (Moscow), 30 October 098894.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

clearly became interested and for a while appears to have considered recognizing Manchukuo. The Foreign Ministry argued the danger of losing Germany’s economic interests in a resentful China as against the doubtful prospect of advantages in Manchuria beyond those that could be secured through normal trade channels. Furthermore, it was argued that a Germany which had just pulled out of the League would be unwise to isolate itself still more by affronting the powers opposed to recognition of the puppet state. Unwittingly, Rosenberg himself was to provide Hitler with another argument against recognition by stressing that closer cooperation with Japan would alienate Britain, which Germany still hoped to woo. These arguments won the day—as they would continue to do for several yeats more. The decision was long-postponed, however, and in the interim other complications intervened. Since Heye had conducted several political discussions on his 1933 trip and continued to mix politics with trade on his second journey to the Far East, he soon came into personal conflict with von Dirksen, who in fact advocated a

policy that otherwise closely paralleled Heye’s.*4 When von Dirksen talked with Hitler, von Blomberg, and others in mid-October

1933 before starting on his new assignment, the subject of German relations with Japan was naturally discussed.3> Von Dirksen gained the impression that Hitler wanted closer relations with Japan and was prepared to recognize Manchukuo. When the Japanese foreign minister urged von Dirksen to make a trip to Manchuria at their first meeting on 18 December 1933, von Dirksen wanted to comply with this request. He argued, when confronted by the immediate opposition of the Foreign Ministry, that this was precisely what Hitler wanted. He thought that such a trip was the best way to prepare for recognition, the key step in his plan for close German-Japanese relations. The Foreign Ministry maintained that von Dirksen had misunderstood Hitler, and pointed out the dangers to Germany’s relations with China, the Soviet Union, England, and the United

States if von Dirksen’s adventurous course were followed. Von Dirksen had to content himself with sending his economic counselor to Manchuria, a step that promptly set off speculation that German recognition of the puppet state was imminent.*° These rumors of impending recognition were furthered by Heye’s appearance in the Far East Hitler had decided on 16 February 1934 that Heye could negotiate a trade agreement with the Manchukuo authorities, but this action was not to constitute recogni-

tion. In view of the Chinese fears resulting from Heye’s activities, Hitler had also authorized the publication of a communiqué denying that recognition was imminent, and a statement to this effect was communicated to the Chinese government.’ In this policy of 34. Documents on this episode are in T-120, 2992/6693/passim. Published items are G.D., C, 2, Nos. 97, 238, 241. On Hitlet’s interest see Memorandum by Ritter, IV Chi 2555 of 21 November 1933, frames H 098930—

931; Rosenberg’s report for Hitler of mid-October 1933, forwarded on 18 December 1933, Nuremberg document 048-PS in Rosenberg Tagebuch, p. 159. 35. At one point in his memoirs (p. 130) von Dirksen claims Hitler gave him no hints of his future policy toward Japan; at another (p. 156) he asserts that von Blomberg told him Hitler wanted better relations. 36. On this dispute see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 7, 237, 138, 154, 158, 162, 174, 183, 198, 236, 256, 267; Memorandum

by von Bulow, 8 February 1934, T-120, 2992/6692/H 098750; U.S. 1934, 3:8, 23, 43-44. One cannot simply dismiss von Dirksen’s repeated insistence that Hitler had authorized recognition in their conversation of 18 October as either a total misunderstanding or a reflection of von Dirksen’s confusion about the realities of Far Eastern politics (he thought all the other powers were about to extend recognition). The origin of the misunderstanding might be seen in Hitler’s excitement at the time about having left the League a few days earlier. In his thinking, the League was closely related to the non-recognition doctrine (see Gethard L. Weinberg, “German Recognition of Manchoukuo,” World Affairs Quarterly, 28, No. 2 [July 1957], p. 153 and n. 17), and Hitler may well have made some hasty reference to that doctrine if he reviewed for von Dirksen his most recent and most spectacular step. For evidence that the Getman Foreign Ministry thought Hitler might approve recognition see von Bulow to Meyer, 13 January 1934, T-120, 2992/6692/H 098730. 37. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 238, 241, 269, 281, 285, 429, n. 6; von Neurath to von Bulow, 27 February 1934, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197898; von Neurath to Trautmann, telegram 24 of 8 Match 1934, T-120, 2992/6692/H

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compromise, Hitler deferred to the Foreign Ministry’s desire to avoid recognition with all its international political complications, while yielding to the wishes of Rosenberg, Thyssen, and Heye to try for the economic advantages that might be gained in Manchuria. If recognition seemed appropriate later, it might be accorded; but the moment when von Seeckt was about to go to China to take over direction of Chiang’s military advisers seemed a poor time to come down too obviously on the side of Japan. The new policy was defined by von Neurath to von Dirksen as one of watching the realities, skeptically seeing what might really be accomplished in Manchuria without pursuing the political question of recognition for the time being.8 The instrument chosen to do the exploring, namely Ferdinand Heye, did not prove successful. He artived in Manchuria late in February 1934 and began negotiations for greater Getman-Manchurian trade.» His activities produced an immediate and general uproar. He promised German recognition, advertised himself as the forthcoming German minister to Manchukuo, and offered to maintain German soybean imports at the 1933 level for three years. He ptoposed that all the payments for these imports be handled through an account in Germany and be used to pay for German industrial products, thereby short-circuiting all the German firms previously trading in the Far East and assuring a new firm—in which he and Thyssen played key roles—a general commission of 10 percent.*° Since these proposals were put forward right after Berlin had published the communiqué of 24 February stating that Germany was not about to recognize Manchukuo, Heye was not received enthusiastically by the Manchukuo authorities, who politely declined his offer on 25

March 1934. In the meantime, the political role Heye had assumed for himself had agitated von Dirksen and the German Foreign Ministry; his plan to cut all other German firms out of the Manchurian trade alarmed German businesses with interests there; and the implications of his dealings with the Manchukuo authorities terrified those German firms, often

the same ones, whose position in China was likely to be imperiled by the Chinese reaction to the agreement Heye proposed.*! There was an immediate re-examination of the situation in Berlin and the submission of the Heye problem to Rudolf Hess, Hitler’s deputy, who was frequently called upon to untangle or to cut the Gordian knots with which the German government snarled itself. While Hess was trying to unravel the dispute between the APA and Thyssen on one side and the Foreign Ministry backed by the now-suspicious Japanese as well as the German firms with Far Eastern interests on the other, Heye proceeded with his negotiations in Manchuria. By the beginning of June 1934 these negotiations had produced a provisional agreement that said practically nothing but still alarmed the Chinese govern098798. The confusion was compounded by the fact that Daitz was telling diplomats in Berlin that recognition

was imminent, while Meyer, the head of the Eastern section of the German Foreign Ministry, was denying it (G_D., C, 2, No. 353; U.S. 1934, 3:59; Ambassador Dodd could tell the difference, but many others could not).

38. G.D., C, 2, No. 300.

39. Myers (Mukden) dispatch of 1 March 1934, State 762.93-Manchuria/1; see also the memorandum by Edmund Fuerholzer, head of the German news agency Transocean for the Far East, “Betrachtungen uber die mandschurische Frage, Anfang April 1934,” in T-81, roll 32, serial 53, frames 28814818.

40. von 41. the

Heye’s proposals of 3 March 1934 are alluded to in various published documents; their text was attached to Dirksen’s report 1341 of 6April 1934, T-120, 2992/6693/H 099291-292. of It should be remembered that Germany had lost its extraterritorial rights in China under articles 128-134 Treaty of Versailles, so that German firms in China were unusually vulnerable to reprisals.

n. 5, 429, 438; 3, No. 24; 42. For documents on this episode see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 312, 324, 326, 353, 425,

March 1934, TNuremberg document 049-PS in Rosenberg Tagebuch, pp. 163-67; Balser (Harbin) report 46 of 22

27 March 1934, frame H 120, 2992/6693/H 099213-217, and memorandum by Erdmannsdorff (Berlin), Hess to von Neurath, 27 April, 099044; von Dirksen to von Biilow, 7 April, T-120, 2998/6693/H 099355—359; Note by Ritter (Berlin), 26 ibid., frame H 099393; von Neurath to Hess, 15 May, ibid., frames H 099397400;

May, ibid., frame H 099555.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ment. When copies of the agreement finally became available in Berlin, it could be seen

that the proposed treaty contained no substantive concessions by the Manchukuo authorities but provided them with some dubious assutances about German soybean import policies. The bureaucratic infighting in Germany continued, with the tone of the communications becoming increasingly bitter. For a while, the whole matter was stalled.43 The Berlin agencies slowly untangled themselves during July and August, eventually deciding to separate private from official business. Heye and his associates in the Far East as well as their backers in Germany would operate as a private concern, dealing in Manchuria like other German firms. The German government declared its willingness to have such trade governed by a compensation agreement that Heye would negotiate for the German-Manchukuo Export-Import Company.“ By this time, however, Heye had been so discredited in Manchuria that he could not get an agreement. He thereupon became involved in a deal to sell a zeppelin to the Japanese as part of a soybean exchange, but soon that enterprise was similarly bogged down. Hitler finally withdrew his support of Heye in February 1935; a GermanManchukuo trade agreement was not to be signed until the end of April 1936—and then through regular diplomatic channels.*° Efforts by the APA to replace Heye with another special commissioner failed, and the foreign section of the NSDAP was no more successful with its fancy schemes for trade with Inner Mongolia.*” Party diplomacy in Far Eastern economic affairs had produced nothing but confusion. The main questions of policy remained: should Germany side with Japan at the expense of its position in China? Could Germany maintain the position it already held in China without offending Japan? Through 1934 and the first half of 1935, Germany continued to balance its Far Eastern interests, with predominant emphasis still given to its relations with China.4* A

tentative effort by Germany to bring China and Japan together was fruitless, though the attempt would be repeated several times later.” As it balanced its commitments in the Far East, Germany maintained its military advisers in China in spite of Japanese objections;*° on the other hand, it reassured the Japanese that it was not about to demand a return of its pre-World War I colorties in the Pacific.>! In the summer of 1935, Germany’s Far Eastern policy seemed to reach a new stage. The dichotomy of interests in both China and Japan that had marked the years since 43. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 482, 489, 493, 494 (on the original copy of this document, the fact that the telegram from

Heye to Thyssen’s Stahlverein was number 61 of a seties was underlined twice at the Foreign Ministry), 495; 3, Nos, 22, 24; Trautmann report 508 of 6 June 1934, T-120, 2787/6022/H 044381-384; von Dirksen telegram

82 of 11 June, T-120, 2998/6693/H 099668; von Dirksen telegram 83 of 12 June (containing the text of the agreement), ibid., frame H 099675; Daitz to von Neurath, 15 June, ibid., frames H 099683—684; Ritter to Daitz, 20 June, ibid., frames H 099686-687; Note by Ulrich (Berlin), 15 June, ibid., frames H 099698-699;

Memorandum by Ritter, 21 June, ibid., frame H 099701; Rosenberry Tagebuch, pp. 38 (8 June), 41-43 (28 June), 49-51 (11 July). 44. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 107, 172, 217; Foreign Ministry telegram to von Dirksen number 88 of 21 August 1934, T-

120, 2998/6693/H

099714; and T-120, 3502/8987/E 630171—345 passim.

45. Noebel (Tokyo) telegram 137 of 20 November 1934, T-120, 2998/6693/H 099738-739; Foreign Ministry to Noebel telegram 120 of 23 November, ibid., frame H 099741; von Dirksen report 4404 of 8 December, ibid., frames H 099748-758; Air Ministry to Foreign Ministry, 16 March 1935, 3502/8986/E 630119131.

46. G.D., C, 3, No. 478. 47. Trautmann report 515 of 21 May, 1935, T-120, 2991/6691/H 098486—504. 48. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 374, 403, 404; 3, Nos. 247, 350, 521; 4, No. 45. German economic interests in China may

have looked especially good because of certain problems in Germany’s trade with Japan, mainly as a result of

Japan’s deficit in that trade (G.D., C, 2, No. 460; 3, Nos. 217, n. 3, 239; 4, No. 69).

49. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 153, 157, 168, 288. 50. Ibid., No. 512. 51. On this subject see “Stichworte fur die miindliche Information der Presse?’ 18 March 1933, 1-120, 2998/6694/H 099788; German Foreign Ministry Memorandum, 25 April 1933, T-120, 3475/8925/E 625876— 877; von Dirksen report 1169 of 29 March 1935, T-120, 2673/5575/E 400036-037; G.D., C, 4, No. 173.

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Summer of 1935

105

Hitler came to power was continuing, but the level of German involvement in the Far East had increased considerably. In regard to China, this was signalized by the raising of the German legation in Peiping to an embassy in May 1935, followed by its transfer to Nanking in June, both at Chiang’s urging.*? At the same time, German-Japanese negotiations for a special agreement that was to become the Anti-Comintern Pact were inaugurated.°> These steps ushered in a new period of Germany’s dilemma. With a growing interest in the two Far Eastern powers that were often in conflict with each other, could Germany maintain good relations with both and draw from each what it needed: influence and economic advantage from China, and political support from Japan? The possible turning of Germany to Japan because of Japan’s conquest of Manchuria, a special focus of German

economic

interest in the Far East, had been

temporarily thwarted by a combination of three factors: the resistance of the German Foreign Ministry, the development of greater interest in China by the German, army, and

the confusion of private profit with public policy in the Heye venture. The Manchurian question, however, would continue to play a significant role in Germany’s Far Eastern policy. Moreover, the German ambassador to Japan, Herbert von Dirksen, would continue to predict a glowing future for Japan’s imperial expansion and for the possibility that Germany might profit from it in spite of Japanese exclusiveness in the areas it controlled, an exclusiveness to which the opponents of an alignment with Japan repeatedly—and prophetically—pointed. For the time being, Hitler would not choose; his attention was focused on problems that seemed both more urgent and more important. The elements in the German government and the National Socialist party which were especially interested in that faraway portion of the world could work at cross purposes for a while longer.

eee ee ee Eee _ , 4 December 1934, T-120, 2787/6022/H 52. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 239, 493; Rabenau, p. 713; Meyer to Trautmann

and RM 422 of 20 May, T-120, 1522/3088/D 044409410; von Neurath Memoranda RM 417 of 17 May 1935,

624772 and D 624776.

ike

1935-1940 (Tiibingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1962), p. 25. 53. Theo Sommer, Deutschland und Japan zwischen den Machten,

Chapter 6

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933—36 |pyee 1933, German-American relations had been improving steadily. The American revulsion against the peace settlement had turned public opinion in the United States against its former associates, especially France. This attitude was exacerbated by the insistence of the Americans and the reluctance of their former allies to proceed with the repayment of loans made to help win the war. The struggling German republic, on the other hand, was viewed with increasing sympathy in the United States as the antiGerman hysteria of the war years gave way to strong animus against Britain and France.! In Germany, there had been some appreciation of the more positive attitude the United States had taken toward it, and the absence of major disputes between the two countries led many Germans to look across the Atlantic with increasingly friendly regard. No two majot powers were on better terms ‘with each other than Germany and the United States before 1933, and the destruction of that relationship must be considered one of the signal events of the 1930s. The new German government at first took little interest in the United States, regarding that country as far off and of no immediate concern in the plans for European conquest that dominated Hitler’s thoughts. Germany’s ambassador to the United States withdrew from the foreign service, unwilling to serve the new masters of his country; and Hitler found Washington a conveniently distant place to which to consign Hans Luther whom he was eager to remove from the presidency of the Reichsbank. Shortly before, General Friedrich von Botticher had been assigned as military attaché to Washington; he would serve there until 1941, his reports reinforcing Hitler’s low estimate of American military power and potential. America’s representation to Germany was a matter of replacing an incumbent ambassador who was returning home with an appointee of the new administration inaugurated in Washington in March 1933. President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt evidently wished to maintain good relations between the two countries. William C. Bullitt, 1. See Selig Adler, “The War-Guilt Question and American

Disillusionment,

1918-1928;” Journal of Modern

History, 23, No. 1 (Match 1951), 1-28. 2. German embassy Washington to Secretary of State Stimson, 6 February 1933, State 701.6211/805. Bétticher

had made a trip to the United States in 1922 while serving as chief of army intelligence. On his role, see Gerhard L. Weinberg, “Hitler’s Image of the United States,” American Historical Review, 69, No. 4 (July 1964), 1012. A naval attaché, Captain, later Rear-Admiral, Witthoeft was assigned to Washington as of 1 October

1933.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

107

who was in Europe as Roosevelt’s unofficial emissary before the inauguration, conveyed such a message to Berlin in late January 1933;3 and, worried about the possible accession

to power of Hitler, Roosevelt had urged Hanfstaengl, his one acquaintance among the

National Socialists, to attempt to moderate Hitlet’s conduct.4 Hitler came to power between

the American

election and the inauguration, and under these citcumstances

Roosevelt canvassed a number of possibilities before settling on the historian William E. Dodd as his ambassador. Roosevelt’s first consideration of James M. Cox, the Democratic presidential candidate of 1920, Newton D. Baker, former secretary of wat and Roosevelt’s rival for the 1932 presidential nomination, and a number of other prominent men suggests the importance he attached to Berlin as a key diplomatic post in contrast to Hitler’s use of Washington as a place of exile.) The man appointed was the incoming president of the American

Historical Association,

a distinguished man

of

letters who had also been active in Democratic politics and on whom Roosevelt counted as a tepresentative of both the values of American society and the hopes of the new administration. Though subjected to considerable criticism, Dodd maintained the president’s full confidence. While the German government, to its own ultimate misfortune,

went forward along policy lines of which Dodd was openly critical, Roosevelt seemed to feel in him a kindred spirit. As the president wrote in September 1935, in connection with an extended leave for Dodd, “I need him in Berlin.’’

In view of the incipient deterioration in German-American relations in the spring of 1933, Roosevelt

tried to establish direct contact with the new

German

government

before his ambassador could arrive in Berlin in July. In mid-March, Roosevelt suggested to the departing German ambassador that he would like an opportunity for a personal meeting with one of the German leaders, perhaps foreign minister, von Neurath.’ With

the work of the disarmament conference set back by events in Germany, he decided to have the American delegate to the conference, Norman Davis, go to Berlin to discuss

both disarmament and the forthcoming World Economic Conference in London with 3. Note by von Biilow, 28 January 1933, T-120, 2371/4601/E 188719—-721; documents in T-120, 3381/8594/E

603512-517; Bullitt to Roosevelt,

8 November 1936, Franklin D, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park (hereafter cited

as Hyde Park), P. S. F. France; Beatrice Farnsworth, William C. Bullitt and the Soviet Union (Bloomington: Indiana

University Press, 1967), pp. 80-85. 4. Hanfstaengl, p. 188. Hanfstaengl and Roosevelt were acquainted from the time FDR was a New York State senator and Hanfstaengl managed the New York branch of his family’s art reproduction business. Roosevelt was responsible for having Hanfstaengl transferred from internment in Canada to the United Statesin 1942. 5. Roosevelt to Cox, 9 March 1933, in Elliott Roosevelt (ed.), F. D. R.: His Personal Letters, 1928-1945 (New

York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1950), 1:337; Roosevelt to Hullrt Dallek, Democrat and Diplomat, The Life of William E. Dodd (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 187-90. 6. Roosevelt to R. Walton Moore, 11 September 1935, Hyde Park, O. F. 523 (FDR and Foreign Affairs, 3:6). On Dodd see his Diary (ed. by W. E. Dodd, Jr., and Martha Dodd) (New York: Harcourt, 1941); Gordon Craig and Felix Gilbert, Te Diplomats (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953), pp. 447-60; and Arnold A, Offner’s fine essay on Dodd in The Historian, 34 (Aug. 1962), 451-69. The book by Dallek, cited above, is useful; see pp. and 373-75 on the Dodd Diary. Important details in Offner’s American Appeasement, United States Foreign Policy T Germany, 1933-1938 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). Through the courtesy of the Dodd family, of have had access to the W. E. Dodd papers in the Library of Congress. There is a very sensitive appreciation on the Dodd in the papers of George S. Messersmith (at the University of Delaware), “Some observations a position to know, in was who Messersmith, Betlin.” to Ambassador as Dodd William Dr. of appointment would be unspecasserts that Roosevelt appointed Dodd because he wanted someone who knew Germany, “there were very few men tacular, and had the background to interpret events. Messersmith maintained that his ineffectiveness was who realized what was happening in Germany more thoroughly” than Dodd, and that that the subject believe I happening.” was what by appalled completely “was Dodd that fact due mainly to the that any other ambassador to of effectiveness ought to be considered in a broader context: there is no evidence and others better informed National Socialist Germany was more effective, even if some were more popular 13 December 1937 in the Dodd Papers, and 1936 December 26 of Dodd to letters Mootre’s Walton R. also (see files 1936-M and 1937-M).

AGA), GeAnINon3:

108

Hitler's Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler and other German officials, in spite of some advice to the contrary from the State Department. At his meetings in Berlin, Davis received an impression of the revolutionary changes in progress in Germany and the intransigence of Hitler in regard to the Jewish question and the need for territorial change, couched in terms of revision of the Versailles Treaty.? Hitler’s recorded impression of Norman Davis was entirely negative.'° He would receive reinforcement of this evaluation of American leadership from the report of Hjalmar Schacht on his visit to Washington in May 1933 for preliminary bilateral talks preceding the World Economic Conference. Roosevelt had invited Germany to send Hitler or another special emissary to Washington, unless the German government preferred regular diplomatic channels.!! Hitler would not go; von Neurath was willing to go himself and suggested that otherwise Ambassador Luther conduct the talks,!2 but Hitler decided to send Schacht. Because of the avowed purpose of the Wash-

ington talks, Hitler’s decision is easily understandable: he had not replaced Luther with Schacht at the Reichsbank so that Luther could have an important role in German economic policy. By the time Schacht went to Washington early in May, the factors beginning to trouble German-American relations were becoming sufficiently distinct to form important subjects for discussion. Schacht himself was directly involved in one of these factors; it would provide the occasion for the most dramatic incident during his trip, and

the failure to resolve the differences raised would poison German-American relations for years. This was the question of international payments. It included certain payments owed by Germany to the United States government, but the bulk of the problem involved the transfer to Americans of interest and amortization payments on German government, municipal, and corporation obligations sold in the United States during the

1920s. The German government was planning to stop the transfer of such payments, allegedly because of a lack of foreign exchange. Although German foreign exchange resources were indeed strained by both the general effects of the depression and its specific deficit in trade with the United States, these were not the only reasons— probably not even the main ones—for the impending moratorium. The specific trade problem with the United States was being greatly alleviated for Germany by the drastic drop in the prices of American commodities exported to Germany. As Schacht himself later reported, for example, Germany had paid 428 million Reichsmark to purchase 296,000 tons of American cotton in 1930, while in 1933 it could purchase 313,000 tons

for as little as 217 million Reichsmark.!3 The general lack of foreign exchange for payments in the United States, however, was as much artificial as real. Germany would not pay its obligations in the United States because it preferred to use its foreign exchange for other purposes, partly to subsidize political and propaganda operations abroad'* but primarily in connection with its rearma8. U.S. 1933, 1:79-81; Moffat Diary, 4 April 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol. 33. 9. On the Davis trip to Berlin see G.D., C, 1. Nos. 144, 148; U.S. 1933, 1:85-89; U.S. 1933, 2:216—20; B.D., 2d,

5, No. 83.

10. Hatlers Tischgesprache (ed. Picker), p. 351. 11. For this episode see the author’s “Schachts Besuch in den USA im Jahre 1933,” Véierteljabrshefie fir Zeitgeschichte, 11, No. 2 (April 1963), 166-80. In general, documents cited there will not again be listed here.

12. Note by Volckets, 11 April 1933, T-120, 2382/4619/E 197658.

13. Schacht to Dodd, 20 February 1934, State 611.6231/384. It should be noted that this one item represented

almost half of Germany’s imports from the U.S., 5 percent of the total German imports in 1933, and more than its imports from any other country except Great Britain and the Netherlands (Svatistisches Jahrbuch fir das Deutsche Reich 1936 [Betlin: Verlag fiir Sozialpolitik, 1936], p. 253). 14. Such use of foreign exchange was a continuing feature of the National Socialist period. Non-German goyernments who observed this, although they could not always be aware of its precise extent, were understandably skeptical when a government gave a lack of foreign exchange as the reason for its refusal to pay its

Germany and the Western H. emisphere, 1933-36

109

ment program. There was no lack of foreign exchange for the purchase of American airplane parts;!5 as Franz Grueger, chief of the economic depart ment of the governmentowned Reichskreditgesellschaft (State Credit Agency), put it: “No obstacles have been placed in the way of those wishing to obtain foreign exchange for imports to be used in the process of armament construction.”!6 There were, furthermore, positive advantages to Germany in defaultin g on the payments to American creditors. Refusal to transfer interest and amottization of the principal would lead to a drastic drop in the value of the securities in the America n money market. Germans could then purchase them with the allegedly nonexistent foreign exchange at a fraction of their face value.!7 Moreover, by authorizing German exporters to use some of the dollar proceeds obtained from the sale of German goods in the United States for the purchase of these depreciated bonds in America, and the subsequent resale of the securities at face value to the original German debtor for Reichsmark, German exports could be subsidized at the expense of the American bondholder, the German exporter having lowered his price in anticipation of this arrangement. The bondholder was “given the choice of sacrificing a large part of his original investment in order to salvage a proportion of his capital, thereby subsidizing the German export trade at the expense of American manufacturers, or of hanging on to his bonds and foregoing most of his annual interest and risking the loss of his entire investment in the remote hope of eventually saving his principal.’’!8 Some of this type of activity, in fact, had started before 1933,!9 but it was Schacht

who, to Hitler’s great delight, made a regular system out of this procedure.2° Periodic changes in the regulations governing its operation would enable the German government to manipulate the system for immediate advantage. Germany’s leaders so looked forward to the economic and political benefits to be derived from such manipulation of defaulted bonds as to reject any idea of trying to have them canceled. Hitler and Schacht wete secretly agreed that Germany “could not agree to a total compilation of the debt,” against which they often directed public attacks.2) The German government had originally intended to suspend transfer payments even before Schacht left for Washington but decided instead to let him explain the forthcoming measure,

simultaneously

authorizing him to put the moratorium into effect either after his return or even by telegram from Washington. Nevertheless, just before leaving Germany, Schacht confidentially promised the American government that no such policy would be adopted during his talks; and after his arrival he gave public expression to similar sentiments.” Possibly because of a misunderstanding, Schacht did send the telegram from Washington to Berlin, authorizing the immediate publication of a moratorium and summoning debts and simultaneously used apparently limitless amounts of such foreign exchange to finance propaganda or other activities within the same country’s borders (see, ¢.g., G.D., C, 1, Nos. 96, 387).

15. Douglas Miller (acting commercial attaché in Berlin) to Willard Thorpe (director of the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce), 4 April 1934, State 611.6231/348. This report was shown to the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Investigation of the Munitions Industry (Nye Committee) and figures prominently, though anonymously, in the section “Participation by American Firms in the Rearming of Germany” of its report, Munitions Industry, 74th Congress, 2d Session, Senate Report No. 944, Part 3 (Washington: Government

Printing Office, 1936), pp. 256—60. 16. Messersmith dispatch 2031 of 17 May 1934, State 862.50/806. ' 17. For a brief history of the bonds and their repatriation through 1933 see the Memorandum of the Finance and Investment Division of 20 March 1934, State 862.51/3946.

18. John G. Erhardt (U.S. consul general Hamburg) report of 10 January 1934, State 611.6231/306. 19. Memorandum of Sussdorf (State Department, Economic Affairs), 7 February 1933, State 462.00 R 296/5749'/2. 20. Hitlers Tischgesprache (ed. Picker), p. 287.

21. G.D., C, 1, No. 182.

e

22. Gordon telegram 66 of 26 April 1933, State 550.S 1 Wash./220; New York Times, 6 May 1933, p. 2.

110

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the creditors to Berlin for talks. President Roosevelt was naturally horrified at what must have looked like a most unscrupulous trick: Schacht had announced publicly at the beginning of the talks that he was “absolutely opposed to any moratoriums” and then a few days later, while still in the American capital, authorized a step that would harm

thousands of American bondholders. The obvious conclusion would be that the moratorium was

an American

idea, urged on the Germans

in their talks with American

officials, when in truth the facts were exactly the other way around.’? Roosevelt and Secretary of State Cordell Hull arranged for Schacht to be told off in no uncertain terms in a carefully staged scene that Roosevelt subsequently recounted with great glee to Ambassador Dodd and which led Schacht to rescind his precipitate action.** The moratorium, accordingly, was postponed briefly, being instituted in June after Schacht’s return to Germany. In spite of promises Schacht had made while in Washington, special provisions dis-

ctiminating against American creditors were included in the moratorium procedures, and the American emphasis on at least preserving the principal, even though interest was scaled down, was disregarded. The different approaches were due to the basic difference

in the aims of the two powers. The United States government wanted to find ways to ease the situation of the debtor and thereby protect both the debtor and the principal of the lender (as in the New Deal’s domestic policy in regard to home mortgages);”° the German government wanted to enrich the debtor at the creditor’s expense. There was little prospect that these policies could be reconciled. The constant protests from Washington had little impact on the Germans, who joyfully proceeded with increasingly ingenious devices that amounted to making the American people subsidize German rearmament.”° When the Germans excused themselves by referring to their shortage of dollars, the Americans angrily pointed to advertisements placed by Germans in American newspapers offering to purchase for dollars the securities whose prices had fallen because of the alleged absence of dollars to pay interest and amortization.2” All warnings against the implications of such measures for German-American relations fell on deaf ears.25 One should not overlook thé fact that the victims of these defrauding operations were precisely those Americans who had backed up their faith and friendship for Germany with hard cash in the years when Germany rebuilt its economy in a world still largely hostile to that nation. The selection of precisely those individuals most friendly to 23. The diary of the chief of the State Department’s Division of Western European Affairs reflects the feelings of the time: “Went in to see Bullitt, who told me at length of the talks with Schacht, including his attempt to

put the President in an almost untenable position (an episode which cannot yet be put on paper) . . .” (Moffat Diary 12 May 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol, 22). 24. This incident is presented in detail in the author’s article on the Schacht visit. Hull’s memorandum on his dressing-down of Schacht is in State 862.51/3988 1/2; the appended draft of the presidential communication handed Schacht bears Roosevelt’s handwritten corrections and initials (see also Cordell Hull, Memoirs [New York: Macmillan, 1948], 1:237-38). Roosevelt’s account of the incident to Dodd is in the latter’s Diary, 16 June 1933, pp. 4-5; reference to Roosevelt’s later recounting of the incident to Henry Morgenthau, Jr., in John M.

Blum (ed.), From the Morgenthau Diaries, 3: Years of War 1941-1945 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1967), p. 418. Herbert Feis’s account is in his 1933, Characters in Crisis (Boston: Little Brown, 1966), pp. 138-41.

The claim that this whole incident was invented by Hull and Dodd is typical of the distortions—and chatac-

teristic of the scholarship—of Charles C. Tansill’s Back Door to War: The Roosevelt Foreign Policy, 1933-1941 (Chicago: Regnery, 1952), pp. 46-8.

AsnGD EG Nor 259) 26. U.S. 1933, 2:439-45, 452-53, 456-59; Hull, 1:238-40; G.D., C, 1, No. 316; 2, Nos. 93, 103; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom

12. Juli 1933,” “... vom

15. September 1933,” T-120, 2612/5650/H

003694695, 729. 27. U.S. 1933, 2:459—-60. Summaries of Schacht’s procedures may be found in Earl R. Beck, Verdict on Schacht (Tallahassee: Florida State University Press, 1955), pp. 46-49; Arthur Schweitzer, “Die wirtschaftliche Wieder-

aufriistung Deutschlands von 1934-1936,” Zeitschrift fir die gesamte Staatswissenschaft, 114 (A 958), 622-23.

28. G.D., C, 1, No. 294.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

shat

Germany out of a population of about 125 million, so that by shady manipulations they might be turned to anti-German attitudes must be considered a masterstroke of petverted genius; no wonder Schacht was referred to as a wizard. Another subject touched on during Schacht’s Washington conversations was that of trade and tariffs. The American government had proposed a tariff truce until the World Economic Conference could deal with the subject. The German response was most unenthusiastic; after considerable delay and agitated internal debate, the German government sent an evasive answer. Hugenberg was the principal obstacle in Berlin. He had developed a bizarre scheme for a “debt reduction tariff’ (Entschuldungsabgabe) that no one else inside or outside the German government could be persuaded to support but that he feared would be petmanently ruled out by a tariff truce.2? Schacht strongly urged acceptance of the American plan to avoid the total isolation of Germany as other powers agreed to it. The objections of the German Minister of Economics were overcome only after the crisis in Washington produced by Schacht’s action on the transfer moratorium made a concession to American wishes seem necessaty.>" The German government, however, was in principle determined not only to maintain its basic tariff system but in fact planned to extend its scope.*! Its tariff program consisted to a great extent of diverting German trade from the United States to other countries, and this required a variety of discriminatory measures against American products.7? Here was the obverse of Germany’s trade concessions to such areas as Southeast Europe; it led to immediate difficulties with the United States on two grounds.

In the first place, the discrimination against American exports—at a time when the German government was engaging in the practices already mentioned to subsidize its own exports to the United States—was certain to arouse hostility in an American government struggling to lift its country out of the depression. Second, and perhaps more important in the long run, was the fact that the procedures involved in this tariff system were incompatible with Germany’s treaty commitments to the United States and with Cordell Hull’s belief in the freeing of world trade as a major avenue to both economic recovery and world peace. The significance of this factor for the relations between Germany and the United States has not hitherto received the attention it deserves. His political career greatly influenced by the American tariff controversy, Cordell Hull as Secretary of State was dedicated to the belief that many of the world’s ills were caused by excessive barriers to trade. He preached to all who would and many who would not listen that only an easing of these bartiers on a broad, multilateral scale could raise the level of world trade and

prosperity, while this in turn would ease world tensions in the political sphere. At a time when the New Deal was turning the monetary policy of the United States from an internationalistic to a nationalistic policy, American trade policy was moving from nationalism to internationalism.23 German policy, however, was becoming extremely nationalistic on

both counts, and this was to become a major cause of deterioration in the relations between the two countries. The strong personal dedication of the American Secretary of State to the policy of opening the channels of world trade, eventually symbolized by the reciprocal trade agreements, meant that the man who would play a key role in American » 29. Ibid., No. 161. vom 3. Mai 1933,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 30. Ibid., Nos. 210, 224; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses 003661. ‘ 31. G.D., C, 1, No. 296. Ausschusses vom 18, Oktober 1933,” T-120, 32. U.S. 1933, 2:418-30, 480-83; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen

0/H 003742.

2612/565 Age of Roosevelt, 2: The Coming of the New 33. This is the essence of Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.’s, discussion in The 260. Deal (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959), esp. p.

112

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

foreign policy in the 1930s was continually and personally affronted by Germany’s determination to bend trade policy to the narrowest military and political considerations.** A third major area of concern in German-American relations grew out of the fundamental clash between the ideology of the new regime in Germany and the ideals of the United States, ideals that were being emphasized increasingly by the new administration in Washington. The general hostility of national socialism to democracy and all its beliefs and practices may have won it many recruits inside Germany, but it certainly made no friends in a country self-consciously dedicated to democratic ideals. The attack of the new Germany on cultural and literary freedom struck at one of the main pillars of American respect for German attainments. The day Schacht arrived in New York, the American press catried lists of books to be burned by the National Socialists on 10 May. A related area of sensitivity was the persecution of Jews in Germany. One of the first manifestations of this in 1933 was the purge of the faculties of German universities—of the very universities that had long been a major factor in American admiration for Germany. One of Hull’s first talks with Ambassador Luther was devoted to the persecution of the Jews;*> the records of the Department of State for this period bulge with protests from American individuals and organizations of all kinds; and while Schacht was in

Washington on 10 May, Major General O’Ryan of New York’s 27th Division led a protest match of 100,000 people in New York City. The subject was touched on repeatedly in Schacht’s conversations in Washington; just before leaving America, Schacht discussed Germany’s persecution of the Jews with a group of prominent Christians and Jews in New York;3° and he was sufficiently impressed by the strong reactions in the United States to take up the subject with Hitler on his return to Germany.*” There is no evidence that Schacht either had or wanted to have any significant impact on the anti-Jewish policy of the regime; in many areas of German life he wanted an anti-Semitic policy followed. His concern was only that it be orderly, comprehensive, and nonviolent.4* From that perspective, all he might hope for was tactical adjustments in the application of anti-Jewish policies to the exigencies of Germany’s foreign trade needs, and at times he did secure such modifications. In the summer of 1933, a retired

American professor of German literature who had known Hitler in the 1920s, John F. Coar, attempted to impress on Hitler and his associates the negative impact Germany’s anti-Semitic policies were having in the United States. He was treated by Hitler to an anti-Jewish diatribe, an attack on the boycott of German goods abroad, an assurance that

Germany would absorb Austria, and an authorization to sound out President Roosevelt 34. I do not wish to underestimate Roosevelt’s personal role in American foreign policy, but there has been a tendency to downgrade the influence of Hull. My research in the files of the State Department, Roosevelt’s papers at Hyde Park, Hull’s own papers in the Library of Congress, and numerous other collections of papers of American diplomats leaves me with the impression that the Secretary of State’s role in key areas of foreign policy in the 1930s was generally a determining one. President Roosevelt maintained a personal and continuing interest in both the conduct and personnel of Ametican foreign relations and formed his own impression of world events, sometimes on the basis of unofficial reports, but generally held to the lines of policy advocated by Hull. It should be noted that even for the later 1930s this view is also held by William L. Langer and S. Everett Gleason, The Challenge to Isolation, 1937-1940 (New York: Harper, 1952), pp. 7-9.

35. U.S. 1933, 2:352-54; Hull, 1:236-37. 36. FDR to Irving Lehman, 18 May 1933 (printed in Edgar B. Nixon [ed.], Franklin D. Roosevelt and Foreign Affairs (Cambridge: Harvard

University Press, 1969], 1:136), and Irving Lehman to FDR, 24 May 1933, Hyde

Park, P.P.F. 436. 37. Schacht’s statement to Irving Lehman, then associate judge of the New York Court of Appeals and brother of the governor of that state—both prominent Democrats and Jews—that Roosevelt “reminded me in every way of Hitler” suggests that Schacht was hardly an expert on American attitudes. For his comments in Berlin, see G.D., C, 1, No. 262; note by Dieckhoff on a conversation with Schacht, 21 May 1933, T-120, 3508/9037/E

632853-854. 38. Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1961), p. 22.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

13

as to concessions that the United States would make if the anti-Jewish campaign in Germany were temporarily relaxed. Roosevelt indicated his willingness to meet Coar, but nothing came of the episode. The attacks on religious liberty in Germany and the retaliatory boycott of German goods in the United States would continue to poison relations between the two countries.“ The one other subject discussed at length during Schacht’s Washington visit was in some ways the most important: the issue of disarmament or German rearmament, then under debate at Geneva. The American government very much wanted the disarmament conference to succeed and did what it could to find a middle ground between the French and German positions.*! While the new administration in Washington was willing to make a contribution to the negotiations by promising not to interfere with League economic sanctions against an aggressor or the provisions permitting inspection in compliance with disarmament agreements, and was further willing to support the Germans on procedural matters,** the president and all his advisers were very concerned about the prospect of German rearmament. Roosevelt put the issue to Schacht in the strongest possible terms, and this message was in fact conveyed to Berlin by Schacht, but with no discernible result.4? President Roosevelt thereupon attempted to influence Hitler directly just before Hitler’s Reichstag speech of 17 May 1933. Roosevelt’s personal message may have contributed to the careful and moderate tone Hitler took in his speech.“ As the evidence summarized shows, however, such sweet tones were designed only to lull Germany’s neighbors until Hitler had his army ready. It was precisely this possibility that some Americans feared. Jay Pierrepont Moffat, chief of the West European division in the State Department, had agreed with William C. Bullitt on the danger of German rearmament on the basis that “The Nazis want five yeats of peace in order the better to prepare for eventual war.”45 The United States chargé in Berlin warned that “Hitler’s statement [in his 17 May speech] that no country stands to gain from a new war ... is in marked contrast to the zeal with which pacifists are now being persecuted in the Third Reich for voicing similar views”; furthermore, he was hearing from Nazis in private conversations that in less than five years Hitler would be able to move forward along the lines laid down in Mein Kampj.6 Hitler’s conciliatory tone, probably inspired by British and French threats of sanctions, pleased Roosevelt but cannot have been very reassuring.4” The president was beginning to receive along with

the regular diplomatic papers a series of perceptive and alarming reports on the situation in Germany from Samuel R. Fuller, Jr. Fuller had worked with Roosevelt in the Navy Department during the war and made periodic trips to Europe to look after his own

1933, Dodd Papers, 1933 39. Dodd Diary, 5,9, 16, 18 August 1933, pp. 20-24, Memorandum of Dodd, 16 August

in Hyde Park, Folder D; Coar to FDR, 9 August, 2 September, and 21 September 1933 and telated papers and 19 September P.P.F. 3716 (FDR and Foreign Affairs, 1:352-53, 359, 384-85); Memorandum of Moffat, 14 Vol. 2. For Coat’s later attempts 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol. 22; Hull to Coat, 20 October 1933, Moffat Papers,

to play a role in U.S.-German relations see Dodd Diary, 1 November

1934, p. 183; “Bestellungen aus der

101/4, £ 214; Memorandum by Pressekonferenz v. 13. Dezember 1934.” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 4 April 1935, State 611.0031/1925. Moffat, 14 March 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol. 23; Memorandum by Moffat, 40. U.S. 1933, 2:357, 359; Hull, 1:240; Offner, American Appeasement, pp. 59-63. Ad WS. 193FOU ANT GD), G AYNos 239) px 4375 Offner, chap. 2.

42. U.S. 1933, 1:128; Moffat Diary 8 May 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol. 33.

War (Washington: Government Printing Office, 43. U.S. 1933, 1:130-31; FDR to Hull, 6 May 1933, Peace and

1943), No. 14; G.D., €, 1, Nos. 214, 233.

eal

OY

243, 246; Nadolny, p. 133. Hitler initialed both the 44, U.S. 1933, 1:139-45; Hull, 1:226-27; G.D., C, 1, Nos. 1783/3650/D 813103-111). See also FDR and (T-120, message

English and German texts of Roosevelt’s

Foreign Affairs, 1:395.

45. Moffat Diary, 2 May 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol. 33.

46. Gordon dispatch 2421 of 20 May 1933, U.S. 1933, 1:159-64. AtaG:Diy GwisiNoe259:

114

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

textile interests there.48 In addition to meeting his business associates, he saw Schacht before his American trip and also briefly met Hitler. The picture Fuller painted then and later of a Germany revitalized and enthralled by Hitler, of signs of regimentation and militarization, of indications that the persecution of the Jews would continue, and of the probability that Hitler would start a war either influenced Roosevelt’s view of Germany or was strikingly similar to what the president perceived on his own. If Hitler did not much care about the impression his Germany made in Washington, there was certainly deep concern in the American capital. Schacht’s visit had done nothing to alleviate this discrepancy in attitude between Washington and Berlin. He reported to Berlin that Hull was unfit for his post and the members of Roosevelt’s cabinet men of no stature; a State Department official commented that there would be “universal relief’ on Schacht’s departure.’ The latter half of 1933 saw not only the friction over trade and transfer disctimination, the persecution of the Jews, and the evident determination of the Germans

to tearm, but brought German-American relations close to the breaking point over the continuation of physical attacks on Americans in Germany. A series of incidents, frequently uninterrupted by the police and unpunished by the German government, excited American public opinion. The subject was raised in the cabinet in Washington, and serious measures, including a warning to Americans not to travel in Germany and even a temporary rupture of diplomatic relations, were contemplated. The new American ambassador made the strongest representations to Hitler at their first meeting, and warnings were issued both directly and indirectly of the grave steps the United States might be forced to take. By the end of the year, new and strict orders by the German government temporarily quelled this issue, but the crisis had been serious indeed, and the state of

American opinion toward Germany had been deeply affected.*° As if the incidents involving Americans in Germany were not sufficiently disturbing, there was the problem of National Socialist activities within the United States. American opinion, which was particularly sensitive to foreign political agitation in the United States, was quickly aroused by signs of public activity on the part of National Socialist groups in America. This was to become an increasingly important subject of dispute in subsequent years, but its role in conditioning American opinion to a view of national socialism as a direct menace to the United States, not simply as an ideology that might be despicable but was at least remote, began as early as 1933.5! The “Friends of the New 48. The reports of Samuel R. Fuller, Jr. (1879-1966), on his trips are at Hyde Park, P. P. F. 2616. Roosevelt would lend these reports to the State Department, indicating his own belief in their great interest and requesting their return. After a trip in the fall of 1935, Roosevelt asked Fuller to speak to Hull (Fuller to FDR, 11 October 1935); it was on this occasion that Fuller left with Hull the copy of his talk with Schacht that thus came to be filed with the State Department records, was used against Schacht at the Nuremberg Trial, and is printed in U.S. 1935, 2:282-86. Correspondence of Roosevelt concerning Fuller’s 1935 trip is also filed in Hyde Park, P. S. F. Dodd. Excerpts from this material have been published in FDR and Foreign Affairs, 1:172-76;

2:518, 541, 604; 3:23—25, 38, 69, 139, 166, 195, 291-94, 422, 459-60. 49. Note by Dieckhoff on a conversation with Schacht, 21 May 1933, T-120, 3508/9037/E 632853-854; G.D.,

C, 1, No. 262; Moffat Papers, entry for 12 May 1933, p. 96. 50. The crisis over these incidents may be followed in U.S. 1933, 2:385-98; Dodd Diary, pp. 35-37, 47, 48-50; Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 1297 of 14 September 1933, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197740-741; Phillips to

FDR, 23 August 1933, Hyde Park, O.F. 198 (FDR and Foreign Affairs, 1:374); Dodd to FDR, 28 October and

FDR to Dodd, 13 November 1933, Hyde Park, P. P. F. 1043; Dodd to Hull, 14 September and Hull to Dodd,

5 October 1933, State 123 Dodd, W.E./48; Dodd report 147 of 14 September 1933, State 362.1113/10; and George S. Messersmith’s 21 pp. memorandum in his papers, “Conversation with Goering on the break of relations.” 51. The subject is examined at length in Alton Frye’s Nazi Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-1941 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), esp. chaps. 3-4. The article by Joachim Remak, “Friends of the New Germany’: The Bund and German-American Relations,” Journal ofModem History, 29, No. 1 (March 1957), 38— 41, deals primarily with the later 1930s, as does the collection of German speeches, articles, excerpts from year-

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

0's

Germany” and other National Socialist groups immediately attracted great public attention, became the object of a congressional investigation, and were observed most anxiously by the American government. While some German diplomats saw the danger of such antics to German-American relations, the National Socialist patty in Germany continued to support the American groups; and since these activities were directed by Rudolf Hess, one must assume that they had Hitler’s general approval. In any case, he was not sufficiently concerned to halt the waving of swastikas before the eyes of the American public.>? Germany’s withdrawal from both the League and the disarmament conference in October led the United States in turn to withdraw even more from European affairs, but it did nothing to increase regard for Germany.*} The first year of relations between Hitler’s regime and the United States ended with the German government still disinterested in America and the American government discouraged over what looked to many like steps toward a new world war.>4 The themes of conflict that began to characterize German-American relations in 1933 continued thereafter. The documentation is voluminous and the details vary, but no significant changes mark the record of continued friction.*> The blatant militarism of the German regime continued to offend the susceptibilities of the American public and to alarm the makers of policy. Reports reaching Washington pointed to great dangers in the future once Germany had rebuilt its economy and its army. There was no question in the minds of American diplomats in Berlin that Germany “would certainly rearm and definitely prepare to wage a war against Europe in general, which would change the course of history, if not of civilization, beyond what we even dream, if their supreme effort would be successful.’*° With great concern, the United States observed the failure of the disarmament negotiations,*” and there are signs that President Roosevelt began to

think in terms of isolating Germany, as eventually voiced in his “quarantine” speech of October 1937.58 The isolation to which Roosevelt referred involved the very way in which, from an American perspective, Germany appeared to be isolating itself—in the field of international economic relations. The decision of the German government to concentrate its resources on rearmament increasingly affected the extension of controls over Germany’s domestic economy books, etc., The German Reich and Americans of German Origin (New York: Oxford University Press, 1938). See also Jacobsen, pp. 528-49. Important but fragmentary files pertaining to the German veterans organization Stablhelm and its activities abroad, including the United States in 1934-35, form the basis of Heinzpeter

Thiimmler, “Die Auslandsorganisation des Stahlhelm im Dienst der Faschistischen Propaganda (1934/35),”

Der deutsche Inperialismus und der Zweite Weltkrieg, 2:283-302. document 52. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 5, 139. For the Stahl/helm representative Georg Schmidt referred to in the latter see the memorandum of Moffat for Phillips of 9 November 1933, Moffat Papers, Vol. 22. 53. Moffat Papers, pp. 99-104; U.S. 1933, 1:273-76.

54. War and Peace, Nos. 20, 21.

of World 55. The book by James V. Compton, The Swastika and the Eagle; Hitler, the United States and the Origins of the United War II (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1967), adds little but errors to my articles on “Hitler’s Image

States” and “German Colonial Plans and Policies, 1938-1942.”

56. Geist (consul general Berlin) to Moffat, 9 June 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 5. See letters of 10 August and 15 September 1934, ibid. Policy 57. In June 1934, the German government through a member of the Military Socialist patty (Webnpolitisches Ami) acting for Disarmament Commissioner Ribbentrop The US. was effort to involve the United States in unofficial disarmament negotiations.

also Geist’s perceptive office of the National made an unsuccessful willing to talk, but only

On this incident, see U.S. 1934, 1:96, through official channels and with the knowledge of Britain and France. 4 General Committee/977; Davis to A 5 500.A State 1934, June 12 of 897 telegram Davis 119-20; Norman

Correspondence 1934-35, Moffat Diary FDR, 4 June 1934, Library of Congress, Norman H. Davis Papers, Official pp. 110-11. I have been unable to 12 June 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 35; see also Dodd Diary, 15 June 1934, archives. German the in incident this to reference any locate On the U.S. desire Letters 1928-1945 1:472-73. 58. U.S. 1934, 1:62, 70, 170-72; FDR to E. M. House, Personal

1:98. that Germany return to the disarmament negotiations see U.S. 1934,

116

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

and foreign trade in 1934. In the summer, Schacht himself took over the Ministry of Economics; and in order to conserve all foreign exchange for politically and militarily important purposes he inaugurated what was called “The New Plan” for the control of international trade and payments.*? The new policies precluded the availability of foreign exchange for the payment of German debts to American citizens, and this subject would provide a topic for continuing and acrimonious arguments between Germany and the United States, areuments in which the highest officials of both governments repeatedly participated in 1934 and 1935. Although very minor concessions were occasionally made by Berlin in order to calm the Americans temporarily, the basic policy of the German government was directed toward a continuation of those manipulations developed in 1933 that were most offensive to Washington.°! German claims that these measures were imposed on them by the shortage of foreign exchange were regularly met by American references to the purchase of war materials with the allegedly nonexistent dollars. Schacht’s argument that the German debt to the United States had been incurred for political purposes and was, therefore, no debt at all was countered by refer-

ence to the reconstruction of German industry and public services that had been financed with the proceeds from the loans.% German trade policy continued to complement its debt manipulations. As already indicated, here was the other side of Germany’s economic penetration of Southeast Europe. Discrimination against American exports and American firms in Germany, and the policy of transferring markets from the United States to other countries remained as constant irritants in German-American relations.®4 Nevertheless, various efforts were made by the German government to maintain a modicum of trade with the United States, as long as it could be fitted with the new German trade policy. Schacht proposed several complicated schemes, including one in which the American government would repurchase depreciated bonds and then accept interest on the actual price it had paid in exchange for continued German purchase of American cotton. It is indicative of the fact that Hitler was not alone in his misassessment of the United States that the German economic wizard found it difficult to understand why the administration in Washington did not wish to participate in the defrauding of its citizens.°° Another approach was to push barter deals between the two countries. Of these the most significant was one in which American cotton and possibly lard were to be exchanged for German wines. In the American administration, such arrangements had a strong supporter in George Peek, a special adviser on foreign trade to the President. After lengthy negotiations the cotton barter failed, however, because of the objections of the Department of State to an arrangement unlikely to increase cotton exports, but more importantly running directly counter to the international trade policy 59. See B.D., 2d, 6, No. 406; Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 790; Schweitzer, Big Business in the Third Reich, pp. 436ff.;

G.D., C, 3, Nos. 13, 169, 207. An account that takes Schacht at face value is Allen T. Bonnell, German Control

over International Economic Relations, 1930-1940 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1940). 60. The documentation on this debate is voluminous; see U.S. 1934, 2:331-99, 497-98; U.S. 1935, 2:428-38;

G.D., C, 2, Nos. 202, 205, 206; 3, Nos. 14, 76, 78, 79, 82, 83, 221, 237, 238, 664; 4, Nos. 284, 290; Dodd Diary, pp. 69-70, 73-74, 104-05, 112-13, 119-20, 129-30, 173-74; Moffat Diary, 19 January 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol.

35; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom

12. August 1935,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004034-035;

Memorandum of Livesay (State Department, Economic Affairs), “Treatment of the Kreuger Loan after July 1934,” 14 November 1934, State 862.51 Bondholders/214.

61. G.D., C, 2, No. 484. 62. Memorandum of Moffat, 6 July 1934, State 862.51/4109.

63. U.S. 1934, 2:356—-63, 369-73; Moffat Diary, 17 Match 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 35. 64. U.S. 1934, 2:409-14, 424-26, 458-60; U.S. 1935, 2:472-73; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses

vom 23, Januar 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 00381819. 65. Dodd Diary, 20 February 1934, pp. 80-81; Schacht to Dodd, 20 February 1934, enclosure to State 611.6231/384; Strauss (Paris) telegram 190 of 13 March 1934, State 851.5151/113.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

swe

the administration was pushing in Congress and making the basis of its negotiations for reciprocal trade agreements with other countries. Furthermore, the intermediate credits to American exporters required by this proposal seemed singularly inappropriate to the United States government in the face of Getmany’s discriminatory policies and the resulting agitation of American public opinion.® Some trade was conducted by direct barter transactions between German and American businessmen nevertheless. A particularly good example of the nature of Germany’s exports and imports under such trade practices was the bartering of water-lice to feed tropical fish in exchange for American copper plate.° Beyond such efforts to maintain a minimum level of trade by barter and other special arrangements, during 1934 and 1935 the German government attempted to place its whole economic relationship with the United States on a new basis. Germany hoped to persuade the United States to negotiate a new trade treaty that would regulate all the relevant questions on a purely bilateral basis, bring about a substantial increase in German exports to the United States, and end the application of the most-favored nation ptinciple under which each power benefited from the concessions either nation made to other countries. The decision to move in this direction was made in Berlin in late February 1934; and it was the hope of the German government that major steps in the negotiations could be taken in March. The American government was extremely dubious about negotiating with Germany on this basis while urging Congress to enact the Trade Agreements Act with its basically opposite world trade policy. Once the act was passed, Washington preferred to negotiate the first of the reciprocal trade agreements with countries that agreed with Hull’s nondiscrimination policies rather than work out with Germany a treaty that replaced the nondiscrimination clause in the existing German-United States commercial treaty by an arrangement more congenial to Berlin.” As the moment came closer when the commercial treaty could be denounced under its own terms, the American government, after considerable deliberation, decided to take

no initiative. There were few practical concessions to offer Germany; there was little hope that the Germans would abide by new trade agreements any more than the existing ones; and while the United States should not enter agreements that would further throttle world trade, it should also avoid starting a trade war with Germany.’! The

German government had decided in the meantime that it would under no circumstances pass up the 15 October 1934 opportunity to denounce the Treaty of Friendship, 66. On these barter plans see U.S. 1934, 2:421-23 (appended to this document was a letter from James Mooney of General Motors Export Corporation to George Peek of 13 April 1934, State 611.6231/348); Mooney to Peek, 7 May 1934, enclosure to State 611.6231/345; Moffat to Livesey, 24 Januaty 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 23; Moffat Diary, 1 June 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 35; Moffat to John C. White (Berlin), 20 December 1934,

Moffat Papers, Vol. 7; Moffat to Messersmith (Vienna), 27 December 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 9; FDR and Foreign Affairs, 2:314-15, 319-22; Phillips Diary, 13-14 December 1934, Houghton Library, Papers of William Phillips, Vol. 6; Offner, pp. 99-102.

29 Werner Daitz of the APA was also thinking up new schemes at this time (Wiley Berlin) to Dodd (in US),

March 1934, Dodd Papers, 1934-W. such 67. Erhardt (consul general Hamburg) dispatch 294 of 28 January 1935, State 611. 6231/532. In another chemical exports barter reported by Erhardt on 15 April 1935, American cotton was received for I. G. Farben price through to du Pont, with the foreign exchange surplus for the Germans used to subsidize the export ‘ repurchase of depreciated bonds (611.6231 /602).

1934, p. 87; “Sitzung des 68. G.D., C, 2, No. 284; Dodd Diary, 28 February 1934, p. 83, and 6 March 003843. Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 26. Februar 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H of Hull, 12 April 1934, State 69. PG.Ds «Cs DNoie294> WS 119340 2:2187 415-18, 420-21; Memorandum

611.6231/336. 70. G.D., C, 2, No. 457; 3, No. 43; U.S. 1934, 2:426-30, 433-37. 71. U.S. 1934, 2:443-44, 448-53; Memorandum

by Moffat, 14 September 1934, State 462.00 R 296/5865;

1934, State 611.6231/561. Assistant Secretary Sayre to several State Department officials, 4 October

118

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Commerce, and Consular Rights, hoping that during the year it would continue to be in effect it could pressure the United States into a new treaty more favorable to Germany.’ The step was taken as planned, but although it assured the Germans a legalized escape from the obligation to accord the United States most-favored nation treatment, the prospect that this would lead to the sort of treaty Germany wanted was slight indeed.” Ambassador Dodd correctly warned the Germans that their past discriminatory practices would make it very hard for the United States to accept a new trade arrangement but that even greater difficulty attached to any new formal agreement that might now be proposed. Once Germany had denounced the treaty, the prospect would be slight indeed of securing U.S. Senate ratification of a new treaty in the face of American public opinion alarmed by the belief that Germany planned a new war and disturbed by the domestic policies of. the German government. When Dodd took new German proposals to Washington in December 1934, his view was immediately confirmed.” Americans were increasingly perturbed by reports from Germany that stressed the militarization of German life, the persecution of the Jews, and the struggle against the Christian churches.’> Anti-German movies, public demonstrations, and the boycott of

German goods both reflected the sensitivity of Americans and furthered the spread of anti-German sentiments. The argument of Hitler that National Socialist propaganda in the United States to which Washington objected was really the product of the Jews did not impress the American government, and German protests against anti-German publicity in the United States were countered by the suggestion that such agitation would stop as soon as the reports of German actions that fed this publicity no longer had a basis in fact.’ The murders on 30 June 1934 and the assassination of the Austrian chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss increased American alarm; and the American public continued to be unfavorably impressed by the activities of National Socialist organizations which suggested that the United States should follow the German model.” A vague message from Hitler to Roosevelt could hardly affect this situation,’ nor did a most inept visit by Ernst Hanfstaengl to the United States in June 1934.7? The German embassy in Washington reported to Berlin on the deteriorating situation, but as the policies that most exercised the Americans wete precisely those intrinsically a part of National 72. “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 25. September 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003944; U.S. 1934, 2:453-55; Douglas Jenkins (consul general Berlin) to Moffat, 20 October 1934, and Moffat to Jenkins, 21 November 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8.

73. Moffat wrote in his diary for 13 and 14 October 1934: “Germany drove another nail into her economic coffin today when she denounced the most-favored nation treaty of 1924.” Moffat Papers, Vol. 36. The Treaty of Friendship, Commetce, and Consular Rights had been signed on 8 December 1923; ratifications were ex-

changed on 14 October 1925 (text in U.S. 1923, 2:29). 74. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 389, 390; Dodd Diary, 11 December 1934, pp. 203-4; Dodd to Schacht, 12 December 1934, Dodd Papers, 1934-S; U.S. 1934, 2:461-62; Offner, pp. 93-99.

75. In July 1934, James Perkins, chairman of the board of the National City Bank, sounded out von Ribbentrop

on behalf of President Roosevelt on the possibility of lessening the persecution of the Jews and the churches, but nothing came of the effort. Dodd Diary, 24 July and 31 August 1934, pp. 131, 157; letter from Henry Mann (then with the National City Bank) to me, 25 October 1962. 76. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 295, 297, 298, 302, 307, 315; Dodd Diary, 5 March 1934, pp. 86-87; Moffat Papers, 8 March

1934, p. 110.

77. On the deteriorating political atmosphere see U.S. 1934, 2:530-31, 218-20, 516-20; Dodd Diary, 28 May and

4 June 1934, pp. 102-3, 106; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 248, 259, 337, 347, 356, 359, 410; 3, Nos. 570, 571.

78. Dodd Diary, 7 and 23 March 1934, pp. 88-89, 93; Moffat Diary, 24 and 26 March 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 35; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 319, 325, 367; FDR and Foreign Affairs, 2:27—28, 34, 35.

79. Hanfstaengl had hoped to come to the U.S. in the fall of 1933 (William Moore to Marguerite Le Hand, 17

September 1933, Hyde Park, O.F. 198-A), but actually came for the twenty-fifth reunion of the Harvard Class of 1909. On his visit and the attendant uproar see Moffat Papers, pp. 111-13; Hanfstaengl, pp. 242-46; Messersmith (Vienna) to Moffat, 13 June 1934, and Moffat to Messersmith, 27 June 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 6.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36 Socialist Germany—tearmament,

racialism, and police terror—such

119 reports had no

substantial effect.8° A temporary calm in German-American relations in the spring of 1935 was quickly followed by renewed tension after a new wave of attacks on the Christian churches and the Jews in Germany that began in the summer and culminated in the fulminations of the National Socialist leaders at the party rally in Nuremberg.’! The continuing growth of German power during 1935 made American officials increasingly apprehensive about Germany’s future intentions. It was this apprehension, reinforced by accurate and alarming analyses received from official and unofficial American observers in Berlin,’ that made the United States government reluctant to bless the visit of the British foreign secretary, Sir John Simon, to Berlin,*> and dubious about the Anglo-German naval agree-

ment that followed in June 1935.°4 In view of this background, the failure of the negotiations conducted in 1935 for a

new German-American trade agreement is not particularly surprising. The German government was determined to avoid agreeing to a meaningful most-favored nation treatment clause in any new treaty—that, after all, was why it had denounced the old treaty— but it wanted to benefit from American concessions extended to other countries under the trade agreements acts. The inconsistency between these two positions came into sharp focus when Karl Ritter, director of the German Foreign Ministry’s economic department, came to the United States in October 1935. In the face of German discrimination against American trade, the United States would not make immediate

trade concessions to Germany in return for dubious promises that at some time in the future Germany would stop discriminating. In view of Germany’s refusal to grant equality of treatment to American creditors at least during a short modus vivendi, there was

no prospect that agreement could be reached before the expiration of the old treaty in mid-October 1935.85 Schacht and others in Berlin now regretted their earlier denunciation of the 1925 Treaty with the United States; their hope that they could pressure Washington into a new agreement that provided special advantages for Germany had proved a serious miscalculation.86 The article of the treaty by which each party promised most-favored nation treatment to the other was formally annulled; Germany could continue its policies without being in technical violation of the treaty, but it could not enjoy the growing 80. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 250, 569. 81, U.S. 1935, 2:357-58, 483-85, 404-5, 487-89; G.D., C, 2, No. 545; 4, Nos. 18, 67, 155, 184, 222, 237. On the case of an American whose arrest and detention in Germany gave rise to much unfavorable publicity in the U.S. starting in July 1935 see U.S. 1936, 2:291-304; Luther telegram 183 of 28 July 1936, T-120, 3024/6600/E 494947. 4 April For unofficial efforts to improve German-American relations in 1935 see Memorandum by Moffat, 1935, State 611.0031/1925; Jenkins dispatch 453 of 13 July 1935, State 862.51/4308. Park P. P. F. 2616, 82. Fuller was in Berlin in September 1935; his reports to President Roosevelt are in Hyde report by the U.S. and U.S. 1935, 2:282-86 (see also Dodd Diary, 14 September 1935, p. 267). A very perceptive 1935, is in State military attaché in Berlin, “German Foreign Policy Under Hitler,’ of 25 November 762.00/122. Vol. 23. 83. Memorandum of Moffat for Hull and Phillips, 21 March 1935, Moffat Papers,

8 June 1935, State 84, U.S. 1935, 1:163-65; Memorandum by Noel H. Field, “German Naval Proposals,” 8. 862.34/146; Moffat to Atherton (London), 24 June 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol.

G.D., C, 4, Nos. 174, 264, 331, 332, 340, 85. For documentation on these negotiations see U.S. 1935, 2:439-71;

vom 12, August 1935,” “... vom 341; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 26. April 1935,” “... 57-58;

004016, 34-35, 41-42, 4. September 1935,” “ ... vom 5. November 1935,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 2616. A memorandum by R. E. Schoenfeld ona Schacht to Fuller, 24 September 1935, Hyde Park, P. P. F. Phillips and other high officials partictconference in the State Department on 1 October 1935, in which Hull, accurately this position was reported summarizes the American position very well (State 611.6231 /727);

pated, 7October 1935, T-120, 3381/85977 E 603729-732). to Berlin (joint telegram of Luther and Ritter, No. 228 of Schoenfeld, 9 September 1935, State 862.51/4336. by Memorandum 269; p. 1935, October 7 Diary, Dodd 86.

120

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

advantages it would otherwise have received as Hull’s trade program developed. The threat of higher tariffs on American goods had not sufficed to force a new treaty on the American government. Furthermore, by the end of 1935 Germany was increasingly concerned that it was not only losing trade advantages in the American market but might soon find the United States retaliating by imposing on goods imported from Germany countervailing duties to compensate for the export subsidies that Germany was using to make up for not having joined in the devaluation of currencies.’’ The prospects on the political and economic horizons of German-American relations were dim at the end of 1935, but there is no evidence to suggest that Hitler was particularly alarmed.* When the German Foreign Ministry warned in the summer of 1935 that the planned export subsidy program would surely lead to countervailing duties under the American tariff laws, Hitler allowed the Ministry of Economics to go ahead with its schemes anyway. In the hope of avoiding retaliation, the form of the new system would be changed slightly and the United States government given formal assurances that the new law did not provide what it in fact provided.® In the winter of 1935-36, however, the American government began to investigate the whole German export system to determine whether it violated the Tariff Act of 1930 that provided for extra import duties to offset export bounties of foreign countries. The Germans became sufficiently alarmed about the prospect of countervailing duties to send on a special mission to Washington in February 1936 one of the directors of the Reichsbank and an official of the Ministry of Economics; but the legal aspects of the American Tariff Act, Cordell Hull’s trade expansion program, and Germany’s foreign trade practices simply could not be brought into harmony.” The special emissaries reinforced the concern in Berlin on their return, and some new proposals were worked out in an effort to avoid the further reduction in German-American trade that would surely follow the imposition of countervailing duties.?! These proposals, however, failed to meet the main American concerns; and as Hans Leitner, the second man in the German embassy in Washington, left to be replaced by Hans Thomsen, hitherto an official in the chancellery in Berlin, Hull gave him a parting lecture on the iniquities of

Germany’s trade policies.” A month later, on 4 June 1936, the U.S. Treasury gave notice of the forthcoming imposition of countervailing duties. The fact that German-American economic relations were heading for a crisis had been apparent to the German government for some time; as the situation deteriorated a new element entered the picture. As will be discussed in connection with the Four-Year Plan, Hermann Goring was entrusted with special responsibilities in the field of foreign

exchange and raw materials in the spring of 1936; and this brought the problems in German-American economic relations to his attention. The specific issue on which 87. U.S. 1935, 2:473-77. 88. The German press, however, was instructed on 27 November

1935, not to attack foreign chiefs of state,

including President Roosevelt (Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/6

f. 197).

89. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 157, 174. The German assurances were given in December 1936 when the U.S. govern-

ment made inquiries about the new system (U.S. 1936, 2:21). 90. On this question, see U.S. 1936, 2:210-41; FDR and Foreign Affairs, 3:308-09; John Morton Blum (ed.), From the Morgenthau Diaries, 1: Years of Crisis, 1928-1938 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959), pp. 149-54. Offner (pp. 146-53) stresses the opposition of the State Department to countervailing duties. 91.

The

report

of the

German

emissaties,

Puhl

and

Hartenstein,

on

their

trip is in “Sitzung

des

Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 19. Februar 1936,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004068-69; the new plan agreed on is in “Sitzung ... vom 28, Matz 1936,” ibid., frames H 004074-77; it was presented to the U.S. on 30 March

1936 (U.S. 1936, 2:221—-23). For related German schemes in regard to the interest on bonds see G.D., C, 4, No. 290; Strauss (Paris) telegram 180 of 10 March 1936, reporting on a meeting of Merle Cochran with Schacht, State 462 R 296 B.LS./501. 92. U.S. 1936, 2:225-27, Dodd telegram 114 of 18 April 1936, State 701.6211/934.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

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Goring first became involved, as a result it would appear of a decision by Hitler, was the long-standing problem of remaining American claims growing out of German sabotage in the United States during World War I. In its handling of the claims cases before the U.S.-German Mixed Claims Commission, the German government had at first secured some success by a systematic policy of bribing witnesses; but as these unsavory practices came to light, the original impact of the sabotage incidents on public opinion in the United States was redoubled by the blatant bad faith of the procedures used to discredit true and to manufacture false evidence.” As the claimants pressed for settlement of their claims and the American government pushed for expeditious handling of the issue, Hitler turned the matter over to Goring after Schacht had proved unwilling to help Frederico Stallforth, a representative of American claimants.°* Géring thereupon had a long conversation with Ferdinand Mayer, the American chargé in Berlin, on 6 May 1936,

and suggested informal negotiations between unofficial German and American representatives both to settle the claims and as a step toward better economic and political relations.*> Although there was some trouble with the German Foreign Ministry, Goring entrusted the talks to Captain Franz Pfeffer von Salomon (the former SA leader) who tried from the beginning, quite unsuccessfully, to have the sabotage claims tied to general German-American trade problems. The American announcement of countervailing duties burst into the middle of von Pfeffer’s preliminary talks and demonstrated the urgency of the situation.”° At a meeting in Goring’s office on 8 June the whole problem was discussed. It was clear that new steps were required. Another mission would be sent to Washington, and something would have to be done about the German measures that had given rise to countervailing duties; but the rivalry between Goring and the German Foreign Ministry would make every step difficult indeed.’ Three German emissaries were sent to Washington in June 1936 to discuss the trade problems, while the U.S. Agent and counsel before the Mixed Claims Commission went to Germany. The Germans were received very pleasantly in Washington, and the Americans and von Pfeffer even came to an agreement in Munich; but eventually nothing would come of either set of negotiations.”8 The Germans decided to drop those practices that had provoked the countervailing duties but simultaneously took steps that in any case would further reduce GermanAmerican trade. The new schemes proposed by the Germans in Washington did not meet the The 93. This whole subject merits scholarly investigation; it is ignored in the secondary literature on this period. It should be concluding report of the American commissioner of 16 July 1941, is in Hyde Park, O. F. 198-C.

National noted that the frauds had been perpetrated during the Weimar period. The facts came out during the

commissioner in 1939 Socialist era, and as they became too obvious to be ignored, the Germans withdrew their

rather than either agree in the final awards or disagree in the face of incontrovertible evidence. State 462.11 94. U.S. 1936, 2:256-60; Dodd telegram 104 of 7 April and Mayer telegram 115 of 21 April 1936, 1 5232/555 and 558. 95. U.S. 1936, 2:260—62; Hull to Mayer, telegram 45 of 7May 1936, State 462.11. 5232/560. 5232/561; Phillips Diary, 14 May 96. U.S. 1936, 2:262-70; Mayer telegram 137 of 8 May 1936, State 462.11 L 1936, Phillips Papers, 10:1513. document PS-3875; U.S. 97. Memorandum by Bodenschatz (of Géring’s office), 9 June 1936, Nuremberg 7 1581. 1579, 11:1578, Papers, Phillips 1936, June 17 and 1936, 2:229-35; Phillips Diary, 15, 16, of State 462.11 L 5232/630 (see ibid., p. 98. On the Munich negotiations see U.S. 1936, 2:272—76; Enclosure 4 Karl Markau, who was later to come to 272) contains the minutes of the 10 July session in Munich with Dr. old associate, Walter Hewel, acting as Hitler’s with and side German the on Pfeffer Washington, joining von secretary. G.D.,

and Baer, see U.S. 1936, 2:236—246; On the talks in Washington, primarily with Brinkmann, Imhoff, 747; Memorandum by Schoenfeld, 6 611.6231/ State 1936, June 29 , Schoenfeld by dum Memoran 469; C, 5, No.

July 1936, State 611.623/210.

ae

Phillips to Dodd dispatch 663 of 22 August Baer remained in the U.S. until the end of September 1936; see 1936, State 611.623/225, and G.D., C, 5, No. 503, n. 6.

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requirements of American trade policy; although the countervailing duties were lifted, no other American concessions were made. On the German side, this led first to postponement and finally a refusal to implement the agreement that had been reached by German and American negotiators in Munich. A final effort by von Pfeffer to salvage the broader goals of Géring’s policy by sending still another special emissary, Dr. Karl Markau, to Washington in December failed because of the doubts of the German Foreign Ministry and embassy in Washington, as well as the American refusal to make trade concessions to Germany in exchange for German adherence to the signed agreement on the claims. More, rather than less, bitterness was the result, less rather than more

satisfaction in

economic relations.” Goring and his assistant von Pfeffer were interested in agreement with the United States only if it provided an opportunity for immediate trade concessions; the Americans would not compromise their general trade agreements policy by making special and exceptional concessions to the one country whose trade policies ran most directly contrary to their own. The countervailing duty issue had been settled by changes in German practices—Berlin had backed down in the face of Washington’s resolve. The basic differences in trade policy, however, remained. The German ambassador, Hans Luther, had

indicated to his own government not only that this was in part Germany’s own fault but that no other administration in Washington was likely to follow as liberal a trade policy as that of Franklin Roosevelt.! As Luther left for Berlin in late November, a bitter conversation with the assistant Secretary of State, Francis Sayre, showed him that no con-

cessions could be expected from Washington.!°! When he returned in January 1937, his conversations had the same tone, and so did his final farewell in May.'°? Germany formally repudiated its agreement on the sabotage claims while making clear that it would not agree to a new trade arrangement with the United States on terms the Americans could accept.!% At the same time as German-American economic relations were evidencing signs of acrimonious deterioration, the failure of the West European powers in the Ethiopian crisis, the apparently growing danget of another war, the public impact of Senator Gerald Nye’s investigation of the munitions industry, and the agitation of pacifist groups were

accentuating the pressure toward isolationism in the United States.!%* In some ways there seemed to be a vicious circle: such developments as the Hoare-Laval Plan that seemed to sell out Ethiopia to Italy when Britain and France were supposedly defending it increased 99. The documentation on this episode is extensive. There were troubles between various groups of American claimants and holders of awards as well as on the German side. The published reports of the Mixed Claims Commission for the period 1933 to 1939 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1940) and the Final Report of H. H. Martin Washington: Government Printing Office, 1941) contain much relevant material. In addition see U.S. 1936, 2:246—-50, 277-88; Dodd Diary, 20 October 1936, pp- 357-58; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 503, 567; Phillips

Diary, 7 August 1936, Phillips Papers, 11:1630; Memorandum by Robert W. Bonyinge (American agent), 11 August 1936, in R. Walton Moore Papers at Hyde Park; Adams (vice-consul Berlin) report 611 of 8 August 1936, State 611.6231/809: a series of documents, including the correspondence of von Pfeffer and Markau with Hull and Moore, for the period July December 1936, in State 462.11 L 5232/645-798 passim; Memorandum by Gritzbach (of Goring’s office), 20 November 1936, T-120, 2621/5482/E 381988. It should be noted that the

Germans attempted to secure the assistance of the Senate majority leader, Joseph Robinson, referred to as Senatsprasidentin the German documents. 100. G.D., C, 5, No. 567. 101. U.S. 1936, 2:252-54; Luther’s report on this talk will appear as G.D., C, 6, No. 52. It was then already

known in Washington that Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff would replace Luther; see Messersmith October 1936, Library of Congress, Cordell Hull Papers, Folder 93.

to Hull, 16

102. U.S. 1937, 2:328-29, 331. 103. Luther Memorandum of 17 April 1937, ibid., pp. 348-50; Jenkins dispatch 1491 of 15 April 1937, ibid., pp. 329-31; Final Report ofH. H. Martin, p. 35. 104. A good summary of the situation is in Robert A. Divine, The Idusion of Neutrality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), chaps. 4-5.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

123

isolationist pressures in the United States, while knowledge that help could not be expected from America if war came only reinforced the willingness of Britain and France to make concessions that might avoid the danger of wart.!°5 The cause of peace was harmed in this fashion, for the absence of a vigorous American role encouraged Germany to greater risks. This in turn undermined the assumptions underlying the isolationist impulse by increasing the likelihood that if war came the United States would be involved in spite of its own preferences. The longer war was postponed, the mote likely it was that German victories would threaten an extra-European power like the United States. The American minister to Vienna, George S. Messersmith, pointed this out after

the Rhineland occupation of March 1936 in a letter to Undersecretary Phillips:

I feel that we have a very great interest in this [British and French firmness] for if this question is settled now as it can be settled, the chances are 99 out of 100 that we can stay out of it [any war risked in the process] and that it will soon be over. If there is weakness and the Germans are allowed to fortify their western frontier, a wat in a year or so hence is inevitable if the regime is able to hold on that long, and in that case the chances of our being able to stay out will certainly be less than 5050, and in my opinion a good deal less, and this is the opinion, as you know, of one

who believes so strongly that we should do everything to endeavor to stay out.1% These warnings were wise indeed and applied to those on both sides of the Atlantic. But the American public refused to consider the possibility that measures they imagined could have kept the United States out of World War I—such as refusal to sell weapons to the victims of ageression—amight help to insure their involvement in World War IL. There are indications that in 1936 President Roosevelt’s increasing concern about developments in Europe led him to have the possibility explored of some constructive American role in the search for peace by several of his ambassadors in Europe, especially Dodd in Berlin. Roosevelt had observed the growing dangers anxiously, continuing to use S. R. Fuller, Jr., to keep in informal contact with the situation. In this process, he had Fuller sound out the Germans in the spring about the possibility of leasing colonies as a means of dealing with the controversial colonial question without raising the question of sovereignty.!°7 Later he authorized Dodd to check whether some kind of conference of the powers, called by American initiative, was likely to be at all helpful. The informal soundings Dodd made in Berlin confirmed the obvious fact that, given the situation in the fall of 1936 after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, nothing could be done. By the end of the year, the plan had been dropped—though it would remain in Roosevelt’s mind as a possibility to explore later.!°8 In the meantime, the United States had to explain to the leaders of the Western powers as clearly as possible that they could not rely on

105. On the European view of this trend, see D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, Nos. 13, 14, 26; 2, Nos. 341, 441; G.D., C, 5, No.

514; Thomas Jones, A Diary with Letters 1931-1950 (London: Oxford University Press, 1954), 14 September 1936, p. 266.

; 106. Messersmith to Phillips, 13 March 1936, State 863.00/1279. talk with 107. See Fullet’s report on his talk with Schacht on 1 April 1936, in Hyde Park, P. P. F. 2616; cf. his

subsequent Schacht on 27 March, with Hitler and Schacht on 1 April, and his correspondence about prior and

appointments with Roosevelt, in ibid. On the colonial issue see pp. 215-19, below. Dodd to FDR, 19 108. On this episode see FDR to Dodd, 5 August 1936, Personal Letters 1928-1945, 1:605—06; 3:373;, G.D., C, 5, Nos. 544, August and 21 September 1936, Hyde Park, P. S. F. Dodd; FDR and Foreign Affairs, Offner, pp. 171-72. 611, 626; Anthony Eden, Facing the Dictators (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962), pp. 595-96;

letters to Cox of 9 For indications that Roosevelt was dropping the idea at the end of 1936 see his Letters 1928-1945, Personal in 1937, January 15 of Cudahy to and 1937, December 1936, to Dodd of 9 January 1:638, 648-49, 652-53.

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American military help if it came to war with Germany.' Only in the economic field was there the possibility of cooperation, a possibility symbolized by the U.S.-BritishFrench stabilization agreement of 25 September 1936.!!° No more effort on Germany’s part was needed to antagonize the American public, but the possibility of future danger was not yet clear either to Germany or the people of the United States. The antagonism toward Germany that had been aroused in the United States was to become a factor of immense importance. The course of German-American diplomatic relations traced here necessarily stresses economic issues—and frictions with regard to them—for it was primarily in this area that Germany’s day-to-day relations with the United States were in fact conducted during this period. Furthermore, from the German point of view, these economic issues were of considerable current significance; in Washington they played a part in turning American officials, and especially Secretary Cordell Hull himself, against the German government. Nevertheless, the factors most responsible for the developing hostility of American public opinion were not of an economic kind. There was genuine and widespread horror at the German relapse into barbarism, a horror fed by reports from Germany by prominent American correspondents and by refugees from German persecution who reached the United States. There was a self-conscious reaction against the vitriolic denunciations of democracy that poured out of the Third Reich. There was angry foreboding about a Germany which combined these developments with a glorification of war and the sponsorship of like-minded—or equally mindless—organizations on the American side of the Atlantic.

When at the end of 1934 the chief of the State Department’s western European division confirmed the estimate of Ambassador Dodd that the United States should prefer to lose its markets in Germany rather than to make a new trade treaty agreeable to Berlin, he recalled that, contrary to the fears of the State Department, its successful

opposition to the proposed cotton barter with Germany had not produced any avalanche of protests from the public.!!! The American people were greatly exercised about economic problems in the years of the great depression, but basic ideological challenges affected them mote deeply still. In Latin America, German activity in the period 1933-36 had been concentrated in two fields of endeavor. The foreign organization of the National Socialist party had taken control of the Germans and those of German descent living in South America, as well as

their institutions the development the foreign trade America and a

and publications.!!2 Of more immediate importance of trade relations. In order to establish a framework policy of the new regime in Berlin, a special mission seties of trade agreements signed.!'3 Designed to

to Germany was that fitted in with was sent to Latin increase German

exports, these agreements also opened up avenues for political influence; but no major impact was evident before 1937. Only in Brazil, the country that was to be the scene of

considerable excitement, were there indications of political repercussions by 1936.!!* The trend in German trade policy was by that time increasingly toward the export of armaments, the displacement of United States trade with South American countries, and the

109. Bullitt (Paris) to Moore, 29 November 1936, quoted in Moore’s letter to Sol Bloom of 23 January 1941, in Hyde Park, R. W. Moore Papers; and U.S. 1936, 1:586-87 110. On the Tripartite Stabilization Agreement see U.S. 1936, 1:535-66; D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 240, 246, 288;

Blum, Morgenthau Diaries, Years of Crisis, pp. 159-73; Fuller to FDR, 22 October 1936, Hyde Park, P. P. F. 2616. 111. Moffat Diary, 28 December 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 36.

112, The most recent account is in Frye, chap. 5. 113. On

the trade mission

see G.D., C, 3, Nos.

30, 492; 5, No.

511; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen

Ausschusses vom 27. Juni 1934” (with annexed instructions for the delegation), and “. . . vom 15. Oktober 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003903-908, 960-961. 114. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 479; 3, No. 449; G.D., C, 5, No. 500.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1933-36

1%

search for raw materials needed for preparations for war under the Four-Year Plan.!'5 It would not have been difficult to predict that such activities were certain to have repercussions not only in Latin America but on Germany’s relations with the United States as well. At the time, however, the main effect of German policy appears to have been to lend impetus to American attempts to convert the Monroe Doctrine into something resembling a defensive alliance against Germany. Ironically, and unintentionally, Germany was helping to bring together the nations of the Western hemisphere; but there is nothing to suggest that anyone in Berlin particularly cared.'!

115. G.D., er

Treuhand Aktiengesellschaft to the ReichsfinanzC, 5, Nos. 569, 598; Deutsche Revisions- und 102.

nisterium, R 2/27, f. tacks 2 June 1938, Bundesarchiv, Reichsfinanzmi

116. Offner, pp. 168-71.

Chapter 7

German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

n order to develop the main themes in Germany’s relations with some countries, it has been necessaty to deal with certain events out of chronological order before returning to examine the circumstances under which Hitler took Germany out of the disarmament conference and the League of Nations in October 1933. The review of Hitler’s general aims before he came to power documented his distaste for the League as an organization and the incompatibility of the policies he intended to follow with the obligations of membership in it. The discussion of German foreign policy in the first months of the new regime illustrated how the previously projected policies were in fact initiated in 1933. By the summer of that year, international reaction to events in Germany had made the disarmament negotiations in Geneva increasingly difficult at the same time as Germany’s rearmament was actually getting under way. The British, French, Italian, and American governments continued to hope for agreement on a disarmament convention; but though the British were inclined to prefer an agreement that provided

some limits on Germany to no agreement at all, the French were most reluctant to make concessions in the absence of new guarantees of their security if any new treaty were violated. The British, however, were unwilling to assume new responsibilities on the Continent and were, therefore, ready to listen to the Italian argument that concessions

must be made to Germany since no power was willing to take steps to keep Germany from rearming.! The negotiations in Geneva deadlocked in June, and the following months were devoted to exploring new plans. These plans, advanced in different versions by the British, French, and Italians, took varying views of allowing Germany a token supply of those types of weapons denied it by the peace treaty, including differing provisions for a pteliminary period in which no basic changes would be made, followed by another petiod during which specific disarmament measures would be taken by France and other countries. These plans also provided for some forms of control to assure that whatever

1. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 383. The French ambassador to Rome summarized the Italian attitude in the same way:

Germany will rearm anyway; no one will start a preventive war; action by the League will lead to a German withdrawal from that organization; therefore one should get Germany’s signature on a treaty by allowing some rearmament (ibid., No. 393).

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had been agreed upon would in fact be observed.2 When the German foreign minister,

von Neurath, met with the leaders of the other delegations at Geneva in the last week of

September 1933, it became clear that there was a wide gap between the proposals Britain, Italy, France, and the United States would support and those Germany was willing to accept.° The British government thereupon began work on a compromise plan;* but before it could be formally presented, the British themselves abandoned it in the face of Germany’s return to a position even more intransigent than the one taken in the September talks.? How had German policy reached this stage? The actual progress of German rearmament in 1933 was slow. The new regime inherited from its predecessor some plans for an increase in the size of the army and basic pteparations in certain areas forbidden to Germany—military aviation,’ armored warfare, chemical warfare, and submarines.’ Though adding very little to the actual strength of the

German armed forces above the limits set by the Treaty of Versailles, these preparations did make it easier for Hitler to get his rearmament program under way, and had, by their illegitimate character, sufficiently undermined the moral susceptibilities of the German officer corps to make them willing and even eager participants in the military program of the new government.® The German cabinet had established a National Defense Council (Reichsverteidigungsral) by a secret decree on 4 April 1933; and this agency, together with its subordinate but mote regularly functioning working committee (Arbeitsausschuss), began the process of coordinating the activities of different government agencies toward military planning. The initial steps in this process could be taken secretly, but substantial rearmament measures would sooner or later become known to the outside world which, because of

the constant sight of marching SA paramilitary formations, was inclined to overestimate rather than underestimate German military might. At some point, the publicly visible process of rearmament would clash with the participation of Germany in the disarmament negotiations; if this clash was postponed until the fall of 1933, two factors were responsible. One was the reluctance of Hitler to provoke other powers too soon—he wanted to see whether they would in fact move toward preventive war in the face of German tearmament. The other was the necessarily slow beginning of the rearmament process itself: as other powers would learn later, the initial period of a rearmament program involves a great deal of planning, organizing, training, and contracting but produces

little in the way of immediately apparent military power.!° There was little doubt in the German government, however, that the time would come when the contradiction between internal rearmament and external disarmament negotiations would confront 2. Documents on these schemes have been published in B.D., 2d, 5; U.S. 1933, 1; G.D., C, 1; D.D.F,, Ist., 3

The course of Italian policy is reflected in Aloisi’s Journal. See also Eden, Facing the Dictators, p. 50.

3. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 411; G.D., G 1, No. 447; U.S. 1933, 1:232-35; D.D.B., 2, Nos. 47, 50, 53, 54, 56.

4. On the British compromise and German information about it see BiDy, 2d, 5, No: 440, ni. 15.G.D., C, 1, No,

478. 5. On the British cabinet meeting of 9 October 1933 at which the 3 October draft compromise was abandoned see B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 425, 440. The Germans were informed on 10 October (G.D., C, 1, No. 486).

6. A useful summary is in Karl-Heinz Vélker, “Die Entwicklung der militarischen Luftfahrt in Deutschland 1920-1933,” Beitriige zur Militar- und Kriegsgeschichte, 3 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962), 121-292. o der 7. Kapitan zur See Schiissler, Der Kampf der Marine gegen V ersailles 1919-1935 (Berlin: Oberkommand RMyy Kriegsmarine, 1937), pp. 38-49, reprinted in TMIVC, 34:565-78. period is in 8. The best summary of the scope and meaning of the secret rearmament measures of the Weimar é Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 766-84.

Mittler, 1954), 9, Burkhart Mueller-Hillebrand, Das Heer 1933-1945, 1: Das Heer bis zum Kriegsbeginn (Darmstadt:

second session 102-03. The earliest published minutes of a meeting of the working committee ate those for the tliche Wehrwissenschaf igungsrat,” Reichsverteid “Der Meinck, Gerhard See 36:220-29). (IMWG, on 26 April 1933 Rundschan, 6, No. 8 (August 1956), pp. 411-15. 10. Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 803.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Berlin with new policy choices. In late April 1933, the German delegate to the disarmament negotiations, Rudolf Nadolny, gave some German journalists a confidential briefing on German plans and prospects in the Geneva negotiations that deserves to be cited as an indication of Germany’s real aims.!! Nadolny explained that Germany hoped to secure legalization for a standing army of 600,000 but was in the process of building an army of that size anyway. Nadolny saw two possible dangers in Geneva: one was that the British and French might agree to a German army of 300,000, reduce their own forces a little, and then insist

on an international control of the newly agreed levels. If the British and French were to insist on such a program, Germany would leave the conference and perhaps also leave the League. The second danger was that the other powers would in fact agree to disarm substantially and therefore refuse to allow Germany to rearm at all; this, too, would lead

Germany to depart from the conference. Since the two contingencies under which Germany would walk out—Germany being allowed to rearm to the level of the others, or the others disarming to Germany’s level—werte precisely the two alternatives that the German delegation consistently argued for in the Geneva talks, the mendacity of their negotiating position is obvious. Clearly an army of great size was needed to attain the aims of the regime in Berlin: doubling or tripling the existing 100,000-man army would be insufficient for great conquests, and international control would immediately reveal Germany’s true aims to all. On the other hand, any substantial disarmament by the other powers as a basis for Germany keeping its army small would immediately destroy, both at home and abroad, the propagandistic underpinnings of the whole rearmament program. No wonder Nadolny preferred to the dangers posed for Germany by agreement on a treaty at Geneva a third alternative, namely no agreement at all but negotiations continuing for months and even years while Germany rearmed. Nadolny was to adhere to this position even after Hitler had gone beyond it. A crisis early in May led the German government to review its negotiating policy and to make a temporary conciliatory gesture in the form of a moderate speech by Hitler on 17 May.'? This speech contained a threat to leave the League, but it did not reveal the extent of the German government’s commitment to rearmament and to a rupture at Geneva. In a cabinet meeting preceding the speech, both von Neurath and war minister von Blomberg had argued that Germany should not continue to participate in the negotiations at Geneva; but Hitler had decided that Germany should stay while threatening to leave, meanwhile carefully rearming and always remaining fully aware of the fact that the issue would not be resolved at the conference table.!? Hitler thus took the same line as Nadolny on the advantage of continuing to participate in negotiations, but with a greater willingness to pull out at whatever might look like an appropriate moment. The building up of Germany’s armed forces, quietly but without regard for the negotiations at Geneva, was to continue as a matter of course; and von Blomberg explained this policy to an assemblage of German generals on 1 June.'* A month later Hitler himself directed 11. Dr. Hans Joachim Kausch, “Informationsbericht Nr.

7 vom

22. April 1933,” Bundesatchiv, Sammlung

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/26, f. 275-79. 12. B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 141, nn. 1 and 3, 144; G.D., C, 1, No. 239, p. 439.

13. G.D., C, 1, No. 226. This was the reason for von Bulow’s telling Habicht that Germany wanted to save the

threat of leaving the League for the disarmament and Saar questions rather than using it on the Austrian issue

(Memorandum of Heeren, 31 July 1933, T-120, 2838/6113/E 45373742). 14. Liebmann Notes, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, E D 1, pp. 48-49 (main portions quoted in Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufristung, pp. 31, 91). Although the policy of rearming during the negotiations was supposed to be kept secret, the German delegation in Geneva discussed it relatively freely with others. Rheinbaben told the counselor of the American delegation that he thought Germany ought just to rearm to the level authorized by the latest British draft proposal and then have the convention ratify this action (Wilson’s unnumbered dispatch

German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

129

an expansion of the armed forces through a build-up of special border formations and the training of 250,000 reservists in the SA.!5 Germany thus preferred to let the disarmament discussions go forward in the summer of 1933 without publicly defining its own position precisely;!° whatever treaty violations it committed in the meantime could always be explained away somehow.1” On several occasions during the summer of 1933 Hitler reiterated in private the extravagantly aggressive schemes characteristic of his pre-1933 speeches and writing, schemes previously cited as a continuing element in his thought immediately after the National Socialist assumption of power at the beginning of the year. Some of the most extreme plans about expansion into the Western Hemisphere, the Far East, and Central Africa reported by Rauschning were voiced by Hitler during this period.!8 At the beginning of August, Hitler explained to two American visitors, Sosthenes Behn of

International Telephone and Telegraph and Henry Mann, European vice-president of the National City Bank, that he hoped to annex Austria, the Polish Corridor, AlsaceLorraine, and the German-inhabited sections of Denmark, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Yugo-

slavia, and Romania—though he wanted to postpone war until Germany was completely prepared.’ In examining the German drive to rearm while avoiding excessive provocation, the evidence of these consistently held aggressive intentions must be kept in mind by the analyst of Hitler’s tactics in the disarmament negotiations. As the fall meeting of the League of Nations Assembly and the resumption of formal disarmament negotiations in Geneva approached, the line to be taken by Germany was discussed in a conference of ministers. Von Neurath decided to go in person and to take along Joseph Goebbels to help counter the anti-German propaganda in Geneva.?? At this point von Neurath still wanted to use the forum that the League provided for Germany, pulling out only after the collapse of the disarmament conference—which he took for granted—and the settlement of the Saar question.”! Publicly he prepared the way by a speech denouncing the lack of progress at Geneva and a press interview denying that the new German government created a new international situation that could justify delay in agreement to Germany’s ostensible demands.” Those demands were at one point to extend to numerical equality with France in size of army and number and types of weapons during the first stage provided for in any convention, and supetiority to France as a counterweight to France’s eastern allies in the second stage; but

the situation in Geneva showed that these demands would wreck the conference undet circumstances in which Germany would be blamed.”? The conference, it soon became of 29 June 1933, State 500. A 15 A 4 Steering Committee/338). 15. Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 797. 16. See the note by von Billow of 23 August on Schwendemann’s memorandum “zu ITF Abr 2655,” of 21

August 1933, T-120, 1629/7360/E 537258. 17. TMWG, 34:205-10; G.D., C, 2, No. 39. 18. Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction, pp. 61-72. 19. There is a brief reference to this meeting in the New York Times, 4 August 1933, p. 6. Henry Mann gave an his account of the conversation to the American minister in Vienna, George H. Earle, who reported on it in report on this oral an for Mann Mr. to indebted am I 862.00/3104). (State 1933 October 11 of 9 dispatch meeting on 17 July 1962 and a letter of 1 August 1962. to have 20. To make a more impressive showing of party leaders, von Neurath at one point also planned far den Vortrag beim Rosenberg accompany him to Geneva (Reichschancellory document, “zu RK 11152 /33 Herrn Reichskanzler am 19. September 1933,” Nuremberg document 2907-PS).

21. G.D., C, 1, No. 426.

Disarmament and Equal Rights 22. The texts may be found in Richard Schmidt and Adolf Grabowsky (eds.), Me wh (Berlin: Carl Heymanns, 1934), pp. 208-15. of Ministry German the Ministry, Foreign German the Hitler, between exchanges the 23. This is a summary of T-120, 1629/7360/E 537463-471, Defense, and the German delegation in Geneva on 25-30 September in 476-479, 499-501, 558-59.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

apparent, could be wrecked without such a propaganda disadvantage to Germany. In Geneva, von Neurath found himself confronted by a proposed two-stage convention that included a provision for controls and seemed to postpone realization of German equality of arms for several years. This looked like a much more promising basis for breaking up the negotiations, since it might be argued in public that the other powers had concerted together to deny Germany the “equality of rights in a system which would provide security for all nations” that they had promised in December 1932. Von Neurath told the leaders of the other delegations at Geneva that their proposals were hardly likely to be acceptable and that he would return to Berlin to confer with Hitler.74 Under British pressure, the French thereupon agreed to inform the Germans of some additional concessions that they were prepated to make,?> and the British themselves, as has already been mentioned, began to work on a compromise proposal. Hitler, however, decided that this was the time to leave the disarmament conference and the League of Nations.*° The reaction of foreign powers to Germany’s activities, especially against Austria, in the summer of 1933 had shown that they were alarmed by the new regime and unwilling to make great concessions to it in the course of formal negotiations, but their reaction also showed that they were not willing to take military action against Germany unless they were literally forced to do so. There was neither the prospect of an agreement satisfactory to Germany nor the danger of military intervention against unilateral action. Some officials in Berlin argued for continued negotiations while Germany rearmed; Nadolny was among those who took this position, and he was therefore excluded from the decisive conferences in Berlin.27 Goebbels, on the other hand, apparently influenced by his brief experience in Geneva, supported Hitler’s inclination to take advantage of the impasse in the negotiations to broaden the differences, and then leave altogether.”® For a moment, Hitler appears to have considered further negotiations”? but then decided to avoid them, lest Germany be pushed by the process of such talks into an agreement, as had been the case in the Four-Power Pact. Fearing such an agreement, Hitler did not want the conference to break up either over Germany’s rejection of controls or over its demands for rearmament, both dangerous grounds for Germany if publicized. He preferred to stiffen the German negotiating position, leave the conference and the League, and couple these steps with a public appeal to Germany and the world.*° The beginning of October 1933 was in any case a time when Germany’s armament program was scheduled to move into a new phase of acceleration. At the same time, Ludwig Beck was made chief of the army office which 24. B.D., 2d, 5, No. 422; G.D., C, 1, No. 469. 25, B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 420, 427; G.D., C, 1, No. 472. 26. Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufriistung, pp. 38-48, gives a summary of these developments and their implications. 27. This is clear from the attendance at the key meetings in Berlin; from von Neurath’s marginal comments on Nadolny’s memorandum

“IIP Abr 4106,” of 4 October, T-120, 1629/7360/E 537585590; and Nadolny’s

memoirs, Mein Beitrag, pp. 140-41, For an excellent exposition of the view that Germany had everything to gain

and nothing to lose by continuing to talk at Geneva while rearming at home see Schwendemann’s memoran-

dum “TI F Abr 3091,” of 29 September 1933, 1629/7360/E 537514516. 28. On Goebbels’s activities in Geneva and return to Berlin see Paul Schmidt, Statis auf diplomatischer Biihne 1923-1945 (Bonn: Athenaum-Verlag, 1950), pp. 279-80; U.S. 1933, 1:303; D.D.B., 3, No. 55; “Bestellungen vom Propagandaministerium vom 29.9.33,” Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/1, f. 116; Messersmith to Phillips, 28 October 1933, State 862.00/3128. It should be noted that incidents arising out of a visit to

Geneva of another prominent National Socialist, Robert Ley of the Labor Front, had precipitated Germany’s

departure from the International Labor Organization (von Biilow memoranda of 17 and 19 June 1933, T-120,

2374/4603/E 190958-960). 29. G.D., C, 1, No. 475. The German proposals of 4 October (ibid., No. 480) were based on von Neurath’s

instructions after a talk with Hitler (RM 1374 of 30 September 1933, T-120, 1629/7360/E 537561).

30. G.D., C, 1, No. 479.

German Rearmament, Withdrawal ‘from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

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subsequently became that of the chief of the general staff of the army.*! The prospect of a disarmament convention including the possibility of international controls must have been especially distasteful to Hitler under these circumstances.?2 Here was the time to remove Germany from the international forum that the National Socialists had always argued it should never have entered in the first place. Japan had left the League when it suited it; Germany would leave the League at the time when the breakup of the disarmament talks provided a convenient opportunity. The tactics for leaving Geneva were quickly worked out in accordance with a suggestion by the state secretary, von Bilow. Although Hitler allowed himself an opportunity to review the decision at the last moment, the intervening days brought no change. On the contrary, the last German negotiating position was so great a step back to the original high demands that the British gave up their idea of a compromise, and the confrontation at the disarmament conference was, therefore, all the more dramatic.33 A last-

minute effort by Mussolini to mediate the differences was rejected in Berlin34 Nadolny was recalled and, still protesting, left the negotiations for the last time.35 For the first of many instances during the Third Reich, there was to be no diplomatic contact that might somehow lead to agreement while the German government was deliberately moving toward a break. On 13 October 1933, the decision to leave Geneva, previously made by Hitler, supported by all of Germany’s leading diplomats except Nadolny,®° and approved by President Hindenburg, was agreed to by the German cabinet. Hitler explained that he did not fear any sanctions, that it would be a service to the world to strike a blow against the League, and that the German people would be given an opportunity to vote their enthusilastic support of the government’s policy. This last step would provide the occasion to dissolve the Reichstag elected in March so that it could be replaced by one in which all the members were nominated by Hitler himself, as well as to dissolve permanently all the local legislatures.3” On the following day, this decision was reviewed and confirmed and then made public. The government appealed to the German electorate, blaming the other powers for the failure of the negotiations, and calling for friendship with France, the one power whose reaction might have worried Hitler. The public response was most favorable; and though there were election irregularities to “improve” the returns of the 12 November plebiscite, the regime could point proudly to a demonstration of national solidarity.*8 If the decision to leave the international forum of Geneva pleased the German public and enabled Hitler to consolidate his domestic position, its foreign repercussions were acrimonious though without great danger. The notification of Mussolini was handled in an exceptionally clumsy fashion and produced a temporary cooling in German-Italian relations, especially since it was coupled with Germany’s refusal to invoke the Four-Power Pact or to accept the latest Italian proposals as a means out of the impasse.” The German attempt to blame Sir John Simon for the breach did nothing 31. Rudolf Absolon, Webrgesety und Webrdienst 1935-1945 (Boppard: Harald Boldt Verlag, 11959) Sapiens Wolfgang Foerster, Ein General kampft gegen den Krieg (Munich: Miinchener Dom-Verlag, 1949), p. 16. 32. See also B.D., 2d, 5, No. 446.

33. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 484, 480, n. 3, 489; B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 434, 435, 444. 34, U.S. 1933, 1:304, 258; G.D., C, 1, No. 494; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 450. 35. G.D., CG, 1, No. 495. 36. This point is appropriately stressed by Offner (pp. 50-52). ZiimGiD SG; 1, Nox499:

other than Germany were 38. Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 351ff. It is not very likely that people in countries of Dachau concentration greatly impressed by the huge margins for Hitler’s ticket returned by the inmates (B.D., 2d, 6, No. 39; U.S. 1933, 2:265). camp 5, No. 476; U.S. 1933, 1:270. The 39. ee C, 1, Nos. 498, 500, 502; 2, Nos. 2, 4, 18, 28; 4, p. 106; B.D., 2d,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

to improve German-British relations.4° The French government had had no confidence that the Germans would in fact observe any disarmament agreement they might sign and were therefore not as disturbed as others by the rupture in the disarmament negotiations. Unwilling to take solitary action against Germany, they could neither stop German tearmament nor muster the needed domestic support for an adequate rearmament effort of theit own in the face of an uncertain future.*! Furthermore, Hitler quickly started a publicity campaign for a rapprochement with France, designed to undermine whatever spirit of opposition might still exist in France. This effort is reviewed below; it appears to have contributed to French acquiescence in the German moves in the fall of 1933. Hitler could feel that his gamble had succeeded. The disarmament negotiations would proceed in a desultory and meaningless fashion for some months, but since no one had taken any action against Germany at this point it was unlikely that anyone would do so when the diplomatic united front that existed in Geneva at the beginning of October vanished.*” Hitler could remind his cabinet of the correctness of his predictions and instruct the military to defend Germany against any foreign attack, knowing that Germany could not win—but also knowing that no attack would come.# The failure of other nations to take action against Germany was certainly not due to the absence of warnings from perceptive observers. The British government was told what the future held not merely by newspaper reporters but by official observers. The British ambassador in Berlin, Sir Horace Rumbold, in summing up the first three months of the Hitler regime, called attention to the exactness with which Hitler was following the route set forth in Mein Kampf: noted that this meant domestic consolidation accompanied by rearmament; and warned that once these objectives had been attained, “it would be misleading to base any hopes on a return to sanity or a serious modification of the views of the chancellor and his entourage.” Sir Horace argued that all this “can only end in one way” and concluded cautiously that Germany’s neighbors had good reason to be vigilant.4 The British military representative at the Geneva negotiations, Brigadier Arthur Temperley, provided his government with a similar analysis of the dangers. He suggested confronting Germany with threats now, while it “is powerless before the French army and our fleet,’ and maintaining pressure over subsequent years until Germany came to its senses. The alternative, to allow things to drift for another five years, would allow German rearmament to become an accomplished fact; and then, unless there were a change of heart in Germany, wat would be inevitable. The alternatives were all grim, but “there is a mad dog abroad once more and we must resolutely combine either to ensure its destruction or at least its confinement until the disease has run its course.”4° Both documents were citculated to the British cabinet with the concutring comments of the permanent undersecretary in the Foreign Office, Sir Robert Vansittart.“© Such views could bring a temporary stiffening in the British negotiating Czech minister to Berlin suggested that the change in German-Italian relations reflected the strengthening and consolidation of German power which precluded Mussolini from influencing Germany as much as formerly, while at the same time the Germans liked the Italian ambassador Cerruti less and less (Mastny report 73 of 29 October 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413954—956).

40, B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 451, 462, 463, 466, 475, 501; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 13, 19; Temperley, p. 257. 41. Joseph Paul-Boncour, Entre deux guerres, 2 (New York: Brentano’s, 1946), pp. 386-87; U.S. 1933, 1:279-81; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 508. 42. Documents on the continued disarmament negotiations may be found in G.D., C, 2; B.D., 2d, 5 and 6; U.S.

1933, 1 and 1934, 1. 43. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 9, 39; TMWC, 34:487-91. 44, B.D., 2d, 5, No. 36.

45. Memorandum by Temperley enclosed with ibid., No. 127.

46. See the quotation from the Vansittart papers in lan Colvin, None So Blind (New York: Harcourt, 1965), pp. 23-24.

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position in Geneva and lengthy examinations of the legal obstacles to military action ee Germany, but no warnings could move the British government to decisive steps. Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald had long been a critic both of wat as an instrument of policy and the Treaty of Versailles as a European settlement. Stanley Baldwin, leader of the Conservatives, the largest group supporting the British national government, was uninterested in foreign affairs, and though unwilling to let down France if a war did break out, had no inclination to accept new commitments for Great Britain.48 Sir

John Simon, the British foreign secretary, was a brilliant lawyer who yet managed to conceal from his contemporaries as well as the puzzled reader of his memoirs whatever firm views on foreign policy he may have held.*? His keen powers of analysis were not matched by the vigor and passion that effective leadership requires. He commented on an incisive analysis of German foreign policy, its direction, and its dangers submitted by Sir Eric Phipps, the new British ambassador to Berlin, by saying “this is a most illuminating document—and terrifying’;>° but there is no evidence to suggest that he ever

drew from such terrifying prospects the conclusion that his countrymen needed to be awakened to the danger. In spite of all warnings that Germany’s leader did not want reconciliation, such reconciliation remained

the laudable but unattainable goal of the

British foreign secretary.*! In this fruitless endeavor, Sir John and his colleagues were supported by the temper of the British people. Distaste for arms and revulsion against war ran deep in the England of the early 1930s, and many still thought that the absence of guns guaranteed the remoteness of war, as a converse of the popular view that the accumulation of arms

assuted the imminence of war. A by-election at East Fulham on 25 October 1933, in which a Conservative seat was lost in a local Labor landslide on the issue of disarmament,

both

reflected

the dominance

of pacifist inclinations

in Labor

circles

and

frightened the national government by suggesting the political dangers of a firm policy.°* [For the next six years—auntil the summer of 1939—the Labor and Liberal parties would denounce as unnecessary all efforts to rebuild British military power; and those like Neville Chamberlain

who

were

later to be reviled as weak-kneed,

were

attacked as

militarists and warmongers for every halting step they took to rearm the country.» The French government had, if anything, an exaggerated picture of the dangers

ahead, but in Paris the disctepancy between insight and resolution was even greater than in London. The French intelligence service provided a reasonably accurate picture of the ptogress of Germany’s tearmament, and its official representative in Berlin, Ambassador André Francois-Poncet, had a clear picture of both the situation at the time and the probable dangers ahead.** Nevertheless, the French government neither could nor would by Vansittart in 47. B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 142, 185. See ibid., No. 253, and Colvin, pp. 26-29, for other warnings

July and August 1933.

48. See his comments on 22 September 1933, in B.D., 2d, 5, No. 406, pp. 618-19.

49. Retrospect (London: Hutchinson, 1952). 50 B.D., 2d, 6, No. 241.

(London: Constable, 51 See his letter to George V of 19 January 1935, in Harold Nicolson, King George V was affected by their 1952), p. 522. It should be noted that Sir John’s effectiveness with the Germans erroneous belief that he was Jewish. i ; ‘ ' 52 Colvin, p. 31. in the campaign against British '53 For an effort by the British Labor Party to enlist Franklin D. Roosevelt the latter’s noncommittal reply of 18 reatmament, see HaroldJ. Laski’s letter to FDR of 5 November 1935 and November in FDR and Foreign Affairs, 3:53-54, 80.

of Francois-Poncet for the first 54 Castellan’s book is based on French intelligence reports. Many reports third volumes of series 2 of the French period of National Socialist rule have been published in the second and e.g,

found in the reports of other diplomats, diplomatic documents. His observations are also often to be of 7 July 1933, in Elek Karsai The Masirevich, de Constantin Berlin, to minister Hungarian report 166 of the

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

take drastic action. Internally divided, worried about the danger of a war with Germany, dubious about the assistance or even the moral support of Britain and the United States,

the French observed the rise of Getman power with frightened indecision.® Its former allies pressed it to make concessions to Germany in precisely those years when the low birthrate of the war period would automatically reduce the size of the annual class of conscripts for its army. Under these circumstances, France would turn to new international treaty arrangements rather than individual and drastic steps. As will be seen,

Paris pushed the idea of a set of agreements covering Eastern Europe, the so-called Eastern Locarno Pact, and then turned to an alliance with Russia. In the meantime, its

resolution was weakened further by the clever way in which the German government manipulated French hopes for peace by calling for a direct understanding between the two powers. There had been occasional references to the possibility of a direct German-French understanding in 1933. Included in these soundings had been references to a mutualassistance pact between the two countries.°° There were soundings calling for high-level personal contacts, first between Edouard Daladier, president of the Council of Ministers,

and von Neurath or von Papen,*’ and subsequently between Daladier and Hitler, but nothing came of all this.°° There were also various semiofficial attempts to bring the two powers closer together,>? but until the crisis in the disarmament negotiations developed in September—October 1933, the German government was not interested in pursuing talks that might reassure the French. In September

1933, however,

such reassurance ‘was an urgent need of German

policy, oriented now to keeping France quiet while Germany moved ahead unrestrained rather than nudging France

into specific concessions

in negotiations.

By this time,

Joachim von Ribbentrop, who was to play an increasingly important role in German foreign policy, was using for diplomatic purposes the contacts he had made in France as a champagne salesman. He had become familiar with Fernand de Brinon, an ardent advocate of Franco-German cooperation who soon became an equally ardent admirer of Adolf Hitler. With the knowledge of Daladier, von Ribbentrop arranged for a meeting

between Hitler and de Brinon on 9 September 1933. This meeting was kept secret, but it paved the way for an interview in November that was publicized and attracted general attention. Concurrently with first bringing Hitler and de Brinon together, von Ribbentrop was also inaugurating those contacts with French war veterans that were to become a major element in Germany’s dealings with France.°! In mid-September, Hitler personally reassured the French ambassador of Germany’s peaceful intentions, and in Meeting of Gémbés and Hitler in 1933,” New Hungarian Quarterly, 3, No. 5 (1962), 194-95. 55. B.D., 2d, 5, Nos. 151, 154. 56. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 9, 163, 165, 190, 360; Memorandum of von Biilow, 24 April 1933, T-120, 2371/4602/E 189182184; Mastny report 31 of 24 April 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413939-940 (excerpt

in Berber, Prager Akten, No. 9).

57. G.D., C, 1, No. 92 (it should be noted that Daladier used Fernand de Brinon in this unofficial sounding). When von Neurath met Daladier at the London Economic Conference, nothing of consequence was discussed

(ibid., No. 314). 58. B.D., 2d., 5, Nos. 258, 266, 269; G.D., C, 1, No. 374. 59. On attempts by the German General von Bredow see G.D., C, 1, No. 114; for an approach in April 1933 by

the self-styled French radical anti-Semite Robert Fabre-Luce see T-120, 2382/4619/E 197650-651,

60. De Brinon’s record of the talk is in Les procés de collaboration, Fernand de Brinon, Joseph Darnand, Jean Luchaire,

compte rendu sténographique (Paris: Albin Michel, 1948), pp. 78-80. On the background of this meeting see de

Brinon’s statements, ibid., pp. 53-55, 200-02, and Daladiet’s testimony, pp. 203-05.

61. TMWG, 35:134. 62. G.D., C, 1, No. 430; André Francois-Poncet, Als Botschafter in Berlin 1931-1938 (Erna Stubl, trans.; Mainz: Florian Kupferberg, 1949), pp. 154-55; Memorandum by K6pke, 20 September 1933, T-120, 2660/5669/H 014244.

German Rearmament, Withdrawal ‘rom the League, and Relations with Britain and France

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Geneva later that month, von Neurath urged on French foreign minister Joseph PaulBoncour a direct German-French understanding as the deadlock in the disarmament negotiations came to a climax. In Hitler’s speech of 14 October, justifying his exit from the League, he included a most friendly reference to Daladier—in response to some

friendly words from the latter—and to the possibility of German-French reconciliation. He was eloquent on this subject at a time when he was still slightly concerned that his step might provoke a French reaction—and as he was tutning more and more toward a treaty of some sort with Poland as the opportune complement to his pacific assurances to the West. While Hitler thought of bilateral negotiations with Poland and conceivably Czechoslovakia, the French government wanted Germany to return to Geneva coupled with an Eastern Locarno Pact and a promise to leave Austria alone as conditions for agreeing to German rearmament. The conflict between these two approaches was clear—Germany wanted bilateral agreements, to be broken at will without third-party interference; France wanted multilateral commitments in which the threat of third-power involvement would act as deterrent to any breach of treaty obligations or assure unified action against an ageressor if a violation did take place. This conflict became apparent as soon as the specifics of a German-French rapprochement were discussed in the first half of November.®° As an impasse accordingly began to develop in these negotiations, Hitler attempted to help recreate confidence by publicizing his pacific intentions. On 15 November plans were made to use a newspaper under instructions from the German Foreign Ministry to push for a German-French rapprochement,‘’ and on the following day Hitler granted de Brinon an interview, filled with pacific assurances, for publication in France.°*

By the time this interview was published in Paris in Le Matin on 22 November, its effect in France was greatly undermined by the appearance in Le Pest Parisien (16-17 November and 22 November) of two secret German documents released to the political editor of that newspaper by the French Foreign Ministry, presumably with that purpose in mind.® The documents were, of course, denounced as forgeries by the German gov-

ernment, but there is no doubt of their authenticity.”” One was a general instruction for German propaganda in the Western Hemisphere, issued by the Propaganda Ministry in September 1933, and the other a shorter, special directive of late October concerning Germany’s departure from the League. Both documents expressed with considerable clarity the continuing hostility of Germany for France, the desire to separate France from

63. G.D., C, 1, No. 466. 64. Domains, 1:311—12; see also B.D., 2d, 5, No. 468; G.D., C, 2, No. 8; U.S. 1933, 1:281-86.

65. Hitler’s talk to the National Socialist leaders is reported in Rauschning, Voice of Destruction, pp. 104-10, and

Breyer, p. 98, as taking place on 14 October, but is almost certainly that of 18 October described in Domatus,

LSU 66. See G.D., C, 2, Nos. 54, 61, 62, 65; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 43, 49.

of Interior, 67. Von Biilow to State Secretary Funk in the Propaganda Ministry and Pfundtner in the Ministry

«P10091,” of 15 November 1933, T-120, 2660/5669/H14386-388.

Essener Verlagsanstalt, 68. Fernand de Brinon, Frankreich-Deutschland 1918-1934 (Albert Koerber, trans. Essen:

(erroneously dated to 1935), pp. 145-52; Fernand de Brinon, Mémoires (Paris: n.d.), p. 28; Domarus, 1:332-34 320/18. 19 November); Phipps (Berlin) telegram 92, 23 November 1933, Foreign Office C 10276/

The full texts of the docu69. Marriner (U.S. chargé Paris) dispatch 412 of 28 November 1933, State 751.62/0.

Le vrai visage des maitres ments were subsequently published by the political editor, Albert Jullien, under the title 1934). Discussion of this du Ile Reich. Les instructions secrétes de la propagande allemande (Pais: Petit Parisien, 1933,” Socal Research, 9, No. 1 publication may be found in Ernst Kris, “German Propaganda Instructions of (London: Oxford, 1949), pp. Propaganda Radio German Speier, Hans and Kris Ernst in and (Feb. 1942), 46-81, had communicated the texts 95, 220. Thete is a detailed summary in Frye, pp. 21-31. The French government aR to London on 9 November (Foreign Office C 9996/9848/18). memo-

at least in part, by von Bilow’s 70, The internal evidence of the documents themselves is corroborated, 381306. 909/1574/ randum of 28 July 1934, T-120,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

England, the aim of Germany to regain all territories with a German minority, and the rejection of any international control of armaments. German propaganda was to be directed to show that the failure of others to grant Germany’s legitimate demands was responsible for the failure to bring about a peaceful reconciliation, so that at least a part of world opinion would blame the other powers when Germany eventually resorted to force. In the meantime, Germany needed time to rearm and thus would pose no threat to its neighbors. As its arms slowly increased, hints of strength would decrease any willingness on the part of others to take action against Germany. Such revelations, believed in the French Foreign Ministry if nowhere else, combined with Hitler’s statement, even in his interview with de Brinon, that Germany would not

return to Geneva, dampened French enthusiasm for concessions to Germany. Discussion, therefore, continued tentatively in the winter of 1933-34 but without concrete

results.’! The Germans would make no concessions on the subject of either rearmament of participation in new multilateral agreements, and the French were unwilling to agree to a return of the Saar territory to Germany without a plebiscite, a subject that had been canvassed in the negotiations. By the time Hitler and Fran¢ois-Poncet met to review the negotiations on 11 December 1933, it was obvious that no basis for an agreement had been reached. It was equally clear, however, that France would take no drastic steps to

prevent Germany from continuing quietly with her rearmament program, the scope of which was known in Paris with considerable accuracy.’ The talks concerning both disarmament and direct German-French rapprochement continued for a time, but reached an impasse in the spring of 1934. The divergence persisted between the British desire to secure some sort of a treaty with the new German government at almost any cost and the French reluctance to concede publicly Germany’s constantly increasing demands. Deadlock was reached in April and publicly admitted in June 1934.7 In the meantime, Germany reaffirmed its determination not to return to the League’ and continued to tearm, covering the process by building up friendship societies in France and Germany, led in France by Fernand de Brinon and in Germany by Otto Abetz.’> It must be remembered that such organizations could and did draw upon substantial reservoirs of genuine belief in the need for reconciliation between the two countries growing out of a mutual respect for the courage of the other’s armies in the last war and a horror of any possible repetition of the carnage of that conflict. Though willing to risk serious difficulties in trade relations with France, Hitler tem-

71. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 86, 100, 101, 104, 105, 112, 113; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 79, 89, 90, 104, 115, 116, 117; D.D.B., 3, No. 87; Jules Laroche, La Pologne de Pilsudski (Paris: Flammarion, 1953), p. 144; Mastny telegram of 29 November 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413961-962; “Verttauliche Mitteilung,” 27 November

1933, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/2, f. 53. 72. G.D., C, 2, No. 116; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 130, 131; Mastny telegram of 12 December 1933, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413965. For a December 1933 French estimate of German military strength, showing that there would be real danger by 1938 see B.D., 2d, 6, No. 103. For Hitler’s and Blomberg’s view that France

would accept German rearmament see the report on the military conferences of 15 and 18 January 1934, in the Liebmann Papers, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, ED 1, p. 51.

73. For unofficial soundings in France in early 1934 authorized by Hitler and conducted by Dr. von Brehmer, who happened to be a German cancer specialist, see Memorandum by von Rintelen, “zu II Fr 430 Il,” 8 March

1934, T-120, 2660/5669/ H 014486-488. Documents on the official negotiations may be found in G.D., C, 2; B.D., 2d, 6; U.S. 1934, 1. The summary in Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aujniistung, pp. 52-86, is helpful but overstates Hitler’s willingness to come to an agreement. 74, This is especially clear in the talks of the Italian undersecretary for foreign affairs, Fulvio Suvich, when he visited Berlin in December 1933 and argued strongly but in vain for Germany’s return (G.D., C, 2, Nos. 120, 126, 145; Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 1735 of 16 December 1933, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197855). 75. Information on this may be found in the trial of de Brinon, cited in n. 60, above, and in Abetz’s interesting, though unreliable, memoirs, Das offene Problem (Cologne: Greven Verlag, 1951).

German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

137

porarily ordered that no insults to France be allowed to appear in Germany.’6 Reassurance and promises combined with an unwillingness to make substantive con-

cessions characterized Germany’s dealings with France, which were conducted, as State

Secretary von Biilow explained, for the “purpose of restoring Germany’s military freedom... the center and main goal of our foreign policy.””7 The German concern that nothing interfere with the scheduled plebiscite and possible return of the Saar territory to Germany in 1935 operated to restrain Berlin for a while, but the obvious willingness of Britain to make greater concessions than France suggested to the Germans that the dangers to their hopes of recovering the Saar were slight indeed. In 1933 and early 1934, the German government worked toward the return of the Saar by politically coordinating all elements in that area into a united front, giving Vice-Chancellor von Papen a special role in handling Saar matters, and by making tactical concessions to assure an early and smooth transfer back to German control of the territory temporarily separated from Germany by the peace treaty. A tremendous propaganda campaign in and toward the Saar was launched by the German government. When it was clear that the effort to have France waive the requirement of a plebiscite had failed,’ attention was focused on holding the plebiscite as early as possible and attaining the highest possible number of votes for reunion with Germany. By the summer of 1934, the plebiscite date had been set for 13 January 1935, and the Germans were well prepared for the triumph they confidently expected.” The greater willingness of Great Britain to make concessions to German arms demands came not only from the genuine desire to secure at least some limitation on a new arms race but also from the hope that the German government might adhere to an agreement that Hitler signed himself rather than one he had inherited from the earlier regime. As the other alternatives appeared to be a preventive war or the unlimited rearmament of Germany, the British even made some concessions to the French desire for guarantees in case Germany broke its commitments, but this obvious sign of the British desire for agreement only spurred on the Germans to further demands and more tapid steps toward rearmament. The February 1934 Berlin visit of the British Lord Privy Seal, Sir Anthony Eden, only clarified the previously mentioned trend to deadlock in the negotiations without suggesting to the British that prompt action on their part was desirable or to the Germans that further rearmament on their part would be particularly dangerous.®° In the same period, as a parallel to the encouragement of unofficial German-French contacts, efforts were made to spur friendship between German and British war veterans as one way of improving the atmosphere between the two 76. Compare “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 10. Januar 1934,” and “.. . vom 17. Januar 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003811-813, 815, with Memorandum by Marschall, “II Fr 1396,” 14 April 1934,

T-120, 2660/5669/H 014524—-525. iiaG. DixCy2,No- 216: 78. In addition to the German-French diplomatic negotiations already mentioned, there was also an unofficial See von sounding in Paris on behalf of von Papen by Kurt Freiherr von Lersner, a retired German diplomat. G.D., C, 2, No. 350. Biilow to Késter, 6 March 1934, T-120, 2386/4620; Késter to von Biilow, 22 March 1934,

423, 452, 79, On the Saar question in 1933-34 see G.D., C, 1, Nos. 80, 169, 203, 207, 227, 235, 236, 240, 248, 470, 474, 475, 482; 2, Nos. 94, 96, 114, 170, 185, 207, 223, 224, 249, 274, 303, 304, 397, 400, 428, 436, 442, 450, 287. A British 477, 481, 500; B.D., 2d, 5, No. 490; 6, Nos. 182, 192, 426; U.S. 1934, 1:17; D.D.F.,, 1st, 2, No. Foreign Office memorandum

10451/2251/18.

summarizing the situation as of 27 November

1933 is in Foreign Office C

.

'

Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, On the German united front organization in the Saar, the Deutsche Front, see Pohle, pp. 408-13; on the see population Saar the to directed propaganda German on Gutachten, 1-403-04;

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/27, £. 9— internal problems in the Saar see the report of 20 February 1934, Bundesarchiv, report and attached documents of 15; for an example of von Papen’s ruthless methods in the Saar see the Archives). Heinrich Drehmer of 20 June 1945, Nuremberg document 1540-PS (National

80. Eden, pp. 69-75.

138

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

countries.8! This improving atmosphere, or at least efforts in that direction, together with British eagerness to secure some sort of agreement eventually led to the Anglo-German naval agreement of 1935; but in the spring of 1934 few would have been so bold as to predict such an event. On the day after the last French memorandum on disarmament, 17 April 1934, Joachim von Ribbentrop was officially appointed by Hitler to the post of disarmament commissioner.®? Hitler’s decision to make this appointment at precisely this time cannot yet be explained, but the fact that questions had been raised about von Ribbentrop’s status in his earlier travels to Britain and France must have suggested that something needed to be done; and the changed situation in the disarmament negotiations may have provided the occasion. With his formal appointment to this position, von Ribbentrop took a major step on the road to prominence in world diplomacy. An ambitious man, capable of great perseverance but little insight, von Ribbentrop must have seemed to Hitler the perfect embodiment of the kind of diplomat he needed. Von Ribbentrop’s travels as a champagne salesman, his social contacts in Germany as a liquor importer, and the knowledge of foreign languages that went with these roles made him stand out in the National Socialist hierarchy. No old fighter for the party’s causes, he had joined the National Socialist movement only in the 1930s, played a part in the intrigues that led to Hitler’s appointment as chancellor, and quickly became close to Hitler whose every wish was his command—in part because he started with no foreign policy concepts of his own. Von Ribbentrop did eventually develop ideas and initiative in certain areas, especially in regard to German policy in the Far East; but for the most part he endeavored to find out what Hitler wanted and then confirmed the opinion of his master. His view of diplomacy was as primitive as Hitler’s; the suggestion that the way to make Winston Churchill more friendly to Germany was to give him a substantial bribe reflects accurately the approach of both.’? Von Ribbentrop’s first major diplomatic mission for Hitler—to try for an adjournment of the disarmament conference—was a failure, but this in no way affected his standing.*4 His feuding with the German Foreign Ministry automatically endeared him to Hitler: failures could be attributed to Foreign Ministry sabotage, while success showed his superior abilities in overcoming all obstacles.

In order to carry forward his diplomatic efforts, von Ribbentrop had organized and now expanded a kind of Foreign Ministry of his own, the Dienststelle Ribbentrop or Ribbentrop office, staffed by ambitious young men who thought that they had found a back door into the realm of high-level diplomacy. This agency, an additional rival for the Foreign Ministry, was used by von Ribbentrop for both official diplomatic tasks assigned to him and for such semiofficial contacts as the German-French friendship societies by which the Third Reich manipulated sentiment for international reconciliation for its own 81. Graham Wootton, The Official History of the British Legion (London: Macdonald & Evans, 1956), p. 169; Phipps (Berlin) dispatch 375, 5 April 1934, Foreign Office C 2294/2294/18. Lord Rothermere, who was to play an influential part in British-German relations, also made his first overtures in 1934; see the draft of a letter

from Hitler to Rothermere, 2 March 1934, T-120, 1802/3707/036560-562. For other eatly unofficial contacts

to influence British opinion, see also Rosenberg, Tagebuch, pp. 28-29; Phipps telegram 88, 4 March 1934, Foreign Office W 2201/1/98; Dodd, Diary, pp. 40-41, 27-29 September 1933; and a seven-page untitled memorandum in the Messersmith papers, beginning with the phrase “The years that I spent in Germany after Hitler came into power...” 82. The appointment was announced publicly on 24 April; on this, see G.D., C, 2, No. 405; B.D., 2d, 6, No.

406; Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht vom 24. April 1934, Die Eraennung des Hertn von Ribbentrop,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/27, f. 107-111. 83. Von Ribbentrop, “Notiz fir den Fuhrer,’ 29 October 1935, Nuremberg document 1169-PS (National

Archives). This item is apparently from the Adjutantur des Fiihrers, requesting the allocation of foreign exchange for this and similar purposes. 84. er C, 2, Nos. 443, 456; 3, No. 94; B.D., 2d, 6, No. 421; Long dispatch 552 of 25 May 1934, State 500. A

15 A 4/2549,

German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

139

purposes. The Foreign Ministry observed the growth of this competitor with a combination of alarm and disdain; a career foreign service officer was assigned to von Ribbentrop to keep an eye on his activities, and the hope was that, like Rosenberg, von Ribbentrop would soon discredit himself.*5 At the beginning, however, von Ribbentrop’s appointment merely puzzled and intrigued the outside world. Even Stanley Baldwin, not generally greatly interested in such matters, expressed some concern. When his friend Thomas Jones complained about the pro-French attitude of the British Foreign Office on 28 April 1934, a few days after von Ribbentrop’s appointment, Baldwin replied: “We don’t know what Germany really intends. We do know and have long known that France is pacific. ... We cannot say that about Germany.”86 The part of German rearmament that was beginning to worry the British government was the growth of its air force. It may be argued retrospectively that this concern was slightly late and did not lead to a reaction commensurate with the danger, but the evidence shows that in London the meaning of German air power for the island kingdom was at least understood.’ There was even better reason for this than almost anyone in the British capital realized. The German air force in 1934 embarked on a great construction program, initially for a goal of 4,000 planes, and in the same year began a pro-

gram of secret military air reconnaissance over other countries.** At the same time, German rearmament in other categories was also moving forward. The navy, already above the strength allowed by the peace treaty, started a major expansion plan for the period April 1934 through March 1936.* In June 1934, Hitler and Admiral Erich Raeder, the commander-in-chief of the German navy, discussed the new warships, including a

series of submarines, that Germany was building in violation of the peace treaty and agreed that the fleet—originally planned mainly with France and Poland in mind—would eventually have to be developed for use against England.” Thus, although the actual build-up of the German navy in the early years of the National Socialist regime was primarily directed toward a struggle for the oceanic supply routes across the North Atlantic in a wat with France, the possibility of war with England was already being considered although it did not dominate German naval planning until early in 1938.7! These discussions about building up the German navy, in turn, emphasized heavily 85. A full-length study of von Ribbentrop and his special office remains to be written. The most recent treatment is inJacobsen, pp. 252-318. A good introduction is Paul Seabury, The Wilhelmstrasse (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1954), pp. 46-53. There are thoughtful comments on von Ribbentrop in Walter Petwaidic,

Die autoritare Anarchie (Hamburg: Hoffman

und Campe, 1946), pp. 71-5. Of interest, though not always

accurate, are the memoirs of the Foreign Ministry official assigned to von Ribbentrop, Erich Kordt, Nicht aus

den Akten (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlags-Gesellschaft, 1950), and of two former members of the Dienststelle Ribbentrop, Otto Abetz (see n. 75) and Bruno Peter Kleist, Zwischen Hitler und Stalin (Bonn: Athenaum, 1950). There is an interesting description by Alfred Leitgen in the Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 262. 86. Thomas Jones, A Diary with Letters 1931-1950 (London: Oxford, 1954), p. 120% 87. B.D., 2d, 6, Nos.

Schweppenburg,

was

308, 309, 311, 313. The

aware

German

of this relation between

military attaché

in London,

British policy toward

Germany

General

Geyr von

and German ait

of various British Foreign rearmament; see his reports for 1934-35 in T-120, 2673/5576/passim. The notes

are most interesting Office officials on an Air Ministry assessment of German air strength of 6 June 1934 Germany for years (C (Foreign Office C 3511/31/18). The British Air Ministry continued to underestimate 3228/55/18). Rowehl is provided by 88. G.D., C, 3:1125. Information on the special reconnaissance squadron of Colonel

595, p. 2. Rudolf Holzhausen, 14 and 15 May 1955, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S.

89. TMWC, 35:583: ibid., 34:519—25.

November 1934, ibid., pp. 775-76. 90. Ibid., 34:775. See also Raeder’s note on his talk with Hitler on 2

distortions of much of the post91. A pioneering work on this subject, rigorously demolishing the apologetic

Gemzell, Raeder, Hitler and Skandinavien, Der war German literature on the basis of careful tesearch, is Carl-Axel

early 1930s see especially chap. 3. On the Kampf fiir einen maritinen Operationsplan (Lund: Gleerup, 1965). For the Hitler-Raeder talk of early August 1934 the on report the see program naval the of ts new financial requiremen in TMWC, 35:592.

140

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the need to safeguard Germany’s own trade routes, especially for the import of iron ore from Sweden. Nor was this the only field in which the economic needs of a future wart played an important part in the rearmament program in late 1933 and 1934. Germany’s military effort would require great quantities of petroleum products, then almost entirely imported. By December 1933 the government had come to an agreement with the great chemical trust, I. G. Farben, assuring it of a market for synthetic gasoline. Since this product could not yet be produced at competitive prices, government subsidy was required for any application of the technical processes that had been invented in earlier yeats.°2 While this program was in its infancy, the German government began efforts to force foreign oil companies to maintain vast quantities of petroleum products in storage inside Germany, a project in which Werner Daitz of the APA and the oil magnate Sir Henry Deterding played active roles.®? Hitler’s own ideas about the Western Hemisphere were influenced by his interest in Mexico’s oil resources,* but that vision looked to the

distant future. In the hard present, the economic policies advocated by many National Socialists that have sometimes been referred to as “middle-class socialism” such as deurbanization and the break-up of the large department stores, conflicted with the economic needs of rearmament; and the summer of 1934 would see the triumph of the

latter needs over the remnants of the former.”° The main focus of German effort, naturally, was on the growth of its army. The new commander-in-chief and the chief of staff, Generals von Fritsch and Beck, worked hard

to create a strong and well-trained force. If Beck had reservations about the speed at which Hitler and some military men wanted to move in the spring of 1934, there can be no doubt that these were as yet differences in detail rather than in principle.*° Hitler was not yet interfering in the details of military administration; he merely told his generals to build up the largest and best army possible in the least amount of time, provided the

means, and periodically urged greater speed. He also told them at the end of February 1934 that this army should be ready for a defensive war in five years and an offensive wat in eight years, and that he planned to strike first in the West and subsequently in the East—precisely as he had once written in Mein Kampf?" A more immediately pressing subject discussed in such conferences was the growing tension between the German army and the SA. Hitler needed the army as the nucleus of his military might; for the time being he still needed the SA to bluff the outside world, in spite of his own assessment that their military value was exceedingly small. For a while, he tried to keep the two groups in uneasy cooperation, restricting the exuberance of Ernst Rohm’s Brownshirts where necessary in order to avoid excessive complications in international affairs.°* While the SA was still dreaming of submerging the army in a brown flood, the military was pushing for the early announcement of a conscription system that Hitler had promised in February 1933 and that would give them full control of Germany’s huge new military establishment. The conscription law was drafted and 92. Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 819-20; see also chap. 13, below. 93. See Rosenberg, Tagebuch, pp. 163-67; U.S. 1934, 2:320ff.; Werner Daitz, “Aktenotiz fiir Herrn Reichsleiter

Rosenberg, Erdoleinlagerung,” 1 November 1934, Nuremberg document 1356-PS (National Archives). 94. Rauschning, Voice ofDestruction, pp. 65-67. 95. This point is amply documented in Schweitzer, Big Business in the Third Reich, chaps. 4 and 5. 96. Compare Beck’s memorandum

of 20 May 1934, in Foerster, pp. 22-23, with the record of the National

Defence Council Working Committee meeting chaired by Beck on 23 and 24 January 1934, in TMWC, 36:381— 404. 97. On the conferences of 27 and 28 February 1934 see the analysis in Bracher, pp. 749-50, 804; Liebmann Notes, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, ED 1, pp. 54, 61. The authenticity of the key source is discussed in Bracher, p. 749, n. 14. 98. Ibid.; see also TMWC, 36:72-73; Blomberg to Hitler, 2 March 1934, and Rohm circular, “G 312/34,” of 6 March 1934, Nuremberg document 846-PS (National Archives); B.D., 2d, 6, No. 244.

German Rearmament, Withdrawal from the League, and Relations with Britain and France

141

discussed in the summer of 1934, but its official adoption was postponed temporarily and was postponed yet again in the fall.°? Ironically, these postponements were due to the horror aroused in the world by the large-scale murders during the purge on 30 June and by the killing of Dollfuss in the following month; but these events, together with the death of Hindenburg and Hitler’s assumption of the presidency, put the final touch on the consolidation of National Socialist rule in Germany and the end of any threat to the atmy from the SA. The army, having provided the weapons for the murders, was now

called by its leader, General Werner von Blomberg, to stand loyally by its master.!° The build-up of Germany’s military forces could proceed apace, and the reintroduction of conscription would come in due time. The purge cleared the way for rearmament along the lines Hitler and his military advisers thought most effective at home, as the end of disarmament conversations had removed the possibility of newly imposed restrictions from abroad.

66 _ te

ee

eae 2776/4603/E 192992-993; Memorandum by von 99. See von Biilow to Beck, 18 June 1934, T-120, tur of 9 October 1934, Institut 317; Liebmann Notes -on Frtitsch’s talk

iAapust 1934,

i

909/1574/381

1 26. ichge ED 1, p. 74; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 105, 165, n. 3, hichte,

area

fir Zeitgeschichte, ED 1, p. 70. On on 9 October 1934, Liebmann Notes, Institut ae ee pti the R6hm purge see Bracher, pp. 934 ff.

Chapter 8

Germany and the European Powers from the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

hile Germany rearmed more intensively in the months following its departure from the League, the European diplomatic picture was rearranged in response to its moves. The German-Polish rapprochement was greeted by the British government with genuine pleasure because it appeared to remove from the international scene one controversial problem fraught with dangerous possibilities.’ The French government, on the other hand, was concerned about the apparent unreliability of its ally in the East. Relief over the lessened danger of war mingled with doubts about the future policy of Poland and an increasing interest in the Soviet Union as a counterweight to Germany.” The Poles themselves wanted to make certain that their new relationship with Germany did not upset their delicately balanced policy between their two great neighbors. With suitable explanations to Berlin, the Polish foreign minister, Josef Beck,

visited Moscow in February 1934 to maintain a semblance of good relations.* Germany’s own

felations with the Soviet Union, however,

continued

to deteriorate in spite of

gestures from the Russian side and the urgings of some German diplomats. After Germany left the League, it looked for a short time as if its relations with the Soviet Union might at least be kept from growing worse. The dispute over press trelations that had grown out of incidents connected with the Reichstag fire trial was ended in late October 1933.4 Starting about this time, Moscow began to hint to German diplomats that better relations were desired. The evidence suggests that many Soviet leaders were reluctant to leave the traditional policy of cooperation with Germany and to align themselves instead with France and the League. Certainly the military leaders of the Soviet Union were dubious of such a shift; and some of the political leaders were not yet convinced that the turn toward collective security that came to be advocated by Maxim Litvinov, the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs, was either wise or safe. Perhaps the hope of securing a better bargain from the prospective ally played a part in the pro1. B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 233, 237, 253. 2. Ibid., Nos. 167, 227. 3. Roos, pp. 136-39; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 244, 275; “Informationsbericht Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/27, f. 3. 4. Niclauss, pp. 146—48; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 21, 25, 30, 34.

Nr. 35 vom

13. Februar

1934,”

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

143

ceedings; the similarity to the situation in 1939 is most striking. In each instance, the Soviet government appeared to look back to past associates while preparing to sign with new friends—unless confronted with a really attractive offer. In both cases, the danger from Japan in the Far East made for Russian caution in Europe.> What was German policy in the face of these approaches? The new German ambassador to the Soviet Union, Rudolf Nadolny, was a strong advocate of close German-Russian relations. His instructions, approved by Hitler personally, seemed inclined to a positive policy. They called for restoring a better atmosphere, redeveloping friendly relations, preventing the Soviet Union from joining any anti-German grouping, and maintaining good economic relations.‘ From the beginning of his stay in Moscow,

however, Nadolny found his own

government

unwilling to

respond to suggestions for steps to implement a policy along these lines. On the contrary, the two governments appeared to be drifting further apart.’? The Germans, not surptisingly, were upset by the indications that the Soviet government was leaning toward an agreement with France but for some time could not bring themselves to look upon this as a serious contingency.’ In his speech to the Reichstag on 31 January 1934, Hitler made a conciliatory reference to the Soviet Union, and Germany, as has been shown,?

waved off any approaches from Japan to avoid feeding any Soviet apprehension of a German-Japanese alliance; but Hitler was clearly not prepared to go any further in approaches or offers. The agreement with Poland gave him the free hand he wanted, and all the urgings of Nadolny could not budge him.!° He wanted no close relations with Russia and rejected all proposals from either Nadolny or the Soviet government pointing in that direction. The deterioration in German-Soviet relations had reached a point where a major new step to bring them together again was necessary to prevent the Soviet Union from turning elsewhere. Hitler rejected the new step and thus encouraged the Soviet search for a new ally. In this he had the support of von Neurath whose hostility to Nadolny as a person as well as to the policies he advocated was unchanged. As one student of the subject has pointed out, the foreign minister who had been placed in the cabinet especially to maintain the continuity of German foreign policy himself shifted to the new line." Nadolny, who had long wanted to become foreign minister, left the diplomatic service

when his advice was undermined by von Neurath and rejected by Hitler.’ New ambassa5. On the Soviet soundings of this period, and the enthusiastic interpretations placed on them by German diplomats who themselves preferred a policy of alignment with Russia, see G.D., C, 2, Nos. 24, 44, 47, 53, 130;

Hartmann

(German military attaché Moscow)

report 167/33 of 7 November

1933, T-120, 2760/5892/E

432735-739. 6. G.D., C, 2, No. 66. 7. Ibid., Nos. 75, 118, 119, 122, 127.

8. See U.S. 1933, 1:347-48 (von Neurath’s memorandum on this talk, RM 1747, T-120, 2383/4619/E 197856, is very abbreviated); U.S. 1933, 2:830-31; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 147, 148, 150, 161, 163, 165.

9. See above, pp. 102f. 10. It is obvious from Nadolny’s careful analysis of the situation of the Soviet Union and of German-Russian to relations that he was thinking of a policy looking toward a revision of the Versailles settlement, in contrast offer to Hitler’s aim of Lebensraum in the East. Thus Nadolny dismisses as absurd all Soviet fears of a German and Poland that would exchange the Polish Corridor for the Ukraine after a successful joint war of Getmany thinking was Hitler what precisely almost was this appear, will As 171). No. 2, C, (G.D., Russia Poland against about early in 1934 and what he had Goring propose to Poland early in 1935. 1. Niclauss,

p. 169.

see G.D., G i:On the eee decision not to make any agreement with Russia and the departure of Nadolny 414, 424, 401, 398, 396, 391, 390, 382, 375, 364, 362, 251, 240, 227, 210, 190, 187, 191, 2, Nos. 173, 176, 181, Nadolny, Men 447, 476, 488; Nadolny telegram 89 of 15 January 1934, T-120, 2791/6025/H 046583-584; Beitra . 166-68. 13 March 1933, pp. 90-91, and 29 on Nadoloy's interest in becoming foreign minister see Aloisi, Journal,

April 1933, pp. 117-18.

144

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

dors soon reptesented the two countries to each other, their relationship correct but without the closeness of prior years." The deterioration of German-Soviet political relations, however, was not allowed to

interfere with the continuation of satisfactory economic ties. The changing economy of the Soviet Union after the First Five-Year Plan somewhat altered the details of the picture, especially in reducing Soviet imports, but the German-Soviet trade and credit proto-

col of 20 March 1934 provided for the smooth functioning of economic relations. yeat 1934 was one in which the Soviet Union repaid a very large proportion of its standing debts to Germany, and these repayments substantially bolstered Germany’s resources of foreign exchange.'4 As in all economic dealings between Germany

The outslim and

Russia, there were occasional specific points of difference, but the evidence does not

support the hypothesis that these were of political origin.’ The specific Soviet proposal for an agreement with Germany that had occasioned the final argument between Hitler and Nadolny in May 1934 had been a project for a joint protocol on the independence of the Baltic states. It would have provided an assurance of security in Eastern Europe for the Soviet Union, and since Russia could not secure it from Germany, it turned to France. The French government was interested in an agreement with Russia and, partly under pressure from Britain, discussed first what generally came to be known as an Eastern Locarno. This proposal, considered in various

forms in 1934 and 1935, was a mutual security pact between France and the countries of Eastern Europe, which Germany would be invited to join. The special project of the French foreign minister, Louis Barthou, it was designed as a multilateral mutual assis-

tance pact to assure peace in Eastern Europe. It assumed the entrance of the Soviet Union into the League of Nations and gave Germany the alternative of tying its own hands against aggressive moves or for all practical purposes isolating itself in the face of a hostile coalition.'* Germany could join a new multilateral system—and perhaps rejoin the League as well—have its rearmament recognized by France, and be protected against attack from any neighbor; but the price was the renunciation of aggressive moves unless it wete prepared to face a group’ of powers pledged to assist each other. Germany’s answer to this was definitely negative, and it continued to be negative through a lengthy series of negotiations, even though Berlin recognized that its refusal would lead to a mutual assistance treaty between France and the Soviet Union.!’ In some respects this outcome looked like an advantage to Hitler: it compromised the French government For Litvinov’s comment on Nadolny’s role in the negotiations see his statement to Anthony Eden on 28 March 1935, in Eden’s Facing the Dictators, p. 164. 13. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 265, 270, 271 (a note in the last document cited the pointed remark of von Bulow that “we

feel that our Embassy in Moscow is now in good hands”). See also Niclauss, pp. 175-76. 14. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 342, 433, 476, n. 7; Niclauss, p. 167; U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, p. 84; Bullitt dispatch 30

of 20 April 1934, State 861.51-German credits/44. An excellent review of Getman-Soviet trade in 1934 by U.S. Vice-Consul Fox in Berlin was sent by Geist (U.S. consul) on 19 August 1935, with his dispatch 515, State 661.6231/160. 15. U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, p. 126; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 181, 359; Memorandum

of von Bulow, 22 October

1934, T-120, 2372/4602/E 189817-818. 16. B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 428, 450, 457, 459, 460, 454, 455, 461, 465, 468, 472, 487-97, 499-501, 504, 510, 512, 515, 516, 523; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 458, 486, 491, 502-505; 3, Nos. 1, 84-88, 92, 93, 95, 101-104, 106; U.S. 1934, 1:489, 117-18, 496-97; Niclauss, pp. 171-80; Parliamentary (Command) Papers: Cmd. 5143, Correspondence showing the

course of certain Diplomatic Discussions directed towards securing an European Settlement, June 1934 to March 1936, Miscellaneous No. 3 (1936) (London: H. M. Stationery Office, 1936) (hereafter cited as Cmd. 5143), No. 2. Documents on these negotiations from Soviet archives may be found cited in M. Andreyeva and L. Vidyasova

(eds.), “The Struggle of the U.S.S.R. for Collective Security in Europe during 1933-1935,” International Affairs (Moscow), 9, Nos. 6, 7, 8, and 10 (June, July, Aug., and Oct. 1963). British Foreign Office memoranda of 17 October 1934 (C 6916/247/18) and 19 December 1934 (C 8797/247/18) ate also very useful. 17. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 11, 51, 57, 61, 74. There is a short but revealing summary of German

Bulow’s letter to Késter of 28 July 1934 (T-120, 3401/8760/E 610917).

tactics in von

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

145

both internally and externally in the eyes of those hostile to Soviet Russia.18 Unwillingness to be associated with the Soviet Union itself and the benefits to be derived from having others associated with Russia instead were not the only reasons for Germany’s unwillingness to participate in any form of Eastern Locarno. The opposition of the German regime to all multilateral commitments, especially when they involved promises of mutual assistance, was doubtless the most important one. There was, furthermore, the danger that any Eastern Locarno, in the ptocess of providing international legal recognition of German rearmament, would set some fixed limits to that tearmament. Having already surpassed in actual rearmament the levels of military strength it had demanded in earlier negotiations, the German government was unwilling

to accept limitations that would immediately force either a reduction in its military strength or an obvious public breach of a treaty that provided for mutual assistance among its adherents in case of violations.'? Behind the final rejection of any new treaty commitment, decided in late August and announced in early September 1934, was one

other supporting factor.2? Germany believed that it could risk the seeming isolation in which rejection of the Eastern Pact would place it in part because Poland would also reject the proposal. The Polish government was displeased by the Franco-Soviet rapprochement, even

though it had contributed to it by drawing closer to Germany. Warsaw was unwilling to undertake any obligations to help its neighbors militarily or to accept the help of any of them against another. Poland’s policy precluded both aiding another power against either Germany or Russia and accepting military aid from one of them against the other. Furthermore, Poland was quite uninterested in aiding either Czechoslovakia or Lithuania against anyone—it had territorial claims against the former and a long-standing quarrel with the latter. Temporarily secure in its agreement with Germany, Poland was no more interested in accepting the commitments of an Eastern Pact than was Germany, and the two powers repeatedly reassured each other of their negative attitude toward the whole concept.”! Whatever modifications in the pact were proposed, Germany and Poland con-

tinued to oppose it and to work out arguments that would avert from either blame for the failure of the negotiations.” The strongest efforts of the French government failed to move Pilsudski and Beck. In April 1934, Barthou visited Warsaw to sound out the Polish

leaders, and during the following months he vainly tried other ways to secure Polish support for a pact.23 After Barthou’s assassination in October 1934, Pierre Laval, the new French foreign minister, made a final effort to attract Poland as well as Germany by further concessions but without success.” It was not that the Poles had illusions about German aims; in November, Polish ambassador Lipski told William Dodd, the American ambassador in Berlin, that

Germany intended “to re-annex Alsace-Lorraine and large parts of Poland as well as Austria and Czechoslovakia.”2> If the moment

of German

aggression ever did come,

18. Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 8 June 1934, p. 38. Soviet entrance into the League would also provide the Germans 001/ with an additional excuse for staying out (Wilson [Geneva] telegram 916 of 30 June 1934, State 500.C

972). (G.D., (C 19. This dilemma is well defined in von Billow’s letters to von Neurath of 23 July and 16 August 1934 3, Nos. 109, 162).

376 and 382. 20. On the German decision see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 164, 188, 190, 191, 200, 201, and pp. of von Neutath 21. G.D., C, 2, No. 465; 3, Nos. 45, 77, n. 7, 92, 139, 177, 184, 194, 226, 379; Memorandum

534, 549, 564; RM 817 of 13 July 1934, T-120, 1431/2945/D 575938; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 479, 484, 503, 519, 520, Lipski Papers, Nos. 27-32, 34, 36-38.

22. G.D., C, 3, No. 392.

;

421, 558, 559; Szembek, pp. 3-7. 23. G.D., C,.2, Nos. 423, 465, n. 1; 3, Nos. 5, 77; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 413, 418,

24. See Scott, pp. 209-10. 25. Dodd, Diary, 17 November 1934, p. 192.

146

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Poland would fight and call on its French ally; but in 1934 as in 1939 Poland was reluctant to do anything that might provoke this contingency, including forming an alliance with Russia, a country that had no greater and no lesser interest in Poland’s territorial integrity than did Germany. The outcome of these lengthy negotiations was one that had been long anticipated in the capitals of Europe. In December 1934, France and Soviet Russia signed an agreement, which Czechoslovakia joined, while Germany and Poland stood aside.?° The import of this new development in international affairs and the related questions of French, British, and Italian policy toward Germany need to be examined, but first the relationship between Germany and Poland, which had contributed so much to the failure of the negotiations, must be scrutinized in greater detail. Although the public posture of the two countries hitherto hostile but now reconciled was the aspect of German-Polish relations most important for European diplomacy in the mid-1930s, a closer look should also be taken at specific issues concerning the German-Polish relationship during those years. Such an examination will illuminate both the “calming” effect of their pact and the continuing difficulties that loomed in the background. The handling of these difficulties, in turn, sheds some light on the long-term policies of both powers. In addition to the very obvious sign of a reduction of tension and joint opposition to the pact, there were other indications of a better atmosphere between Germany and Poland. Beyond mutual expressions of pleasure over the conclusion of their agreement in January 1934, and the attendant publicity that ensued, there was concrete progress in those public statements of loyalty that replaced earlier expressions of hostility and recrimination.2” German newspapers and radio stations ceased attacking Poland, and the tone of the official Polish press changed drastically. Efforts were made to give the public in each country a more favorable image of the other and to restrain in this manner the skepticism toward the new policy retained by many on both sides of the border. After preliminary soundings in May, Goebbels reciprocated the visit of some Polish journalists by going to Warsaw in mid-June for satisfactory talks with Pilsudski and Beck.?8 One practical result of this trip was the German-Polish radio agreement of 13 October 1934 and the resulting attempts to improve mutual understanding by friendly and informative broadcasts about each country.?? The economic sphere was another area in which concrete steps were taken to cement the new relationship. The treaty ending the trade and tariff war was followed by talks between German and Polish agricultural representatives, a series of negotiations in the summer of 1934, and eventually a supplementary trade and compensation agreement in the fall.°° The development of German-Polish economic relations, however, was by no 26. U.S. 1934, 1:523-24; G.D., C, 3, No. 382. 27. G.D., C, 2, Nos. Bundesatchiv, Brammer, 28. G.D., C, 2, No. 485; to Moltke, 12 May 1934,

226, 230, 234, 244, n. 1; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz v. 17. 3. 34,” Z.Sg, 101/3, f. 128; Lipski Papers, No. 51. 4:1226-27; Memorandum by Meyer, 7 May 1934, T-120, 2906/6174/E 463044; Meyer ibid., frames E 463047—048; Cudahy dispatch 312 of 14 June 1934, State 760c.62/234.

There was also a proposal for von Ribbentrop to see Beck and Pilsudski in the summer of 1934, but this was postponed because of the latter’s bad health (Moltke to von Ribbentrop, 31 July 1934, T-120, 2387/4620/E 200742). Von Ribbentrop eventually made a nonpolitical visit to Poland in October 1935 (Nielsen [U.S. chargé a.i. Warsaw] dispatch 863 of 8 October 1935, State 033.6260c/1). Later that year, Hans Frank made his first visit to Poland in connection with his work in the Academy for Germanic Law (Szembek, 10 December 1935, p. 139; Frank, pp. 400-01). 29. Pohle, Der Rundfunk als Instrument der Politik, pp. 397-98. 30. G.D., C, 2, No. 431; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 30. April 1934,” “.

. vom 24, Mai

1934,” “... vom 4. Juni 1934,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003874, 890, 893; Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 13 July 1934, p. 42; Crosby (Warsaw) dispatch 384 of 14 August 1934, Jefferson Patterson (U.S. consul Breslau) dispatch 4 of 5 November 1934, and Cudahy dispatch 651 of 28 Match 1935, State 660c.6231/221, 227, and 232.

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

147

means perfectly smooth, The payments owed by Germany to Poland for railway traffic actoss the Polish Corridor were increasingly in arrears, and a setious dispute soon arose, eventually threatening to lead to political complications in late 1935 after the subject had been included in the purview of new trade negotiations.?! Hitler had to insist on concessions to Poland in order to obtain a new agreement on 4 November 1935,22 but the dispute over German arrears in railway payments dragged on into 1936, primarily because Germany preferred to use its foreign exchange for other purposes.3> In the meantime, however, the two powers had repeatedly exchanged expressions of goodwill and elevated their respective ministers to the status of ambassadors. Such international pleasantries did not remove all the difficulties on the path to German-Polish cooperation. From its inception the new relationship could not obviate serious policy clashes in some sensitive areas. In 1933 and 1934, the efforts of Germany to preserve, and of Poland to restrict, German influence in the control and management

of key industrial and mining facilities in those parts of Upper Silesia ceded to Poland after World War I led to continued friction. The lengthy German struggle against the polonization of I. G. Kattowitz-Laura

enterprises need not be reviewed here, but it

reveals much more than the tendency of such German industrialists as Fritz Thyssen and Friedrich

Flick to place profit above

all national

considerations.

This issue, rather,

showed that where specific material interests were concerned any number of goodwill trips were unlikely to ease differences when neither side was prepared to make major concessions unless forced to do so by the circumstances of the situation.*° The suggestion of the American minister to Poland, John Cudahy, that in this instance Polish

actions reflected continued mistrust of Germany was at least partially correct.*° As von Bulow noted of German subsidies to Prince Pless, one of the most important German landholders in Upper Silesia, Germany was supporting the prince in expectation of eventually regaining territory in Upper Silesia—and for no other purpose.’ In the face of the determination of Michal Grazynski, the Polish governor (voivod) of Silesia, to eliminate all German influence, the conflict was certain to continue. Under the cover of the GermanPolish agreement, and in spite of German protests and the warnings of the Polish

31. The difficulties can be traced in G.D., C, 3, Nos. 419, 487, 561; 4, Nos. 53, 192, 204, 217, 271, 301, 302, 390, 392, 409, 436, 455; Szembek, 26 October 1935, p. 123, 28 October, pp. 123-24, 22 November, pp. 133—

34; Lipski Papers, No. 50; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 6. April 1935,” “.. . vom 13. Juli

1935,” “... vom 18. Juli 1935,” “... vom 22. August 1935,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004014015, 029-030, 036040. 32. G.D., C, 4, No. 390.

Hitler and 33. For the later stages of the Corridor railway payments issue, settled through the intervention of

261, 264; Szembek, Goring, see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 470, 474, 521, 528, 537, 551, 567; 5, Nos. 22, 62, 82, 107, 151,

159; Lipski 13 December 1935, pp. 140-41, 8 January 1936, pp. 148-49, 25 January, p. 155, 10 February (?), p.

760c.62/310; U.S. vice Papers, Nos. 52, 54, 56, pp. 248-50; Cudahy dispatch 989 of 30 January 1936, State

Lipski to Schacht, 26 consul Berlin Adams report sent as dispatch 593 of 13 July 1936, State 660c¢.6231/264; 1936, ibid., frames April 3 enclosure, with Géring to Moltke von 382288; 2621/5482/E February 1936, T-120,

E 382283—287. 34. G.D., C, 3, No. 256; Lipski Papers, No. 30. 352, 372; 3, No. 401; 35. On this problem see G.D., p, 1, Nos. 359, 473; 2, Nos. 41, 52, 209, 217, 331, 340,

188746-747; von Moltke telegram 16 of Memorandum of von Bilow, 2 September 1933, T-120, 2371/4601/E

Préssekonferenz Vv. 6.3.34,” Bundesarchiv, 12 February 1934, T-120, 2954/6213/E 469926; “Bestellungen a.d.

this dispute is in folder EAP 250Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/3, f. 105. Correspondence of the APA for 1933-34 on ’ 38. Serial 17, Roll d-18-20/1, T-81, this observed government States United The 760c.6212/35. State 1934, April 36. Cudahy dispatch 242 of 11 in Upper

of American (Harriman) interests whole question with particular care because of the involvement ilesian industry.

ee a

see also von Neurath’s ome by von Biilow, 25 January 1934, T-120, 2371/4601/E 188764766;

575957. memorandum RM 1223 of 31 October 1934, T-120, 1431/2945/D

148

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

Foreign Ministry, Grazynski moved forward with increasing effectiveness.** For the time being, Berlin was prepared to sacrifice interests in Upper Silesia to the political advantages of the agreement with Poland, but there was no guarantee that this would

always be the case. The nationality struggle in Upper Silesia represented only an especially acute portion of the wider possibilities for friction inherent in the presence of the German minority in Poland. Their fate had been a primary focus of German-Polish difficulties in the Weimar petiod. The German government had often used its position in the League of Nations to attempt to protect the rights of this minority by insisting that Poland respect the obligations it had assumed when granted the territory in which they lived. The departure of Germany from the League provided the Polish government with the long-sought opportunity to be rid of international responsibilities in this regard. Berlin, having deprived itself of a forum for protest in Geneva, and having decided to maintain good relations

with Poland, could only observe the Polish moves with quiet regret and occasional, unsuccessful appeals to Polish goodwill.*? Germany might still speak up for the German minority in Poland, but only in a most limited way.*° The long-range interest of the Reich in this minority could be maintained only by unofficial means. From the German side,

the key agency was the League of Germans for the East (Bund Deutscher Osten), under the leadership of Theodor Oberlander, who had been associated with the National Socialists

since 1923. It publicized inside Germany the racial struggle along the Polish and Czechoslovakian borders and acted as an agent for the financial and moral support of the German minority in Poland.*! Within Poland, a lengthy internal struggle led to the nazification of the larger part of the German minority, although the group continued to be divided into separate organizations that feuded with each other and maintained contacts with rival agencies in Germany.” In this field, too, conflict between Germany and Poland

was postponed rather than resolved. The situation in Danzig, which had helped pave the way for the rapprochement

between Germany and Poland, was troubled in many ways in 1934 and 1935, but neither nation allowed the complications in’ Danzig to disturb the maintenance of their new relationship. The problem of German financial support to maintain the budget of the free city so that it would not have to turn for help to Poland remained a constant worry for Berlin, especially because of the great quantity of foreign exchange required for the process. On each occasion when the situation became acute, Hitler insisted that the essential minimum of foreign exchange be transferred in order to avoid forcing Danzig into concessions to Poland that would threaten its German character. Clearly he wanted a holding operation on the economic front.4? This operation was aided slightly by the 38. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 496, 498; Szembek, 17-18 April 1935, pp. 61-64. 39. German White Book, No. 40; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 8, 197, 210, 313, 325, 339; Szembek, 24 April 1935, pp. 66-67,

20 July 1935, p. 108. For a somewhat mote optimistic report see “Informationsbericht 13,” of 7 November 1934, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/27, f. 435-37. A useful summary is in Roos, pp. 170-74; see also Margarete Gartner, Botschafterin des guten Willens (Bonn: Athendum, 1955), pp. 274-75. 40. Von Moltke report 1046 of 16 October 1934, T-120, 2907/6177/E 464087—095.

41. Most interesting are two reports on a briefing given some German journalists by Oberlander in eatly Match 1935. One account is in “Informationsbericht 31,” of 7 Match 1935, in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Se. 101/28, f, 85-91; the other is in a letter by Kurt Metzger of 8 March 1935, in Bundesatchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/1, f. 22—

25. See also Jacobsen, pp. 69, 169.

42. See Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte Gutachten, 1:404—07; Jacobsen, pp. 580-97. The accounts in Breyer and in

Theodor Bierschenk, Die deutsche Volksgruppe in Polen (Kitzingen: Holzner, 1954), are exceedingly apologetic in tone, the latter even more than the former. For the problem of German agencies’ contacts with the

organizations in Poland see G.D., C, 4, No. 35. 43. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 22, 407, 441; 3, Nos. 40, 96, 192, 223, 224, 259, 262, 327; Radowitz (Danzig) to Meyer telegram 5 of 24 January 1934, T-120, 2787/6023/H 044563; Meyer to Radowitz telegram 9 of 28 May 1934, T-120, 2915/6203/E 468473; Ministerialrat Mayer, Treuhdnder fiir Danzig im Reichsfinanzministerium, to

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

149

functioning of Rauschning’s policy toward Poland. There was still occasional economic friction, but as long as a real will for cooperation reinforced the economic needs of both Danzig and Poland, some progress could be made. Both the atmosphere and the level of economic activity between Danzig and Poland improved. The improvement of Danzig-Polish relations was threatened from two sides, how-

ever. The Polish government was quite willing to use the cover of the German-Polish agreement to push harder for its own interests in the free city in a manner similar to its course in the minorities

question inside Poland.

Such pressure, of course, produced

irritation as the Danzig authorities resisted. More dramatic was the political development within the free city where the National Socialist leader Forster wanted to push rapidly forward the nazification of the state in violation of the Danzig constitution. He was willing to take grave risks in the economic sphere to build up political support for his party. Once the National Socialists secured full power through successful elections, they could keep any subsequent economic crisis from having political repercussions—there would be no more elections. Furthermore, Forster objected to Rauschning’s basic aim of a real rapprochement with Poland. In all of these areas, Forster’s position was closer to Hitler’s views than Rauschning’s. It is, therefore, understandable that although Hitler

supported Rauschning until the new relationship with Poland was firmly established, he dropped Rauschning in the fall of 1934 when it became evident that further cooperation between Rauschning and Forster was impossible. Others might advise against such a step—the Foreign Ministry apparently did, and the army may have—but Hitler sensed that Forster was really his man, while Rauschning had views of his own.*° Forstet’s new course was to put forward Arthur Greiser as senate president instead of Rauschning, and immediately increased tension over the internal development of the

free city. The Forster-Greiser regime hoped to use the subsidies from Germany and an exuberantly extravagant internal economic policy to gain support in new elections, but these efforts did not bring the desired result: the National Socialists failed to secure the two-thirds vote needed to amend the constitution. Under these circumstances, Forster’s

policy implied violation of the Danzig constitution with increasing frequency and gravity. Neither the Polish government nor the League was willing to take action to uphold the democratic institutions of Danzig. Poland would not act as long as purely Polish interests within the free city were respected; as for the rights of individual Germans, Watsaw did not care. The League of Nations as guarantor of the constitution, and the high commissioner as the League’s local representative tried—with neither vigor nor success—to restrain the onslaught of the National Socialist party upon the freedom of the people of Danzig.*° RM 1239 of 3 vatious ministries, 18 October 1934, 2787/6023/H 044587—-588; Memorandum of von Neurath

The beginnings of November 1934, and Note by Falkenberg of 29 January 1935, 1468/3015/D 598324325, Kimmich, The Free financial support of Danzig by Berlin during the Weimar period ate traced in Christoph M. 2 and 3. City: Danzig and German Foreign Policy, 1919-1934 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968), chaps.

of Dertinger on a confidential 44. Breyer, p. 94; Leonhardt, p. 67; G.D., C, 2, No. 40; “Tnformationsbericht” Brammer, Z.S¢. 101/27, f. 69— report by Rauschning to a press conference on 17 April 1934, in Bundesarchiv,

75; Bruins

(U.S. consul Danzig) dispatches 391 of 17 March

1934 and 512 of 29 October

1934, State

760c.60K/311 and 321.

C, 2, No. 439; 3, Nos. 224, 236, 243, 244, 45. On the Rauschning-Forster dispute and its denouement see G.D., York: Putnam, 1941), pp. 14-30. On (New Revolution Conservative The 248, 249, 308, 329; Hermann Rauschning,

Area Headquarters in East Prussia the army’s concern see the documents apparently sent by the Army on 12 October 1934, and the other a Rauschning with talk a on report a one Berlin, to 1) kommando (Webrkreis Beck, and Blomberg, von Fritsch, and on the situation in Danzig on 15 October 1934, initialed by von

report in the Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Nachlass with a marginal note by von Fritsch on the outcome of the dispute, Gen.Obst. Beck, H 08-28/1, f. 46-53. Ernst Sodeikat, “Der Nationalsozialismus und 46. On this subject see the accounts in Leonhardt, passi m., and 2 (April 1966), 139-74. Published documents No. 14, te, Zeitgeschich fir shefte die Danziger Opposition,” Vierteljahr

150

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The internal action of the Forster regime that promptly drew the attention of the Polish government was one of a series of measures taken by the Danzig authorities in the summer of 1935 when they were forced to devaluate the currency in the wake of their own extravagant policies.” Since Danzig’s economic situation deteriorated rapidly in the spring and summer of 1935, Berlin was obliged to choose between allowing Danzig to turn to Poland for help—with a resulting increase in Polish influence—and combining further, aid from Germany with stringent economies and controls inside Danzig.*® The latter course was adopted, and of the steps taken in Danzig under the accompanying program of restrictions the foreign-exchange control law of 11 June immediately touched off a crisis in Danzig-Polish relations. Considering themselves injured by this measure, the Poles answered with restrictions on Danzig’s trade, and Danzig in turn opened the cus-

toms border to East Prussia. For a moment it looked as if the whole Danzig question would suddenly cause a major dispute between Poland and Germany. It was correctly assumed in Warsaw that Hitler had been willing to have the Danzig government try the currency control scheme, but it was hard for the Poles to know how far Germany was prepared to go. They were willing to fight but hoped that Germany did not really want war.” They were alarmed by the fact that Schacht and the head of the eastern section of the German Foreign Ministry, Richard Meyer, both known for their

intransigent attitude toward Poland, were in Danzig, presumably instructing the authorities of the free city on the tactics to follow. In view of Goring’s earlier role in German-Polish relations and the affairs of Danzig, the Polish government approached him; and GéGring in turn directed the Danzig authorities to be conciliatory.5° At a meeting

in Berlin between Hitler and Beck on 3 July, the two agreed that Danzig would not be allowed to affect the good relations between the two countries.5! Because the crisis in Danzig-Polish relations nevertheless became more acute at the end of July, the sincerity of both Germany and Poland was really put to the test, a test aggravated by the desire of the National Socialist leadership in Danzig to use the situation to bring about annexation to Germany. At a conference in Danzig, thé German state secretary, von Bulow, made it quite

clear to the Danzig leaders that annexation to Germany was not yet possible. In order to annex Danzig, Germany would either have to fight—and for this it was not yet prepared—or give up its claims to the Polish Corridor—and this was out of the question. Danzig must, therefore, negotiate with Poland; and since the Poles were quite willing to talk, a settlement should be possible.*? In spite of these instructions, the Danzig leaders moved forward ruthlessly until they were given unmistakable directives by Hitler and Goring to follow a conciliatory line; the abrupt change in policy produced agreement

include G.D., C, 3, Nos. 202, 391, 485, 500; 4, Nos. 4, 80, 86.

Sean Lester, the League High Commissioner in Danzig from the fall of 1933 to 1936, was at first welcomed by the officials at Danzig (U.S. consul Danzig, Heisler dispatch 333 of 6 November 1933, State 860K.01-High Commissioner/13), but later became unpopular with them because of his insistence on respect for the constitution. 47. See the interrogation of Karl Schaefer of the Bank of Danzig by John Brown Mason, 14 September 1945 (Office of the Chief of Military History, Foreign Studies Branch). 48. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 65, 92, 97, 103, 112, 123, 126, 130, 133, 134, 143, 150; Szembek, p. 93; Gallman US. consul Danzig) dispatch 129 of 11 September 1935, State 760K.62/46. 49. Szembek, pp. 94-102. 50. G.D., C, 4, No. 158; Lipski Papers, Nos. 46, 47; Szembek, pai:

51. G.D., C, 4, No. 190; Nielsen (U.S. chargé a.i. Warsaw) dispatch 770 of 17 July 1935, State 760c.62/296.

52. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 214, 215, 224, 226, 227; Szembek, 23 July 1935, p. 108. 53. G.D., C, 4, No. 240. There is another, more detailed, memorandum

on this meeting in Nuremberg docu-

ment 3899-PS (National Archives). Roos (p. 186, n. 17, and elsewhere) refers to this document as coming from Schacht’s files; I am of the opinion that it is from Goring’s.

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

leash

between Danzig and Poland on 9 August.54 Although lesser Polish officials as well as the National Socialist leaders in Danzig pushed forward recklessly, those at the top wished to avoid raising a basic political problem that could divide Germany and Poland. Once Hitler and Beck insisted on the implementation of their position the crisis passed; and the German government made the necessaty aftangements to maintain Danzig’s economic life without interfering with Poland’s vital interests.* The theory advanced by Beck at the time—and later by Hans Roos in his book5*— that the German Foreign Ministry was pushing forward on its own, hoping to force Hitler’s hand, is not borne out by the evidence now available. The effort to precipitate a mote serious crisis originated in Danzig and can be understood on the basis of directives from Hitler to Forster and Greiser. In the spring, Hitler had cautioned the Danzig leaders not to allow the annexation question to arise in the election campaign or to permit the campaign to damage German-Polish relations.*’ As the economic crisis became more serious, however, Hitler approved in advance the exchange control regulations that precipitated the confrontation with Poland. He also urged the Danzig National Socialists to show “determination, energy, and toughness” in order to reassure the local popula-

tion, frightened by devaluation and Polish pressure.°* He left open the ultimate intentions and position of the German government, adopting, as he often did, a position that

allowed him to decide at the last minute whether it was safe to move forward radically or wiser to defer action. The prompt and clear reaction of Poland showed Hitler, and Go6ring who handled the details for him, that there could be no fait accompli without

drastic repercussions. Accordingly, Hitler promptly insisted that the Danzig leaders agree to a settlement regardless of their personal preferences and their earlier disregard of von Bulow’s warnings. The settlement of the Danzig currency dispute in August 1935 showed the effect of the determination

that Hitler and Beck

had expressed in the preceding month;

no

specific problem in German-Polish relations should be allowed to interfere with a continuation of the policy marked by the agreement of January 1934.°° On the other hand, Géring’s mission to Poland in January 1935 had shown that there were also limits beyond which that policy could not be extended. The discovery of this upper limit to German-Polish relations was also the result of a German probe of Poland’s position. The parallel course of Germany and Poland in response to the proposed Eastern Locarno Pact has been described; it inspired Hitler to consider more far-reaching plans for German-Polish cooperation. When the German-Polish agreement was first under consideration, Hitler explained

to Rauschning the possibility of a joint German-Polish military action against Soviet

that Russia. From his talk with Pilsudski in December 1933, Rauschning was convinced this to returned Hitler , Nevertheless the Poles would never agree to such a scheme.©

of 26 theme a year later. Around the first anniversary of the German-Polish agreement public pleasant a gave He mind. Hitler’s on apparently was January 1934, the subject to Lammers, 6 August 1935, T-120, 54, G.D., C, 4, Nos. 240, 244, 245, 247, 250, 251, 254, 256; von Billow 200851-852. /4620/E 2387 1935, August 22 Bulow, von to Radowitz 1468/3015/D 598332; Szembek, 6-9 August 1935, pp. 108-13; 55. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 258, 272, 358; Lipski Papers, pp: 215-17; Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/6, f. 50. “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz, 9.8.1935,” Bundesatchiv,

il 56. Roos, pp. 185-89. of German correspondents on 13 March 57. This is clear from the reports on Forster’s confidential briefing £..29—35. and Bundesatchiy, Traub, Zise. 1410/1, 1935, in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/28, f. 97-109,

58. G.D., C, 4, No. 150.

G.D., C, 4, No. 190. 59. On Beck’s visit see Szembek, 2-3 July 1935, pp. 103-7; 60. See pp. 59-60, above.

12

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

interview to the semiofficial Gazeta Polskd®! after discussing with Lipski, the Polish ambassador, the possibility of a joint German-Polish defense against the Soviet Union in preference to a German alliance with the Soviet Union, dividing Poland between them.“ The new president of the Danzig Senate, Arthur Greiser, had just made a successful visit to Warsaw; now Goring was to go to Poland.® Hitler’s instructions to Goring may well have reflected his exuberance as a result of the Saar plebiscite; in any case, Hitler and Goring spent several days together at the Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden between the plebiscite and Géring’s departure on his “hunting trip.”°+ It would appear that Goring was to hunt for something other than wildlife. The available evidence indicates that GGring was instructed to raise with the Polish government, and particularly with Marshal Pilsudski, the possibility of a German-Polish military alliance against Russia in which a successful war would lead to Polish expansion into the Soviet Ukraine and German expansion into the area of the Baltic states and North Russia. Such an arrangement might involve leaving the Polish Corridor unchanged, in which case Lithuania would go to Germany, or shifting the corridor by substituting Polish control of Lithuania for its present access to the sea, with Germany controlling the area beyond Lithuania. The Poles were friendly and courteous, they extended themselves to make Go6ring’s trip agreeable, and they assured their distinguished guest of their continued interest in amicable German-Polish relations. In spite of GG6ring’s allusions to the alternative possibility of a German-Soviet agreement to partition Poland, however, the Polish leaders made it quite clear that they would not have any part in such an alliance. They knew that if such a scheme failed they would lose their independence to the Soviet Union; if it succeeded, they would lose their independence to Germany. The men who looked upon themselves as the architects of Polish independence were not interested in either possibility in 1935 any more than in 1939. They were prepared to go a considerable way in cooperation with Germany, even at the risk of annoying their French ally, but not to the extent of allying themselves with Germany and thereby throwing themselves upon the mercy of Berlin.% This episode throws light both on German long-range goals and on the limits of German-Polish friendship. Evidence of later German approaches to Poland indicates that Hitler kept in mind the possibility of joint operations against Russia in spite of the fact that Goring had been politely waved off. With no wish simply to regain the German borders of 1914, Hitler was prepared to have Poland play some subordinate part in the schemes of territorial aggrandizement he visualized for the future. But while he found the Polish government unwilling to associate itself with such dangerous enterprise, he could see from the very mild Polish reaction to Germany’s reintroduction of conscription in March 1935 that that country was still willing to operate diplomatically in concert with Germany and independently of France.‘ Because this was in any case the prime aim 61. Polish White Book, No. 14.

62. Ibid., No. 13; Lipski Papers, No. 33.

63. On Greiser’s visit see Szembek, 9 January 1935, p. 16; Cudahy dispatch 561 of 15 January 1935, State 760c.60K/324. 64. Geist to Moffat, 26 January 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8. 65. In addition to the evidence cited by Roos, pp. 208-12, I have used a report of 22 February 1935, on a dis-

cussion between General Schindler, German military attaché in Poland, and Defense Minister von Blomberg

about Géring’s visit in the papers of General Beck, Bundesarchiv, H 08-28/ 1, £. 54. The report was initialed by

Beck on 22 February 1935; according to it, Hitler had explained the scheme discussed during Goring’s visit to

Poland in defensive terms and as proposed by the Poles. See also G.D., C, 3, No. 474; Cudahy dispatches 583

of 29 January and 607 of 21 February 1935, State 760c.62/262 and 264. 66. On Polish-French difficulties at this time, see Szembek, 23 January 1935, p. 26, 28 January, p. 31, 2 February, pp. 36-38; Laroche, pp. 191-95. 67. On Poland’s mild reaction to the announcement of conscription see Szembek, pp. 46-49; Lipski Papers,

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

153

of Germany’s policy toward Poland in the years when Germany was not yet ready for a major wart, Hitler would continue to maintain the course of accommo dation with Warsaw in spite of the rebuff to his more ambitious concepts. The expansion of Germany’s military might was, of course, of great concern to the other major powers, Italy, France, and Britain. The purge of 30 June 1934, the assassination of Dollfuss on 25 July and the assumption by Hitler of the presidency upon Hindenburg’s death at the beginning of August strengthened Hitler’s hold on Germany but did nothing to enhance Germany’s reputation abroad. The general revulsion was compounded by two specific aspects of these events. The clumsy attempt to justify some of the murdets of 30 June by reference to “a foreign power” with which the victims had allegedly conspired threw a temporary cloud over German telations with France, the country generally assumed to have been the one in contact with the “conspirators.” If this matter was cleared up by subsequent explanations and reassurances to the French,

the impact of the Vienna coup of 25 July on Germany’s relations with Italy was far more lasting.® The shock of the coup of 25 July for German-Italian relations has already been described. There followed a deterioration in that relationship that took a long time to mend. There was a press feud of extreme violence that poisoned the atmosphere and continued well into the fall. A major factor that made a return to any degree of cordiality difficult was the continued activity of the National Socialists in Austria. Immediately after the failure of the 25 July coup, the German government made a public and spectacular show of changing its policy toward Vienna. This did not, however, entirely alleviate the situation because neither the person of the new ambassador to Vienna—von Papen— nor the sincerity of the shift was trusted abroad. The chief of the cabinet of the Italian foreign minister, Baron Pompeo Aloisi, commented in his diary that Germany, “having been conquered in the field of terrorism, now wants to triumph by diplomacy.””? The appearance of the new German emissary to Vienna, therefore, was taken as a sign more of a shift in emphasis than in direction. Simultaneously, international awareness of the continued existence of the Austrian legion in Germany and of ties between the German and Austrian National Socialist parties gave the German assurances of a new policy a hollow ring indeed.’! The complicated negotiations for a possible internal political truce in Austria conducted by the new Austrian chancellor, Kurt von Schuschnigg, and one of the more independent local National Socialists, Anton Reinthaller, in the fall of 1934 Nos. 38, 39; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 536, 553; U.S. 1935, 1:205—07; 2:311; Cudahy telegram 23 of 22 March 1935, State

862.20/767; Girsa (Czech 1041/1809/413562—563.

minister Warsaw)

report 27 of 18 March

1935, Czech

document

in T-120,

68. On the events of June 30 see Bracher, Machtergreifung, pp. 934ff. There are relevant documents in G.D., C, 3,

and B.D., 2d, 6. The German Foreign Ministry was hardly touched directly by the purge; on 2 July K. A. Vicco von Biilow-Schwante and Attaché Lippert were arrested by Prince Waldeck, the patty’s representative in the Wilhelmstrasse, for the SS, but both were released by the Gestapo on the same day (Memorandum by von Billow-Schwante, 2 July 1934, T-120, 2371/4601 /E 188783—784).

69. The events as seen by an Italian official in any case not very favorable to national socialism may be followed in the entries for the second half of 1934 in Aloisi, Journal. 70. Ibid., 27 July 1934, p. 207. 71. On the Austrian legion and related activities in Germany after the July coup see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 134, 135, 141, 165, 183, 174, n. 8, 179, 208, 337, 347, 362, 398, 424, 435; “Aktenvermerk uber Besprechung 6sterreich. Mil. Att. Gen.Maj. Jansa mit Obstlt. Bockmann am 13.1X.1934,” T-120, 2890/6115/E 454920-921; Memorandum of Renthe-Fink “zu II Oe 3349,” 8 December 1934, ibid., frame E 454949. On the continued ties between the German and Austrian National Socialists see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 116, n. 10, 173, 198, 398, n. 1; Memorandum by von Biilow, 19 November 1934, T-120, 909/1574/381349; inclosure to the American Legation Vienna dispatch 183 of 19 October 1934, State 863.00/1104. It should be noted that German military attaché in Vienna, General Muff, favored the continuation of German suppott, both in leader-

ship and money, to the Austrian National Socialists (Bericht 25/34 geh. 323 of 10 September 1934, T-120, 2695/5705/E 414396398).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

were unsuccessful and therefore led to no real easing of the situation.” It is not surprising that under these circumstances the Austrian government did what it could to strengthen its international position by publishing a suitably edited and documented account of the 25 July coup, by maintaining close relations with Italy, and

by appealing to Britain and France for continued support.” The Italians held to their position of reserve toward Germany and in fact expressed rather openly their continued suspicions of German motives toward Austria. To ease this situation, both von Papen and Ulrich von Hassell, the German ambassador to Rome, began to urge that Germany subscribe to some international statement on the integrity of Austria. The German government, however, declined whatever schemes along these lines von Papen, von Hassell,

ort the Italian or Hungarian governments proposed. Hitler, fully supported by von Neurath and von Bulow, believed that it was wiser for Germany not to tie its own hands by any meaningful agreement. Since it had no intention of moving openly against Austria right away, the international clamor would subside in time; Germany had only to wait. If Germany did not lose its nerve, it would emerge

from the situation without having

assumed any formal restraints. When Berlin accepted a commitment about Austria in 1936, it would be of a bilateral, not a multilateral, nature.”

In the face of this unwillingness to make any substantial gestures toward Austria and, by implication, toward Italy, German-Italian relations remained distant. The open

hostility slowly subsided, but the period of cooperation on the international scene was replaced by one of coolness and latent hostility. In the eyes of the Italian government, German hegemony in Europe could be even more dangerous than French hegemony. By instructions to the press and by warning of French ambitions, the German government tried to deter Italy’s turn toward France, but without success. Rome did not wish to destroy all ties with Germany and cultivated those with the German military on the assumption that only the National Socialist party was responsible for Germany’s Austrian policy, but there was nevertheless an unmistakable reorientation of Italian policy to a closer relationship with France.’> If Italy’s support of the German position on the Saar question helped maintain a friendly tie with Berlin,” its developing interest in an aggressive policy in East Africa played a key part in Italy’s rapprochement with France that was to culminate in Pierre Laval’s visit to Rome in January 1935.77 Laval was in Rome 4-8 January 1935. He had paved the way by seeing to it that no

blame was publicly attached to Italy for its role in supporting the Croatian terrorists responsible for the October

1934 assassination of Laval’s predecessor, Barthou, and

King Alexander of Yugoslavia.’* If this regard for Mussolini’s susceptibilities inclined the Italian leader to a friendlier regard for France, Mussolini’s own interest in an African empire turned him in the same direction. The preparations for what eventually became 72. On the Reinthaller negotiations see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 198, 257; von Papen to Hitler, A 3264/34, 12 November 1934, T-120, 778/1549/376671. For informed and detailed analyses of these negotiations by the American minister in Vienna, George S. Messersmith, see his dispatch 202 of 7 November 1934, and his letters to Undersecretary of State William Phillips of 8 and 16 November 1934, State 863.00/1114, 1135, and 1136,

73. Osusky (Czech minister Paris) to Benes, No. 376 of 23 August 1934, Czech document in T-120, 1143/2028/444313-315. 74. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 127, 161, pp. 338-41, Nos. 166, 167, 174, 230, n. 8, 241, 266, 267, 296, 317, 345, 380, 408, n. 1; 4, pp. 1227-29; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 546, 548, 556, 560, 561; Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 1031 of 12

September 1934, T-120, 2383/4619/E 198016. 75. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 118, 152, 222, 293, 303, 310, 352, 381, 383, 385, 406, 425; Memorandum of von Bulow, 12

December 1934, T-120, 784/1555/377605-606; Kausch, “Streng vertrauliche Anweisung iiber die Behandlung der 6sterreichischen Probleme,” 12 September 1934, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/4, f. 101. 76. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 228, 299, 309, 318, 376; von Hassel report I 1366, 21 December 1934, T-120, 2700/5737/H 029165-168. 77. G.D., C, 3, No. 230.

78. Mili¢evic, Konigsmord von Marseille, p. 85.

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

#55

the Italo-Ethiopian war were already undet way; the first major incident, that at Wal Wal, had occurred on 4 December 1934.7 Italy could not risk an advance in East Africa without some assurance from France. If France supported Italy, Britain would be unlikely to act alone. In their talks, Mussolini and Laval came to a series of agreements.®” The published

agreements dealt with Italian rights in Tunisia, the cession of some African desert by the French to Libya and a tiny piece of coast to Italian Eritrea, and the turning over by France of some shares in the railway connecting Djibouti in French Somaliland with the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa. There was a further agreement to consult together if Austrian independence should be threatened, while any future danger to Austtia was to be obviated by a Danubian Pact containing a pledge of noninterference into Austrian domestic politics to be signed by Austria, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Italy, with France, Romania, and Poland also invited to adhere. A secret

arrangement provided for French-Italian consultation if Germany assumed complete freedom to rearm in violation of the Versailles Treaty. In addition, the French minister

gave Mussolini a free hand to move forward in Ethiopia, a step leading to misunderstanding on both sides. Italy assumed that France really would support it and was, therefore, disappointed when France, however reluctantly, later joined in sanctions against Italy; while the French may not have expected Mussolini to move toward an outright military conquest of all Ethiopia and were therefore to find themselves in a position of having to choose between support of the League and their newfound friend.*! The German government was invited to sign the Danubian Pact, but Hitler was no

mote interested in tying his own hands in this way than in any others. On the basis of Laval’s general policies there are good reasons for believing that he really hoped to combine a check to German ambitions—through the Franco-Italian alignment—with good Franco-German relations, but as the following account of those relations will show, it

was a one-sided desire. In the meantime, Berlin rejected immediate adhesion to the Rome agreements and insisted on negotiations about German participation hedged about with conditions Germany confidently expected would be rejected. As before, Germany would refuse all multilateral commitments.** German-French relations from the summer of 1934 to early 1935 were dominated by three themes. There was the effort of France to revive the disarmament negotiations of to atrange a new security system like an Eastern Locarno that eventually became the Franco-Soviet alliance. There was the growing rapprochement between France and Italy, arising out of their common opposition to Germany’s Austrian policy. Finally, there were the attempts to improve German-French relations directly by the official route of government negotiations and the unofficial method of contacts between veterans organizain George W. 79. The origins and beginnings of Mussolini’s aggressive policy towatd Ethiopia are examined 1967), chaps. 2 and 3. Baer, The Coming of the Italian-Ethiopian War (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, ofFrance, 193 11949 80. See the summary in Scott, pp. 214-17 and Geoffrey Warner, Pierre Laval and the Eclipse secret ones, ate published the including themselves, agreements The 66-71. pp. 1968), Macmillan, York: (New

1935 on Ethiopia,’ Middle East and examined in Donald C. Watt, “The Secret Laval-Mussolini Agreement of

with Dino Grandi in the diary of Journal, 15 (1961), 69-78. In addition, see Norman Davis’s report on a talk Papers, Vol. 10; and von Papen to Hitler, telegram 3 of 5 January 1935, T-

William Phillips, 3 April 1936, Phillips 120, 2499/4939/E 271937.

(The Hague: Mouton, 1967), chap. 2; 81. Franklin D. Laurens, France and the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis, 1935-1936

Baer, chap. 4.

461, 466; von Papen report iN 53/355 T-120, 82. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 407, 411, 418, 423, 438-40, 456, 460,

January 1935, Laval still professed to believe 2757/5885/E 431254-259. It is worth noting that as late as 30 (U.S. 1935, 1:182-84). Pact Danubian a sign would that there was a chance that Germany Clerk’s (Paris) dispatch 142 of 31 January There is an apt retrospective view of Laval’s 1935 policy in Sir G. genuine horror of war and a natural inclination a charactet: Laval’s M. inform tics characteris main “Two 1936:

to double-dealing” (Foreign Office C 656/1/17).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

tions, friendship societies, and so on, that had been inaugurated the previous winter and

spring. In the background, there was the problem of the forthcoming plebiscite in the Saar as a possible source of conflict between the two powers, or alternatively, as a means of reconciliation by the cooperative removal of a troublesome issue in their relationship. The efforts to revive disarmament negotiations were a failure, as could be expected in view of the German position. German rearmament was proceeding at a faitly rapid rate, and there was no reason for it to stop under circumstances where no one was

willing to take any action to stop it. To avoid a major crisis before Germany was ready to face it, the Foreign Ministry restrained the pressures from the military for remilitarization of the Rhineland, but otherwise the only restraint still exercised was the temporary postponement of the reintroduction of conscription.** Otherwise, Germany rearmed without

tegatd to protests or concern expressed by other countries.84 The public atmosphere inside Germany was increasingly militarized, and foreign observers commented on the unprecedented indoctrination of the youth, in fact of the whole population, with a spirit of militarism and the expectation of victory in another war. In the focus on military rearmament with its emphasis on the training of soldiers and the production of arms, this facet—the rearmament of public opinion, so to speak—is often overlooked; but it went forward rapidly in the early years of the National Socialist regime as Hitler himself had indicated that it would as a prerequisite for the material rearmament of the country.® The abortive negotiations for an Eastern Locarno and the subsequent Franco-Soviet Pact have already been mentioned, as has the Franco-Italian rapprochement. If these developments did not lead to a substantial stiffening of French policy toward Germany, it was mainly due to other developments in the relations of these two powers. Although Laval’s predecessor, Louis Barthou, wished to build up defenses against German aggression, he was by no means interested in having France follow an aggressively antiGerman policy herself. He made every effort to maintain cordial relations with Germany and to surmount the incidents and problems that arose from time to time.8¢ Through de Brinon, Barthou arranged for a friendly meeting with von Ribbentrop and attempted to combine a security system for Frante with good relations with Germany.’ If Barthou was cool but friendly, his successor, Pierre Laval, was even more interested in improving

German-French relations. The German government was happy to see him become foreign minister, and though never responding with any substantial gestures of its own, always listened with great pleasure to his protestations that he wanted to end the past hostility between the two countries.** This was particularly evident in regard to the forthcoming plebiscite in the Saar. Laval did everything possible to avoid incidents in anticipation of what was likely to be a heavy vote for reunion with Germany in the hope that this 83. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 452, 487; 3, Nos. 2, 159, 170, 274, 369, 393; Liebmann Notes for 9 October 1934, ED 1,

pp. 73-74.

84. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 355, 356, 358. 85. See the very perceptive letter of the U.S, consul general in Berlin, Raymond Geist, to the chief of the Division of West European Affairs in the Department of State of 15 September 1934, Moffat Papers, Vol. 5. In 1934, the APA began a major effort to have the iron ore shipments from Sweden rerouted through Liitbeck instead of Rotterdam, Antwerp, and Emden in view of the prospect of future wat (Daitz to Rosenberg, 6 November 1934, Nuremberg document 1356-PS, National Archives). During the same period, the German navy established contact with Estonia to try to secure oil from the Estonian oil shale works (Nuremberg document 984-PS, National Archives). 86. G.D., C, 3, No. 31, n. 14, Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 478 of 26 April 1934, T-120, 2383/4619/E

197951—952. 87. G.D., C, 3, No. 31; U.S. 1934, 1:122; B.D., 2d, 6:454; von Ribbentrop to Hitler, 1 June 1934, T-120, 1784/ 3650/D 813444445. 88. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 240, 399; Memorandum of von Biilow, 7 November 1934, T-120, 2372/4602/E 189975— 977; Mastny report 78 of 24 October 1934. Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413756-757 (parts in

Berber, Prager Akten, No. 33).

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

LS7

might pave the way for better relations thereafter.® If there wete some signs that official relations were improving slightly, at the same time unofficial contacts were being expanded. A speech by Rudolf Hess to the wat veterans of the world on 8 July 1934 started a major German effort to utilize contacts between German and foreign veterans associations as a means of building up support for peaceful relations.°° There followed a series of direct contacts between Getman and Prench veterans organizations, personally encouraged by Hitler, including trips by leaders of various veterans groups. The foreign ministries on both sides attempted to restrain these activities, but their impact on the international atmosphere should not be underestimated, The sentiments of those involved were in most cases quite sincere, even if the German government planned to utilize them for far different purposes than the participants realized.?! The French were not the only ones who were building up hopes for a relaxation of tension after the Saar plebiscite. Most anxious

for some

agreement in 1934, and still

hoping for an accommodation even after the shocks of early 1935, was Great Britain. British policy had been oriented toward an understanding with Germany based on some degree of German rearmament within the framework of a general settlement that included Germany’s return to the League. Beyond the continued unwillingness of Germany to agree to any such policies, there was a specific aspect of German rearmament as well as German policy in international trade that made for friction with London. As has already been mentioned, German rearmament in the air raised an immediate and

strong reaction in Britain. If the French were alarmed at increases in the German army, the English were most sensitive to the possibility of war in the air. It was Stanley Baldwin who, in November 1932, made the statement: “The bomber will always get through.” Under the impact of German air rearmament, Britain began to rebuild its own air force,

if only on a small scale; and the accompanying debate in the House of Commons showed how fear of German strength influenced British policy.” If Baldwin now asserted that Britain’s line of defense was on the Rhine, and if Ramsay MacDonald warned the German ambassador, Leopold von Hoesch, that an ait arms race might play the same

role that the naval race had played before World War I, these wete ominous signs of danger ahead; but no

serious concern

about their long-range implications appears to

have influenced the German government. In Berlin the main emphasis remained on talking and stalling while rearming.”* British protests and warnings were disregarded.”° 370, 372, 375, 89. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 290, 297, 300, 306, 307, 328, 330, 335, n. 2, 340, 343, 344, 357, 363-65, 368,

377, 396; D.D.B., 3, No. 146; Eden, pp. 113-17; Warner, Laval, pp. 61-63. 501; Gerl to Hess, 1 90. Text in Rudolf Hess, Reden (Munich: Eher, 1938), pp. 39-48. See also B.D., 2d, 6, No.

11 July 1934, T-120, January 1938, Nuremberg document 3752-PS (National Archives); Késter telegram 946, 2696/5717/H 024391-392.

1529, 3 December 1934, T-120, 1G Di GABmNosaiS lila 215, 324-0359, ine10; 367, 388; Paris telegram , Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/4, f. 2661/5669/H 014966; “Bestellungen a.d. Pressekonferenz, 30.11.34,” Bundesarchiv ecember 1934 are in 198; Domatus, 1:464. A number of documents on the veterans’ contacts in Novembet-D

general purpose and setting in T-120, 2696/5717/passim. There is a summary of these projects and their Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, Frankreich,” auf Angriff her psychologisc “Hitlers Wilhelm Ritter von Schramm, sutvey that shows the role of Otto Abetz Beilage zu Das Parlament, B 5/61, 1 February 1961. A contemporary

m by von Rintelen, “II Fr. 414,” 12 and the misuse of genuine goodwill on both sides is in Memorandu the French side, there are two interfrom information For 024647-649. H 2696/5717/ T-120, February 1935, and No. 32 of 4 December 1934, December 3 of 30 No. Ibl, Paris, in a.i. esting reports by the Czech chargé Czech documents

in T-120, 1041/1809/413752-753

(excerpts in Berber, Prager Aktien, No. 36), and frame

413754. 92. G.D., C, 2, No. 164; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 161, 164. 2d, 6, No. 443 93. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 90, 98, 99, 138; cf. U.S. 1934, 1:76; B.D.,

Schweppenburg, Erinnerungen eines Militarattachés, p. 17; 94. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 154, 289; B.D., 2d, 6, No. 547; Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/27, f. 439-41. 1934,” r Novembe 9. vom ionen Informat iche “Vertraul

95. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 355, 356, 358.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The aspect of German international trade policy most upsetting to the British—as it was to the United States—was the handling of international payments. For a great trading nation, this was, of course, a matter of considerable public concern. A serious

crisis in the summer of 1934 was met by forced clearing legislation in which Britain took advantage of its favorable situation to pressure Germany into substantial concessions. The whole development of German-British trade and payments was, nevertheless, a subject of continuing friction, and one that disillusioned many British officials about the possibility of dealing constructively with the whole range of British-German differences.” Since the German government could find foreign exchange to repurchase the

bonds on which it had defaulted and to pay for imports connected with rearmament, there was an understandable annoyance among British negotiators over German claims of a lack of foreign exchange to pay for past obligations or current purchases of a nonmilitary nature.” As in the case of German relations with the United States, such economic troubles were mainly important as symbols rather than causes of a process of deterioration of Germany’s relations with other lands, though in London as in Washington the German tactics were also well calculated to engender maximum dislike and distrust on the part of those who had to deal with Berlin. On the plane of official German-British relations, there was, thus, a clear and significant worsening of the situation, and the German diplomatic reports from London

reflect that process quite accurately.?° It was also obvious to the Germans that Britain and France were moving mote closely together in the military sphere and that Britain was as sensitive as ever towatd any German threat to Belgium.” On the other hand, there seemed to be no reason for Berlin to fear a really drastic change in British policy. Clearly the British government would take no great risks. This had been shown by its mild and anxious rather than vigorous reaction to Germany’s departure from the League. Similarly, any concessions Britain might make to Japan to enable Britain to concentrate on Europe would be interpreted as a sign of weakness.! Hitler himself was receiving from Rosenberg indications of soundings in London that pointed toward a willingness to go far to meet Germdany’s wishes.!°! In late September 1934, he received a most interesting report, widely circulated, of a conversation between the counselor of the German embassy in London and Edgar Granville, private secretary to the British foreign secretary, Sir John Simon. Granville stressed that Britain was making progress in its 96. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 193, 196, 197, 200, 204, 212, 231, 233, 426, 466, 471, 490; 3, Nos. 9, 12, 18, 20, 21, 29, 35— 38, 42, 44, 46, 49, 53, 54, 58, 108, 130, 160, 175, 176, 185, 277, 278, 316; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos. 386, 469; TMWC, 36:573; Note by von Ulrich, “W 8025,” 17 September 1934., T-120, 2628/5622/E 404066—067; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 8. August 1934,” 2612/5650/H 003919-20; “Bestellungen a.d. Pressekonferenz v. 4.12.34,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.S¢. 101/4 f. 203-04. 97. See MacDonald’s comments in G.D., C, 2, No. 28, and those of the British negotiator, Sir Frederick Leith-

Ross, in “Aufzeichnung iiber die 6. Sitzung der deutschenglischen Wirtschaftsverhandlungen am 26, September 1934 vormittags,” T-120, 2628/5622/E 404013018. The documentation on this subject in the British Foreign Office records is almost endless. For a reflection of the thinking in London see Wigram’s minute of 25 October 1934 (Foreign Office C 7091/90/18); for the views of the British negotiator, Sir Frederick Leith-Ross, see Phipps’s Berlin telegram 267 of the same date (Foreign Office C 7280/90/18). It should be noted that these documents relate to the British threat of a forced clearing system to secure German agreement to a new Anglo-German transfer agreement. A summary of the British-German negotiations is in Foreign Office C 646/25/18. 98. A detailed analysis is in Bismarck’s report, A 3234 of 12 September 1934, T-120, 2628/5622/B 404078

102.

99. G.D., C, 3, No. 47. There was a series of soundings about a German-Belgian nonaggression pact that was

badly mishandled by von Ribbentrop but showed both British sensitivity and German worry about any new

multilateral commitments (G.D., C, 2, Nos. 464, 467, 497, 502, 503; 3, Nos. 52, 71, 73, 94; B.D., 2d, 6, Nos.

430-32, 450, 466; D.D.B., 3, No. 97). 100. Feiling, Life ofNeville Chamberlain, p. 253.

101. Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 11 July 1934, pp. 49-51; cf. ibid., September 1934, pp. 57-58.

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

N59

tapprochement with Japan and he thought relations with Germany much improved. He emphasized Britain’s policy of isolation and of accepting no commitments and made an assertion that could only have sounded like a go-ahead to Hitler: “No country, and especially not England, would ever go to war for the interests of other nations outside its own territory.””!? Such a statement could be interpreted to mean that Britain might go to wat outside its own territory if it believed this to be in its own interests, but such was clearly not the interpretation Hitler placed on this or similar statements later. It suggested instead the possibility of a direct accommodation between the two countries, a subject

on which von Ribbentrop touched while in London in November

1934 and toward

which contacts between the Lord Privy Seal, Sir Anthony Eden, and Hitler might lead in

the future.!% The Berlin government was further encouraged in its belief that there would be no serious resistance to its continental ambitions by the unofficial contacts from Britain that became more numerous at this time and that in turn inspired British officials to take an optimistic view of the future. An “Anglo-German Group” was formed in London at the end of 1934, and Lord Allen of Hurtwood visited Hitler on 25 January 1934 in its behalf to explore the possibility of German-British friendship.'°* A few days later Phillip Kerr, Lord Lothian, received assurances from Hitler of his great desire for peace. Through this

meeting preparations were also begun for the subsequent visit to Berlin of Sir John Simon himself.!° In his talks with German leaders, Lothian always insisted that the out-

standing issues would have to be settled by peaceful negotiations, but there is nothing to indicate that his hosts took this point very seriously. It was in fact quite clear that at the beginning of 1935 the British government was determined to attempt a settlement with Germany and this attitude was both supported and pushed forward by the policy of England’s leading newspaper, The Times! Simultaneously, the campaign of those whose religious inclinations led them to imagine that they could appeal to the “good” in the leaders of National Socialist Germany helped to shape portions of British opinion in a direction favoring concessions to Germany. The honorable motives of these men evoked no response from the makers of German policy, but those who approached Germany with eyes focused on their own doctrines rather than German realities were slow to be

disillusioned.!°” The German response to all the overtures made to them was the opposite of what the British and French had hoped for. The desire for peace and friendship was always 102. Bismarck’s

report, “Unterredung

mit dem

aussenpolitische Fragen,” T-120, 2903/6161/E

Parlamentarischen

461714-719.

Privatsekretar Sir John Simons

uber

The date on the document is burned; it was

received in Berlin on 29 September 1934 and given file number III E 2609.

103. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 333, 334; T. Jones, 16 December 1934, p. 19 (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 104. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 422, 463; Arthur Marwick, Clifford Allen: The Open Conspirator

read Hurtwood, not 1964), pp. 159-62. See also Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 15 March 1935, p. 76 (should dupes” in Foreign Office C “Mentwood”); Jacobsen, p. 335. There is a skeptical evaluation of this “marché des

2518/55/18.

Macmillan, 1960), pp. 203105. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 445, 468; J. R. M. Butler, Lord Lothian, 1882-1940 (London:

04, 330-37; Gartner, p. 309.

10 January 1935, T-120, 2383/4619/E 106. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 421, 469; Memorandum of von Neurath, RM 10,

hopes ate set forth in his letter 198062-063; Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 21 January 1935, pp. 65-66. Sir John Simon’s p. 522. For the attitude of The Fifth, the George King Nicolson, in quoted V, George King to 1935, January of 14 Part I (London: The Times, 1912-1948, Beyond, and Anniversary 150th The 4: Times, Times see The History of the h to Phillips of 6 June Messersmit S. George of letter the in 1952), chap. 23; the excellent contemporary analysis Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/ 1935, State 863.00/1203; and Mastny’s report 57 of 7 June 1936, cabinet, 8 April 1935, Foreign Office C 413136-138. See also Eden’s complaints about The Times to the ; e 2962/55/18. for better British-German relations 107. A fine survey of the major elements and individuals in this movement

Wiener Library Bulletin, 14, No. 2 (1960), pp. 30-31; is in Donald C. Watt, “Christian Essay in Appeasement,”

pp. 123-35. for a broader analysis see the same author’s Personalities and Policies,

160

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

taken solely as a sign of weakness, as it may have been in part, but only in part. As Hitler explained to his ministers when triumphantly discussing the arrangements agreed upon for the Saar plebiscite, “The French have definitely missed the opportunity for a preventive war. This also explains France’s effort for rapprochement.’!8 In view of this German interpretation of friendly gestures from her neighbor in the West, the overwhelming vote for union with Germany in the Saar on 13 January and the subsequent transfer of the area to Germany produced the opposite effect in Berlin from what those outside Germany had hoped. Instead of clearing the air by removing a German grievance and a potential source of friction, it freed Germany from restraint and made the German leaders more exuberant and determined. The world would soon find out in which ditection Berlin would move. Whatever new schemes in arms limitations the British and French governments might devise at their meeting early in February 1935, Germany was determined to go ahead on its own. The German strategy had been reconfirmed in January: there might be negotiations, but there would be no agreement in any way limiting the extent of German armaments or imposing international controls or inspection.'° The negotiations on the ptoposals anyone might make would simply be used to cover the time while Germany tearmed.!!° The return of the Saar to Germany only made this policy more attractive. Hitler gave some reassuring public interviews, but his privately expressed sentiments were of a very different nature.!!! In conference with Goring on the Obersalzberg before his trip to Poland, Hitler

confirmed that Germany would sign none of the pacts then being pushed by France. Hitler indicated that in about two weeks Germany would take an important step in the field of armaments; the record we have does not indicate what that step was to be, but either the announcement of air rearmament or the reintroduction of conscription, or

both, appears to have been discussed.!!* Germany would use the German minorities in neighboring states, including Lorraine, to secure territorial concessions. Hungary would become dependent on Germany, and a possible Habsburg restoration in Austria could be the first step “in the process of closing in on Czechoslovakia.” In the meantime, Germany would continue its efforts to reduce the fears of France.'!3 Such efforts, how-

ever, would in no way inhibit its far-reaching plans for expansion eastward.!"4 As Germany acted on these sentiments by a parallel course of public assurances of 108. G.D., C, 3, No. 373. Hitler had by this time been confident for some time that France would not launch a

preventive attack (ibid., Nos. 281, 283, 293). 109. Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Liebmann Papers, ED 1, pp. 79-82; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 436, 437, 446; Memotandum of von Neurath, RM 41, 19 January 1935, T-120, 2383/4619/E 198071—072; Phipps telegram 24, 19 January 1935, Foreign Office C 507/55/18. 110. G.D., C, 3, No. 454. The minutes of the Anglo-French discussions of 1-3 February are in Foreign Office C 893/55/18; see also C 1048/55/18.

111. Interview by Pierre Huss of the Hearst press on 16 January 1935, Domarus, 1:473-74; by Ward Price on 17 January, ibid., pp. 474-76. Huss gave a teport on his days on the Obersalzberg to the U.S. consul general in Berlin, and the lattet’s letter to Jay Pierrepont Moffat of 26 January 1935 (Moffat Papers, Vol. 8) is the main source for the text that follows. See also Hitler’s comments to Rosenberg on 8 February 1935, in Rosenberg’s Tagebuch, pp. 69-70. 112, Goring may also have been authorized to inform the Poles of the forthcoming German step. There ate both hints and denials of this to be found in the Czech diplomatic documents; Girsa (Warsaw) teport 27 of 18 March 1935, T-120, 1041/1809/ 413562-563; Mastny report 21 of 20 March, ibid., frame 413507; Mastny’s telegram of 22 March, ibid., frame 413428.

113. In the State Department, only the reference to a Habsburg restoration was questioned, on the assumption that it would hinder rather than help Germany’s Anschiuss ambitions (Moffat to Geist, 27 February 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8). 114. For confirming indirect evidence on Hitler’s exposition of his long-range intentions in late January 1935 see Mastny report 8 of 27 January 1935, and his memorandum of February 1935, Czech documents in T-120,

1040/1809/413228-230 and frames 413102-108.

From the Proposed Eastern Pact to the Announcement of Conscription

161

peaceful intent and continued rejection of all proposals for substantive agreement, the stimulus events in the Saar had given to German intransigence began to be recognized abroad.1° The disappointment of British hopes for a more reasonable attitude after the plebiscite might have been expected to dampen the enthusiasm for direct approaches to Berlin, but such was not the case.'! The British were certainly aware that Germany might merely be trying to split them from France, but in spite of grave doubts among the permanent officials of the foreign office, plans were pushed for a visit to Berlin by Simon and Eden for discussions with Hitler.!!7 The timing may have been good from the British point of view but was particularly bad for Germany. The British wanted to explore German reactions to various new proposals for an ait pact and revised security atrangements, while the German government was planning to reveal publicly the existence of its air force. The secret decree on the air force was agreed upon in the cabinet in Berlin on 26 February just before the date of Simon’s visit was announced.!!8 Since the decree was to take effect on March 1 and announced to the governments of other countries a few days later, the German government wanted Simon’s visit postponed. It

found an excuse in a phrase in the British white paper calling for a slight measure of British rearmament in response to developments in Germany and promptly discovered that Hitler was too ill to receive visitors from England.!!9 While the British were puzzling out ways to arrange a visit after all, Hitler not only announced the existence of the German air force but planned further action to move rearmament forward during the expected international negotiations on new pact proposals until “after a year no one would dare attack us anymore.’’!”° In the days between 5 Match and 13 March Hitler decided to announce the reintroduction of conscription in Germany. There is ample evidence that he had always intended to take this step; he had promised it to the military immediately after 30 January 1933; and he had been obliged to postpone it solely because of the international situation. He thought it safe now and wished to make the announcement of it before Simon came to Berlin. Hitler made the decision himself and only informed the German Foreign Ministry and his military leaders at the last moment. Von Blomberg was skeptical, but Hitler went ahead, supported it would appear by many of his military and civilian advisers and perhaps influenced by the lack of reaction to the announcement of air rearmament. The outside world was angry but confined itself to verbal protests. The British ministers, undaunted by reality, would visit Berlin all the same.'?! The trip might give both sides an opportunity to secure a clearer picture of the other’s plans and intentions. The conversations between Simon and Eden on the one hand and Hitler accompanied by von Neurath and von Ribbentrop on the other produced no agreement on any subject. The British exploration of the possibility of Germany’s agreeing to a pact covering Austria, returning to the League, signing an Eastern Locarno, or making any 115. U.S. 1935, 1:5, 7, 185-87; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 489, 490; Lipski Papers, No. 33; Eden, pp. 136-37; Phipps

dispatch 60, 22 January 1935, Foreign Office C 623/55/18. 116. Moffat to Ray Atherton (London), 19 February 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8.

atmosphere 117. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 501-503; Cmd. 5143, Nos. 7, 8; for an excellent picture of the Foreign Office

in the early and mid-1930s, and especially the roles of Wigram and Vansittart, see Valentine Lawford, Bound.for Diplomacy (London: John Murray, 1963). The minutes of Simon’s Paris talks before his Berlin trip are in Foreign Office C 1657/55/18; his briefing memorandum in C 2696/55/18.

118..G.D.:, GC, 3, No-507.

circular of 21 March 1935, 119. Ibid., Nos. 517, 519; Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufristung, pp. 92-96; Bene§ 41). Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413467—468 (parts in Berber, Prager Aktien, No. No. 534. 120. Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 12 March 1935, pp. 74-15; TMWG, 34:44-46; G.D., C, 3, Nos. 526, 528, 532, 539, 548, 550; 121. Meinck, pp. 97-99; Hossbach, pp. 9496; Feiling, p. 255; G.D., C, 3,

17 March, Czech document in U.S. 1935, 2:297; Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 16 March, pp. 76-77; Mastny report 19 of

Foreign Office C 2285/55/18. T-120, 1041/1809/413502—504; British cabinet conclusions of 18 March,

162

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

other clear commitment was answered unmistakably in the negative.’2? The British ministers were disappointed by the realization that the settlement they had hoped for was unattainable. Eden appears to have drawn the conclusion that there was little prospect of this changing in the future. Simon, on the other hand, was to continue hoping for the best. There is nothing to suggest that Hitler was greatly impressed by either the talks or by such warnings as he received of a stiffening in British attitude as a result of his own actions or his announcement during the talks that Germany had reached parity in air power with Britain. This last boast was probably an exaggeration, but if so, it only added fear as a deterrent to the already existing reluctance of London to face the dangers ahead.!23 Like the visit of the Soviet commissar for foreign affairs, Vyacheslav Molotov, to

Berlin five-and-a-half years later, the visit of Sir John Simon gave the two sides an opportunity to size up each other. Hitler took the occasion to speak volubly of peace but made evident his intent to continue preparation for war; Sir John hoped that a combination of concessions to Germany with firmness unaccompanied by action might avert the possibility of war. The personal impressions received are of importance: Hitler gave an impression of deep sincerity, Sir John of weakness. Both were, in a way, misled. Hitler was

sincere in not wanting a war with England, since he wished its acquiescence in his proposed eastern conquests; but just as Sir John failed to see clearly that Hitler wanted a certain kind of war—even if he did not wish to fight England as yet—so Hitler failed to understand that Sir John’s sincere wish for peace did not mean that England would not fight under any citcumstances. The subsequent course of German-English relations would only reinforce these mutual self-deceptions.

122. On the talks see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 528, 531, 537, 552, 555; U.S. 1935, 1:200-02; Simon, pp. 202-03; Eden, pp. 148-59; Cerny (Czech chargé a.i. London) report 13 of 1 April 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413548-550 (excerpt in Berber, Prager Akten, No. 44); General R. van Overstraeten, A/bert I-Léopold

III (Bruges: Desclée de Brouwer, 1949), pp. 160-62. The British minutes are in Foreign Office C 2580/55/18; see also C 2797/55/18.

123. Butler, p. 204; T. Jones, 30 March 1935, p. 144.

Chapter 9

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

yen the visit of the British ministers to Germany in late March 1935, Sir Anthony Eden continued to Moscow, Warsaw, and Prague, while Sir John Simon returned to London. Eden found the Soviet government anxious about Germany, the Polish leaders satisfied with their independent line, and the Czech government astonishingly confident about the future.! In the meantime, preparations were made for a meeting between the leaders of Britain, France, and Italy at Stresa prior to discussion by the League at Geneva of the German announcement of conscription. The German government, having just raised major claims to further rearmament in the talks with Simon and Eden—tight after the announcement of conscription—was at least a little concerned about the possibility of all the other European powers collaborating against it and followed the diplomatic situation with great care. For a short time, the tone from Berlin was more conciliatory, although no substantive concessions were offered in the continuing negotiations for an air pact, an Eastern Locarno, or a Danubian Pact.? The long-heralded meeting at Stresa took place on 11 April. As planned, the

meeting led to the issuance of a joint communiqué expressing regret at the German unilateral action on conscription, reaffirming loyalty to Locarno, and insisting that the policy of the powers would continue to be inspired by the need to maintain Austria’s independence and integrity.» The deliberate failure of the British prime minister and foreign secretary to bring up the subject of Ethiopia and their subsequent acquiescence in a formula referring to the maintenance of peace “in Europe”—with that restrictive phrase personally inserted by Mussolini—was not unreasonably taken by Mussolini as a green light for his East African venture. The pacific character of British policy, revealed to him by the leak of British diplomatic papers from the British embassy in Rome that lasted from 1935 until at least 1939, only confirmed him in his resolution. The effects of this 1. See Eden’s own account in Facing the Dictators (Book One, chaps. 9 and 10), and Foreign Office C 2689/C 2690/C 2726/C 2930/55/18. 2. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 563, 564, 567; 4, Nos. 5, 9, 10, 17; Cmd.

5143, No. 12; Geyr von Schweppenburg,

Erinnerungen eines Militérattachés, pp. 35-36. On the Danubian Pact see M. Sz-Ormos, “Sur les causes de l’échec du pacte danubien (1934-35),” Acta Historica, 14, No. 1-2 (1968), pp. 21-81. 3, This statement was, however, far weaker than the Franco-Italian treaty exchanging military guarantees of the

demilitarized Rhineland and the independence of Austria that Mussolini, according to one source, had proposed to France before the meeting (Osusky reporting to Bene’ on a conversation with Laval, 9 April 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413446).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

were to become apparent in the summer and fall of 1935; at the moment, the solidarity of the three powers appeared to be complete, and at the subsequent meeting of the council of the League all joined in denouncing the recent German move.* Some emphasis to the isolation of Germany was given by the signing on 2 May 1935 of the Franco-Soviet Pact of mutual assistance, followed by a Czech-Soviet Pact on 16

May.> If Berlin officials had anticipated these developments, they were somewhat surptised to see Poland join in the united front at Geneva. The Poles had been obdurate in the face of Eden’s approach at the beginning of April—and had so informed the Germans—and they had been angry over the failure of Britain, France, and Italy to invite

them to Stresa.° Warsaw’s

fear that Germany might make concessions

expense had been met by reassurances

at Poland’s

from Berlin.’ In Geneva, however, the Polish

government was not yet prepared to isolate itself as the spokesman for Germany, and in response to pressure from the Western powers had gone along with the resolution condemning Germany. Beck, the Polish foreign minister, was no doubt concerned that while no action of any sort would follow from passage of the resolution, the French government might well denounce the Franco-Polish alliance if Poland refused to support the public gesture.§ To Hitler, however, this action, coming between the Polish rejection of his overture for a military alliance against Russia and Laval’s trip to Warsaw, may have looked like a warning of possible total isolation. The opportunity to reestablish close German-Polish relations came sooner than expected: Marshal Pilsudski died on 12 May; the Poles reassured Berlin of their intention of continuing his policy toward Germany; and Goring was sent to the funeral ceremonies, using the opportunity to regale the Poles with promises of peace, tales of Soviet airfields in Czechoslovakia, and invitations to

Berlin.!° Hitler himself contributed to calming the fears of other powers by a major foreign policy speech on 21 May 1935.'! He offered bilateral non-aggression pacts to all neighbors except Lithuania (which was currently an object of German wrath); he assured the world that he wanted only peace; he promised to observe the Locarno Treaty including the demilitarization of the Rhineland; and he declared that Germany had no desite to interfere in the internal affairs of Austria or to secure its annexation to Germany. Since the evidence shows not only that each of these promises was later broken but that prepatations to break a number of them were already underway, it may be asked why he would make them and why anyone believed him. The first question is easy to answer. He was

4. On the Stresa conference and the subsequent council session see U.S. 7935, 1:212-16, 229-32, 244-46, 260. 69; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 24, 33, 36, 37, 46; Cmd. 5143, No. 13; Scott, pp. 240-43; Vansittart, Mast Procession, pp. 516-21; Colvin, None So Bind, pp. 60-61; Baer, chap. 6; Laurens, pp. 42-43; Geoffrey Thompson, Front-Line

Diplomat (London: Hutchinson, 1959), pp. 96-99; Breckinridge Long Diary, 8 April 1935, p. 127, and 17 April, pp. 134-37, Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Long Papers. The British briefing paper for Stresa is in Foreign Office C 3049/55/18; the minutes in C 3289/55/18. On the Italian access to British diplomatic documents see Colvin, pp. 58-60; Mario Toscano, “Problemi particolari della storia della Seconda Guerra Mondiale,” Rivista di studi politici internazionali, 17, No. 3 (1950), pp:

388-98. 5. For the terms and final negotiations see Scott, pp. 243-50;

G.D., C, 4, No. 44. Excerpts

from Soviet

documents on the negotiations are in the seties of articles by M. Andreyeva and L. Vidyasova in International Affairs (Moscow). 6. Szembek, 2 April 1935, pp. 52-56, 12 April, p. 61; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 8, 11; U.S. 1935, 1:217-22.

7. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 28, 30. 8. Ibid., Nos. 41, 49; Szembek, 19-20 April, pp. 64-65, 29 April, p. 67; Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the Czech Foreign Ministry, No. 14/35, 18 April 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/414148-149, 9. Szembek, 10 May 1935, pp. 70-74; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 88, 90. 10. Roos, pp. 218-19; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 98, 115, p. 494; Lipski Papers, Nos. 43, 44; Szembek, 18 May, pp. 81-83,

87, 27 May, pp. 89-90.

11. Domains, 1:505-14.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

165

concerned that the recent alliance between France and the Soviet Union together with the Stresa front might bring together all the other European powers against him in a mutual assistance system of the type he never failed to denounce. The very alliance that he would use a year later as an excuse to break the Locarno Pact at first led him to promise adherence to that system so that he might reassure those who had been alarmed by his most recent step. That anybody believed these pledges is more difficult to understand. Laval was as interested as ever in attaining an agreement with Germany, and he had so informed Goring when the two had had an opportunity to speak at the time of Pilsudski’s funeral.'? The British naval attaché in Berlin had told his American colleague that he would “feel more disposed to place reliance on German assurances, had he not been categorically told that no submarines were building, just prior to the announcement that twelve keels had been laid down.”!3 His government, however, did not share this skepti-

cism. Sir John Simon had come back ftom Berlin dubious about the possibility of agreement with Hitler; but after each encounter with reality, he returned to the attempt for a

settlement with Germany.'* Although willing to support a measure of British rearmament, Sir John always tried for some agreement with Germany, unwilling or unable to recognize that the attempts themselves only assured German intransigence because they were interpreted as signs of weakness.!° Accordingly he continued talks with the Germans about the various pact proposals that had been under consideration before his trip to Berlin.!° The one and only project that came to fruition, however, was not one of the international arrangements hitherto publicly endorsed by the British, French, or Italian governments but an Anglo-German naval agreement that provided for precisely the one thing the Stresa meeting had condemned: the repudiation of a treaty commitment without the consent of all the partners to that treaty. The origins and nature of the Anglo-German naval agreement of 1935 are quickly told; its significance requires more extensive comment.'’ The naval limitations treaty in force in the early 1930s, the London Naval Treaty of 1930, was to expire in 1935, and a

conference to determine the possibility of a new naval treaty was expected. In the summer of 1934 there was some consideration of Germany’s policy toward participation in such a conference, and Hitler decided that, though not eager to join, Germany would play a part if invited.'* It was, however, much easier to go ahead and build whatever war-

ships Germany’s shipyard capacity and raw material resources would allow.'? The con-

12. Szembek, 18 May 1935, pp. 81-83, 23 May, pp. 88-89; Strauss (Paris) dispatch 1905, 28 May 1935, State

862.20/1031. See also G.D., C, 4, Nos. 127, 129; Cmd. 5143, No. 26; Warner, Laval; p. 83.

13. White (U.S. counsellor Berlin) dispatch 2016, 29 May, 1935, State 862.20/1040. 14, Bingham (London) telegram 169, 10 April 1935, State 862.20/853; Emmet (The Hague) dispatch 191, 2

Geyr April 1935, State 862.20/914; von Papen telegram 33, 6 April 1935, T-120, 2499/4939/E 272003-04;,

report [5 April 1935], T-120, 2677/5576/E 400281—285. 15. U.S. 1935, 1:249-54; Atherton (London) dispatch 1389, 25 April 1935, State 862.20/980; “Vertraulicher Informationsbericht,” 22 May 1935, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg, 101/28, f. 179-81.

151, 152; 16. Cmd. 5143, Nos. 19, 20, 22-25; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 68, 77, 79, 82, 102, 106, 107, 113, 117, 122, 140,

and 1020; Long (Rome) dispatch 1111, 24 May 1935, and Bingham telegram 241, 27 May, State 862.20/1033 see his Long Diary, 28 May 1935, pp. 149-50, Long Papers. For the skeptical comment of Jay Pierrepont Moffat there is a reasonable letter to Hugh R. Wilson, the American minister in Switzerland, of 6 May 1935: “Unless help feeling that to chance of success, negotiations (I feat) do more harm than good. To be concrete, I cannot or reach an ambitions her abjure to mean not does she when negotiating or talking into maneuver Germany situation” (Moffat Papers, agreement would not only vof result in appeasement but might actually aggravate the

Vol. 9). Agreement of 1935: An 17. a best treatment of the subject is Donald C. Watt’s “The Anglo-German Naval to sources cited in References 155-75. pp. 1956), (June 2 No. 28, History, Modern Interim Judgement,” Journal of that article are generally not repeated here.

18. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 25, 32. 19. Ibid., No. 287.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

struction program already set up was carried forward; and, as Hitler explained to Admiral Raeder at the beginning of November 1934, no lack of money would be allowed to interfere with the progress of naval rearmament.”” About the time of this discussion, Hitler decided that he would make his diplomatic demand for naval strength equal to one-third of the British navy and so inform the British government. There is little evidence of the precise origin of this figure.*! There is, however, evidence, to be recounted presently, that

in spite of being elaborately spelled out in the agreement between Germany and England, the figure was violated in a number of ways from the very beginning. Hitler’s projection of this figure therefore must be taken as a facet of his political views of the moment rather than as a precise indication of his plans for naval construction. Hitler wanted to build up a navy, and he wanted the friendship of Britain in the initial phases of his expansionist policy. He was determined to build up Germany’s naval power, and he at no time hesitated to disregard his treaty commitments if they interfered with these plans. It was obvious, however, that the German navy would be relatively

small to begin with, both because of the great time needed to build the larger warships and because the major emphasis in the allocation of Germany’s resources would have to go to the army and air force. The navy that Germany would need for its first wars was the kind that would protect its access to Swedish iron ore, safeguard communications with East Prussia, ensure control of the Baltic against the Soviet Union, and give it the ability to threaten the oceanic supply routes of France. Such a navy would not have to be so large as to threaten England, and in view of Germany’s unfortunate pre-1914 naval rivalry with England, why not say so? This was the concept Hitler had already set forth in Mein Kampf, and if agreement with England could be reached, it would serve to reassure

that country while Germany moved forward in other areas on its target list, simultaneously dividing England from France. In this context, the ratio of one-third, or 35 percent, of British naval strength was an expression of an intent to build a substantial navy without (for the time being) threatening British naval supremacy—though on the assumption that Britain was prepared to forego its naval interests in such other parts of the world as the Far East. If Britain would agree to sanction such a German navy, the

resulting treaty would be a major diplomatic triumph, a triumph requiring no concession that might interfere with Germany’s plans. If Britain did not agree, Germany would continue to build such a navy all the same. At the end of November 1934, the German government informed Great Britain of

its interest in bilateral naval negotiations, its claim for an end to all restrictions on German naval construction such as those embodied in the peace treaty, and its willingness to restrict itself to 35 percent of British naval strength." In the meantime, construc-

tion was pushed as rapidly as possible, so that the German navy might have attained the greatest possible strength by the time negotiations actually took place.”3 As the British and German naval authorities stayed in touch in the winter of 1934-35, the figure of 35 percent eventually leaked out, and the British asked that the subject be deferred until Simon’s visit to Berlin in March.7# On 26 Match, Hitler personally told Sir John that the German demand was one he still insisted upon, claiming that its implicit acknowledgment of British naval superiority was a major concession. Although in Hitler’s view the 20. Raeder-Hitler talk of 2 November 1934, TMWC, 34:775-76. 21. G.D., C, 3, No. 298. The figure may have originated with Admiral Raeder. A German Navy document of 4 June 1934 tefers to his having ordered construction planning to be developed on the basis of “33-1/3 percent of English tonnage” (Marineleitung “A IV a 2136/34 G. Kdos.” of 4 June 1934, T-120, 3234/7792/E 565815). 22. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 358, 360; Foreign Office C 841/55/18.

23. See Hitler’s instructions to this effect of 16 January 1935, quoted in document 854-D, TMWC, 35:558 (cf. Bracher, p. 803, n. 267).

24, G.D., C, 3, Nos. 416, 541.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

167

proposed ratio was a guideline he was already preparing to exceed in some areas, Sit John appears to have thought it a maximum demand from which the Germans might be persuaded to back down in the course of negotiations.2> He was to be disabused of this notion at the naval talks in London to which he formally invited the Germans while in Berlin. On the basis of von Ribbentrop’s assignment to the disarmament negotiations and his participation in the meetings with Simon and Eden, Hitler decided in late March 1935 to entrust him with the conduct of the talks, insisting in the initial instructions that 35

percent be an irreducible minimum demand.” Just as the visit of Simon to Berlin had been put off until after the German government had announced the existence of its ait force and the reintroduction of conscription, so now the naval talks were postponed

until Germany could announce its naval rearmament and then calm the resulting flurry of excitement. In both cases, Hitler moved shrewdly to improve his bargaining position. In April 1935, the Germans informed the British of some of their naval construction plans, at first denying and subsequently affirming the inclusion of submarines.2’ The resulting

uproar in Britain then provided the opportunity to delay actual talks until after Hitler’s 21 May speech promising peace and goodwill to all. Once again the British were left with the choice of becoming involved in negotiations that would necessarily look like acquiescence in Germany’s move—or sulk in their tents. Under these circumstances, the time for the negotiations was finally set for early June 1935.78 The instructions to the German delegation were simply to insist on the 35 percent figure and leave all else as flexible as possible.” The British government may not have anticipated the signing of a formal document, and the German Foreign Ministry did not either, but the talks did in fact lead to an exchange of notes that had the effect of a treaty.>” From the first meeting on 4 June, von Ribbentrop insisted that preliminary to any discussion of details must be British agreement to the 35 percent formula. He both refused to deviate from this minimum and pressured for its acceptance—the approach he came to take to most diplomatic problems. The British negotiators overcame their initial reluctance; the British cabinet agreed; and by the evening of 5 June the Germans had

been told that the figure would be accepted.*! It was only after Sir John Simon had officially confirmed acceptance of the figure on 6 June that the British government began to consult other interested powers.*2 This matter will be reviewed subsequently, but the sequence of events clearly shows British willingness to move rapidly to an agreement, if necessary disregarding the protests of others. Once the British government had given way on the main point at issue, agreement on the other details was reached without great difficulty.*° Because the Germans were already beginning a large program of submarine construction that would soon put them well in excess of the 35 percent limit, they insisted that in this category they be allowed a 25. 26. 27. 28. 29.

Ibid., No. 555, pp. 1064-73; 4, No. 19. Ibid., 3, No. 560. Ibid., 4, Nos. 25, 51, 52. On the background, see ibid., Nos. 50, 54, 55, 58-60, 66, 74, 104. Ibid., No. 100.

German source for the talks 30. Ibid., No. 114; Dodd telegram 114, 29 May 1935, State 862.34/120. The main documents in G.D., C, 4, relevant the of most ssim; 3223/7790/pa T-120, in staff naval German is a file of the

are from this file which I have examined in full. ; S1RGID iCrAa Nose 3, 1324195=3i1claims that this was the second time 32. Ibid., No. 141; U.S. 1935, 1:163—-64. Sir Samuel Hoare in his memoirs , Nine Troubled Years (London: that other powers were asked, but he is clearly in error (Viscount Templewood Collins, 1954], pp. 141-42). for 23 June 1935, quoted in Jacobsen, p. 33. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 154, 156, 165; but see the Krogmann diary entry AVS ime Ts

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

45 percent figure for the time being, and parity, ie., 100 percent of British strength in submarines in principle.34 This meant that as soon as Germany’s violation of this portion of the agreement became too obvious—as it did by the end of 1938—the German government could claim its privilege of parity and thus retroactively legitimize its treaty violations.*° The British government, in the middle of a change on 7 June in which Baldwin replaced MacDonald and Sit Samuel Hoare took over Simon’s position, approved the agreement with Germany on the advice of its naval leaders, in response to the tremendous domestic political pressures for disarmament agreements, and in the hope of putting a limit on German rearmament in at least one field. It seemed to them that the French government had repeatedly caused them to miss opportunities for agreement with Germany; that the insistence of France on not agreeing formally to any degree of German rearmament in fact had led to unlimited German rearmament. The British may well have thought that failure to agree to 35 percent at the time would only lead, as in the case of German ait armaments, to a subsequent claim for parity. London was, therefore,

willing to go ahead, regardless of the views of others.*° These views were distinctively negative. The Italian government was unwilling to protest and presumably took the British action as confirming its previous assessment of British weakness. The French government was most disturbed by this breach of the Stresa front. The willingness of Great Britain to sanction German violations of the peace treaty, to make a bilateral “deal” with Germany, and to confront its erstwhile ally with a fait accompli aroused great bitterness in Paris.>’ The British readiness to disregard treaties and pledges in this case played a fateful role in the developing divergence between the policies of Britain and France in regard to Italy in 1935. As Donald C. Watt aptly characterized the posture of Britain after the naval agreement: “This was not, perhaps, the most

suitable position from which to launch the crusade which occupied Britain’s attentions for the second half of 1935 against Italy, the defiler of treaties, the breaker of covenants.” If the Soviet Union was alarmed* and Japan was pleased, the other major power, the United States, was most skeptical. In Washington, the agreement was thought

to represent a shrewd move on Germany’s part, one fraught with danger for the future.*° The official American position was noncommittal, but State Department officials were clearly skeptical of the wisdom of the British action, a skepticism that would reinforce

34. G.D., C, 4, No. 148. 35. See the summary in document D-854, TMIWC,

35:559. The description of the violations of the Anglo-

German naval agreement in the area of submarines in this source must be discounted somewhat because its purpose was to defend the leadership of the German navy against subsequent charges that the submarine arm had been neglected in the years before World War II. 36. I cannot agree with the emphasis placed by Watt (p. 169) on the key role played by timing and the fact that Sir Robert Craigie, the Foreign Office representative in the British delegation, was the head of the American

department in assessing the British decision to sign the naval agreement in June 1935. The German claim to 35 percent had been known to the British government for at least six months when the German delegation arrived in London; it is difficult to believe that there had been no discussion of the subject in the Foreign Office and the cabinet before the June talks. This aspect of the issue, as well as the relationship of British interest in the 35 percent figure to its desire for naval limitation vis-a-vis France and Italy, is examined in a Yale dissertation by Charles Bright. 37. The French memorandum in reply to the British request for comment is available in summary in Strauss telegram 511, 18 June 1935, U.S. 1935, 1:165—66. In March 1936, the French ambassador to Berlin commented that since Hitler was always saying that he would not agree to any unequal treaties, the Anglo-German naval agreement would surely go the way of Locarno (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 435); see also Baer, pp. 184-87.

38. Watt, “The Anglo-German Naval Agreement,” p. 174. 39. U.S. 1935, 1:168. The Soviets had been informed by Eden on 28 March that the German demand of 35

percent was regarded as “impossible” (Foreign Office C 2726/55/18, p. 3).

40. Memorandum of Noel H. Field (Division of Western European Affairs), 8 June 1935, State 862.34/146.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

169

the isolationist tendency of American thinking‘! The effect of the agreement on Germany was most important. Von Ribbentrop’s stock immediately rose tremendously; he obviously knew how to implement Hitler’s ideas and have them accepted by the British. The possibility of further German-British agreements loomed in the distance—if Germany could secure London’s acquiescence in its own plans at no cost, there vas no limit to the expressions of friendship that Hitler would utter. The proper instrument of such a policy, moreover, was obviously the man who had started it so successfully? This impression, and the dangerously erroneous deductions Hitler made from it, was reinforced by simultaneous developments in the contacts between German and English war veterans. Here, too, von Ribbentrop’s efforts appeared to be bringing about useful results. Von Ribbentrop had made a number of useful contacts in England in November 1934* and had followed this up by establishing relations with the British Legion, the major British veterans’ organization, in February 1935. Out of this grew an invitation to a delegation from the legion to visit Berlin. The British Foreign Office did not object to such contacts, and at the annual convention of the legion on 9 June 1935—during the naval talks—the president of the legion, General Sir Frederick Maurice, voiced his belief

that a visit to Germany would be a good idea.** There followed the celebrated speech of Edward, Prince of Wales, on 11 June favoring contact between British and German veterans. In Britain, the fact that the officers of the British Legion, of which the future Duke of Windsor was the patron, had requested this speech was overlooked as the government became concerned over possible repercussions. The king reprimanded his son, and the British government reassured the French. In Germany, however, the speech

was interpreted in the light of earlier pro-German utterances made by the Prince of Wales and, combined with the subsequent visit of the legion group to Germany and their reception by Hitler, led to exaggerated views of pro-German feelings in England.** There can be little doubt that this exploitation of a genuine desire for peace and reconciliation enhanced the short-run pressures for concessions to Germany, but it also contributed the unwarranted assumption by Berlin that there would be no limits to such concessions. As for Germany’s general diplomatic position, the advantages of the naval agreement were considerable. The Stresa front was broken; France was isolated. The Italian

government was pleased.‘7 Germany’s prestige had risen, and it had acquired the platform from which it could, as became evident very quickly, reject any and all efforts for international agreements and guarantees to secure the peace. Perhaps learning from this experience, the British government in subsequent years would always insist that agree24 June 1935, 41. Hull telegram to Bingham No. 135, 11 June 1935, U.S. 1935, 1:164-65; Moffat to Atherton, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8.

yielding For the negative impact of the Anglo-German naval agreement in Scandinavia, where it was seen as

The Nordic Powers, control of the Baltic to Germany, see Nils Orvik, “From Collective Security to Neutrality;

D. C. Watt (eds.), The League of Nations, Britain and the Approach of War, 1935-1939,” in K. Bourne and Studies in International History (London: Longmans, 1967), p. 389. and the incident recounted in 42, On this aspect see especially Erich Kordt, Nicht aus den Akten, pp. 108-12,

Jacobsen, p. 79. 43, Kordt, pp. 81ff. 44, Wootton, pp. 173-76.

State 740.00/38%2, and Bingham to 45. Ibid., pp. 176-82; G.D., C, 4, No. 159; Bingham to Hull, 28 June 1935,

z” of the APA of 20 February 1934, Roosevelt, 24 December 1935, Hyde Park, P. S. Bingham. An “Aktennoti of the British royal family may on a conversation with Prince Hohenlohe-Langenburg suggests that this relative the Prince of Wales’s speech (T-454, have played a part in laying the groundwork for the veterans’ contacts and in T-120, 1041/1 809/413559—-561. 86/21). See also Jan Masaryk’s report 21 of August 1935, Czech document gen, Middle East Diary 1917-1956 (London: 46. G.D., C, 4, No. 27; Wootton, pp. 183-87; Richard Meinertzha Tatsachen, pp. 143-44. Cresset Press, 1959), pp. 154-55; Helfferich, 1932-1946

47. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 199, 206.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ments on specific subjects, such as colonies, be made only within a wider framework of attangements to protect peace in Europe, but in this first and last experiment in a bilater-

al settlement the British had given Germany a decisive advantage in the diplomatic arena. As far as naval construction was concerned, the agreement had no particular significance. Germany could and did develop its navy as it wished and to the extent that its resources permitted.48 While the current construction program was largely within the limits of the naval agreement, Germany already had begun to inaugurate those naval schemes that looked to the distant future when Germany would want a navy able to cope with Britain’s. The plans for the construction of the superbattleships needed for that purpose and the facilities required for that type of a navy were begun at the very time when Hitler celebrated his latest diplomatic triumph.*? These preparations shed a revealing light on Hitlet’s sincerity. They also reveal the complete unreliability of the memoirs and statements of Admiral Raeder, the commander in chief of the German navy, who claims

to have believed Hitler’s public avowals of permanent friendship with Britain in the very years when his own headquarters was preparing the plans and initiating construction of a navy designed to challenge Britain on the high seas. As the world looked with astonishment at the conclusion of the Anglo-German naval agreement, a crisis of even greater scope was occupying the center of attention. The imminent conflict between Italy and Ethiopia would benefit only the men in Berlin. The details of the diplomacy surrounding that conflict are not relevant here—though it may be worth recording that, of all those involved in that sordid episode, today only the chief victim, Haile Selassie, emperor of Ethiopia, sits in the seat of the mighty. For an understanding of the evolution of the international situation and Germany’s place in it, however, certain aspects of that conflict must be reviewed.

Mussolini decided to push forward his plans for the seizure of Ethiopia in the fall of 1934. In view of the hostility between Germany and Italy over the Austrian question, the ruler of Ethiopia tried to secure arms from Germany as well as other sources. The Berlin government, however, had no wish to antagonize Italy over issues so remote from Germany’s concerns. Germany declined to help and set a neutral course in the developing confrontation.” In the manner previously described, the Italian African venture brought

Italy and France closer together, an alignment cultivated by both powers in the first half of 1935 and hastened by the Anglo-German naval agreement. That agreement showed the French that they would have to work with Italy to prevent the annexation of Austria by Germany, and it is not entirely coincidental that the Franco-Italian military convention for cooperation against any German military move against Austria was signed on the day after the anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo that had been thoughtlessly picked for the signing of the naval agreement.*! This alignment of Italy and France was very much on the minds of the leaders of Britain as they faced the crisis over Ethiopia. The British government, having failed to warn Mussolini at Stresa and thus becoming responsible for his belief that he could move forward with impunity, made a numbet of last-minute attempts to dissuade the Italian leader from his aggressive designs. There was a scheme to recompense Ethiopia for making concessions to Italy by giving it 48. Ibid., No. 275; TMWC, 41:3-5. 49. On this subject see the very important details in Paul W. Zieb, Logistische Probleme der Kriegsmarine (Neckargemtnd: Vowinckel, 1961), pp. 140-44. For British credulousness on this subject see Sir Robert Craigie’s minutes of 23 November 1936, Foreign Office A 9482/4671/45.

50. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 280, 402, 403. 51, Baer, pp. 84-85; Laurens, pp. 52-53; Gamelin, Servir, 2:163-69; Gaetano Salvemini, Prelude to World War II

(Garden City: Doubleday, 1954), p. 223; G.D., C, 4:976, n. 5; Long to Roosevelt, 8 February 1935, Hyde Park,

P. S. F. Long; Osusky’s reports to Bene’ of 27 June and 2 July 1935, Czech documents in T-120, 1041/1809/

413466 and 1143/2028/444368-369,

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

IVA

an outlet to the sea through a part of British Somaliland; there was a special trip by Sir

Anthony Eden, the British minister for League of Nations Affairs, to Rome; and there

was a great deal of pleading and talking at Geneva. None of this had the slightest impact on Mussolini who by now was determined to go ahead. He felt that the status of his regime was committed to aggression once he openly statted to move under the impression that he had France’s approval and Britain’s tacit consent.52 Confronted by this determination, Britain and France adopted precisely those policies best calculated to harm their own interests and least likely to aid Ethiopia. The British government, carried forwatd by a sudden outburst of popular support for the League, now advocated sanctions against Italy but was unwilling to risk a war that successful sanctions might well precipitate. They would annoy Italy by obstruction—and thus simultaneously tally the Italian people to Mussolini’s venture while spoiling the prospect of a future common front against German aggression—but they would not push their measures to the risk of conflict. The British government was reasonably confident that they could defeat Italy, but they were wortied about the future international situation if their navy had been weakened in a war in the Mediterranean; and they were worried about the evolution of Italy’s domestic situation if they should defeat Italy and precipitate Mussolini’s fall. They thus antagonized Italy but without inflicting sufficient damage to reduce the potential danger that Italy might pose to Britain in the future.%3 The French were amazed at the enthusiasm with which the British public endorsed in Africa the very principle of collective security they had hitherto rejected with such emphasis in Europe. The nation that had been unwilling to accept responsibility for the integrity of the East European allies of France suddenly seemed eager to support Ethiopia. Coming right after the British abandonment of the Stresa front in the naval treaty with Germany, the anti-Italian thrust of British policy was especially regretted by a French government that had apparently won over Italy to a common front of resistance to German aggressive moves in Europe. The reluctance of France, under these citcumstances, to support Britain wholeheartedly on the Ethiopian question helped restrain the

British from pushing forward with effective measures against Italy lest they be left facing Italy alone. This in turn meant, first, that Mussolini knew it was safe for him to go for-

ward with his policy, and second, that the British would be angry with the French for not giving full support to the concept of collective security. This, in turn, would affect British policy on the question of supporting France in taking action against Germany in the March 1936 crisis over Germany’s violation of Locarno in remilitarizing the Rhineland. The French, on the other hand, had seen little reason to support Britain’s new crusade for the League, while London simultaneously refused to extend similar enthusiasm to its

prospective obligation to assist France under the Locarno agreements. Forced by circumstances to choose between the League and Rome, Britain and France destroyed the League, alienated Rome, and drifted further apart themselves.

As this situation developed during the course of the summer and fall of 1935, it provided the German government with great benefits that may be divided into four general categories. First, it made it easy for Germany to postpone and eventually evade agreement on all of the various pact proposals that had once been the subject of such great international interest. The same reluctance of the Western powets to antagonize Germany while they were in difficulty with Italy also enabled Germany to proceed essentially undisturbed with the process of rearmament and military planning. A third benefit 52. The account in Baer, chaps. 7-10, is considerably more perceptive than Laurens, chaps. 4-6. in Spain certainly 53, It should be noted that the drain upon Italy by its involvement first in Ethiopia and then

long-range effects were of no affected its conduct of diplomacy in 1939 and of the war after 1940, but these help to England in the mid-1930s.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

for Germany was that the concentration of Britain, France, and Italy on the Mediterranean gave Germany a greater opportunity to extend its influence in the Balkans, an opportunity enhanced by the imposition of sanctions on Italy which opened up new possibilities for German trade expansion. The fourth and in the long run perhaps most important result of the Ethiopian conflict was the rapprochement between Italy and Germany that would come to be known as the Axis. The first of these themes need not be traced in detail. In tedious negotiations, the German government delayed and eventually rendered impossible any agreement on new security pacts. The Air Pact, the Eastern Locarno Pact, the Danubian Pact, all fell victim to Germany’s unwillingness to accept multilateral restrictions on its freedom of action.>* The final rejection of all new security pacts was given by Hitler to the British ambassador, Sir Eric Phipps, on 13 December 1935; and in that conversation Hitler alluded to

the next step on the road: the demilitarized Rhineland.*> By this time, Germany’s departure from the League of Nations had become final, with the end of the two-year period after withdrawal specified in the covenant.*° The British and French had, in fact, already dropped, at least for the time being, their request that Germany return to the League as part of the international agreements under consideration. The French prime minister and foreign minister, Pierre Laval, had been prepared to go even further. In a lengthy series of negotiations in the summer and fall of 1935 he had attempted to secure a direct rapprochement with Germany. These negotiations, falling between the signing and the ratification of the Franco-Soviet alliance, were designed to bring about a harmonizing of that pact with better Franco-German relations, to reduce the importance of the pact with Russia, and to strengthen Laval’s position in the quicksand of French politics. He clearly had in mind as a model his previous agreement with Italy—on which French policy continued to build°’—and included in the concept personal contact with Hitler. Through official and unofficial channels, Laval attempted to bring about some agreement between the two neighbors, urging speed because his successor was unlikely to follow a similar policy, but hoping to commit the next French government to agreement with Germany just as his predecessors had committed his own government to the Soviet Union. To these overtures there was no positive response from Germany, and by the end of 1935 all these efforts, like their predecessors, had been thwarted by Berlin.*® As the chief of the west European section of Rosenberg’s foreign policy office later expressed it, Laval’s plans for agreement with Germany “could not be

54. These negotiations can be traced in Cmd. 5143 and G.D., C, 4. 55. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 460, 462; the reference to ending the demilitarization of the Rhineland is not incladed in

the report of Sir Eric Phipps in Cmd. 5143, No. 46. See also Lipski Papers, No. 55. 56, See Gilbert (Geneva) telegram 503, 15 October 1935, State 500.C 001/1136. The German Foreign Ministry

immediately

pushed

for the dissolution

of the

German

Society

for League

of Nations

Questions

(Memorandum of von Bulow, 22 October T-120, 2371/4601/E 188839).

57. On Gamelin’s visit to Rome in July and Badoglio’s trip to Paris in September see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 194, 373. 58 On the official negotiations see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 225, 231, 235, 277, 287, 415, 418, 419, 423, 425, 426, 430, 435, 440, 467; Dodd, Diary, 22 May 1935, p. 247; Dodd dispatch 2492, 27 November 1935, State 751.62/327;

Warner, Laval, pp. 84, 92-94, 110-111. On unofficial contacts involving the APA see Rosenberg to Lammers,

29 January 1936, Nuremberg document 274-PS (National Archives), and Jacobsen, p. 62, n. 17; on unofficial contacts involving de Brinon see G.D., C, 4, No. 384; Szembek, 9 November 1935, pp. 130-31; Dodd telegram 217 of 7 November and dispatch 2450 of 8 November 1935, State 751.62/320 and 325; “Informationsbericht Nr. 53,” 28 October and “Informationsbericht Nr. 56,” of 11 November 1935, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

101/28, f. 317-19 and 335-37. On unofficial contacts that continued the use of war veterans see Forster (Paris) report B 2946 III, 4 July 1935, T-120, 2696/5717/H 024408—410; Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the Czech Foreign Ministry, No. 25/35, 12 September 1935, Czech document in 'T-120, 1041/1809/414166— 167.

In May 1937, Laval gave an interesting review of all his efforts to some unofficial German visitors; see the enclosure attached to Rosenberg’s letter to G6ring, 22 May 1937, Bundesarchiv, Stabsamt Goring, f. 134-145.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

173

carried out because Germany turned them down.’ Postponing to the indefinite future any treaty arrangement like the proposed Eastern Locarno Pact implied not only an unwillingness on Germany’s part to place its relationship with Britain and France on a new basis but had similar implications for its relations with the Soviet Union. The economic telationship of Germany and Russia was maintained under the terms of the new trade treaty of 9 April 1935 that provided for German credit to Russia of 200 million marks. The hopes initially attached to the prospect of this agreement during the negotiations for it faded under the impact of an unfriendly speech by Vyacheslav Molotov on 28 January and the exceedingly uncooperative attitude of Schacht during the talks with David Kandelaki, the leader of the Soviet trade delegation to Berlin.°! There is considerable evidence, all the same, that the continued worty of

Soviet leaders about German intentions led them to hope that there was still some prospect of normalizing political relations. The Soviet Union entered upon its new treaty with France reluctantly and while still leaving open other possibilities; Soviet leaders repeatedly indicated as much to the Germans by expressions of fear of German intentions combined with hope for new agreements.°? The German government displayed no interest in responding to these soundings, but in the summer of 1935 informal negotiations in Berlin between Schacht and Kandelaki roused new hopes on the Russian side. The details of the Schacht-Kandelaki talks of June and July 1935 are by no means cleat as yet, but it appears that Schacht had substantially reversed his earlier attitude. The subsequent failure of the Germans to follow through on the talks as soon as their political implications became clear, and the eventual collapse of the more novel parts of even

the economic portions of the proposed agreements, strongly suggests that Germany’s raw material and foreign-exchange shortages were the dominant element in Schacht’s initiative rather than any political directive from Hitler. It should be remembered, on the other hand, that the ideological preconceptions of the Soviet leaders inclined them to look upon Schacht as far more influential than he really was, to assume that he would be

not only aware of the political implications of any major agreement but also able to insist on his policy regardless of doubts expressed elsewhere in the German government, and therefore to attach to the negotiations—and their eventual failure—an importance greater than the facts probably warranted. In June 1935, Schacht suggested an expanded German-Soviet trade program which he hoped to make attractive to the Soviet government by offering a general credit of a very large sum, eventually defined as 500 million for a ten-year period. Kandelaki immediately went to Moscow to discuss this project. There the highest Soviet leaders, including Stalin, not unreasonably assumed that political as well as economic motives must lie behind any such German proposal. Kandelaki returned with the reply that the Soviet

59. Georg Ebert to Rosenberg, 22 July 1937, T-454, 86/163. 60. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 20, 21. 505, 61. On the economic negotiations and on German-Soviet ttade in this period see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 494, 514, 529, 546, 562; White (Berlin) dispatches 1640 of 5 January and 1715 of 29 January 1935, State 861.51— of its German credits/53 and 54; Russland-Ausschuss der Deutschen Wirtschaft circular to the members

Vorstand, 11 January 1935, EAP 250-d-18-15/8 in T-81, roll 15, serial 36; Wiley (Moscow) dispatch 392 of 16 we February and telegram 93 of 9March 1935, State 861.51-German credits/57 and 58. to the The turn in the negotiations can be seen by comparing the German Foreign Ministry’s request on Gestapo not to proceed with planned searches of Soviet agencies in Germany because of the negotiations 25 January with the positive response when the Gestapo checked again on 14 February 1935 (Tippelskirch,

Aufz. IV Ru 310, T-120, 2791/6025/H 047200-201 and IV Ru 636, T-120, 2792/6025/H 047222).

9January 1935, T-120, 1071/1906/ 62UGD* Gr4 Nos: 2, 3,07, 15,1235 705,718,195, 180; Schulenburg’s report of 047259. Note also the report of 429003; Schulenburg telegram 49, 22 March 1935, T-120, 2792/6025/H

in report 527, 25 May 1935, Trautmann on a conversation with the counselor of the Soviet embassy in Peking T-120, 2792/6025/H 047280-287.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

government would like to await the completion of the existing 200-million program before entering on bigger projects, but then immediately suggested that German-Soviet political relations might be improved. The German government did not follow up on this hint—evidence that Schacht had moved on his own with economic rather than political objectives in mind—but when the economic discussions were resumed at the end of October 1935, the Soviet government returned to the political issue. The Russians were clearly angry over the French delay in ratifying the Franco-Soviet Pact; and just as the government of Pierre Laval made a last effort at accommodation with Germany before ratification, so now the Soviet government made what can only be interpreted as a last attempt to come to agreement with Germany before committing itself to a policy of collective security. In conversations in Moscow the Russians convinced German diplomats that they were seriously interested in exploring new approaches.“ The Soviet leaders were encouraged by another conversation between Schacht and Kandelaki on 30 October 1935 in which the long-term credit possibility was again ventilated, leading the Russians to think once again that there must be political intentions on the German side.° From mid-November to early December, the Russian government made a series of diplomatic probes of German intentions, trying to sound them out directly in Berlin and through the German embassy in Moscow as well as indirectly through the German consul general in Tiflis. Discussions between the Germans and Russians took place in Berlin during the negotiations for a new economic agreement in December of 1935 and January and February 1936. There was disagreement within the German government over the best course to follow. The German ambassador to Russia, Count Friedrich Werner von der

Schulenburg, went to Berlin to confer with Hitler and with Germany’s economic and military leaders.°’ The Russian requests for military equipment within the trade agreement framework as well as the long-term character of the trade credit both—perhaps intentionally—gave the trade negotiations a political aspect that Hitler, it soon became evident, did not want. The negotiations, therefore, were allowed to continue indecisively,

and as the French government moved toward ratification of the Franco-Soviet Pact in late February, the Russians also lost interest.°? The broader questions were removed from the talks and eventually a routine trade and payments agreement was signed on 29 April 1936.° 63. G.D., C, 4, No. 211. On the June talks see Bullitt (Moscow) telegram 255, 27 June 1935, State 861.51-

German credits/68. The denial by Hilger (of the Getman embassy in Moscow) reported in Bullitt’s telegram 257 of the same date (ibid./69) merely reflects the secrecy of the Schacht-Kandelaki talks; even the German Foreign Ministry appears to have found out about the credit offer only in December 1935.

64. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 383, 387, 407. 65. Ibid., No. 386. 66. Ibid., Nos. 439, 453; Dienstmann (Tiflis) to German embassy Moscow, telegram. 28, 16 November 1935, and Tippelskitch (Moscow) to Roediger (Berlin), 18 November 1935, T-120, 1071/1906/429127-129; Memo-

randum by Tippelskirch, 28 November, ibid., frames 429130-132; Hencke (Berlin) to Tippelskirch, 26 November, T-120, 1097/2082/450950—-951,

and Tippelskirch to Hencke, 28 November, ibid., frames 450956960;

Leibbrandt (APA) to Rosenberg, 25 November

1935, and Memorandum

of Eugen Diitksen (APA), 13

November 1935, EAP 250-d-18-05/5, T-81, serial 32, roll 11. It should be noted that the representative of the

Narkomindel in Tiflis who contacted the German consul general there was Georgei Astakhov, later a key figure in the 1939 German-Soviet negotiations.

67. G.D., C, 4, No. 439; Hencke to Tippelskirch, 4 December 1935, T-120, 1097/ 2082/450965-969, 68. On these negotiations see Niclauss, pp. 187-91; G.D., C, 4:968, Nos. 472, 483, 489, 490, 502, 505, 518, 524, 530, 565; D.D.F., 2d., 1, Nos. 8, 21, 46, 364; U.S. 1936, 1:200-02, 212-13; Hencke (Berlin) to von Dirksen (Tokyo), 14 January 1936, T-120, 1097/2082/450885-890; Hencke to Schulenburg, 29 January 1936, ibid., frames 450919-921; Hencke to Schulenburg, 5 February 1936, ibid., frames 450926-927; Koéstring (German military attaché Moscow), Beilage I zu Beticht 3/36, 3 February 1936, T-120, 2760/5892/E 433188-189. See

also Chilston (Moscow) to Collier (London), 11 February 1936, Foreign Office N 911/187/38. 69, The text and relevant document in G.D., C, 4, No. 302.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

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Hitler desired correct military relations with the Red army, and he preferred that mutually profitable trade relations continue, but he wanted nothing that would deprive him of an anti-Bolshevik propaganda line while Germany was building up its power in Central Europe.” He was also concerned about the possible repercussions in Poland of a German-Soviet rapprochement since Poland’s acquiescence was important for the remilitarization of the Rhineland; the Poles were reassured by Goring that the rumors of better German-Soviet relations were false.7! Beyond the light they shed on both German and Soviet foreign policy in 1935, these negotiations by their interrelation of economic and political issues in the initial stages, as well as the simultaneous negotiations with other powers, foreshadow the German-Soviet discussions of 1939. But the difference should be clearly noted: Russia was interested in 1935, but Germany was not. Its primary interest was still in gaining time to rearm, not yet in Soviet acquiescence in an attack on other countries. When Germany actually contemplated war, its attitude toward the Soviet Union would change. In the meantime, the Moscow government had directed the Comintern, the inter-

national organization of Communist parties subservient to the Soviet Union, to alter its policy of attacking the Socialists throughout the world as “Social Fascists” and thus the main enemies of the working class. Instead, in order to secure allies against a possible future German threat, the Communist parties abroad were reoriented toward a united front against fascism in alliance with other parties in their respective countries. This united front policy was developed during 1935, though its official endorsement at the Seventh Comintern Congress in August 1935 did not immediately end all doubts among the Communist

faithful. In any case, it had not restrained Stalin from continuing to

explore the possibility of a political agreement with Germany; the check to that had come from Berlin.” German rearmament proceeded rapidly during 1935. After the reintroduction of conscription, both the military and civilian leaders of Germany were worried lest any activity in the demilitarized zone in the Rhineland provide France with an opportunity to claim a violation of the Locarno Pact that might justify military action. Great care was accordingly exercised to avoid such activity or at least to camouflage it or keep it to a minimum.’ Such restrictions, however, did not substantially hinder the building up of Germany’s armed forces. In fact, the year that brought conscription back into German life also saw the beginning of military planning going beyond the emergency defensive measures considered at the time Germany left the League. The details of this planning cannot yet be reconstructed, but there is enough evidence to indicate its general nature. Immediately following the promulgation of conscription, the German Ministry of War initiated the process of revising the defense plans of October 1933.” The situation in which Germany might have to fight was defined in a directive of 30 March 1935 as one of warding off an attack by France and Italy. In this directive, the possibility of attacking Czechoslovakia was referred to, but there is explicit rejection of a surprise attack on that country; military action would be taken only if the Czechs had already 70. Interrogation of Késtring by Oron J. Hale, 30-31 August 1945, Office of the Chief of Military History, (Berlin) to Tippelskirch (Moscow), 11 March 1936, _T-120, Foreign Studies Branch; Hencke

1097/2082/451002-005; Tippelskirch to Hencke, 16 March, ibid., frame 451008; Hencke to Tippelskirch, 18 March, ibid., frames 451009-012; Hencke to Tippelskitch, 25 March, ibid., frames 451014017.

71. G.D., C, 4, No. 591. 72. See Armstrong, Politics of Totalitarianism, pp. 33-38.

idabed

73. G.D., G; 4, Nos. 32, 56, 57, 118, 147, 163, 242, 420; Fritsch on 24 April 1935, Liebmann Notes, Institut far

Zeitgeschichte, ED-1. pp. 83-85; Reichenau on 26 June 1935, TMWG, 36:434-35, 74. G.D., C, 3, No. 540.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

taken aggressive action themselves.” Discussions by the Minister of War with the chiefs of the branches of the German armed forces during April, however, led to a reorientation of von Blomberg’s thinking: on 2 May he asked the armed forces to prepare precisely for that surprise attack (Uberfall) which his office had previously rejected.’ This suggestion of an attack on Czechoslovakia immediately provoked a violent rejoinder from the chief of staff of the German Army, General Ludwig Beck, who had apparently not taken part in the April discussions. He warned his commander in chief, General von Fritsch, that the attack on Czechoslovakia proposed in this directive would lead to a general war and to Germany’s defeat and occupation with its army trapped in Bohemia. He declined to prepare the detailed suggestions von Blomberg had requested, and he asked to be relieved of his position if there were any serious intention of going forwatd with the project.”” The subject of an attack on Czechoslovakia thereupon disappeared from the military records for two yeats—as far as one can tell at the moment— but there is nothing to suggest that this quiescence reflected any fundamental change in policy. Hitler himself indicated to some of his officers in the fall of 1935, after Mussolini’s attack on Ethiopia, that a similar occasion might come for Germany.’* As Viktor Brack of Hitler’s staff explained to a member of the American embassy in Berlin in November 1935, Hitler would not undertake active steps in foreign policy until “the platform from which he can shoot has been firmly established.””? Until that moment came, Germany would concentrate on tearming.®?

Southeast Europe was another area in which the show of great concern over Ethiopia enabled Germany to move forward in 1935-36. German military thinking was already being directed against Czechoslovakia, as has just been demonstrated; its diplomatic policy in this period was designed to lay the groundwork for steps against that country when Germany was ready and the situation favorable. It would be somewhat misleading to read into the events an interpretation based on the precise steps followed by Germany in 1938, but there were ample contemporary signs of the general orientation of German policy. German policy toward the Czech state in 1935 and early 1936 may be described as falling into three separate categories. In international propaganda, Germany stressed the new treaty between Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union in order to discredit the Czech state, implying that it was Russia’s Central European aircraft carrier. In direct relations between Berlin and Prague, the Germans were mainly intent upon maintaining a generally hostile attitude, refraining from agreement on any specific issue outstanding between the two countries, the question of agitation against Germany by German 75. Ibid., No. 568. 76. Blomberg directive on “Schulung,” 2 May 1935, TMWC, 34:485-86. 77. The full text of Beck’s memorandum of 3 May in Beck’s papers in the Bundesarchiv, H 08-28/2. Excerpts from the memorandum and the covering letter to Fritsch are printed in Foerster, pp. 31-32. The additional documents now available (see nn. 74 and 75) and the full text of Beck’s memorandum support the interpretation in Boris Celovsky, Das Miinchener Abkommen, p. 91, against the fanciful efforts of Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufristung, pp. 137-38. The formulation in Helmut Krausnick, “Vorgeschichte und Beginn des militdrischen Widerstandes gegen Hitler,” Die Vollmacht des Gewissens, 1 (Munich: Hermann Rinn, 1956), p. 263, is better than Meinck’s but still does not face the issue as squarely as Beck himself did. Useful, but inconclusive,

are the documents now printed in Voelker, Dokumente und Dokumentaifotos, pp. 445-50. There is a fine analysis of the relationship of Beck’s protest to the conflict between the leadership of the German army and the leadership of the German armed forces as directed by von Blomberg in Klaus-Jirgen Miller, Das Heer und Hitler (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1969), pp. 210-13, 229-31. 78. Gorlitz, Keitel, pp. 80-81. 79. Dodd dispatch 2470, 15 November 1935, State 860M.01-Memel/443; cf. Phipps dispatch 1160, 13 November 1935, Foreign Office C 7647/55/18.

80. See the minutes of the eleventh session of the Reichsverteidigungsausschuss of December 1935, TMWC, 36:437-77.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization ofthe Rhineland

77

emigrés living in Czechoslovakia being the most important of these at the time! Looking to the future was the third theme of German policy: the financial and political support of Konrad Henlein’s Sudeten German Front, later party, inside Czechoslovakia. While there were various crosscurrents within this movement, its growth in 1934 and eatly 1935 made it appear to Berlin as a suitable successor of the prohibited German National Socialist party as an instrument of German policy. Henlein received large financial subsidies from Berlin for the campaign preceding the May 1935 elections as well as for other activities of his party. For such operations, the needed foreign exchange could always be found. The German government, acting both through regular diplomatic channels and through the Association for Germandom Abroad (WVolesbund fir das Deutschtum im Ausland) began the operations that one day were destined to lead to disaster both the German and the Czech inhabitants of Czechoslovakia.® Henlein’s party won a great victory in the May elections, absorbing the majority of the German voters within the Czech state.® The financing of the Henlein party from Berlin was known to the Prague government, and Berlin in turn knew that the Czech government was aware of the facts.§4 None of this would prevent the German government, or certain postwar German writers, from stressing the wholly imaginary independence of Henlein and the obtuseness of the Czech government in not making greater concessions to him. The Czech government, understandably alarmed, continued to hope

for an accommodation between the major powers as the best way to peace.®> The only alternative for the Czech government would be direct agreement with Germany. As Eduard Benes, the foreign minister and later president of Czechoslovakia, explained quite frankly to the American minister, Czechoslovakia had no alternative other than dependence on its principal allies if it were not to fall under Germany’s influence.®° After March 1936, Benes was to try for a direct agreement with Germany, only to discover that this, too, was precluded by Berlin’s policy. Germany’s intentions ruled out any agree-

ment; strengthening the Sudeten German party as a weapon for future use against the Czech state from within, Germany bent its diplomatic efforts to reorient Hungary’s policy and sought to split the Little Entente as a means of pressuring Czechoslovakia from without. In its dealings with Hungary, Germany attempted to focus the revisionist aspirations 81. On the general subject of German-Czech relations see G.D., C, 3, No. 33; 4, Nos. 89, 105, 359, 429, 580. On the negotiations concerning émigrés see G.D., C, 3, fos. 477, 480, 511, 523; 4, Nos. 89, 128; Benes to the Czech legation in Berlin, 3 me 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413480-481; Krofta’s comments

to the section chiefs of the Czech Foreign Ministry, No. 20/35, 6 June 1935, Czech document in T-120,

1041/1809/414158. 82. On the German subsidies to Henlein see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 482, 509; 4, Nos. 119, 225. 357, 413, 512; a useful

survey in Briigel, pp. 258-74. The author cannot accept Jacobsen’s evaluation (pp. 162ff.) of the VDA’s role in this regard. 83. G.D., C, 3, No. 525; 4, No. 99; Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the Czech Foreign Ministry, No.

19/35, 23 May 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/414156.

For the election, the Sudeten German Front made an arrangement with the Carpathian German Party under which the former subsidized the latter and arranged for Franz Karmasin, who was to play a signifcant role in later years, to be elected to the Czech parliament. The annex to the electoral agreement of 28 March 1935 is printed in Kral, Die Deutschen in der Tschechoslowakei, p. 70.

didediies

The possible relationship of the Sudeten Germans to the Slovak nationalists at this time is not clear; see the

Dr. Peter Bazovsky, letter of K. Hoffman of the Czech legation in Berlin to the Czech Foreign Ministry about | am indebted to 59. p. S/owakei, Hoensch, 500-501; 1143/2028/444 T-120, in document 8 July 1935, Czech

vyvoj a Professor Josef Anderle for information about Bazovsky and his father based on Ivan Deter, Stovensky Reminiscences and ludécké zrada: Fakta, vxpominky a twahy (Slovak development and the Populist Treason: Facts, Reflections] (Prague: Kvasnicka a Hampl, 1946), pp. 338-39. 84. Kral, p. 82. B5aUR IFS N:227; 86. Wright (Prague) dispatch 131, 25 March 1935, State 862.20/920.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

of Budapest on Czechoslovakia. On various occasions in 1934 and 1935, the German government emphasized to the leaders of Hungary that they should concentrate their revisionist demands in a single direction—northward—and improve their relations with Yugoslavia and possibly even with Romania. If this were accomplished, joint GermanHungarian pressure could be brought to bear on the Czechs while Hungary would be free of threats from the other members of the Little Entente.®’ The Hungarian government was not entirely persuaded of the wisdom of this policy and particularly the reconciliation with Yugoslavia. They objected strenuously to the antirevisionist statements Hermann Goring was supposed to have made in Belgrade as he sought Germany’s own rapprochement with Yugoslavia, and Goring himself had to urge the policy of concentrating on the Czechs and improving relations with Belgrade while in Budapest in May 1935.88 The same theme was urged on the Hungarian chief of staff during his visit to Berlin in the following month.’ When the Hungarian prime minister, Julius Gombés, made his second pilgrimage to Berlin in late September, he spoke as if he wete somewhat inclined to fall in with German wishes, but the Germans simply could not persuade Hungary to make a clean break with its past policies in this regard.°” Whatever Gémbés may really have thought, his position in domestic Hungarian affairs was not firm enough to permit him to renounce any of Hungary’s revisionist hopes. He may also have feared the future intentions of Germany itself because of other aspects of German-Hungarian relations. The Germans had been most displeased when Hungary joined with Italy and Austria in the Rome protocol of March 1934 and continued to hold this deviation against Budapest.?! The Hungarian and German governments also continued to spar at arm’s length about the fate of the German minority in Hungary. Hungary still hoped for cooperation between the German and Magyar minorities in the successor states, but the Germans pteferred to concentrate on the situation in Hungary. The contacts between German agencies and the minority inside Hungary aroused the suspicions of the Budapest government; at the same time, the continued refusal of the Hungarian regime to grant the wishes of the minority agitated the Germans. Certainly in this sphere there was no sign of cooperation, although there was at least a frank exchange of views.”* The Hungarians 87. For German

explanations

of this policy see the Stilpnagel

memorandum

of 7 November

1934,

Bundesatchiv, Beck, H 08-28/1; Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 2 February 1935, pp. 67-69. Hitler assumed that this

policy would also make Hungary totally dependent on Germany (Geist to Moffat, 26 January 1935, Moffat Papers, Vol. 8). 88. On the incident concerning Goring’s alleged statements in Belgrade about Hungarian revisionist demands, see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 291, 292, 305, 323, 336. This issue precipitated a German demand for the recall of the Yugoslav minister to Berlin, Constantin de Masirevich, who was replaced in August 1935 after considerable

prodding from Berlin. On G6ring’s trip to Budapest see G.D., C, 4:291-92 and No. 146; Horthy Papers, No. 21 and p. 82; Masirevich report, ca. 22 May 1935, in Szinai and Sziics, p. 182; Beck memorandum on a conversation with von Bulow on 22 June 1935, Bundesitchiv, Beck, H 08-28/2; Montgomery (Budapest) dispatch 258, 10 June

1935, State 762.64/36. 89. Beck’s notes on the meeting of 24 June 1935, in Bundesarchiv, Beck, H 08-28/2; excerpts in Foerster, p.

28. 90 G.D., C, 4, Nos. 307, 311, 328, 344, 348; Magda Adam, Gyula Juhasz, and Lajos Kerekes (eds.), Allianz

Hitler-Horthy-Mussolini (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiad6, 1966), No. 8. On Gémb6s’s visit to Berlin (and the almost simultaneous visit of German air force General Erhard Milch to Budapest) see also Messersmith to Phillips, I. October 1935, State 863.00/1235; Dodd dispatch 2355, 2 October 1935, State 762.64/40; Riggs (Budapest)

dispatch 287, 11 October 1935, State 762.64/44. Von Neurath declined a return invitation soon after (von Neutath telegram to Budapest No. 88, 6 November 1935, T-120, 1436/2980/D 580602). 91. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 311, 313, 327, 341, 345, 346; Memorandum of von Bulow, 16 March

1934, T-120,

2372/4602/E 189882-883. 92. G.D., C, 2, No. 731; 3, Nos. 305, 400, 426; 4, Nos. 38, 139, 178, 233, 267, 274, 314, 337, 424, 527; Memoranda

of von Bilow of 16 March and 28 August 1934, T-120, 1436/2980/D

580519

and 580551;

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

179

refused to be drawn into any treaty system that might tequite them to impose sanctions against Germany in support of Austrian independence, but Germany’s continued interference into Austrian affairs did nothing to bring Berlin and Budapest closer together.% In the economic

field, however, the close ties begun in 1933-34 were extended, and,

within rigid limits, Germany began the delivery of weapons as part of the trade relations between the two countries.%* Hungary became increasingly dependent on Germany

economically; as the situation was described at a German government conference on 8

October 1935: “In the case of Hungary and Yugoslavia, the Foreign Ministry is of the opinion that the political considerations responsible for the special concessions made to these countries at the beginning of 1934 remain unchanged.” Since Yugoslavia was the other country to which Germany’s economic concessions

wete to be continued, and the repercussions of these and of other signs of a German-

Yugoslav rapprochement within Hungary have already been mentioned, the continuation of that rapprochement in 1934 and 1935 deserves to be placed in the context of German advances in Southeast Europe. The economic relationship just referred to continued.” The willingness of Yugoslavia to follow Britain’s lead in a policy of sanctions against Italy in the winter of 1935-36 was to provide a further opening to Germany. The disruption of Yugoslavia’s very important trade with Italy was not compensated for by adequate concessions from Britain and France. By the time sanctions ended in July 1936, the road to further German

economic

penetration had been opened wider than ever, and no

return to the trade pattern that existed before the sanctions occurred.®’ A direct hand in the improvement of German-Yugoslav relations was taken by Hermann Goring. He had made a brief trip to Belgrade in May 1934.98 The October 1934 murder of Yugoslav king Alexander I at Marseilles by Croatian terrorists supported by Mussolini provided the opportunity for a second trip by Goring.” While Laval saw to it that Italy was not compromised in the international uproar that followed the assassination, the German government not only made a genuine effort to help find the culprits!”

but capitalized on Yugoslav resentment over French negligence in security precautions by sending Goring, the Prussian minister president, to the funeral ceremonies in Belgrade. There he made a good personal impression, assured the Yugoslav leaders that Germany would not support any Hungarian effort at revision of the Hungarian-Yugoslav border by force of arms, and gave a general impetus to an era of improved relations between Germany and Yugoslavia.!°' He was to promote this trend further by a third visit to Belgrade in May 1935 on a combined honeymoon and goodwill tour. The friendly reception he received on this occasion made him an even mote firm advocate of the line that saw Yugoslavia as a possible friend of Germany in the Balkans and a joint opponent of the Habsburg restoration in Austria that was again being discussed in the spring and Memorandum of von Bulow, 3 September 1934, T-120, 2372/4602/E 189895; Jacobsen, pp. 521-28. 93. G.D., C, 2, Nos. 444, 455; 3, Nos. 150, 266, n. 3, 296; von Papen to Hitler, No. 50 of 8 May 1935, T-120, Education 2499/4939/E 272032-033. See also the report of Mackensen on the visit of the German Minister of

Rust to Horthy and Gémbés, 16 October 1934, T-120, 2700/5737/H 029049-052. 94. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 209, 307, nn. 2 and 10, 310, 316, 391. 95. “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 8. Oktober 1935,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004051. by von BilowGermany and Hungary were also cooperating directly on some police matters (Memorandum Schwante, 14 March 1935, T-120, 2899/6141/E 459241-242). 26. April 1935,” T-120, 96. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 434, 447; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 2612/5650/H 004015. ¥ 97. Hoptner, pp. 98-102; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 52. and Czech minister in Bucharest 98. G.D., C, 3, No. 27; Czech minister in Belgrade report of 14 May 1934, report of 17 May 1934, Czech documents in T-120, 041/1809/413695 and 413678. 029165-168. 99, Salvemini, p. 169; von Hassell report I 1366, 21 December 1934, T-120, 2700/737/H p . 78-79; G.D., C, 2, Nos. 332, 354. . Miliéevié, 1934, State 760H.62/16. en GD. Cc; Mons 263, 269, 319; Wilson (Belgrade) dispatch 204, 23 October

180

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

summer of 1935.!02 Under the new government of Milan Stojadinovi¢, installed in Belgtade in July 1935, the policy of its predecessor was continued with the support of the regent, Prince Paul. By the spring of 1936, Yugoslavia was clearly realigning itself with Germany.!3 By that time, Goring was trying to mediate between Yugoslavia and Hungary, although it was by no means certain that Germany’s aim of detaching Yugoslavia from the Little Entente could be achieved.'** Moreover, a new, more proGerman minister to represent Yugoslavia in Berlin was appointed at the end of 1935; and the French government could recognize the signs that Belgrade was developing a policy closer and closer to that of the Third Reich.!% In contrast to the willingness of Hungary at least to consider better relations with Yugoslavia, Germany’s effort to bring Hungary and Romania closer together was a complete failure.!°° This did not prevent Germany from endeavoring to increase both its trade and its influence in Romania itself. In the fall of 1934 and the spring of 1935 there were negotiations that led to a new agreement expanding the level of trade between the two countries and preparing the way for even closer ties.!°’ The foreign policy office of the National Socialist party tried to use these negotiations to further its own schemes for interfering with Romanian domestic politics on behalf of movements that were pledged to domestic policies more akin to the National Socialist party and to foreign policies mote responsive to German demands. These attempts appear to have had relatively little influence on the course of German-Romanian economic relations, but they both aided the extremist elements inside Romania and made the government in Bucharest—and especially King Carol—mote suspicious of Germany.! Mote important for the German government in these years than the internal politics of Romania was that country’s relationship with other major powers, and especially with the Soviet Union. German policy was concentrated on efforts to keep Romania from joining the bloc forming against it, and particularly from granting the Soviet Union the right to move troops across Romanian territory in case of German aggression against Czechoslovakia or any other country. If German policy had been completely successful in this regard by the spring of 1936, several factors had combined to make it so. The economic relations between Germany and Romania surely played a part. The concern of Romania lest it become the object of great power conflicts no doubt contributed a share. The unimpressive conduct of the Western powers in the face of German rearmament

102. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 91, 93, 198, 261; von Papen to Hitler report A 1661, 13 July 1935, T-120, 2499/4939/E 27091—093; Jacobsen, p. 360.

For his dealings with Yugoslavia, Géring used Franz Neuhausen whom he had saved from a jail sentence in Bulgaria (Bodenschatz to Mackensen, 10 November 1938, Nuremberg document 1824-PS, National Archives).

Neuhausen became consul general in Belgrade and official representative of the Four-Year Plan there. On G6ring’s trip to Belgrade and on other occasions, he acted as Géring’s official representative (G.D., C, 4:163;

Faber du Faur, p. 220; scattered correspondence in Bundesarchiv, Stabsamt Goring). During World War I, he played a major role in the administration and looting of German-occupied Yugoslavia. 103. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 191, 434, 446, 447. 104. Ibid., Nos. 444, 533, 550, 576. 105. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 42. 106. G.D., C, 4, No. 576. 107. Ibid., 2, Nos. 285, 295, 302, 387, 543, 551, 556; 4, Nos. 6, 110, 297; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 13. September 1934,” “. .. vom 8. Oktober 1934,” “.... vom 11. Oktober TO oe \aayent

15. Oktober 1934,” “. .. vom 2. November 1934,” “.. 3952, 3954, 3961, 3968-69, 4022-23.

108. Copy of a memorandum

. vom 14. Juni 1935,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 003936,

by Duckwitz of the APA, 17 August 1934, Nuremberg document 1147-PS

(National Archives); G.D., C, 3, No. 285, n. 2; Rosenberg to Darré, 14 September 1934, 1147-PS; Rosenberg,

Tagebuch, 2 January and 2 February 1935, pp. 65-67, 26 February 1935, pp. 73-74; Rosenberg memorandum

for Hitler, 1 September 1935, 080-PS; von Neurath to Rosenberg, 7 September 1935, 027-PS; Wiedemann to Rosenberg, 14 February 1936, cited in G.D., C, 4:1070, n. 5.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

181

measures was not calculated to inspire confidence in Buchatest.!9? The manner in which Germany tefused to give open support to Hungarian revisionist aspitations against Romania was of some help.'!? A variety of German personal ties to the ruler of Romania was also exploited. The most important factor that kept Romania from making the concession to the Soviet Union that Germany most feared was the realization of Romania’s leaders, including the foreign minister, Nicolae Titulescu, that in any new wat between Germany and Russia any Southeast European countty involved would lose its independence to the winner—which he expected would not be Germany—and that only the maintenance of peace could save them.!!! Thus the combination of German ptessures and Romanian fears kept Romania out of any firm anti-German alignment. While Germany kept Hungary within its orbit, made great strides toward drawing Yugoslavia into it, and kept Romania from joining those opposed to Germany, its policy toward the other countries in the southeast was concentrated on economic atrangements. With Turkey, Greece, and Bulgaria, Germany developed stronger economic ties. It also initiated a small program of exporting armaments to those nations. Such arms exports violated German law, but no German official or officer of the period found that significant. More important in the long run was the fact that such economic ties and arms exports helped to displace Italian influence in the area and reestablish German standing and prestige.'!? By the beginning of 1936, Germany had attained an established position in Southeast Europe to the point where it could warn the countries of that area to take no steps and make no arrangements among themselves without considering German interests and respecting its role. Behind this new diplomatic position of Germany stood another factor: the continued strength and existence of Germany itself as a power that had chosen a path entirely different from that stamped as appropriate by the victors of the last war. Perhaps in Germany there was a new model to follow, one that retroactively placed the various new authoritarian systems of the East and Southeast European states in an entirely more favorable perspective—harbingers of the future rather than temporary aberrations in a time of economic and nationalistic crisis. The pompous facade of National Socialist Germany not only impressed its own population and gave them a secular substitute for a form of religious salvation but also radiated to the new and reorganized states to the East and Southeast the confident message that perhaps this was indeed the wave of the future.!!4

109. Seba (Czech minister 1041/1809/413419-420.

in Bucharest)

telegram

of 19 March

1935,

Czech

document

in T-120,

110. See especially G.D., C, 4, No. 514. 111. Note ibid., No. 205. On the discussions of German-Romanian relations, Romanian policy toward the Soviet Union, and German worry that Romania might grant transit rights for Russian troops see G.D., C, 2,

Nos. 322, 387; 4, Nos. 64, 110, 153, 160, 175, 339, 353, 362, 385, 393, 401, 405, 427, 431, 478, 516, 535, 561, 577, 581; Pochhammer (Bucharest) telegram II Balk 1137g, 13 May 1935, T-120, 2758/5888/E 431675; von

Papen to Hitler, No. 2644 of 11 November 1935, 2499/4939/E 272148; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz

yom 26. November 1935,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/6, f. 196; [Memorandum by Rosenberg on a conversation with Romanian Minister Comnen on 29 February 1936], Nuremberg document 030-PS (National to Archives). The account in Oprea, Tituleseu’s Diplomatic Activity, pp. 97-101, stresses Titulescu’s willingness pe sign with Russia, but fails to explain fully the failure of the negotiations.

see ibid., 3,No. 112. For Turkey see G.D., C, 3, Nos. 59, 353, n. 4, 371, 484; 4, Nos. 26, 144, 449. For Bulgaria (Berlin) dispatch 411, n. 3; 4, Nos. 14, 48, 481, 557; Dodd dispatch 2028, 5 June 1935, State 762.70/4; White and 12. For Greece 1539, 4 December 1934 and McArdle (Sofia) dispatch 150 of 31 May 1935, State 762.74/10 volume “Studienfahrt 1934, see G.D., C, 3, No. 124; 4, Nos. 312, 369, 459; on G6ring’s trip to Greece see the Griechenland,” in Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, No. 3809.

113. G.D.,C, 4, Nos. 543, 558, 559.

Bats

in “Faschismus und Kollaboration in 114. This is, in essence, also the conclusion drawn by Martin Broszat

3 (July, 1966), p. 241. Ostmitteleuropa zwischen den Weltkriegen,” Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 14, No.

182

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The last and perhaps most important benefit that Germany drew from the estrangement between Italy and the Western powers over Ethiopia was the slow reorientation of Italy from its close ties with France and England early in 1935 to a position more friendly toward, or at least more tolerant of, Germany. The major factor in the friction between

Italy and Germany had been the Austrian question, and Italy had aligned itself with France partly in response to the danger of an Ansch/uss.'° France in turn had been willing to make concessions to Italy to bring it more firmly into a position of defending the status quo in Europe and for that reason had been reluctant to oppose Italy’s East African venture. As the Ethiopian question became increasingly acute in the spring and summer of 1935, Germany remained aloof and neutral, rejecting the possibility of embarrassing and weakening Italy in Europe by supporting Ethiopia.'!® The Italian government appreciated this attitude and in the face of the hardening opposition of the Western powers began to think of a rapprochement with Berlin.'!’ A key factor in any new development in German-Italian relations was the relationship of Germany to Austria. German interference in Austria’s internal affairs continued in 1935; it was directed both to influencing public opinion in Austria and gaining an increasing control over Austrian economic life.!'® Furthermore, Germany refused to commit itself to any international agreement either against interference in Austria or affirming its independence.'!? Nevertheless, there were certain signs that German policy was shifting, from one looking to immediate control of Austria to a temporary accommodation that still, of course, left all possibilities open for the future. Hitler’s views, as explained on 19 January 1935 in Berlin to a group of Austrian National Socialist leaders including Alfred Frauenfeld, the former Gaw/eiter of Vienna, was that they should stay out of internal Austrian affairs. Germany would continue to provide financial support for the Austrian National Socialist party, but “the Austrian question could be solved only by means of foreign policy [as opposed to an internal coup]. This would take a period of three to five years until Germany had rearmed to a point where no one could interfere with it.”!20 In the meantime, steps were finally taken to move the Austrian legion from Bavaria to northwest Germany where it would no longer be a sore point in relations with Austria.!2! The German press was instructed, apparently on direct orders from Hitler, that for a while there was to be no reporting whatsoever on Austria.!22 The leaders of the Austrian National Socialist party in Germany were directed to make themselves as inconspicuous as possible.!23 When there had been renewed agitation over a 115. An excellent summary of this development is in the report for the year 1934 of the German military attaché in Rome, General Fischer, 10 June 1935, T-120, 2676/5609/E 402176-181. 116. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 403, n. 2, 557, 558; 4, Nos. 63, 83, 212; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 27. Februar 1935,” Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/5, f. 64. 117. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 63, 87, 109; Lipski Papers, No. 45; Baer, p. 159.

118. For German propaganda in Austria see G.D., C, 4, No. 241; Memorandum of Altenburg II Oe 47, 5 January 1935, T-120, 2832/6077/E 450716-718; Memorandum of Képke II Oe 1658, 27 June 1935, 2836/6111/E 453099. For German intervention into Austrian economic life in 1935 see G.D., C, 3, No. 533;

4:346-47, Der deutsche Imperialismus und der Zweite Weltkrieg, 2:471, 486-87. 119. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 410, 527, 530; Memorandum by von Papen, 16 February 1935,-T-120, 2499/4939/E 271971-974; Diary of Breckinridge Long (on a talk with von Hassell), 16 April 1935, pp. 133-34, Long Papers.

120. The report on Frauenfeld’s talk was transmitted to Austrian police headquarters in Vienna by an Austrian informant and then in turn betrayed to the German legation in Vienna. See the German legation’s report of 22 January 1935, in T-120, 2499/4939/E 271824. The speed with which such information was passed around is itself revealing—a four-day cycle from Berlin to Vienna and back. 121. G.D., C, 3, Nos. 510, 522; but see the memorandum

2890/6115/E 455075—076.

of Renthe-Fink II Oe 933, 13 April 1935, T-120,

122. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 22. Januar 1935,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/5, f. 19.

123. G.D., C, 4, No. 85; Memorandum

455047-048.

of Altenburg II Oe 465, 15 February 1935, T-120, 2990/6115/E

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

183

possible restoration of the Habsburgs in the spring of 1935 and the German position appeared temporarily weak because of the announcements of conscription and naval construction, Hitler tried to reduce foreign fear of Germany by promising in his speech of 21 May that he would respect the independence of Austria.!24 The response of the Austrian government to this gesture was a friendly hint that bilateral German-Austrian talks might well lead to an agreement. This possibility had been canvassed earlier in the year in conversations between von Papen and Franz Peter, the general secretary of the Austrian Foreign Ministry, as well as the Austrian chancellor, Schuschnigg.'?5 Schuschnige had demonstrated his interest in some accommodation as eatly as the fall of 1934 in his talks with various Austrian nationalist and National Socialist leaders; and he now returned to the subject, replying to Hitler’s speech with a conciliatory statement before the Austrian parliament. Under these circumstances, von

Papen thought it advisable to confer with Hitler in person.!26 Germany’s policies toward Austria and Italy were now under the simultaneous review that their close interrelationship certainly warranted. By this time—mid-June 1935—the first signs of better German-Italian relations were

evident, in part in response to the relaxation in German-Austrian

tensions. An

effort was being made in both Rome and Berlin to restrain the press from the polemics that had characterized the latter part of 1934, and there were also attempts to improve

the economic relations between the two countries.!27 Whatever Mussolini’s suspicions of German

long-term aims, his increasing concentration

on Ethiopia persuaded him to

adopt a friendlier attitude toward Germany, if only to offset the pressure from the League powers.'?8 The German Foreign Ministry did not wish to respond in any immediate way to this opportunity for a rapprochement in spite of the urgings of the German ambassador, Ulrich von Hassell. Recognizing that it was Rome’s concern over the Ethio-

pian question that made it suddenly so solicitous of Germany, the German Foreign Ministry preferred to wait, confident that increasing isolation would make Italy more willing to make concessions to Germany.!”? Hitler’s attitude, however, was somewhat different. He evidently regretted the estrangement from the Italian leader, an estrange-

ment that thwarted his basic approach to German-Italian relations. In order to bridge the gap, therefore, he turned to Mussolini’s unofficial emissary in Berlin, Giuseppe Renzetti,

as soon as the possibility of improving German-Italian relations appeared. On 21 June 1935, Hitler explained to Renzetti that he wanted Rome to replace the Italian ambassador to Berlin, Vittorio Cerruti. Indirectly revealing that the Germans were reading at least some of the reports of the Italian ambassador, Hitler maintained that Cerruti did not report accurately to Rome, unlike the British, French, and Polish

ambassadors who, regardless of their private views, reported exactly what Hitler told them. Just as he himself would recall von Hassell or anyone else from Rome within

124. On the talk about a Habsburg restoration in early 1935 see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 34, 84, 96, 138; Long Diary, 10

April 1935, pp. 128-31, Long Papers (see also Long’s dispatch 1042, 11 April 1935, State 862.20/952).

15 February 125. G.D., C, 4, No. 111; von Papen’s memoranda on his talks with Secretary General Peter on

and with Schuschnigg on 10 April 1935, in T-120, 2499 /4939/E 271971-974 and E 272006—013.

272053055 126. Gehl, p. 109; von Papen to Hitler A 1388, 13 June 1935, T-120, 2499 /4939/E

(note von

Papen’s reference to his plan to report orally on an important conversation with Starhembetg).

12/35, 2 May 1935, Tr 127. On the press see G.D., C, 4, No. 124; General Fischer (Rome) annex 1 to report Mai 1935,” Bundesarchiv, 120, 2676/5609/E 402244-247; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 25. of Clodius, I It 658, 18 Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/5, f. 170. On trade see G.D., C, 4, No. 67, n. 2; Memorandum April 1935, T-120, 2700/5737/H 029272-273. 6 June 1935, State 762.00/96. On 128. Baer, pp. 160-61; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 120, 121, 162; Dodd dispatch 2037,

Mussolini’s long-term concerns see U.S. 1935, 1:188.

that the personal element 129. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 164, 166, 194, 202. Again one cannot escape the impression (cf. ibid., Nos. 5, 9). played a part: von Hassell was for, so von Neurath was against, better relations

184

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

twenty-four hours if Mussolini so requested, and just as he would send to Rome as replacement anyone Mussolini desited—except von Ribbentrop for whom Hitler had other plans—so he expected Mussolini to replace Cerruti with someone more congenial

(though apparently no specific names were mentioned). Hitler further argued that he wanted a return to better German-Italian relations. He disclaimed at length any responsibility for the Vienna coup of 25 July 1934, asserting that he did not want to annex Austria. All he was interested in was that some National Socialists be included in the Austrian government. In any case, Germany and Italy had too much in common to allow the Austrian problem to come between them, and proper diplomatic representation would facilitate better cooperation.!*° This approach to Mussolini through Renzetti clearly reveals the continued link between Hitler’s Austrian policy and his Italian policy in the summer of 1935. Mussolini responded promptly by transferring Cerruti to Paris and replacing him with Bernardo Attolico, hitherto the Italian ambassador in Moscow.'3! The day after Cerruti said farewell to von Billow, the German ambassador to Moscow wrote von Bulow that Attolico

was hurrying to Berlin at Mussolini’s instructions so that he could attend the National Socialist party rally in Nuremberg in September as a demonstrative contrast to his predecessor who had acted in concert with the ambassadors of other major powers in declining to attend these annual spectacles.'°* The change of ambassadors was designed to create a change of atmosphere, in the hope of paving the way for a change of policies.!93 Hitler had at first followed a rather cautious policy toward Italy’s East African venture, perhaps in part out of regard for his relations with England that had been improved by the naval agreement. In spite of considerable anti-Italian and pro-Ethiopian sympathies among the German public, he held to a policy of neutrality in a form distinctly inclined in favor of Italy.!5* Once Italy actually initiated hostilities at the beginning of October, the dangers to Germany of an Italian collapse in the face of Western sanctions were simply too great. It might well be to Germany’s advantage for the war in East Africa to last a long time, but the defeat of Mussolini would isolate Germany and set a dangerous precedent among other major powers of resistance to aggression. Hitler was aware of these implications, so expressed himself, and directed

130. Renzetti to Mussolini,

21 June 1935, T-586, 419/009445-450.

On

28 June Renzetti

sent additional

comments on Cerruti coming from Hermann Goring (ibid., frames 009476—477). There is a detailed account of this incident in Jens Petersen, “Deutschland und Italien im Sommer 1935, Der Wechsel des italienischen Botschaftets in Berlin,” Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, 20, No. 6 (June 1969), 330-41.

131. In her memoirs, Elisabetta Cerruti refers to hearing news of the impending transfer of her husband to Paris in May 1935 (Ambassador's Wife, pp. 189, 194). This is either an error in memory or an indication that Mussolini, who was aware of Cerruti’s attitude toward the National Socialists, had already decided to move him before receiving Hitler’s request. According to the diary of Baron Aloisi (p. 160), Géring had asked for Cerruti’s recall when he was in Rome on 7 November 1933 to deliver Hitler’s letter to Mussolini explaining Germany’s departure from the League (cf. ibid., 4 February 1934, p. 177). Aloisi further records (18 November 1933, p. 162) that Mussolini did decide to recall Cerruti at that time. Mussolini changed his mind, however; the

trip of Suvich to Berlin in December 1933 that G6ring had requested at the same time as he had demanded Cerruti’s recall may have looked like an adequate gesture. 132. Memorandum

of von Bulow, 12 August 1935, T-120, 2373/4602/E

190090; Schulenburg to von Bulow,

13 August 1935, T-120, 2387/4620/E 200989-992; G.D., C, 4, No. 265. Attolico was soon agitating for Italy’s withdrawal from the League (G.D., C, 4, No. 437).

133. Massimo Magistrati, “La Germania e l’impresa italiana di Etiopia (Ricordi di Berlino),” Rivista di studi politici internazionali, 17, No. 4 (Oct—Dec. 1950), pp. 588-90. Magistrati had served under Attolico in Rio de Janeiro; the article cited here may be considered Magistratidori, 1956). 134. There is considerable evidence that Hitler doubted the wisdom of Mussolini’s attack on Ethiopia (see Meinertzhagen, pp. 154-55; G.D., C, 4, No. 367), but as in other instances, was willing to work with him

regardless of differences in judgment on specific issues.

From Stresa to the Remilitarization of the Rhineland

185

German policy accordingly.!35 At the same time Hitler requested Mussolini to replace Cerruti he also authorized von Papen to continue the informal talks about a possible bilateral German-Austtian agreement.'°° Von Papen at first moved quickly. He was wortied that the diplomatic focus of the great powers on East Africa and the temporary restraint that Henlein’s

electoral victory had imposed on Czechoslovakia would lead Schuschnigg to push for a Habsburg restoration as a safeguard of Austrian independence in accord with Schuschnigg’s personal preferences, a move that might be safely attempted at that moment.!37 A German-Austrian agreement—or even serious negotiations for such agreement—would obviously forestall any such move, and on 11 July von Papen handed a draft proposal to the Austrian foreign minister.'** It provided for a settlement of current differences in German-Austrian telations and looked forward to the close coordination of their policies. Negotiations on the proposal were hindered by division within the Austrian government, continued agitation over the restoration issue, and Schuschnigg’s temporary

absence from government affairs due to the automobile accident in which his wife was killed. From the German side, the unseemly anniversary celebration of the murder of Dollfuss hardly aided the progress of talks.!°° In spite of such difficulties, a little progress was made, leading to an agreement to restrain press attacks on each other, announced on 28 August 1935,'4° The Austrian foreign minister replied in a generally favorable manner to von Papen’s general approach on 1 October; but in agreement with Hitler, von Papen handled the subsequent talks in a dilatory manner as internal changes in the Austrian government followed the outbreak of war between Italy and Ethiopia.'4! While the British and French stumbled from bluster to blunder in the Ethiopian crisis, the Germans could afford to wait. Stanley Baldwin might be sure that Germany would start a war in two to four years; and on the eve of the Italian attack, Sir Samuel Hoare could talk of American cooperation in sanctions to bring down Mussolini; but

Germany’s only real concern was that Hoare’s eloquent speech of 11 September in Geneva in favor of collective security might be followed by an accommodation between Italy and the League powers that would shift attention back to Europe.'** For a moment 135. For an expression of Hitlet’s views see Gérlitz, Keitel, pp. 80-81; Wiskeman, p. 67. For the evolution of Germany’s neutrality policy in a manner best calculated to protect its own interests while favoring Italy see G.D., C, 4, Nos. 246, 261, 283, 298, 299, 313, 322-27, 333, 334, 343, 346, 350-52, 361, 364, 365, 371, 372, 382, 389, 394, 400, 406, 408, 410, 438, 441; “Informationsbericht

Nr. 55,” 7 November

1935, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/28, f. 327-331. For an excellent discussion of German opinion and government policy see the “Aufzeichnungen uber Deutschlands aussenpolitische Lage,” of 17 October 1935, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/28, f. 299-305.

For a report on Italy’s use of Hamburg as a port for the transshipment of goods to evade the League’s sanctions see Erhardt (U.S. consul general Hamburg) dispatch 583, 16 November 1935, State 765.84/2810; cf.

DDi 2d, 1,INo. 25.

136. G.D., C, 4, No. 197. Germany knew of Italian-Austrian arrangements in case Germany invaded Austria

(ibid., No. 296). E 137. Von Papen to Hitler, A 1620 of 9 July and A 1685 of 16 July 1935, T-120, 2499/4939/E 272083-088, 272089-090; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 206 n. 6, 216, 228. 503, 25 July 1935, State 138. G.D., C, 4, No. 203; Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 474, 476-77; Messersmith dispatch

762.63/292. 2499/4939/E 272056-059, 139. Von Papen to Hitler, A 1451 of 22 June and A 1931 of 17 August 1935, T-120, E 272105-110. 190172-173; 140. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 588-91; Memorandum of von Biilow, 18 July 1935, T-120, 2373/4602/E Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/6, f. 76; Bundesarchiv, 1935], August [29 Redaktion” die an Bestellung “Vertrauliche x Messersmith dispatch 537, 30 August 1935, State 762.63/297. Nr. 52,” 22 October 141. Gehl, pp. 109-11; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 319, 333, 335, 349, 368; “Tnformationsbericht 1935, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/28, f. 309-11. of S. R. Fuller on a conversation with Stanley 142, G.D., C, 4, Nos. 308, 360, 366, 375, 404, 412; Memorandum 2616. F. P. P. Park Hyde Baldwin, 30 September 1935,

186

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War i

it looked as if the Hoare-Laval proposals of early December 1935 might provide the basis for a settlement, but as the British public condemned in Ethiopia what they would later hail in Czechoslovakia, the wat in East Africa ground on to the sole benefit of the

Third Reich.'43 The esteem of the German government for British astuteness was not likely to be enhanced by this performance. They had known of prior British assurances to Mussolini that no serious steps would be taken against Italy.!44 The later policy of the British leaders may have been actuated by the best of motives, but it could only appear to Berlin in the worst possible light. London’s concern over the danger from Germany if Britain became embroiled in war with Italy had played a part in the desire for compromise with Mussolini—a compromise that might save at least a bit of Ethiopia when no one was willing to fight to defend the whole country—but the turn to appeasement guaranteed to destroy whatever opporafter a clarion call for determined action was tunities might have existed in either Siiostioralen the future British prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, had himself predicted in July 1935, either Mussolini had to be

stopped completely or_the League would be worthless—the small powers would race each other to Spiers) It would, in fact, be some time before the race of the small powers to Berlin began, but the country that would lead the race and become Germany’s first ally—Mussolini’s Italy—was already beginning to gravitate in that direction. The failure of the Hoare-Laval plan made practically certain that there would be no return to the Stresa front. In spite of Laval’s written plea to Mussolini after that failure and in contradiction of his own earlier promises, Mussolini denounced his agreement with France on 28 December 1935.14¢

Italy would move forward to total occupation of Ethiopia under circumstances in which Germany would be its only potential ally.!*” There were still points of friction between Germany and Italy, not only over Austria but also arising out of a heritage of mutual suspicion in the German and Italian diplomatic services.'#8 Such continuing rumbling, however, could not obscure the fact that the

whole world situation had changed greatly, to Germany’s advantage. No one saw this mote clearly than Hitler himself, who resolved to take advantage of it for his own next move. In any case, all danger to Germany had surely passed: as von Neutath wrote to the German ambassador to the Vatican on 13 November and as the commander in chief of the German army explained to a group of German generals soon after, there was no

longer a danger of a preventive war because all feared the rising power of the new Germany.!*

143. On the Hoare-Laval plan see Laurens, chap. 11; Warner, pp. 115-26; Hoare, pp. 177ff.; Vansittart, Mast Procession, pp. 537-41; Maurice Peterson, Both Sides of the Curtain (London: Constable, 1950), pp. 116-22; T.

Jones, pp. 158-61; U.S. 7935, 1:699-705, 711-13, and 1936, 3:100—02; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 457, 458, 461, 465, 469; FDR and Foreign Affairs, 3:136-37; Bingham to Roosevelt, 24 December

1935, Hyde Park, P. S. F. Bingham,

Memorandum of Breckinridge Long (Rome), 7 February 1936, Phillips Papers, Vol. 36. 144. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 317, 321, 326, 329; General Fischer annex 2 to report 24/35, 11 October 1935, T-120,

2676/5609/E 402357.

fs Feiling, p. 265. 6. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 145, n. 3. 147. Wiskeman, pp. 70-72; cf. Lipski Papers, No. 56.

148. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 388, 408, 411, 414, 417, 463, 464, 469, 476, pp. 930-31; von Hassell report I 972, 19 December 1935, T-120, 2700/5737/H 029433436. On the Austrian situation at this time see also G.D., C, 4, Nos. 368 and 428. 149. G.D., C, 4, No. 408; von Fritsch’s comments Zeitgeschichte, ED-1, pp. 87-89.

on 18 November

1935, Liebmann

Notes, Institut fiir

Chapter 10

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland The Emperor [Haile Selassie] said he was perplexed by the strange maneuvers of European diplomacy and the half measures of the League. He realized of course that the stage was set for another European war and that in the present confusion arising from Germany’s defiance of Locarno Ethiopia’s fate is relegated to a secondary place. But he found it difficult to understand British inconsistencies and France’s inability to see that if Italy had been checked in time Germany would never have dared to follow in her footsteps. (Engert telegram 259, 1 May 1936, U.S. 1936, 3:64).

he provision of the 1919 peace settlement requiring the demilitarization of the left bank of the Rhine and a strip fifty kilometers wide on the right bank had been reaffirmed in the Locarno Pact. It formed not only an integral part of those treaties but constituted the single most important guarantee of peace in Europe. Observance of this arrangement rendered any German attack on France or the Low Countries impossible, while the British and Italian guarantees of Locarno protected Germany against any possible French aggression. Furthermore, the fact that Germany was open to invasion in the West made her incapable of aggression in any other direction: any attack on Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Lithuania, or Denmark might precipitate a French attack that

Germany could not possibly ward off. The Locarno Pact thus provided stability in a Europe that, if organized on anything even remotely resembling the national principle, was cettain to have a Germany potentially more powerful than any country other than the Soviet Union. The imposition of a demilitarized zone on Germany might seem to some a disproportionate German contribution to such stability, but the accompanying British guarantee against France had been welcome compensation for Germany two years after the French occupation of the Ruhr. Moreover, it could be argued with considerable justice that an arrangement that restrained Germany from adventurous policies might be advantageous not only to the potential victims of such policies but to the Germans themselves. Although it was invariably assumed in Germany between the wars that any drastic revision of the territorial status quo initiated by Germany would unfailingly redound to Germany’s advantage, there was no natural or divine law to this effect. The restraining influence of the demilitarized zone could thus be said to have favorable as well as unfavorable implications for Germany, but certainly this was not the German view. In Germany, the early evacuation of allied occupation troops from the Rhineland was soon forgotten, the restriction on the nation’s sovereignty was considered an unreasonable and one-sided imposition, and German propaganda was often successful in making the subject appear to others in a light similar to the one in which the Germans themselves saw it.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

For Hitler’s government, the demilitarized zone was a particularly serious hindrance. It complicated the general progress of rearmament; more significantly, it precluded any really active foreign policy in the direction of expanding Germany’s living space, the main aim of the Hitler regime. The National Socialist members of the Reichstag had voted against the Locarno agreement in 1925; in Mein Kampf, Hitler had contrasted that agreement as a sign of the continuing decay of the Weimar Republic with the recovery of Prussia after the defeat of 1806.1 Once in power, however, Hitler recognized that it was very dangerous for Germany to tamper with this portion of the European order: France might move, .and some or all of the other powers might back the French. In the early yeats of the National Socialist regime, therefore, care was taken not to provoke any concern about Germany’s adherence to Locarno. On the contrary, Hitler repeatedly reaffirmed his intention of keeping the terms of that treaty and within Germany insisted that such preliminary steps as were taken toward remilitarizing the Rhineland be kept secret and to a minimum. Such caution, however, was dictated by the exigencies of the

moment; Hitler would seize what looked to him like the earliest possible opportunity to cast off that restriction on his freedom of action. He had thought of introducing a demand for the abolition of the demilitarized zone into the disarmament negotiations in 1934 but had dropped the idea in the summer of that year because of Germany’s difficult diplomatic situation. Had it not been included in the Locarno as well as the Versailles settlement, the demilitarized zone would in fact have been reoccupied in March 1935

when conscription was reintroduced.? Hitler was then still operating with the argument that Germany considered itself bound by agreements it had signed voluntarily but not bound by those imposed upon it; and in the publicity of the day, the Versailles and Locarno treaties wete allocated to these different categories. There is some evidence that in the summer of 1935 Hitler referred to the future remilitarization of the Rhineland in conversations with his associates, although as yet in indefinite terms.? Whether the step would be taken as a result of negotiations with the other Locarno powers, especially France, or without such preliminaries, was still open;

but the concept that the step would be taken in the spring of 1936 was already included in Hitler’s consideration of the issue.* During 1935, the German government began to ptepare a legal case against the continued validity of the Locarno agreement by claiming that the Franco-Soviet Pact was incompatible with it. This contention was not only rejected by other signatories, including Italy, but it is most doubtful that the Germans

themselves seriously held to it. They carefully avoided recourse to the procedures that the Locarno Pact itself provided for precisely such a claim and eventually switched to other arguments. Although there is as yet no clear evidence on the issue, it would appear that the main purposes in raising this point were to prepare the ground for domestic propaganda solidifying German opinion and to raise the question of the demilitarized 1. Mein Kampf, 2:761—62; similarly in Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 114. 2. See the letter from Frohwein of the Foreign Ministry to Erbe of the Ministry of the Interior, “II Abr. 2075,” 11 August 1934, T-120, 3289/7881/E 570604. G.D., C, 4, No. 575; German text in Esmonde Robertson (ed.)

“Zur Wiederbesetzung des Rheinlandes 1936,” Viertefahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 10, No. 2 (April 1962), p. 195. 3. See the reports of Jean Dobler, French consul general in Cologne, of 30 May 1935, in Les Evenements survenues en France de 1933 a 1945, Temoignages et documents recueillis par la Commission d’enquéte parlementaire (Paris: Presses Universitaires, 1947), 2:474—77, of 13 June 1935, cited in his report of 12 March 1936, ibid., pp. (483-84, and of 26 June 1935, in ibid., pp. 478-79. These reports ate refetred to in D.D.F., 2d, 1:108, n. 1 and p. 142, No. 96,

n. 2. The conversation between Hitler and Rudolf Diels about which the latter spoke with Dobler appears to be the meeting described in a confused manner, but with explicit reference to the demilitarized zone, by Diels in his memoirs, Lucifer ante portas (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1950), pp. 80-85. Internal evidence shows that Diels was unawate of Doblet’s reports and testimony when writing his own account. 4, Rumors in the German Ministry of Wat referring to March 1936 as the date for action are cited in Bella Fromm, Blood and Banquets (New York: Harpers, 1942), 8 October 1935, p. 209.

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

189

zone in international affairs, partly by clouding the legal aspect, partly by raising the Soviet threat. This, in turn, would give the German government some picture of likely foreign reaction to any actions violating the Locarno agreem ent. Under these circumstances, the willingness of the French government to submit the German legal claim to legal adjudication may well have served only to reinforce Hitler’s belief that a dramatic step on his part would not be met by drastic countermeasures.5 In November and December of 1935 the possibility of German action in the Rhineland came increasingly to the fore. The French ambassador to Berlin, André FrancoisPoncet, warned his government after meeting with Hitler on 21 November that the German government would soon either confront France with a Jait accompli in the Rhineland—counting on French internal dissentions and love of peace to keep France from moving—or would propose negotiations to end the demilitarized zone’ When Hitler met with the British ambassador on 13 December and rejected renewed British overtures for an air pact, he himself referred explicitly to the need to end the demilitarized status of the Rhineland.’ Hitler was by this time already discussing the details of reenteri ng the Rhineland with his military advisers; around Christmas, the commander in chief of the German

army, General von Fritsch, was reviewing Hitler’s plan with the heads of the

operations and organization sections of the army general staff and explaining to them his worries about possible foreign complications growing out of such a move.’ Diplomatic contacts with the other signatories of Locarno in January 1936 were marked by several clearly discernible characteristics. In those meetings which brought Hitler, von Neurath, and von Biilow together with French diplomats, the emphasis was

on German complaints about the Franco-Soviet Pact that was about to go to the Chamber of Deputies for ratification.? The Germans also claimed to be greatly exercised ovet the Franco-British staff talks that were developing out of joint policies toward Italy and the danger of war in the Mediterranean. While the Germans professed to see in these talks a threat against themselves, they in fact expected no attack but were greatly concerned that the British and French might plan to ward off German aggression jointly while ostensibly coordinating plans against possible further Italian aggression. Similar 5. G.D., ©, 4, Nos. 72, 170; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 227. 6. Fran¢ois-Poncet’s report quoted in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 37, p. 53. 7. The German tecord in G.D., C, 4, Nos. 460 and 462 makes this clear in spite of its absence from the report

of Phipps published in Cmd. 5143, No. 46. The summary of the German record circulated to German embassies abroad is reflected in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 160; it includes a reference to the demilitarized zone (cf. G.D., C, 4, No. 462, n. 6). The British government knew of the German demand and began to consider the issue (see Foreign Office C 8329/55/18). The full report of Phipps is in C 8364/55/18; on the editing of Cmd. 5143 see

C 2488/C 2493/4/18. 8. Memorandum of Freiherr von Siegler on a conversation with General Otto Stapf (in 1936 head of the organization section) on 6 June 1952, Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 152, pp. 7-8. In his memoirs, General Erich von Manstein, then chief of the operations section, claims that he heard nothing about any intended remilitarization of the Rhineland from von Fritsch at that time and claims that Beck, not von Fritsch, first told

him and about the forthcoming events on the morning of 5 March 1936 (Aus einem Soldatenleben [Bonn: Athenaum, 1958], p. 236). The only way to reconcile the two accounts is to interpret the December meeting as one concerning the general problems of a Rhineland occupation, with the Match one dealing only with implementation of an operation immediately ensuing. On the whole, Stapfs account appears more trustworthy than Manstein’s, which is one long, almost whining, apologia. Manstein’s account, if taken literally, is also incompatible with the memoirs of Friedrich Hossbach, then chief military adjutant of Hitler, who claims that Hitler discussed the intended reoccupation with von Fritsch in Berlin on 12 February (Zwischen Wehrmacht und Hitler, p. 97). It is difficult to believe that von Fritsch thereupon kept his chief of operations completely uninformed for

three weeks. 9. Hitler-Francois-Poncet on 1 January in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 1, and U.S. 1936, 1:180-81; von Bilow-FrangoisPoncet on 10 January, in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 30, and Memorandum of von Bulow, 10 January, T-120, 2373/4602/E 190273274; Biilow-Francois-Poncet on 13 January in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 49, and G.D., C, 4, No. 494, with important additions noted on the copy filmed in T-120, 2373 /4602/E 190275-279.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

complaints were launched in German conversations with the British who were scolded about their military talks with the French and given new excuses for Germany’s unwillingness to go forward as promised with negotiations for an air pact.'° From these talks, both the British and French governments received the impression that the Berlin regime was looking for an excuse to justify reoccupation of the Rhineland, though the Germans invariably denied this assertion when confronted with it. It was becoming obvious to the French government that some step in regard to the Rhineland was probably imminent and that whatever reluctance the German army might have about the risks involved, Hitler would disregard that reluctance if he decided to move.!! The French military attaché in Berlin thought that action to remilitarize the Rhineland was impending but that the Germans would first try to find out what the French reaction would be and then act if it seemed safe to do so.!? Precisely for this reason there were some in Paris who believed that France should warn Germany if military moves in answer to a German coup were in fact intended.'? On this subject, French officials were in a largely self-created dilemma to which they never found a satisfactory solution. They were convinced on the one hand that once Germany remilitarized the Rhineland it would fortify its border with France and then destroy with impunity the Little Entente, France’s allies; but they also had a ridiculously exaggerated view of Ger-

man military strength and were therefore reluctant to become involved then and there in a conflict with Germany.'* Thus, though recognizing the implications of a remilitarized Rhineland not only for France but for the whole of Europe, the French leaders were already so terrified of what they imagined to be German military strength as to make it unlikely that they would muster the needed energy to prepare any counteraction to a German fait accompli. In fact, as the evidence of French documents reveals to the incredulous observer, during the weeks of January and February 1936, as the issue of the Rhineland came to the fore, France not only lacked a previously prepared plan for a military countermove to remilitarization but did not even begin to prepare one while all its intelligence and diplomatic sources were telling them that such a step was impending.!» Since the French government ‘on the whole was reasonably well-informed on the extent of German rearmament, the exaggerated view of German military strength in 1936, placing it ahead of France in trained men and about to pull ahead in matériel, may have been due to the psychological effect of Germany’s paramilitary formations like the SA of whose utility in regular military operations the French had apparently convinced themselves, or to the belief that the secret rearmament of Germany in prior years had in fact extended much further than either French intelligence at the time or the facts known later indicated, or to a need to deceive oneself with good excuses for refraining from

action—or to a combination of all three.!© While holding to this overassessment of 10. Eden-Hoesch on 6 January in G.D., C, 4, No. 484, Memorandum by Wenninger, II M 374g, 6 January, T120, 2673/5578/E 400748, and Cmd. 5143, Nos. 47, 48; Neurath-Phipps on 14 January, in G.D., C, 4, No. 496;

von Neurath-Phipps on 17 January in G.D., C, 4, Nos. 500, 501, von Neurath memorandum RM 40, 17 January, T-120, 2383/4619/E 198234—235, Cmd. 5143, No. 49, and Diplomaciai iratok magyarorszdg kiilpolitikajahox 1936-1945, 1 (Budapest: Akadémiai kiado, 1962) hereafter cited as Hungarian Documents, 1), No. 19.

11. 12. 13. 14.

D.D.F, 2d, 1, Nos. 17, 24, 27, 36, 37, 59, 91. Ibid., No. 63; cf. No. 76. Ibid., No. 53. Ibid., Nos. 82, 83.

15 othe Selentian documents may be found in D.D.F., 2d, 1. The general situations described had already been clear from Les Evenements and from the second volume of the memoirs of General Maurice Gamelin, Servir (Paris: Plon, 1946). The problems of relationships between the French military commanders and civilian authorities are analyzed in Philip C. F. Bankwitz, Maxime Weygand and Civil-Military Relations in Modern France (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1967).

16. The picture of German rearmament shown in Castellan’s book is confirmed and supplemented by the reports in D.D.F., 2d, 1. The exaggerated view of German strength—which ignores the lack of arms and

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

191

German might, the French government was also unwilling to raise the subject of the demilitarized zone in negotiations with Germany, fearful of opening up the very question they preferred not to face. In short, France was incapable of formulating any coherent diplomatic or military plan in the face of impending disaster.!7 The Belgian government was as worried about the threats and rumors of an end to Locarno as the French, but they were even less eager than France to become involved in either diplomatic initiative or a military countermove. On the contrary, the possibility of complications about the demilitarized zone and Belgium’s obligations in relation to it only reinforced those tendencies in Belgium that were already pressing it toward a neutralist position.!8 As the British government faced the prospect of German moves on the demilitarized zone in the first weeks of 1936, disappointment over the refusal of Germany to agree to an air pact was mingled with reluctance to take any serious action against a German coup. Both the air pact and the demilitarized zone were discussed in London with German and French leaders when they arrived for the funeral of George V at the end of January 1936, but no firm British position emerged.!9 Proposals were discussed at that time within the British government in an attempt to come to a general agreement with Germany. These schemes envisaged using the Rhineland and the return of Germany’s former colonies in Africa in bargaining for Germany’s return “to Geneva disarmament and a formal renunciation of any territorial designs in Europe, including aims at absorption of Austria and Czechoslovakia.”2° But the British government neither decided to try for such an agreement at the time nor tried to make such an effort jointly with the French.?! What the Western powers would not do from a position of strength in 1936 they would subsequently try to do from a position of weakness in 1938—though then at the expense of others rather than themselves. At this time, the French knew nothing of internal British discussions of a general approach to Germany. They accurately foresaw, however, that the British government would be only too glad to use as an excuse for evading action the same step—French ratification of the Franco-Soviet Pact of 1935—that the Germans would use as an excuse for their move. The French ambassador to London correctly anticipated that the British, who looked upon Locarno more as a guarantee of the existing borders than as a security for the demilitarized zone, would not be alarmed by any German move that involved no ammunition for the paramilitary formations—still echoes in General Maurice Gauché’s book, p. 46. Similar views were expressed by the French Minister of War, General Louis Mourin, on 31 March 1936 (D.D.B., 4, No.

62). 17. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 125, 126, 170; D.D.B., 4, No. 5, 18. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 73, 123, 137, 146, 167; D.D.B., 4, documents listed under chap. 1; G.D., C, 4, No. 547.

19. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 32, 112; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 501, 523, 529, 547; Cmd. 5143, No. 50; Eden, pp. 364-65, 372-76; British documents in Foreign Office C 151/C 418/C 763/C 796/4/18. 20. Memorandum of Vansittart of February 1936, quoted in Colvin, None So Bind, p. 55; Feiling, p. 300;

Atherton (London) dispatch 2207, 22 May 1936, State 740.0011 Mutual Guarantees (Locarno)/700. See also D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, No. 113. A similar course is advocated in effect in Dodd’s dispatch 2651 of 8 February 1936,

U.S. 1936, 1:189-95. British documents pertaining to these internal discussions may be found in Foreign Office C 7734/C/7752 C 8523/55/18, N 518/187/38, N 833/20/38, F 855/427/59, C 663/97/18, C 7515/134/18, C 454/ C 585/ C 614/ C 750/ C 807/ C 880/ C 979/ C 998/ C 1028/ C 1353/4/18, C 400/99/18, W 1048/ W 1274/79/98. The close relationship of this discussion to the consideration of future British policy ward the League in view of the fiasco of British actions in the Ethiopian crisis may be followed in W 5075 /79/98.

21. At about the same time that Vansittart was urging an effort using colonial concessions for a comprehensive settlement with Germany, President Roosevelt was arranging for a sounding of German officials on a scheme for leasing to Germany specific mining and other concessions in colonies to meet the supposed needs of the German economy (Hyde Park P. P. F. 2616; Roosevelt must have given Fuller instructions for his talk with yd Schacht of 1 April 1936, at their meeting on either 13 February or 6 March 1936).

On British consideration of a transfer of mandates to Germany in the spring and summer of 1936, ending in

a negative decision in July, see Foreign Office C 4275/ C 85/ C 5520/ C 5822/ C 5973/97/18.

12

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

crossing of the Franco-German or Belgium-German border and that in theit opinion the French would not act either. Britain and France both looked to the other for reinforcement of its own weakness rather than confirmation of a strong resolve, and both were well satisfied.” In the meantime, the German government was preparing its move. There were the beginnings of a serious tightening of the economic situation as the German rearmament boom approached a state of full employment. Problems involving foreign exchange and raw materials allocation that were to eventuate in the launching of the Four-Year Plan later that year were not yet publicly evident in full detail. The situation was serious enough, however, to suggest a propaganda campaign to rally public opinion in Germany

around new perspectives in the economy: the old slogan of the National Socialist party had been “Freedom and Bread”; on 17 January 1936, Goebbels launched a new slogan,

“Guns or Butter.”23 Some observers argued subsequently that one of the reasons for the timing of Germany’s Rhineland action was to divert the attention of the German public by a spectacular coup from the economic difficulties of the winter of 1935—36, and cer-

tainly some of Hitler’s diplomatic advisers were very much concerned by the extent to which such political considerations had influenced him to act.24 More important in the circumstances under which Hitler made his decision in timing was the position of Italy. The estrangement between Italy and the Western powers and the concomitant beginnings of a rapprochement between Italy and Germany as a result of the Italian attack on Ethiopia have already been examined. In, the first months of 1936, these developments were coming to a head as a result of events in Geneva and in Ethiopia. In Geneva, after the failure of the Hoare-Laval plan, the sanctionist powers were again turning to the consideration of the possibility of including oil among the items not to be sold to Italy. It was recognized by both Britain and France that such a measure would mean a final rupture with Italy, and the Italian government assured them that Italy would leave the League if such sanctions were in fact decided upon.** The desire of the Italians to use this threat in their negotiations with Britain and France was to have unexpected repercussions in March; but when first raised, it helped restrain the Western powers who in any case were reluctant to push the sanctions policy further. The discussions in Geneva in January and February, however, were strenuous and bitter; and Rome could

not yet be certain of their outcome. While these arguments were going on in Geneva, the situation in East Africa was marked by a temporary stalemate during which the Italians prepared for new offensive moves against Ethiopia. Under these circumstances Rome was hardly inclined to take a strong line against Germany. It was this combination of factors that was of great importance to. Hitler in making any decision. As long as the friction between Italy and the Western powers continued, he could hope that the Italian government would not look

unfavorably on a German move that directed attention away from Italy. Certainly Italy would hardly participate in a policy of sanctions against Germany while itself the victim of sanctions, a point that was equally clear to all concerned.76 Once the Italians had won

22. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 106, 163, 184. See also Sit Lewis Namier’s essay on the Flandin memoirs, in Europe in

Decay (London: Macmillan, 1950), pp. 9-33, and the British cabinet discussion of 5 March 1936 in Foreign Office C 1760/4/18. 23, See Arnold J. Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs 1936 (London: Oxford University Press, 1937), p. 123; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 80. This was the public manifestation of the difficulties alluded to in the conference between Hitler, Schacht, and others on 25 November 1935, and Schacht’s letter to von Blomberg of 24 December 1935

(IMWG, 36:291—95). Cf. Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufriistung, pp. 160-62. 24. See von Hassell’s subsequent private memorandum on the Rhineland coup, in Robertson, pp. 202-5.

25. D.DiF., 2d, 1,.No. 19. 26. Ibid., No. 142; U.S. 1936, 1:183-87; G.D., C, 4, No. 519; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 3.

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193,

their war in East Africa, however, a rapprochement between Italy and the British and French was always possible. The Italians might then trade support of sanctions against Germany for an end to sanctions against themselves. The Italian victories in East Aftica in February 1936 may well have helped ptecipitate German action for which GermanItalian conversations had already paved the way. On 17 January 1936, the German ambassador to Italy, Ulrich von Hassell had a conversation with Hitler in which the possibility of better German-Italian relations was canvassed. Hitler’s comments show that he considered the German-Italian antagonism of 1934 a closed chapter and that, assuming Italy would not rejoin the Stresa front, he was prepared to continue a policy of benevolent neutrality toward Italy in its African venture. Furthermore, he was quite explicit on the point that Germany would not return to the League of Nations, so that the Italians could continue to use the threat of withdrawal, a

threat that Ambassador Attolico strongly urged his government to catty out27 The Italian government indicated its willingness to push for a more accommodating course toward Germany in Vienna; the Germans

soon

followed up on these hints with the

Austrians but deferred serious negotiations—which eventually led to the agreement of 11 July 1936—auntil after the more immediate goal of remilitarization had been attained.?8 In the last days of January and the first days of February 1936, Hitler considered the question of reoccupying the Rhineland in the immediate future.2? The submission of the Franco-Soviet Pact to the Chamber of Deputies for ratification, announced by the Laval government on 16 January and implemented by the new French government of Albert Sarraut on 11 February, would provide an appropriate excuse. On 12 February the German chargé d’affaires in Paris was summoned to a conference with Hitler, von Blom-

berg, von Neurath, and von Ribbentrop to report on possible French reactions to remilitatization.*° The attitude of Italy was also of key importance at this juncture. The Italians themselves apparently expected a German move at this time,>! as von Hassell explained to Hitler when they discussed the matter on 14 February.** Hitler had probably already decided to act, but he preferred to coordinate his denunciation of Locarno with Mussolini if at all possible, or at least to secure Mussolini’s acquiescence. The possibility of sending Goring as a special messenger to Rome was canvassed, but it had been dropped by the time von Hassell returned to Germany for further deliberations on 19 February.3? By then, Hitler had not only decided to go ahead, he had tejected out of hand recent British approaches for some form of new agreement and was already working out the details of the speeches and proposals that would accompany his

27. G.D., C, 4, No. 506; cf. “Information,” 18 January 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Zig OZ ty sus 28. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 515, 525, 545; Robert H. Whealey (ed.), “Mussolini’s Ideological Diplomacy: An Un-

published

Document,” Journal of Modern

History, 39, No.

4, (Dec.

1967), 432-37;

“Bestellung aus

det

Pressekonferenz,” 22 January 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/7, £. 57; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 4 (German text in Acta Historica, 7, Nos. 3-4 [1960], 366-67), 17, 26, 27, 36, 42. On the postponement of serious mat negotiations see especially G.D., C, 4, No. 586.

29. For a reflection of Hitler’s having discussed the subject with Géring—who was to participate in all the key by von Papen meetings on this question—before 10 February 1936 see D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, No. 162; for a reference Kanya of minister foreign Hungarian the to comments former's the see time the at issue the to Hitler reviewing Ministry in 5 February, Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 27. For material on the preparations in the German Foreign ; the first week of February 1936 see T-120, 3289X 7881/E 570752-766. German embassy in the at chargé was Forster 48. (1956), 10 Bulletin, Library Wiener in Forster Dirk of Letter 30. Johannes von Paris from the death of Roland Késter on 31 December 1935, to the appointment of Count Zone am Rhein Welczek in April 1936. See also Max Braubach, Der Einmarsch deutscher Truppen in die entmilitarisierte im Marz 1936 (Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1956), p. 14. 31. G.D., C, 4, No. 553. 32. Hossbach, p. 97; G.D., C, 4, No. 564; Robertson, pp. 192-93, 202-03.

33. G.D., C, 4, No. 575; Robertson, pp. 194-95, 203-05.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War 10

move into the Rhineland.24 He would promise the French and British almost anything to keep them quiet for the moment; in spite of von Hassell’s objections, he wanted to move right away, partly for the domestic reasons that have already been touched on. Von Hassell was to sound out Mussolini’s attitude, while Goring would contribute his share to the preparations by a trip to Warsaw rather than Rome. In Warsaw, Goring was to teassure the Poles that rumors of a German-Soviet rapprochement were false and to scout out their reaction to any German move against the Locarno agreement.*> To the outside world, the visit, coming right after one by

Hitler’s legal expert, Hans Frank, demonstrated that German-Polish relations were good in spite of continued difficulties over the payments for Germany’s railway traffic across the Polish Corridor and the excitement produced by a speech of Schacht calling for the return of Polish Upper Silesia.2° In the preceding months, following the uncertainty after Pilsudski’s death in May 1935, the combined efforts of the two governments had kept their friction points, especially in Danzig, at a minimum. The two powers had maintained reasonably good relations, in part at the expense of the democratic opposition in Danzig.3’ But this had not been a simple operation. There were strong internal pressures for a policy closer to France and less cooperative toward Germany than the one followed by the Polish foreign minister, Josef Beck. Beck gambled on a double-track policy: he could pretend to agree with those in the Polish government who wished to stand by France in case of a reoccupation of the Rhineland although he believed that Poland was not obligated to do so*8 because he did not believe that France would really move when the time came. Goring could return to Germany reassured, while Beck was teady both to reassure the advocates of a firm common policy with France in resistance to Germany and to follow in practice a continued policy of aloof but effective cooperation with Germany.*? While Goring was sounding out the Polish government, von Hassell returned to Rome. He had already received an indirect indication from Mussolini, who was citcumventing the Italian Foreign Ministry, that Italy would take no action if Germany broke with the Locarno Pact in response to the Franco-Soviet Pact.*? This position was tfeiterated by Mussolini to von Hassell on 22 February. Mussolini still thought it likely that oil sanctions would be instituted—in which case he would leave the League and make 34, On these British approaches see U.S. 1936, 1:196—98; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 562, 568, 583, 594; 5, No. 8; Cmd.

5143, Nos. 51, 57; Eden, p. 379. Von Hassell cites von Bulow as explaining Hitler’s indifference toward the British overtures as due to the fact that they did not fit into his plans (Robertson, p. 204). 35. On GGring’s visit see Szembek, 11 February 1936, pp. 159-60, 19 February, pp. 162-63; G.D., C, 4, No. 591; D. D. P., 2d, 1, Nos. 212, 221, 222; D.D.B., 4, No. 17; Slavik (Czech minister in Warsaw) report 21, 29

February 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413313. 36. On the Corridor payments issue see pp. 146-47, above, and D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 118, 148, 178, 179; Szembek, 22 December 1935, p. 144, 10 February 1936, p. 159. The subject was discussed when Beck was in

Berlin at the end of January 1936 (D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos, 124, 128; Cudahy (Warsaw) dispatch 989, 30 January 1936, State 760c.62/310). On Schacht’s speech at Beuthen on 28 January and the resulting difficulties see G.D., C, 4, No. 591, n. 6; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 127, 129; Szembek, 12 February, p. 161. 37. On German-Polish relations in 1935 and early 1936 see Szembek, pp. 89-90, 143-46, 149, 152-54, 162;

Lipski Papers, Nos. 49, 55, 56; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 142, 442, 443, 454, 468, 473, 474, n. 6, 492, 499, 500, 509, 520, 522, 546; Radowitz (Danzig) dispatch I.G. 722/35, 18 June 1935, T-120, 2787/6023/H 044646-648; Schliep (Warsaw) report P VI 17, 22 November 1935, ibid., frames H 044685—687; Gallman (U.S. consul Danzig) dispatches 125, 31 August 1935, State 760K.62/45, 139 of 2October, 162 of 19 November, 166 of 5 December,

State 860K.00/183, 187, and 189; D.D.F,, 2d, 1, Nos. 84, 86, 89, 97. 38. Szembek, 4 and 26 February 1936, pp. 159, 163.

39. See the summary of the evidence in Roos, pp. 233-37. The newly published French documents add detail but support the interpretation of Roos (see below, pp. 199f). A detailed attack on Beck’s person and career by Poles opposed to his policies, possibly the Sikorski group, may be found in the Czech documents under 3 December 1935, T-120, 1143/2028/444370-378.

40. G.D., C, 4, No. 574.

The Remilitarization ofthe Rhineland

195

Locatno “disappear of its own accord.’4! If the Germans, howevet, wete to act before that time, Italy would not move against them, an assurance that was subsequently confirmed in spite of some efforts in the Italian Foreign Ministry to restrain the firm commitment Mussolini had made.*? Under these circumstances, Hitler felt that he could make his move, although some

anxiety remained. Poland would be unlikely to act. Italy would certainly stand aside. The British government had shown by its own recent approaches that little strong action need be feared from that quarter. The new king, Edward VIII, was thought friendlier to Germany than had been George V; as the head of the department of the German Foreign Ministry dealing with Great Britain expressed it: “King Edward does not mistrust us.’43 A propaganda campaign against the Franco-Soviet Pact would weaken any resolve to act in both Britain and France; as von Hassell noted on 22 February, “it was quite clear that he [Hitler] really wanted the ratification to use as a platform for his action.”“4 Hitler’s interview with the French journalist Bertrand de Jouvenel on 21 February, not published in France until 28 February after ratification of the FrancoSoviet Pact in the Chamber of Deputies, has sometimes been taken as an honest effort

by Hitler to forestall ratification; but since Hitler expressly rejected warnings to London and Paris to prevent ratification, the friendly statements in that interview can now be

seen as merely the last in a series of propaganda moves toward the French. It almost misfired by stimulating the French to inquire what new plans for better German-French relations Hitler might have in mind, but Hitler put off answering such embarrassing questions until his troops could give the reply.* If the French were to be assuaged by sweet words, more spectacular balm would soothe the English: Hitler would offer to return to the League just when the British had indicated that such a return was no longer a prerequisite for an Anglo-German tapprochement. Confronted by the dazzling prospect of recetving even more than they dared hope for, the British government and the British public would surely be entranced into acquiescence. This particular concession had not been included among the list of diversionary offers Hitler had sketched out on 19 February. In fact, Hitler had just

41. Ibid., No. 579 (German text in Robertson, pp. 196-99); von Hassell to von Neurath, 23 February 1936,

Deutsches Zentral Archiv Potsdam, Biiro RAM 60952 (heteafter cited as DZA Potsdam 60952). 42. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 592, 598 (German text in Robertson, pp. 200-01), 603 (German text in Robertson, p. 202),

pp. 1170-72; 5, No. 5. The key figure in opposition to Mussolini’s new policy was Fulvio Suvich, the Undersectetaty of State in the Italian Foreign Ministry. He not only tried to tone down Mussolini’s statements to von Hassell but also reassured the French and American ambassadors about the significance of von Hassell’s peregtinations (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 211; Long Diary, 22 February 1936, pp. 315-16, Long Papers, U.S. 1936, 1:204—05), 43. U.S. 1936, 1:188. Dieckhoff was summarizing the import of a conversation von Neurath had had with the new king in London at the time of the funeral of George V. Von Neurath had expressed similar views to the Hungarian foreign minister Kanya when they were both in London (Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 19). Cf. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 507, 510; 5, 316. For other contemporary indications of a pro-German attitude of Edward VII see

also G.D., C, 4, No. 531; Phillips Diary, 29 January 1936, Phillips Papers, Vol. 9, p. 1271. Edward VIII was to be treated well in the German press, as were the exchange of German and British war veterans occurtting simultaneously in part in line with his previously discussed speech as Prince of Wales (Wotton, pp. 194-99; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz,” 18 January 1936, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/7, f. 43).

dass er ausdricklich 44, Von Hassel’s notes in Robertson, p. 204. The full sentence reads: “Bezeichnend ist, ganz klar, dass et die ablehnte, durch Warnungen in Paris und London die Ratifikation zu verhindern: es war

preRatifikation geradezu wiinschte, namlich als Plattform fiir seine Aktion.” On the propaganda campaign

1:565—68; Cmd. ceding the remilitarization see D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 95, 104, 172, 193, 204, 205, 208; Domatus,

des Fihrers 5143, No. 52; Hitler’s decree about the press of 29 January 1936, in Anordnungen des Stellvertreters (Munich: Eher, 1937), pp. 244-49.

1:57981; Cmd. 5143, Nos. 54-56; 45. On the Jouvenel interview and the resulting French inquiries see Domarus 23 Match 1935, pp. 328-29, D.D.F, 2d, 1, Nos. 255, 265, 272, 281, 293, 349; G.D., C, 4, No. 604; Long Diary,

Long Papers; Osusky0/1809/413087.

46. G.D., C, 4, No. 575 (German text in Robertson, p. 195).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy,.1933-1939: The Road to World War II

reassured the Italians that he had no intention of returning to Geneva and knew that the Italians were using the threat to leave the League in their attempts to prevent oil sanctions. Why then this added offer with its possible disadvantages along with its assumed benefits? The evidence for Hitler’s last-minute change of plans leading to the inclusion of an offer to return to the League is scanty and indirect. The doubts and hesitations expressed by all of his military and some of his diplomatic advisers may have suggested the need to dangle additional concessions before the Western powers; certainly a return to Geneva would be the most spectacular of these, and there is evidence that Hitler discussed it with von Neurath on 27 February.47 In the second place, the sanctions committee of the League was scheduled to meet on 2 March; and Italian threats to leave the League were

important because they seemed to be having the desired effect of frightening France and England out of supporting oil sanctions.’ In a short time, however, Britain and France would be unlikely to become further entangled in trouble with Italy once Germany had moved into the Rhineland; they would hardly turn to oil sanctions then, and Italy’s threat to leave Geneva would become irrelevant. Still another factor minimized the possibility of Germany antagonizing Italy by offering to return to the League at precisely the moment that Italy was threatening to leave: nothing in the record suggests that Hitler was in any way setious about the offer. Once it had served its purpose of confusing opinion abroad, Germany would have no more interest in it. Any Italian objection would then wither automatically. It should be noted, however, that in this case as in others Hitler was inclined to take extreme steps or make major additional concessions in a crisis,

leaving the possible repercussions to be dealt with later. As in 1933 he had been willing to risk temporary Italian displeasure by leaving the League without prior warning to Rome,

so now

he would use the promise to return to Geneva

under circumstances

cettain to be offensive to Mussolini. The key matter in Hitler’s eyes was the Rhineland action itself. He would find ways to take care of other problems later. On 2 March 1936, the military directives for the reoccupation of the Rhineland were issued; on 5 Match the date for the action was set as 7 Match, a Saturday, in the hope of

gaining a weekend’s respite before any counteraction could be taken. On the day of the reoccupation, the Locarno powers were to be informed and the Reichstag would meet to

hear Hitler explain his move while promising peace and goodwill to all. German military plans provided for small German units to move into the Rhineland, joining the local militarized police (Landespolizei) and staging a fighting withdrawal if there were a military counteraction from the West.#? The story that the German troops had orders to withdraw if France moved against them is partially correct but essentially misleading; the withdrawal was to be a tactical defensive move, not a return to the earlier

position. The possibility of a war was thus accepted by Hitler, but he clearly did not think 47. Memorandum of Dodd, 29 Februaty 1936, Dodd Papers, folder 1936-D. A summary of this memorandum is in Dodd Diary, pp. 314-16, and his account of the meeting to Franc¢ois-Poncet in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 292. Von

Neurath’s own memorandum on his meeting with Dodd on 29 February is short and uninformative (RM 162, T-120, 2383/4619/E 198262-263). Von Papen subsequently claimed credit for having talked Hitler into his offer to return to Geneva in a conversation with Sir Walford Selby, British minister to Austria, when the latter was about to return to London for consultation on 12 March (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 420). Von Papen’s own report on this conversation (G.D., C, 5, No. 90) refers to the German offer in general terms. The British ambassador to Germany claimed to know that the German Foreign Ministry was opposed to the idea and that von Biilow had not been told about it until the last moment (D.D.B., 4, No. 74). 48. See especially D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 218, 224, 239; G.D., C, 5:1; Eden, pp. 367-69. A summary

of the

evidence in Laurens, pp. 324-33, 49. The evidence is ably summarized in Donald C. Watt, “German Plans for reoccupation of the Rhineland: A Note,” Journal ofContemporary History, 1, No. 4 (Oct. 1966), pp. 193-99. See also D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 320.

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

LOT

the contingency very likely. There were some last-minute conferences in Berlin, especially

on 2 Match, and rumors of some impending move circulated in the German capital; but

when Hitler summoned his cabinet on 6 March, ordets had been given and the troops were already.on the move. Tn the last days before the German move, rumors and warnings had not been lacking. It was quite clear to the British and French governments that something might be done by the Germans, using the ratification of the Franco-Soviet Pact as an excuse, and that the German step might well involve the demilitarized zone. The two govern-

ments had begun to discuss this problem, and the French government, at least, was warned by its representatives of a possibly imminent move.5! This danger, however, only

led the French to a mote accommodating attitude toward England in regard to the prospect of including Germany in a new naval agreement growing out of the London Naval Conference.*? By deferring somewhat to British wishes for good relations with Germany, the French government hoped to keep England cooperative in case of any drastic German move, but it may be doubted that such a course had much substantive value. As for direct action in response to any German move, the French no mote planned this now than before. They awaited the worst, unwilling and unable to cope with the clear dangers ahead.°> They knew that, largely because of domestic pressure from the Flemish element,

Belgium was trying to loosen its military ties to France.54 The French government also knew that their eastern allies could be depended upon only as long as France could aid them by threatening Germany’s open western border.*> The leaders of the Little Entente,

in turn, recognized that if Germany moved west it would be only so that subsequently it could move east and southeast. Once Germany had fortified its western border, France would be incapable of preventing Germany from taking any action it might decide upon in regard to them, and the countries of Southeast Europe would have to draw the conse-

quences.*° The only way the French could console themselves was with the notion that a German move into the Rhineland would be likely to lead France to a firmer alliance with England, including plans for common defense against any further German aggression westward. This purely defensive perception of the issues reflected the self-assessment of France as incapable of maintaining the status quo in Europe. Its view of the future in regard to Franco-British relations was largely correct. The two points together constituted France’s abdication from any significant role in European diplomacy. The initiative would pass to Germany, checked if at all by Britain.° On 7 March, German troops moved into the demilitarized zone, the German foreign minister, von Neurath, informed the ambassadors of the major foreign powers 50. Minutes of the council of ministers of 6 March 1936, in G.D., C, 5, No. 9. On the meetings of 2 and 3 Match I have been unable to find official contemporary records, but see Dertinger’s “Abendmaterial,” 2 March 1936, and “Informationsbericht Nr. 12,” 5 March 1936, in Bundesatchivy, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f. 81-91;

DDR 2d, 1s Nos.272; 531. ) 51. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 175, 180, 188, 200, 242, 287, 288. 52. The relationship of Germany to the later stages of the London naval conference is not reviewed here because of its relative unimportance. On this subject, especially as it affected Franco-British relations, see ibid., Nos. 120, 155. that the French 53. Ibid., Nos. 186, 187, 196, 203, 241, 269, 283. The French government was aware of the fact

especially general staff had no plans whatever for coping with a German temilitarization of the Rhineland; see

on 3 March that France ibid., No. 223. On similar British indecision see U.S. 196, 1:213. Flandin told Eden

i — would not act alone (Foreign Office C 1386/4/18). convention of 54. The negotiations over officially announcing the termination of the Franco-Belgian military 1920 may be followed in D.D.B., 3. Agreement was registered on 6 March 1936! 55. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 156. foal ne 56. Ibid., Nos. 256, 270. sh cooperation if Getmany re57. The French general staff memorandum of 18 February 1936 on Franco-Briti 202). No. (ibid., direction this in points occupied the Rhineland clearly

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

about the German move, and Hitler spoke to the assembled Reichstag. The initial troop deployment was kept small, establishing remilitarization while simultaneously showing that no attack across the French or Belgian border was intended.°* Hitler had a lastminute attack of nerves,°® but he then issued the final orders and the troops marched.

When the news reached Paris and London on the morning of 7 March, there was shock but no immediate action. The German notification with its accompanying offers of peace had been designed primarily to ward off any dangerous repercussions. Since France was both most affected by the German step and potentially most dangerous to Germany, every effort was made to urge the British government to restrain the French. That the British and French would object to what Germany had done was taken for granted, but the real issue was whether any action would accompany or follow their anticipated complaints. The initial situation was all that Germany could hope for. In London, Sir Anthony Eden immediately acted as the Germans had hoped by trying to restrain the French, and the French in turn suggested that there was not much sense in considering new peace ptoposals from Berlin when those that Germany had signed voluntarily could be tossed aside so casually.' But whatever response the French ambassador in London or foreign minister in Paris might give to English suggestions, the fact was that the British government’s first inclination as expressed on 7 March was that there had been a deplorable breach of international behavior but that no immediate counteraction was called for. As the British Foreign Office informed the American chargé d’affaires, “England would make every endeavour to prevent the imposition of military and/or economic sanctions against Germany.’’° The French could have acted alone, however, had they had the will to do so and had

this will infused into its military leadership an interest in planning for such a contingency. In spite of some courageous voices in the cabinet, the lack of determination of the majority of the Ministry, reinforced by the hesitations of the military, carried the day. The political factor of an election two months off, a public fearful of war and willing to fight

only in defense of France’s own frontiers, and a military program that contained no plan whatsoever for any relevant countermove combined to force a diplomatic rather than a military rejoinder to Germany.® The implications of this policy were clear to the French foreign minister; the next day Pierre-Etienne Flandin told the American ambassador to Paris that the Germans would first fortify the Rhineland and then turn east. In an attempt to avert such grim prospects, Flandin attempted in the days immediately following to recover by diplomacy what had been lost by inaction. René Massigli of the French Foreign Ministry had armed him with a clear prognosis of what would happen if France yielded on this occasion: the Poles would draw the logical conse-

58. The military moves are summarized in Braubach, p. 19; notifications, sent to Germany’s diplomats on 5 Match for delivery on 7 Match, in G.D., C, 5, Nos. 3, 4, 7.

59. Hossbach, pp. 97—98. 60. On the initial notifications and protests see D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 298, 307; Cmd. 5/43, No. 58; Eden, pp.

380-82; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 12-16, 21; U.S. 1936, 1:208. 61. D.D.F, 2d, 1, Nos. 301, 316, 317; see also ibid., No. 520; D.D.B., 4, No. 21; Eden, pp. 383, 388. 62. Atherton (London) telegram 92, 9 March 1936, State 740.001 Mutual Guarantee (Locatno)/381. See also the telegrams 187 and 190 of Strauss from Paris, 10 March, ibid. /401 and 402 (item 406 in this file is identified

in U.S. 1936, 1:232-33 as item 460 by mistake). The reaction of the Belgians was similar to that of the British (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 330). 63. The evidence is summarized in Braubach, pp. 26-28; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 334. Note that French army plans

required mobilization of the whole French army to chase three German regiments across the Rhine (ibid., No. 393; Les évenements 1:62, 65), and that Gamelin seriously doubted that France could break through in the Rhineland and defeat Germany (D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 334, 525). 64. U.S. 1936, 1:216-17.

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

(90

quences in determining their future policy, the pro-German line would come to the fore in Yugoslavia and Romania, the Czechs would settle for the best terms they could get, and Austria would clearly be next on the list.6 In a series of conversations and conferences, Flandin now attempted to persuade the other Locarno powets to take some sort of drastic action against Germany. The terms of the Locarno Treaty gave him a strong position to argue for British support unless either Great Britain wished to break its Own treaty commitments or was prepared to see France act on its own. For a short time it looked as if Flandin and those in England like Winston Churchill who thought action vas needed, were making headway.°° Following a stormy meeting of the Locarno powers in Paris, another conference was held in London the weekend after the German coup. By this time, the concern felt in the

British Foreign Office over a possible breach with France as well as the mote critical attitude of many people in British public life toward the German move were beginning to make themselves felt.°7 Flandin now took a stronger line and began to get some British support. He could point to assurances of cooperation from at least some of France’s allies. The Czech and Romanian governments had promised to side with France; the case of Yugoslavia was more doubtful, but at least that country’s govern-

ment sounded encouraging. Since none of these powers could afford to participate in economic sanctions against Germany, the value of their support was by no means very great—that is, unless France and England were willing to turn to military action. The position of the other East European allies of France was even more dubious. The Soviet Union might argue against appeasement and its leaders denounce Germany’s actions, but neither wanted nor expected France to march.”° Poland was simultaneously assuring the French of loyalty to the alliance and assuring the Germans that since Germany was not planning to attack France there was no occasion for the alliance to become effective. Beck reassured the French while expressing to the Germans some concern that their offer of a twenty-five-year pact in the west and the south contrasted strangely with the ten-year term of the German-Polish agreement.’! He thus satisfied Polish Marshal Smigly-Rydz who believed that France would indeed move against Germany, without jeopardizing his own policy based on the assumption that no drastic action would in fact ensue.” That such procedures did nothing for Beck’s personal reputation and involved enormous tisks will be obvious; that the French government could draw from such duplicity a reinforcement for its own weakness and thereby in turn confirm Beck in his 65. This accurate prediction of the events of the subsequent two years may be found in D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 407. 66. See D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 322, 328, 380; U.S. 1936, 1:228-29; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 27, 35, 37, 43, 47, 50, 58; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 41-44; Geyr von Schweppenburg, pp. 83-86; Eden, pp. 390-99. From the British records, however, it would appear that on the evening of 13 March Flandin agreed to

legalize remilitarization affer negotiations (see Foreign Office C1996 /4/18, p. 232). 67. D.D.F, 2d, 1, Nos. 363, 410; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 66, 73; U.S. 1936, 1:232-33; Winston S. Churchill, The Gathering Storm (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1948), pp. 195-97. 1936, 1:227-28. 68. Czechoslovakia: D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, Nos. 385, 402; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 70, 86, 120. Romania: U.S. 40; Hoptner, No. 1, Documents, Hungarian 56; 48, Nos. 5, C, G.D., see but 377; 360, Nos. 1, 69. D.D.F., 2d,

Yugoslavia in Crisis, p. 45. 70. D.D.F., 2d, No. 366; U.S. 1936, 1:212.

Szembek, 7, 10, 11 March 71. D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, Nos. 303, 324, 325, 327, 408; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 19, 61, 82, 106; 14 March 1936, Czech 28, report and March, 9 25, port Slavik 239-41; 1:230, 1936, pp. 166-70; U.S. 1936, in Prager Akten, No. 59); Gotthold documents in T-120, 1040/1809/413319-324 (excerpt from latter report

2, No. 1 er Beck und Staatssekretar Graf Szembek,” VaerteHiahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, Rhode, “AussenministJosef Guarantee (Locarno) if616 Mutual 740.0011 State 1936, April 2 1078, dispatch Cudahy 90-93; pp. (Jan. 1954), with Flandin in London in which (the section omitted from U.S. 1936, 1:275, dealing with Beck’s conversation Beck had categorically refused to back France in military action against Germany).

view, defending Polish policy, see Waclaw 72. D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 71, 214; D.D.B., 4, No. 14. For a different

Ambassador ofPoland (New York: Jedrzejewicz (ed.), Diplomat in Paris 1936-1939, Memoirs ofJuliusz Lukasiewicz, 8-11. pp. Papers), Lukasiewicz as cited Columbia University Press, 1970) (hereafter

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course is equally clear. Whatever judgment one might subsequently make of the wisdom of such policies, Flandin must have realized that all he could expect from Warsaw was a vote for some pious resolution in the council of the League. As for Italy, with Britain one of the two guarantor powers of the Locarno Pact, even such a vote could not be counted on, to say nothing of any meaningful steps against Germany. Still the object of sanctions, Italy was not about to join in sanctions against Germany. The Italian government was indeed upset over the way in which Germany had acted; as in 1933 Hitler had warned Mussolini that Germany would leave the disarmament conference but had not indicated that he also planned to leave the League, so now

he had informed Rome of the planned remilitarization of the Rhineland but not his intention to offer to return to Geneva. For reasons previously explained, this shocked the Italian government and momentarily strengthened the pro-French elements in the Italian Foreign Ministry. Mussolini himself, after a few days of sulking, returned to his line of tacit support for Germany. The advantages to Italy of Germany’s coup were too obvious to overlook: attention shifted from Ethiopia to the Rhineland; as for Germany’s return to the League, it would soon become apparent that it was scheduled for the Teutonic

Calends.’3 Under these circumstances, the key to the situation, which on the first days had been in Paris, now

shifted to London.

If Britain were willing to act, something

would be done; if not, there would not only be no action at all but there might well be a real breach between London and Paris. The British government was aware of this fact and attempted to secure some con-

cessions from Germany to use in restraining the French demands for joint action. They hoped for some reduction in the German troops in the Rhineland—or at least a promise of no further increases—and some commitment not to fortify the area.”4 Berlin had been anxiously watching the reactions of the other powers. Observers in the German capital noted the widespread anxiety; behind the scenes Hitler followed the reports from abroad with great care and examined the British request with his advisers. At first he was quite worried and inclined to offer concessions, but he recovered his firmness and declined to

make any concessions beyond a temporary halt in further increases in troops in the Rhineland.’? The Germans gave out a little information on their troop strength in the former demilitarized zone to show that they were not about to attack France or Belgium, but the details revealed were not specific enough to be considered an explicit commitment.’ The German people were whipped into ecstatic enthusiasm by a propaganda campaign for the new “elections” Hitler had decreed;” simultaneously, Hitler attempted 73. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 11, 18, 26, 28, 41, 45, 54, 75, 330, 350; U.S. 1936, 1:210; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 378, 396; Laurens, pp. 343-44. The real meaning of Germany’s offer should have been clear to all when the German government insisted on 8 March that Eden strike the phrase “She wished to return [to the League] now” from his statement in the House of Commons (G.D., C, 5, No. 31). 74. G.D., C, 5, No. 81. The idea may have originated with Lord Lothian; see ibid., no. 74, and Butler, Lord

Lothian, pp. 212-13. 75. G.D., C, 5, No. 84. Because of the inaccessibility of the contemporary documentation at the time various

eatly accounts of these events were written, the chronology has frequently been confused; it can now be clati-

fied. There were three crises in Betlin: the first, recorded by Hossbach and referred to above, occurred on March, before the final orders to the troops to move. The second took place right after the 8 March speech of the French prime minister, Sarraut, and is the one referred to in the text here. It pteceded the crisis of the

weekend of 12-14 March, related to the well-known telegram sent by the three German service attachés in London that will be examined shortly. For referral to Hitler of the diplomatic reports during the crucial days see the notes in G.D., C, 5. For the crisis of nerves in Berlin n 8-10 March see, in addition to the evidence summarized in Braubach, pp. 21-23, G.D., C, 5, Nos. 76; D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, Nos. 337, 394, 395; Gorlitz, Keitel, p. 91

(Keitel has reversed the sequence of the second and third crises but is nevertheless useful as a source because

he took von Blomberg’s place at a conference held on either 9 or 10 March).

76. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 23, 65. 77. See the “Richtlinien fiir den Wahlkampf,” of 10 March 1936 in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, £.

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201

to soothe opinion abroad, especially in England, by murmuring sweet assurances to the

noted English correspondent, Ward Price, on 9 March.78 With no substantial concession from Germany to use in negotiations with the other Locarno powets in London on 12-13 March, the British leaders, already moving toward

a mote setious view of the situation, began to stiffen their resolve in response to

Flandin’s arguments. During these two days, the possibility of drastic action against Germany again came to the fore; for a short time it seemed as if Great Britain either would give its blessings to a French move of some sort ot join France in sanctions itself. The choice for Britain appeared to be between a breach with France and the likelihood of further German aggression or some drastic response to the occupation of the Rhineland with some risk of immediate conflict with Germany. For a moment it looked as if the British government inclined to the second alternative.” Reports on this threatening development reached Berlin on 12-13 March, accompanied by hints that Italy was weakening in its support of Germany and accentuated by warnings from Germany’s military attachés in Paris and London that there was an imminent possibility of war.8? It was in the face of these setious contingencies that von Blomberg, the war minister, apparently urged Hitler to make some significant concessions, possibly the withdrawal of those units that had been moved furthest west.*! Von Neurath opposed any such concessions, and Hitler, after some wavering, agreed with him.® Hitler was to hold these warnings and worries against the military; the fact

that he himself eventually remained firm and came through the crisis successfully was to have later significance. The one token move that Hitler did authorize was a more precise statement of the size of German forces in the Rhineland to combat both press exaggerations of their size and any fears of a possible German attack.®* The crisis ebbed as quickly as it had arisen. The British government eventually agreed to certain gestures toward Paris in order to please the French, but all sanctions or other drastic measures against Germany were rejected. What caused this rapid turn away from a firm stand? Three factors stand out. In the first place, it was clear from the

beginning of the crisis and had been made increasingly explicit by 13 March that the British Dominions, especially the Union of South Africa and Canada, would not stand with England if it came to war. The South African government in particular was busy backing the German position in London and with the other Dominion governments.** Second, Britain’s own leaders were unwilling to risk war, and they recognized that such a

tisk was indeed present. Nothing in the record suggests that Prime Minister Baldwin had any clear idea of the issues involved. He was being advised by his friend Thomas Jones to take Hitlet’s offers at face value and otherwise do nothing, advice in which Lord Lothian, Vincent Massey, the Astors, Sir Thomas Inskip (who was about to be appointed

457, 543. 101-05. Excerpts from Hitler’s speeches in Domatus, 1:603—16, See also D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 456, Affairs 1936 78. Domatus, 1:598—601; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 383; Arnold J. Toynbee (ed.), Documents on International

Dictators (New York: (London: Oxford University Press, 1937), pp. 7-61; George Ward Price, I Know These ra 179. Holt, 1938), p.

Nos. 85, 91, 92, 127; U.S. 79. There is an excellent summary of the crisis in G.D., C, 5:236-37. See also ibid.,

1936, 1:235-36, 241-44; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 414, 425, Eden, pp. 399-403. in London), 113; D.D.F., 80. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 87-89, 94, 98 (the famous telegram of the three service attachés

taché, pp. 31-35. See also 2d, 1, No. 405; Geyr von Schweppenburg, pp. 86-88; Fitz-Randolph, Frihstiicks-At G.D., C, 5, Nos. 96, 102. aus den Alken, p. 134. 81. Testimony of Jodl, TMWC, 15:352, Gorlitz, Keitel, p. 91; Kordt, Nicht , TMWC, 10:218-19; Testimony of interpreter) (the Schmidt of Affidavit 109; 2, n. 98, No. 5, GC, G.D., 82. See von Neurath, TMWC, 17:41—-42. . Lh, 83. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 104, 112, 145, 222. U.S. 1936, 1:244, There is a brief discussion of 84. Ibid., Nos. 95, 118, 127, 175, 262; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 346;

between Britain and Germany 1935— this episode in Donald C. Watt, “South African Attempts to Mediate 1938,” Bourne and Watt, Studies in International History, pp. 406-07.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

minister for the coordination of defense), Arnold Toynbee (who had just returned from meeting Hitler), and Norman Davis (who was in London for the naval negotiations) joined wholeheartedly.85 Not only members of the cabinet but the king himself urged a peaceful settlement, and his intervention was known to the German government.®° Most important, however, was the pressure of British public opinion, influenced not only by the feeling that the demilitarization of the Rhineland had been an unjust portion of the peace settlement but seeing no good reason for risking wat over an action that, however reprehensible, did not itself involve an attack on another country—unlike the Italian attack on Ethiopia in the preceding year. As the British Secretary of State for War explained to the German ambassador in London on the evening of 8 March, “though the

British people were prepared to fight for France in the event of a German incursion into French territory, they would not resort to arms on account of the recent occupation of the Rhineland. The people did not know much about the demilitarization provisions and most of them probably took the view that they did not care ‘two hoots’ about the Germans reoccupying their own territory.’ Once this point was clear on 14 March, the denouement of the crisis was as expected. The Germans were invited to send a representative to a meeting of the League council in London, where the council members listened to von Ribbentrop imitate his

mastet’s voice before voting that Germany had indeed broken its treaty commitments.** To calm the French, the British in a meeting of the Locarno powers on 19 March agreed

to a stiff note to Germany and military staff conversations if no immediate satisfactory settlement were reached; but though the staff talks that eventually did take place annoyed the Germans, there was no real substance to this British gesture of consolation for France, and the Germans knew it.8? On the other hand, the Germans used the firm tone that the British had agreed to as an occasion for righteous indignation, rejection of all the

major proposals made to them, and further delay, delay being the main object of German policy during the last half of April and the month of May. It was in part to make it easier to secure these delays in international action by con85. See T. Jones, 8 March 1936, pp. 179-81. Norman Davis’s account of the same discussion is in the Phillips diary for 3 April 1936, Phillips Papers, 10:1420. Toynbee had just lectured in Germany at the invitation of Hans Frank’s Academy for Germanic Law in favor of revising the peace settlement in regard to South Tyrol, Austria, the Sudetenland, Eupen, Memel, and so on, and had been to see Hitler who gave him an outline of Germany’s

expansion plans for the next few yeats (in addition to the record of Jones already cited, see D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 250; The Times of London, 29 February 1936; Frank, Im Angesicht des Galgens, pp. 216-18; Memorandum of Toynbee, 8 March 1936, Foreign Office C 1814/4/18; and the not very informative section 22 in Toynbee’s

memoits, Acquaintances [London: Oxford University Press, 1967]). On Lord Lothian at this time see also D.D.F,, 2d, 1, Nos. 436, 438. 86. While the extravagant tales of Fritz Hesse, Das Spiel um Deutschland (Munich: Paul List, 1953), pp. 59ff., have been effectively demolished by Helmut Krausnick, “Legenden um Hitlers Aussenpolitik,” Vierteliabrshefie fir Zeitgeschichte, 2, No. 3 (July 1954), p. 220 and n. 10, there is ample evidence for a less spectacular role by Edward VUI (G.D., C, 5, Nos. 77, 147, 178). The British cabinet discussions of 13-16 March may be traced in Foreign

Office C 1996/4/18.

87. G.D., C, 5, No. 33; Duff Cooper, pp. 196-97. Other comments

to the same effect in the memoirs

of

Churchill, Eden, and others. The subsequent development of British opinion, especially among the general staff, can be traced in the reports of the German military attaché in London, Geyr von Schweppenburg, in T-

120, 2673/5576/passim, summatized in his memoirs, pp. 88-95. 88. On the invitation to von Ribbentrop and his stay in London see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 119, 121, 123, 124, 126, 134, 135, 138, 152, 154, 157; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 429, 437, 444; Schmidt, Svatist auf diplomatischer Biibne, pp. 320— 24; Kordt, pp. 136-44, 192; Jan Mastyk (Czech minister London) report 5, 27 March 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413088-093 (some rearranged excerpts in Prager Akten, No. 62).

89. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 162, 163, 168, 199; U.S. 1936, 1:263-64; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 454, 481, 483, 484, 498. The

proposals of 19 March are summarized in G.D., C, 5:208-14. On the military staff talks see D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 492, 493; 2, Nos. 4, 5, 19, 92, 97, 217; Eden, pp. 415-17; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 53, 63, 64, 72, 76, 99; G.D., C, 5, Nos.

122, 227, 236, 251, 259, 290, 303, 340; see also Foreign Office C 2305/ C 2361/4/18. 90. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 176, 182, 183, 186-88, 285, 286; D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, No. 521.

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

203

tinued negotiations that counterproposals accompanied Berlin’s rejection of the London proposals of 19 March when that rejection was made official.?! By that time it was evident to all that there would be no drastic action against Germany and that even economic sanctions had been tuled out.?? The German government was forced to be cautious; every effort had been made to avoid incidents that might lead to new complications.” Berlin had also had some anxious moments about the attitude of Italy. For a moment it looked as if Mussolini might consider withdrawing support ftom Germany in return for the dropping of League sanctions against Italy, but by late March he had returned firmly to a pro-German position in the negotiations..* Even Belgium was becoming increasingly reluctant to stand by France and under German pressure turned increasingly toward a neutral position.°> All Europe could see that the German triumph was complete. This triumph was symbolized by Berlin’s refusal to answer a series of questions about its counterproposals presented by the British government on its own behalf and that of France.°° The one thing Germany did not want was a set of new fixed obligations; once the various offers made by Berlin during the crisis had served their purpose of confusing public opinion abroad and deterring any military countermeasures, all German interest in them vanished. Collapse of the post-World War I security system in the face of German action was certain to lead to a complete reorientation of the policies of most of the European powers. Some of the resulting changes would take more time to make themselves felt, but immediate repercussions affected more than the European atmosphere. Each country was forced into a reexamination of the situation. Turkey could take advantage of the precedent created by Germany to end the regime of the Straits included in the Lausanne Convention.®’ Others were not so fortunate. Austria, which appeared to be

next on Hitler’s list, could only watch and hope for the best while making an effort to appease Germany. Czechoslovakia, which had gone furthest in assuring France of support in the crisis, was

both the most

disappointed

and the most

threatened

of

France’s allies. Horrified by the complaisance of the Western powers at Germany’s coup and knowing that the fortifications Germany would soon build in that area would cut off the possibility of effective aid from other countries, the Czech government was compelled to reappraise the European situation and give serious consideration to a rapprochement with Germany.” The implications for Romania were similar if less 91. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 200, 207, 208, 211, 242-44, 247; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 57, 58; D.D.F,, 2d, 1, No. 517. It should be noted that the German military was more willing to be conciliatory than the Foreign Ministry (see G.D., G 5, Nos. 230, 233). 92. G.D., C, 5, No. 214; D.D.F, 2d, 1, No. 538. 93,°G.D., CG, 5, Nos. 136, 137, 160; 218, 240: 94, Ibid., Nos. 117, 146, 149, 161, 164, 174, 177, 180, 184, 185, 219, 252, 255; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 442, 518, 526; 2yINo: 17:

it clear from the 95, G.D., C, 5, Nos. 143, 167; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 469; 2, No. 27. The Dutch had made up (G.D., C, 5, Nos. beginning of the Rhineland ctisis that they would stay out of everything—auntil swallowed

83, 128, 190, 193).

pp. 416-19; D.D.F., 96. On the early history of the “Questionnaire” and the German handling of it see Eden,

78, 82; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 2d, 1, No. 539; 2, Nos. 6, 103, 125, 126, 134, 140, 147, 162, 187; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 74, State 740.0011 Mutual 248, 266, 267, 272, 279, 280, 310, 313, 317; Mayer (Berlin) telegram 136, 7 May 1936, Foreign Office C 3458/C Guarantee (Locarno) /688; Phipps telegrams 114 of 7 May and 175 of 14 May 1936,

3662/4/18. to a Turkish note citculated about a 97, For the conference at Montreux, held in June and July 1936 in response

C, 5, No. 277; DDE, 2d, 1, passim.; month after the Rhineland occupation, see U.S. 1936, 3:503—28; G.D.,

Turks divert attention away from the Eden, pp. 471ff. The German government, in turn, was happy to have the /E 190256; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 77). Rhineland (Memorandum of von Biilow, 17 April 1936, T-120, 2373/4602

leading to the Austro-German Agreement of 98. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 308, 332; 2, No. 18. For the negotiations

; é 11 July 1936 see chap. 11. toward Germany see policy new possible a of signs eatliest the and Prague on 99. For the first tepercussions

204

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

urgent. Its government had long tried to keep on friendly relations with Germany along with its alliance with France, but now there were increasing signs of a willingness to move closer to the Third Reich.!° The economic factor that played some part in Romania’s relations with Germany was of greater importance in Yugoslavia. Its government was worried about the relief that Germany’s coup provided for Italy, the prime concern of Yugoslavia’s leaders; but certainly no steps would or could now be taken by Belgrade that would in any way antagonize its most important partner in trade.!0! When the chiefs of staff of the Little Entente met in Bucharest on 15—20 June 1936,

they maintained their military plans, especially vis-a-vis Hungary; but they agreed that the attitude of France would be the key to the future conduct of each country. If France withdrew its promise of protection from Central Europe, the allies there would be forced to choose between the two gteat powers—Germany and the Soviet Union—that flanked the region.! Their fears would have been confirmed had they known that the French setvice chiefs had concluded at the end of April that if Germany proceeded to fortify the Rhineland and did not attack through the Low Countries, France could help its East

European allies only by an operation similar to that staged at Salonika in World War 1.19 France, as these ideas showed, was determined to fight only a defensive war, defensive in

both strategy and tactics. This limited its choices; those of its allies were more restricted still.!°* In fact, it could be said that they were even more restricted than anyone as yet realized: only the sight of the French dozing in the Maginot Line while Poland was being overrun in 1939 would reveal to all that promises of assistance from Paris had been wotthless since 1936, if not before.

Pope Pius XI told the French ambassador to the Vatican on 16 March 1936 that if France had immediately sent 200,000 soldiers into the Rhineland all would have been well. He recognized that it was France’s love of peace that had restrained it but added that such an attitude would hardly prevent Germany from next taking steps against Austria and Czechoslovakia.! This aspect of the crisis—that the wish for peace might most dramatically undermine the prospects for it—was most evident within Germany itself. The absence of drastic foreign reaction to Germany’s move following upon a period of anxious waiting in Germany only encouraged the government to take risks and the German people to allow Hitler to take those risks since he seemed to come out all tight. The German public had been greatly alarmed, and now their relief and joy were all the greater. Hitler, who had acted against the counsel of his military advisers, was now all the more confident that he could assume even greater risks, disregard cautious advice, and

triumph tule had the road knew as

by bluff until he could conquer by force. His one worry at the beginning of his been that France might be led by statesmen who would act before he could take of military conquest; he was now confident that there was no such danger. He well as foreign observers that for some time at least Germany could only grow

D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 373, 423, 424, 476; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 55, 148, 256, 258. The Germans were not yet interested

in a special agreement with the Czech government (ibid., No. 268); for the negotiations for such a treaty, see chap. 12. 100. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 39, 131, 142; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 494. The removal of Titulescu as Romanian foreign

minister later in 1936 must be seen in this context.

101. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 202, 216; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 510. 102. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 365; Rudolf Kiszling, Die militdrischen Vereinbarungen der Kleinen Entente (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1959). 103. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 138; cf. ibid., No. 23; 3, Nos. 9, 38, 67, 394. 104. Ibid., 2, Nos. 369, 375. 105. Ibid., Nos. 441, 447. The Vatican had kept silent for fear of jeopardizing the rights of Catholics in

Germany (ibid., No. 342; D.D.B., 4, No. 45).

106. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 458, 467, 513; Dodd, Diary, 18 March 1936, pp. 323-24.

The Remilitarization of the Rhineland

205

stronget and less vulnerable as it continued to rearm and fortify its western border. Its position, it seemed, could only get better, its risks decrease, as the war France and Britain

had been unwilling to chance when they were in a strong position would become more and more dangerous for them.!° Neville Chamberlain recorded in his diary for 12 March 1936 that he had emphasized in his talk with Flandin “that public opinion here would not support us in sanctions of any kind. His [Flandin’s] view is that, if a firm front is maintained by France and England, Germany will yield without war. We cannot accept this as a reliable estimate of a mad dictator’s reactions.”!°° Both Chamberlain and Flandin were partially right and partially wrong. Chamberlain was probably correct in his assessment of British opinion when that opinion had never been informed as to the significance of the demilitarized zone, and we now know that Hitler at least would have

tried to fight—he was quite mad enough for that. Flandin was probably correct in the assumption that a firm front presented by Britain and France would suffice to win out, but he was wrong in thinking that it could be done without war and in his fear that France could not take care of the situation by itself. Where there was no will, all were determined to make certain that they would not find a way.

i

a

2d, 1, No. 439; U.S. 1936, 1:219-27, Shes 107. For excellent analyses of the situation see D.D.F., Hitler's No. 189. On

to aid its allies see G.D., C, 5, German awareness of the key issue of France’s future ability Hitler on 28 March 1936), p. 211. attitude, see Braubach, pp. 38-40; Frank (talk with 108. Feiling, p. 279.

Chapter 11

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936 The German-Austrian Agreement; German Relations with Italy, England, and France; Outbreak of the Spanish Civil War

he evident success of Germany in not only remilitarizing the Rhineland but securing tacit international acquiescence to this step inaugurated a drastic and obvious shift in the whole international situation. The estrangement of Italy from the Western powers had made that country more friendly to Germany, a change that affected both barriers to German expansion of which Italy was the guarantor. Italy was, de jure, one of the guaranteeing powers of Locarno; it abandoned this role in favor of Germany’s demolition of the Locarno system under the circumstances just described. De facto, Italy was the protector of Austrian independence, and Mussolini was turning away from that role at the same time. In January 1936, Mussolini had indicated to the German ambassador, Ulrich von Hassell, that the time for an Austro-German agreement had come and that he would simultaneously urge such a course on the Austrian government.! The Berlin government had noted this Italian shift with pleasure but preferred to postpone further exploration of the possibility of an agreement with Austria until after the remilitarization of the Rhineland when, presumably, better terms could be secured from Austria.

The shift in Italy’s position, growing out of its East African venture, was no secret of surprise in Vienna. Under these circumstances, the possibility of a return to more democratic governmental procedures to improve the prospects of support from the British and French public was apparently considered in Vienna.? Aware of Italy’s waning interest, the Austrian government, however, preferred to look around for diplomatic support elsewhere in preference, or in addition, to London and Paris.* A rapprochement with Czechoslovakia—and through it with the Little Entente—was one such possibility, and the Austrian chancellor, Kurt von Schuschnigg, made efforts in this direction on a

visit to Prague in January 1936.° Although the Czech government was in principle quite 1. G_D., C, 4, Nos. 485, 486. 2. Ibid., Nos. 487, 497, 545.

3. See the Austrian memorandum of 18 December 1935, in Braunthal, Tragedy ofAustria, p. 209. 4, D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 5. 5. Ibid., Nos. 74, 88; G.D., C, 4, No. 488 and p. 1043; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 1-7, 8 (German text in Acta

Historica, 1, Nos. 3-4 [1960], pp. 368-69), 9-13, 16, 23-5, 28, 33, 38, 60; U.S. 7936, 1:181-83; Schuschnigg, Austrian Requiem, chap. IX.

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936 sympathetic to Austtia’s

needs, especially in terms

of imptoved

207 economic

relations,

attempts to secure an alternative form of international support for Austria with the Little Entente powers failed in spite of French support. The renewed agitation for a Habsburg restoration was certainly in part responsible for this failure. The Austrian government was unwilling to hazard the risks attendant upon such a restoration and was equally unwilling to renounce restoration permanently. It therefore had to forego the advantages a renunciation might have brought if it had extended beyond the purely temporary restraint pressed upon Vienna by friend and foe alike.® Austria, accordingly, had neither the possible benefits in terms of the recognized independent status and stability of a restoration nor of the renunciation of restoration; leaving the question open may have been

wise in regard to domestic affairs but it was hardly productive in international affairs. Nor could the Austrian government place reliance upon Hungary. The established Rome

protocols association of Italy, Hungary, and Austria provided no basis for an

Austrian policy independent of German influence. As Schuschnigg told the Hungarian prime minister, GOmbos, and the foreign minister, Kanya, in mid-March, he wanted better relations with Germany, but a pact restricted to the topic of external aggression would not suffice; he needed an agreement against intervention in internal affairs. To the

insistence of the Hungarians that trade treaties with any Little Entente powers was one thing but that no Southeast European treaty system of an economic or political nature could be established without the immediate participation of Germany, Schuschnigg could only reply, with a smiling reference to the Rhineland occupation, that apparently Berlin reserved to itself the sole right to confront the world with a fait accompli.’ When the Rome

protocol powers

met

in Rome

on

21-23

Match

1936, both the Italian and

Hungarian leaders urged the Austrian chancellor to come to a prompt agreement with Germany, making such domestic concessions as might be necessary. Mussolini suggested that internal opposition in Austria to such a course, hitherto provided by Starhemberg and the Heimwehr, need no longer be feared, a hint that Schuschnigg—who knew that

the Heimwehr depended on Italian subsidies—doubtless understood.* Under these circumstances Schuschnigg moved toward a resumption of the tentative negotiations he had held with von Papen in the preceding year. During the early months of 1936, rectiminations in German-Austrian diplomatic contacts slowly gave way to consideration of a possible agreement.’ Even the galling affront to Austria implicit in the inclusion of such Austrian National Socialists as Theo Habicht in the German National Socialist party list of candidates for the Reichstag in the “elections” of 29 March caused no change in either Austrian or Italian calculations. Though a clear indication of Germany’s ultimate aims, the gesture provoked only oral protests.'° Starhemberg, aware of Mussolini’s

shift of policy, made

a last-minute

attempt

to arrange the Getrman-

Austrian agreement himself, using the former Austrian minister of justice, Franz Hueber, who was a Heimwehr

member

and a brother-in-law of Goring, as a go-between; but

Schuschnigg outmaneuvered his rival and succeeded in removing him from political influence in the middle of May.'' 155 18, 205.2129, 377, 43; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 6. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 34, 60, 164; Hungarian Documents, di Nose 25:14,

526, 542, 544, and pp. 1102, 1106.

:

cf. bid., Nos. 64, 68; GD, 'GisyNe: 7. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 62 (German text in Acta Historica, 7:369-72);

; 129; U.S. 1936, 1:495-96. 226, 253; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 499; 2, No. 8. Gehl, pp. 125-26; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 569, 597; 5, Nos. 165, 171, 204, Historica, 7:372-73), 72, 74, 76. Documents, 1, Nos. 41, 48, 51, 53-55, 70, 71 (German text in Acta

110; Hungarian /E 190398-400; G.D., C, 4, No. 586; By, 9. Memorandum of von Biilow, 27 January 1936, T-120, 2373/4602 56, 58. 52, 45, 27, 21, 19, Nos. 1, Documents, Hungarian 226; 80, Nos. Memorantelegram 35, 23 Match 1936, T-120, 2499/4939/E, 272276;

10. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 502; von Papen Bilow to Hess, 2 April, 778/1549/376262—263. dum of von Bulow, 26 Match, 2373/4602/E 190331; von events. See also G.D., C, 4, No. 556; 5, Nos. 90, 246, 11. Gehl, pp. 126-29, summarizes the evidence and the

1

208

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

A direct, personal contact between the leaders of Germany and Italy smoothed the way for the German-Austrian negotiations. In late March, Hans Frank, the attorney who had defended Hitler in court cases during the 1920s and after 1933 was charged by Hitler with reorienting German law according to National Socialist precepts, saw Hitler before going to Rome to lecture. Hitler asked him to deliver a friendly message of solidarity to Mussolini, assuring him of Germany’s sympathy in his Ethiopian venture and in the joint struggle against both bolshevism and the democracies. Frank talked with Mussolini on 4 April, delivered the message, and in turn received assurances of Italian support in the

cutfrent negotiations growing out of Germany’s reoccupation of the Rhineland. Mussolini’s resentment toward England and France over sanctions was still a major factor motivating Italian policy.!? The spring of 1936 was to see a number of exchange visits between Berlin and Rome, culminating in that of Mussolini’s daughter, Edda Ciano, who went to Berlin in June.'3 Such special personal diplomacy was equally important for the short-term accommodation between Germany and Austria and for the longterm rapprochement between Germany and Italy. That Hitler, not Mussolini, would set the tone for their common fate could be seen in a secondary aspect of Frank’s trip: Mussolini’s advice against conflict with the Christian churches was the only specific recommendation Frank took back to Hitler. Hitler was happy to see relations with Italy improve, but as for religious policy he would go his own way. In the spring and early summer of 1936, the German government prepared the way for an agreement with Austria not only by improving the atmosphere in German-Italian telations but also by increasing domestic pressure on the Austrian government. On the recommendation of von Papen, the Germans subsidized the militant right wing of the Austrian trade union movement, the Freibeitsbund. Suitably violent in its anti-Semitism and pronounced in its pro-National Socialist sympathies, this organization would pressure the government for concessions from the streets.!4 Simultaneously, on the diplomatic level von Papen would urge the Austrian chancellor to accept into the government men who were referred to as representatives of the “national opposition.” These men were ostensibly respectable elements in Austtian public life who could be depended upon to move Austria into close subservience to and eventual annexation by Germany. Those Austrians most prominent in this category—Edmund Glaise-Horstenau, the officer and military historian, General Carl von Bardolff, who headed the German club in Vienna, and Heinrich Ritter von Srbik, the noted historian—were all eventually

rewarded with places on Hitler’s list of National Socialist Reichstag deputies. Their opportunity to earn this honor was provided by the 1936 negotiations.!5 To avoid inci311; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 69, 89, 99; Renthe-Fink to Mackensen, II Oe 1418 of 14 May 1936, T-120,

2832/6077/E 450726.

12. On Frank’s Rome trip see G.D., C, 5, No. 255; Hans Frank, Iw Angesicht des Galgens, pp. 220-33; Aloisi, 4 April 1936, p. 366. Frank’s account is marred by obvious inaccuracies—e.g., the reference to the civil war in

Spain that had not yet started (p. 229)—but the sarcastic picture of Frank in Filippo Anfuso, Rom-Berlin im diplomatischen Spiegel (Trans. by Egon Hyman; Essen: Pohl, 1951), p. 23, is not warranted. Frank’s account of Hitler’s message to Mussolini (Frank, p. 221) corresponds closely with contemporary sources on Hitler’s views. For Frank’s trips to Italy in the 1920s and his temporary withdrawal from the NSDAP. over the South Tyrol question see Hoepke, pp. 310, 327.

13. For the careful way in which the French government observed such signs of a German-Italian rapproche-

ment see D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 127, 239, 218, 278, 325, 334, n. 1; Drummond 1936, Foreign Office R 3302/341/22.

(Rome) dispatch 658 of 5 June

14. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 172, 319 (also in TMWC, 31:200-02). It should be noted that as shrewd an observer of the

Austrian scene as G. E. R. Gedye did not realize that von Papen was paying for the Freibeitsbund (Betrayal in Central Europe [New York: Harper, 1939], pp. 176-77). 15. Bardolff had been refused an interview with Hitler in 1933 (G.D., C, 1, No. 497, n. 2) but was considered the future National Socialist leader of Austria (B.D., 2d, 6, No. 300). Von Stbik gave lectures in support of national socialism in Berlin in early 1936 (D.D.F.,, 2d, 1, No. 243). Biographies of Glaise-Horstenau, von

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936 dents that might interfere with the diplomatic

talks and negotiations

209 among

the

Austrians, those Austrians identified as National Socialists were given strict orders from

Berlin to keep quiet and refrain from terrorist acts.'6 In May-and June of 1936 the talks between Schuschnigg and von Papen moved

rapidly toward a conclusion. Schuschnigg, for reasons still not quite clear, appeats to

have believed that a German promise to respect Austtia’s independence and refrain from interfering in internal affaits would be kept and thus agreed to make concessions. In part he appears to have felt that his own position might be strengthened by a rapprochement with Berlin that would calm the situation inside Austria and that in any case he could not afford to reject an opportunity to secure Hitler’s public recognition of the independence of Austria. If Germany adhered to its promise to respect that independence and to refrain from internal intervention, it would be all to the good. If, however, Germany vio-

lated its freely given pledge, it would show up Hitlet’s duplicity once and for all. However dubious the logic of this approach—very similar to the Vatican’s in the 1933 concordat negotiations—it sufficed for the Austrian chancellor.!’ Hitler was interested in an amnesty for his followers in Austria and the entrance of representatives of the “national opposition” into the Austrian government. Obviously an agreement could only strengthen Germany’s position in Vienna, in part at the expense of Italy. The Italian government not only acquiesced but even urged agreement on Schuschnigg. Mussolini told him to settle with Germany when the two met early in June. Furthermore, on 10 June the Italian dictator dismissed Fulvio Suvich as undersecretary in the Foreign Ministry and gave up the office of foreign minister to his son-in-law, Galeazzo Ciano. Suvich had been a strong defender of Austrian independence, while Ciano, whatever his later views, started out determined to do everything differently.!* In the field of German-Austrian relations this policy would quickly bear fruit; under Italian

urging and German pressure, Schuschnigg moved toward a settlement with Berlin.” Only two possible obstacles still stood in the way of agreement. German demands might be so high as to scare off the Austrian government, which was then likely to turn to a Habsburg restoration as the only alternative support of Austrian integrity”? German willingness to make some minor concessions in the talks sufficed to avert that possibility, although Schuschnigg rejected a German demand for a Berlin veto on any restoration. The other threat to German success lay in a possible last-minute shift in Italian policy due to a rapprochement with Britain and France The Italian conquest of Ethiopia in the spring of 1936 rendered the policy of sanctions meaningless. The same fear of the impact on the European balance of a permanent realignment of Italy had previously tempered their willingness to make sanctions really effective and now hastened the desire of the Western powers to abandon sanctions lest Italy adopt a different policy in Europe when able to shift the emphasis of its influence Bardolff, and von Srbik may be found in the Reichstag handbook. 16. G.D., C, 5, No. 297; Memorandum of Renthe-Fink,

4 May 1936, T-120, 2838/6112/E 453702; Anordnungen

des Stellvertreters des Fiibrers, 3 Jane 1936, p. 297.

G.D., C, 5, Nos. 288, 294, 304; For the negotiations up to the Hitler-von Papen meeting of 10 May see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 91, 94, 96. 17. D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 108, 225, 241, 380. T-120, 2383/4619/E 198289. 18. G.D., C, 5, No. 381; cf. Neurath Memorandum RM 356, 25 April 1936, documents in G.D., C, 5, Nos. 321, 325, Published 129-31. pp. Gehl, in is negotiations the of summary A 19, Documents, 1, Nos. 101, 103-105. See 343, 344, 351, 357, 360, 369, 371; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 327, 371; Hungarian 6292—296, and A 3154 of 11 June, 778/1549/37 T-120, May, 20 of also von Papen’s reports to Hitler A 2734

2499 /4939/E 272370-372.

1, Nos. 106, 110-12, 116; von Papen to 20. G.D., G, 5, No: 393; D.D.F,, 2d, 2, No. 347; Hungarian Documents, telegram 30, 18 June, State Messetsmith 272373-380; E 2499/4939/ T-120, Hitler, A 3281 of 17 June 1936,

863.01/354.

210

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

from the African continent. In June and early July of 1936, France and Britain made an attempt to restore their earlier relationship with Italy, but this attempt failed completely, only underlining the extent to which Mussolini had already shifted toward Germany. Future historians with full access to the Italian archives may come to the conclusion that whatever chance there might have been for a return to Stresa had been lost in April and May of 1936 when French efforts to hasten a rapprochement with Rome were wrecked by the interaction of the continued reluctance of the British public to abandon its attachment to the League’s policy in Africa with the exaltation of the Italians over their final triumph in Ethiopia, a triumph involving a large-scale use of poison gas. Mussolini would not by some moderate gesture build a bridge over the gulf that the British did not yet care to cross. Once more the Western powers chose the worst of alternatives: they would neither prevent an Italian victory that effectively destroyed the League! nor quickly make the best of a bad situation by abandoning a lost policy at a time when such a shift might still have influenced the Italian government.” Perhaps Mussolini was merely holding out a return to Stresa as bait designed to gain him an early end to sanctions and possibly even recognition of his African empire while actually intending to move toward Germany all along. The Western powers would never find out as they allowed the critical weeks to go by. Neville Chamberlain’s speech of 10 June, referring to hopes placed in the continuation of sanctions as the “very midsummer of madness,” was criticized by some as made too soon when in fact it came too late to have any significant effect on the international situation. At almost the same time as Suvich’s dismissal, the Popular Front under Léon Blum came to power in France. Given Mussolini’s animosity toward Eden, this combination of government changes made any rapprochement between France, England, and Italy unlikely. However strongly Léon Blum might wish to work for peace, there would be no eatly echo of his hopes from Rome.”4 By the time Mussolini might have reevaluated his policy, the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War and Italian intervention in that conflict had already confirmed his new course. The choices made in Rome in the winter of 1935-36 proved to be even more far-reaching than anyone in Italy may have realized at the time.° Under these circumstances, the German-Austrian negotiations proceeded rapidly to a successful conclusion. The agreements signed on 11 July, after von Papen and GlaiseHorstenau had secured Hitler’s approval, provided for German recognition of Austrian independence and for Austria to follow a course closer to Germany in international affairs. A variety of other provisions covered both some accommodation on outstanding issues and mechanisms for the preparation of further economic and cultural agreements, but the real significance of the event is not evident from the texts to which Schuschnigg affixed his name.”° The Austro-German agreement marked a major triumph for Hitler in 21. See Stanley Baldwin’s statement on 13 April that he would not allow the African situation to lead to war; Germany was the greater danger but had to be dealt with softly until Britain rearmed (D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 63). 22. Laurens, pp. 354-56, places a major part of the responsibility for the failure to conciliate Italy on Léon Blum, but partly contradicts himself by stressing Mussolini’s own intransigeance. 23. Chamberlain had himself opposed the lifting of sanctions earlier; see his diary entry for 2 May 1936, in Feiling, p. 281; cf. Eden, pp. 432-34. The negotiations of April-May 1936 can best be traced in the French diplomatic documents, 2d series, 2. esp. Nos. 46, 73, 90, 111, 112, 133, 144, 149, 150, 173, 233, 234, 245, 248, 262, 265, 271, 272, 286, 293, 294. See also Vansittart’s memorandum of 21 May in Colvin, pp. 105-06.

24, D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 275. 25. The last efforts to divert Italy from its pro-German course and thus to reorient its Austrian policy ate summarized in Gehl, pp. 131-32. See also G.D., C, 5, Nos. 26. Texts in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 152, 153. On the concluding 395, 401, 407, 408, 415, 423, 424, 447; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 27; von Papen to von Neurath telegram 79, 23 June 1936,

410, 415; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 311, 312, 332, 417. stages of the negotiations see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 389, 388, 422; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 121-23, 125— T-120, 2499/4939/E 272382; Messersmith telegram

36, 9 July, State 863.01/369; Messersmith dispatches 823, 10 July and 833, 17 July, State 863.00/1295 and 1296; Messersmith to Hull, 20 July 1936, Library of Congress, Cordell Hull Papers, Foldet 91. See also the reference to

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

aM |

supplanting Italian influence in Vienna and in heralding a new role for Germany in Southeast Europe. In a mote technical diplomatic context, here was another victory for bilateral over multilateral negotiations.?” The signing of the agreement in the same week that marked the official burial of sanctions against Italy by the League symbolized the demise of the concept of collective security. As for German adhetence to the promise not to interfere in Austrian internal affairs, that would continue only as long as Germany found it in its own interests to do so, regardless of any agreement. The secretary general in the Austrian Foreign Ministry,

Franz Peter, expressed Austrian worries over this question the day before the agreement was signed.”* An internal political measure of the Austrian government would eventually be used by Hitler as the occasion for annexing that country; if he paid some attention for a short time to his promise of noninterference in Austrian internal affairs, it was because he had already decided to build up fortifications in the Rhineland and continue rearmament before turning to new adventures to the south and east.”? On 16 July Hitler explained this rationale to Austrian National Socialist leaders: they would have to keep quiet until Germany was ready to move. Incidents that endangered Germany’s relations with Britain and France and threatened the developing friendship with Italy would only interfere with the ultimate aims of German policy. However disappointed for the moment, the Austrian National Socialists would have to work quietly and wait.*° In the meantime, Hitler could wave off British concerns about his aggressive intentions and

move forward with the improvement of relations with Italy. In the one area where the two prospective partners might clash, Mussolini had yielded to Germany; perhaps Hitler thought it only fair that Italy should thus repay his renunciation of South Tyrol. As Jurgen Gehl put it: “Hitler had postponed the Anschluss, which he could not achieve anyhow for the time being, and gained Mussolini’s friendship in return; Mussolini had

renounced a policy which he had found impossible to continue and maintained Austria’s independence at the same time.”3! Von Papen had attained the first major goal of his mission and offered to give up his post; but when Hitler talked to him at Bayreuth on 20 July, he decided to keep von Papen in Vienna and promote him to ambassador. It was in those same days at Bayreuth that Hitler made two other fateful decisions: to intervene in the Spanish Civil War and to appoint Joachim von Ribbentrop as ambassador to Great Britain.22 ‘These decisions involved Germany’s policies in the summer of 1936 toward Britain, Spain, and, by implication, toward Italy. The Austrian question occupied Hitler

only briefly as his attention was demanded by other concerns. In Germany’s policy toward Great Britain, the naval aspect played a role in 1936 as it had in 1935, though in nowhere near as spectacular a manner. The British government wished to associate the Germans with the London Naval Conference in the early months of 1936 and eventually overcame French reluctance in this regard; but the conference— primarily because of Japan’s departure from the naval limitations program—led to no significant results, and only a limited agreement between Great Britain, the United States, As eer chs Sowa aati l A 0 October 1936, PS-3623 (National the last stages of the negotiations in Seyss-Inquart to Glaise-Horstenau, 9 Archives). 27. D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 432, 455.

Documents,1, Nos. 143, 144. 28. U.S. 1936, 1:317. Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 439, 440, 474; Hungarian

18 May 1936 in U.S. 1936, 1:300-03. 29. This is reflected in Bullitt’s report on his talk with von Neurath on ty

(D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 69, 121). The Austrian minister to Germany had come to the same conclusion 34:16-17. Paul Bargeton, political TMWG, 4005-PS, in 1942, in given Rainer, 30. See the account of Friedrich 2d, 2,No.

Anschluss in April 1936 D.D.E., director at the Quai d’Orsay, predicted that this was the toad to the the Germans to wait until 1938 (ibid., 113); the chief of the Austrian general staff, General Jansa, also expected Documents, 1, No. 129. Hungarian see Vienna in chargé Hungarian the by assessment an No. 116). For 5, No. 457. 31. Gehl, pp. 133-34. See also U.S. 1936, 1:322-25; G.D., C, 32. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 455, 475; D, 1, Nos. 158, 159:

22

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

and France was signed on 25 March.*3 On the German side, the talks of February and Match had shown that, in regard to procedure, Hitler wanted von Ribbentrop to handle formal political negotiations; Germany would push for maximum construction for itself, using the alleged danger from the Soviet Union as the handiest excuse of the moment. A brief ruckus with the British over cruiser types was smoothed over by nominal concessions from the German side, but the course of the German-British negotiations on naval questions from May to October 1936 reveals the public posture of Germany, as set by Hitler in accordance with Admiral Raeder’s advice, as being entirely uncompromising on any matters that touched the building program the German navy was developing.» That program was designed to build up a force to fight France; the German navy still hoped that Britain would be neutral in such a conflict. The general thrust of the naval planning for war with France, however, was offensive, not defensive, in character and

looked toward attacks on French shipping connections across the Atlantic as well as to North Africa.*° The types of ships—heavy cruisers and aircraft carriers—that Germany was starting to build in pursuance of that strategy were, of course, the very ones that could be used for a similar conflict with England, a conflict for which the longer-range preparations of the German navy inaugurated in 1935 were also preparing the Third Reich. Important influences were being brought to bear on the English government to keep open a line to Germany and perhaps work out a better relationship. A combination of German wooing and English interest was at work. With Stanley Baldwin as prime minister, ineffectual pessimism in foreign affairs had succeeded the ineffectual optimism of Ramsay MacDonald at 10 Downing Street. As Baldwin told his friend Thomas Jones: “With two lunatics like Mussolini and Hitler you can never be sure of anything. But I am determined to keep the country out of war... . You will not get our people for a long time yet to be willing to pledge themselves to go to war for objects in the east of Europe.’ It was in this atmosphere that in May and June 1936 Baldwin considered a personal meeting with Hitler, and the British government suggested that the Germans invite a British minister, possibly ‘Lord Halifax, to Berlin. Nothing came of either scheme.?’ On the British side, there was suspicion and eventually disillusionment as Berlin refused even to answer the British questionnaire concerning a possible new set of international agreements to replace the destroyed Locarno system.38 33. The relationship of Germany to the conference can be traced in U.S. 1936, 1:40-42, 58-60, 63-64, 68, 71,

73, 78-81, 88, 94; G.D., C, 4, Nos. 555, 584, 585, 589, 596, 599, 601, 605; 5, Nos. 6, 10, 46, 144; D.D.F, 2d, 1, Nos. 90, 141, 153, 198, 500. 34, The negotiations may be followed in G.D., C, 5, Nos. 309, 323, 331, 336, 337, 355, 361, 366, 402, 421, 431,

445, 448, 456, 459, 470, 486, 496, 529, 560, 563, 564, 571; D.D.F,, 2d, 2, No. 301; Kordt, Nicht aus den Akten,

pp: 145-46. During these negotiations, the Germans also acknowledged that they were again fortifying the

island of Heligoland in violation of Article 115 of the Treaty of Versailles (G.D.,, C, 5, No. 418; “Anweisung Nr.

598,” 19 June 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.S¢. 101/6, f. 391). 35. For details see Gemzell, pp. 42-50, 82.

36. T. Jones, 30 April 1936, p. 191. For recognition of British unwillingness to assume new continental commitments see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 32, 35, 95.

37. On the proposed Hitler-Baldwin meeting and the proposed trip of Lord Halifax see T. Jones, pp. 194-224 and 251-59, passim; U.S. 1936, 1:304, 332; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 322, 326, 367, 379, 384; D.D.F,, 2d, 2, No. 283. The entries in Eden’s diary for 20 May and 3 June, quoted in Eden, p. 421, belong in this context. See also Annelies von Ribbentrop (ed.), Joachim von Ribbentrop, Zwischen London und Moskau (Leoni: Druffel, 1954), pp. 67-68. The imagination boggles at the effort to visualize Baldwin and Hitler conversing. 38. On the protracted British efforts to secure an answer to their questions about German policy see D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 187, 194, 298, 309; D.D.B., 4, No. 83; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 322, 348, 359, 375, 379, 412, 416; History of the Times, p. 902; Eden, p. 420; Mayer (Berlin) telegram 199, 26 June 1936, State 740.0011 Mutual Guarantee

(Locarno) /713; and Foreign Office C 3829/4/18. It is not surprising that the British were upset by Germany’s using the publication of the questionnaire as an excuse for not answering since they believed a leak in Berlin had forced publication on them (Atherton

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

213

From the German side, there was a willingness to exchange pleasant words, but ada-

mant refusal to come to any concrete—and thus limiting—definition of German demands and possible concessions. Von Ribbentrop, therefore, could not repeat his triumph of the preceding summer as London increasingly recognized that the offers made by Hitler at the time of the remilitarization of the Rhineland in fact had never been intended seriously.» The sentiments voiced to von Ribbentrop by important people in England, however, can only have convinced him that Germany need not be concerned

about Britain’s European policy. Lord Lothian was preaching British agreement to the German annexation of Austria, Danzig, and Memel, while Sir Thomas Inskip, whom no

one ever accused of either great energy or great competence, had been appointed to coordinate Britain’s defense establishment.‘ The privately expressed suspicions of Neville Chamberlain that Germany would not act in good faith! and the public speech of Duff Cooper, Secretary of State for War, emphasizing the continued association of France and England were harbingers of a distant future rather than significant events of the time.‘? The current situation was affected more by the change of government in France. The electoral victory of the Popular Front in France, the wave of strikes immediately following, and the subsequent formation of the government of Léon Blum had the paradoxical effect of bringing closer together the leaders while separating even further the followers

of the British and French

governments.

Anthony

Eden, who

directed British foreign policy during the semiretirement of Baldwin in the late summer of 1936, found Blum and his foreign minister, Yvon Delbos, vastly more congenial than their predecessors, Albert Sarraut and Pierre-Etienne Flandin.4? The shift to the left

represented by developments in France, however, could be and was exploited by the German government as an ideological supplement to the Franco-Soviet Pact and as grist for anti-Communist propaganda that was being intensified in 1936 and was correctly assumed to have some influence on the conservative followers of the British government.44 The German government preferred to exploit the possibility of dividing the two Western powers rather than to respond positively to the friendly approaches of the new French government. Though aware of the fact that, in spite of its anti-National Socialist inclinations and

the presence of Léon Blum, a Jew, as prime minister, the new government of France wanted good relations with Germany in continuation of the traditional anti-Versailles proclivities of the French Left, Berlin carefully turned a deaf ear to all approaches from

Paris.42 Under these circumstances, the British, French, and Belgians discussed with each

other what to do about a replacement for the Locarno Treaty and after much irresolute deliberation decided to call for a new Five-Power conference in the fall of 1936. By that time Germany and Italy in concert were refusing to participate in any new security [London] dispatch 2207, 22 May 1936, State 740.0011 Mutual Guarantee (Locarno)/700).

Bundesarchiv Bramrner, Z.S8. 39. G.D., C, 5, No. 405; Dertinger’s “Tnformationsbericht Nr. 21,” 19 June 1936, of 26 May 1936, Foreign Office C 101/29, f. 241-51; British Foreign Office minutes on Phipps telegram 183

3879/4/18.

2d, 2. No. 243; Foreign Office C 40. Butler, Lord Lothian, pp. 213-15, 354-62; T. Jones, pp. 214-16; D.D.F,

4184/4/18. 41. Butler, p. 215.

42. Duff Cooper, O/d Men Forget, pp. 202-04; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 387.

'

very hard on Flandin — esp. pp. 43, The views of Eden emerge clearly from his memoirs. He comes down on his predecessors (p. 429). A be would he nt improveme the at 423-25) and comments on Blum: “I rejoiced were reciprocal. careful reading of the French diplomatic documents suggests that the feelings ngen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 2. September AAMIDUDIE, Ody 2,Nos: 2309231,°297793 7, 323; “Bestellu 131. f. 101/8, Z.Sg. » Bundesatchiv Brammer,

pe

2d, 2, Nos. 352) S19 US, C, 5, Nos. 314, 345, 350, 358, 387, 388, 411, 414, 422, 499, 521; D.D.F,,

2373/4602/E 190290-291. 1936, 1:315—16; Memorandum of von Biilow, 25 May 1936, T-120,

214

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

scheme, though couching their declinations in polite, ever-ingenious excuses for postponement of discussions.*° Of fateful long-range importance for Germany’s relations with the Western powers was the appointment of von Ribbentrop as ambassador to London in the summer of 1936. The appointment was initially designed in part to appease von Ribbentrop by giving him a significant appointment when von Neurath displayed unaccustomed energy in opposing von Ribbentrop’s appointment to the post of Secretary of State vacated by the sudden death of Bernhard von Bilow.*’ Initially expected to improve relations between Germany and England, the new ambassadorial appointment was to have the opposite effect. Von Ribbentrop would leave England convinced of British opposition to Germany and equally convinced of its inability to do so with any real danger to Germany.*8 He approached his task with what can only be called idiotic ideas about bribing his way to success in London.” He returned an advocate of war against Great Britain.5° The impression he himself made in England was most unfavorable. His long delay in going to London to assume his post, his lengthy absences from his assignment there, and his general demeanor made few friends.*! The implications of all this would become evident in later years when von Ribbentrop became German foreign minister. Hitler’s own attitude toward negotiations for any new treaties with the Western powers was made crystal clear by an incident relating to what was essentially a minor point but a most revealing one all the same. Part XII of the Treaty of Versailles had contained a number of provisions for international regulation of certain rivers and canals in Germany.°? There had been some negotiations about revising these provisions in accordance with German wishes, but at the time of the crisis over the Rhineland the German

government had denied any intention of denouncing this part of the treaty or even making amicable revision a prerequisite for Germany’s return to the League.*? A variety of negotiations took place during the summer of 1936, and tentative agreements satisfactory to Germany were initialed on 4 May concerning the Rhine and on 5 October concerning the river Elbe. The issue was obviously on the road to an amicable solution.* 46. No useful purpose would be served by reviewing these negotiations. They may be traced in: D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 324, 377, 386, 405, 407, 411, 414, 431, 450, 464, 468, 470, 473, 478; 3, passim.; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 391, 417, 425, 428, 435, 446, 463, 466, 471, 474, 475, 477, 478, 484, 487-89, 515, 530-33, 541, 546-48, 552, 558, 561, 585, 596, 601, 607, 617, 631, 632; D, 3, Nos. 66, 85; Eden, p. 439; U.S. 1936, 1:327—-28, 347, 353-55, 384-87; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 86, 87, 89-91, 93-98, 100-102, 105-11, 124, 125, 127, 141, 143, 152, 155, 162-64, 169, 171-73, 180, 185; Ciano’s Diplomatic Papers (ed. Malcolm Muggeridge, trans. Stuart Hood; London: Odhams, 1948), pp. 19, 20-21, 22; “Vertrauliche Bestellung fur die Redaktion,” 9 October 1936, Bundesarchiv Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, £. 219; Dodd telegram 305, 17 October 1936, State 740.0011 Mutual Guarantee (Locarno) /825; Foreign

Office C 4721/C 5228/C 7712/4/18. 47. TMWC, 40:472-73; Jacobsen, pp. 301-02. See also G.D., C, 5, No. 601, on von Ribbentrop’s view of his

assignment, and Szembek’s diary, 14 August 1936, pp. 201-02, for von Ribbentrop’s reaction to his appoint-

ment. 48. Johnson (U.S. chargé a.i. London) dispatch 3879, 8 February 1938, State 862.00/3745. 49. He had originally wanted a million Reichsmatk in pounds in 1935 (“Notiz fiir den Fihrer,” 29 October 1935, 1169-PS, National Archives), and then tried again in 1936 (Note by Ritter,

5 November 1936, DZA

Potsdam, 60964, f. 29). He discussed the subject with the press attaché of the German embassy in London (Fitz-Randolph, Frihsticksattaché aus London, pp. 80-81). 50. See G.D., D, 1, No. 93, and the comments

of Hewel about von Ribbentrop’s views in Picker, Hitlers

Tischgesprache, pp. 238-39. 51. U.S. Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles reporting on his talk with King George VI and Queen Elizabeth on 11 March 1940, wrote: “Both the King and Queen spoke with vehement detestation of Ribbentrop....” The report is at Hyde Park; other parts are printed in U.S. 1940, 1:21-117. 52. The provisions themselves and a summary of their history in the interwar years nay be found in U.S. 1979, 13:647-91. 53. D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 237, 382, 398; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 3, 69. 54, G.D., C, 5, Nos. 497, 614, p. 1113 and n. 11; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 223223) june 41936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg 101/29, f. 253-59; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 13. August

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

215

When Hitler was informed that Germany’s demands had been met and a new treaty— this one for the Elbe—was to be signed on 24 November, he decided that Germany would under no circumstances agree to revision of the peace treaties by mutual consent, Instead, Germany would unilaterally denounce the relevant sections of the peace treaty, and do so in time to prevent an agreed solution.55 The denunciation was made on 14 November. It could hardly be considered a good omen for peaceful revision or a model procedure encouraging Germany’s neighbors to strive for new agreements. But few took notice.>° Aside from the international complications growing out of the Spanish Civil War, soon to be discussed, German relations with the Western powers in the summer and fall

of 1936 saw some spectacular but actually not very significant visits and an unspectacular trend that produced a major diplomatic shift in Germany’s favor. The visits that attracted much attention were those of Hjalmar Schacht to Paris in August and that of David Lloyd George to Hitler in September, but the move that counted was made by Belgium in October. Schacht’s visit to Paris must be seen as the temporary interaction of two otherwise unrelated developments: Germany’s interest in colonies and Schacht’s declining influence in German affairs. The colonial question had played no special role in German foreign policy in the preceding years; to clarify its more prominent appearance at this time, a brief review of the subject and its earlier treatment in National Socialist Germany is necessary. In Mein Kampf, as in his second book, Hitler had condemned the colonial policy of the Second Reich, primarily because it was not a colonial policy at all in the sense that he wished the term used. Colonialism to him meant the acquisition of territories suitable for German settlement after the expulsion, extermination, or enslavement of the local popu-

lation. Lands suitable for such treatment were in his opinion available only in Eastern Eutope—those suitable for European settlement outside the European continent having been preempted by others before Germany appeared on the colonial scene. From this perspective, the acquisition of Germany’s colonial empire in the last two decades of the nineteenth century had been merely a facet of Germany’s trade policy with harmful effects on Germany’s diplomatic position in the world and no compensating benefits in terms of land suitable for settlement. During the 1920s, the National Socialist party paid relatively little attention to the continuing agitation by colonial enthusiasts in Germany; but with the seizure of power, the party inherited the German colonial movement and

“coordinated” it, a process that was simplified by the strongly rightist character of the members and leaders of colonial societies.>” 1936,” ibid., Z.Sg. 101/8, £. 97.

18, 25. For information 55, The documents recording Hitler’s decision will be published as G.D., C, 6, Nos.

Germany at the time that Hitler’s personal reversal of the German Foreign Ministry’s policy was known outside see report No. 32 of 26 November

1936, by Krno, the Czech minister at The Hague, Czech document in T-

120, 1040/1809/413247—248.

D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 491; D.D.B., 4, No. 56. For the German step and its repercussions see U.S. 1936, 1:372-74; Bundesarchiv, Brammer, ZS8. 101/8, f. 180; “Bestellung vertraulich und sehr wichtig!” 14 November 1936, 1936, Czech document in T-120, 315; Krno (Czech minister at The Hague) report 30, 17 November

27, 26 November 1936, Czech docu1040/1809/413245—246; Kiinzl-Jizersky (Czech minister Bern) report

in Getmany, Auswartiges Amt, Aussenment in T-120, 1040/1809/413358—362; and the documents collected

Halbjabr 1936 (Nur far Dienstgebrauch; politische Dokumente 1936, Heft 2: Aussenpolitische Vorgdnge im xweiten The whole incident is reviewed Munich). te, Zeitgeschich fiir Institut in (copy 1937) Berlin: Reichsdruckerei, used the German action to immediately Poles the Ironically, 2. n. 79, p. briefly in Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, in regard to the Oder River and its reverse a Hague Court decision against them and favoring Germany 1936, p. 217). tributaries (cf. U.S. 1919, 13:662, and Szembek, 14 November

gee

dye

of German Colonialism,’ Nationalism and 57. The survey by Mary E. Townsend, “Hitler and the Revival ed.; New York: Columbia University Earle, M. (Edward Hayes Internationalism, Essays Inscribed to Carlton J. H.

216

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

In view of the low priority then assigned to the colonial issue by Hitler, those who were interested in the subject were allowed some time to work out reconciliation between the policy of Lebensraum in Europe and colonial aspirations elsewhere. By 1936— 37 this synthesis was developing; it is presented most succinctly by Hermann Behrens in an article appropriately entitled “Eastern and Colonial Policy—Their Complementary Necessity” in the October 1937 issue of Deutscher-Kolonial-Dienst.® Behrens, the associate editor of this organ of the colonial policy office of the National Socialist party, asserted that Germany needed both land for settlement and taw materials in which it was deficient. While Eastern Europe was suitable for settlement, it lacked many of the raw materials Germany required; conversely, colonial territories in Africa would provide the raw materials but were unsuitable for settlement. Germany obviously had to have both. While organizational and ideological questions of colonial policy were being considered inside Germany with the bureaucratic infighting characteristic of the Third Reich, little had been done in the diplomatic field.*? There was a brief flurry in the press about the former German possessions under Japanese mandate in 1933 when Japan left the League and in 1935 when its withdrawal became final, but the only result of this was to point up the sensitivity of the Japanese government in regard to these Pacific islands. In the spring of 1933 there were some discussions of colonial problems between Germany and Italy, but nothing came of them either.! Caution was the order of the day; Hitler authorized a little colonial propaganda, but it was all to be in low key, stressing Germany’s rights but not attacking anyone.®* Hitler touched on the colonial question in his conversation with Sir John Simon in the spring of 1935, tying the colonial issue to any German return to the League of Nations, possibly in response to a suggestion from the head of the Reich Colonial League; but he drew back as soon as Simon indicated opposition.® Press, 1950), pp. 399-430, has been replaced by Wolfe W. Schmokel, Dream of Empire: German Colonialism,

1919-1945 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1964), a useful but in many ways inadequate book. From East Germany, there is Horst Ktthne, “Zur Kolonialgeschichte des faschistischen deutschen Imperialismus (1933— 1939),” Zeitschrift fiir Geschichtswissenschaft, 9 (1961), 514-37. The best treatment is Klaus Hildebrand, Vom Reich zum Weltreich, Hitler, NSDAP und Roloniale Frage 1919-1945 (Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1969). For the most active period of German colonial preparations, see Gerhard L. Weinberg, “German Colonial Plans and Policies

1938-1942,” Geschichte und Gegenwartsbewusstsein, Festschrift fir Hans Rothfels (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck Ruprecht, 1963), pp. 462-91. 58. “Ost- und Kolonialpolitik: ihre ergianzende Notwendigkeit,” Deutscher Kolonial-Dienst, 2, No. 10 (Oct. 1937),

1-8. 59. The account in Schmokel, chap. 1, is useful; but for von Ribbentrop’s role earlier in 1937 (Schmokel, p- 30),

see von Ribbentrop’s letter of 3 July 1935, claiming control of colonial policy, quoted in Horst Kiithne, “Die

Finfte Kolonne des faschistischen deutschen Imperialismus in Siidwestafrika (1933-1939),” Zedtschrift fiir Geschichtswissenschaft, 8 (1960), 778, n. 48; von Ribbentrop’s Minute for Hitler of 28 August 1936, G.D., C, 5,

No. 520; and Jacobsen, pp. 296-98. Very detailed is Hildebrand, pp. 248-451. 60. Gerhard L. Weinberg, “Deutsch-japanische Verhandlungen tiber das Stidseemandat, 1937-1938,” Vierte/Jabrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichte, 4, No. 4 (Oct. 1956), 391 and n. 4; see also German Foreign Ministry, “Stichworte fiir die miindliche Information der Presse,” 18 March 1933, T-120, 2998/6694/H 099788; von Dirksen (Tokyo) report 1169, 29 March 1935, T-120, 2673/5575/E 400034—037; G.D., C, 4, No. 73; andJ. Reimers’s Gottingen

1936 dissertation, “Das japanische Kolonialmandat und der Austritt Japans aus dem Vélkerbund.” Schmokel (pp. 140-41) appeats to have missed most of the material relevant to this issue.

61. G.D., C, 1, Nos. 171, 172, 176, 181. 62. “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz vom 8.2.34,” “. . . vom 7. Mai 1934,” “. . vom 7. Februar 1935.7 Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/3, f. 63, 215, and 101/5, f. 36; Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 4 May 1934, p. 28.

63. G.D., C, 3, No. 555, pp. 1062-64. Hitler had noted with interest Schnee’s memorandum on the colonial question of 20 March 1935 (ibid., No. 549), but the date leaves uncertain whether he saw it before or after the talk with Simon (see T-120, 3611/9785/E 687259), Hildebrand argues that until 1935 Hitler used restraint in colonial questions as a means of trying for England’s agreement to German eastward expansion, while afterward he used the colonial demand as a threat to secure such agreement. I am not convinced that the evidence supports such a clear line, at least for the mid-

1930s.

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

217

The obvious British reluctance to move on this issue at a time when Hitler still thought of himself as wooing that country and the difficulties experienced by the National Socialists in former German Southwest Africa in the face of the determined Opposition of the South African government which did not wish its platonic expressions of friendship for Germany converted into substantive concessions at its own expense led Hitler to maintain a most cautious attitude in 1935 and to keep German colonialist propaganda within bounds.® In an interview with the president of United Press in November 1935, Hitler said that Germany would never renounce its colonial demands, but he assured his listener that he would never make war on that account, an assurance

that von Ribbentrop removed from the official text of the conversation. As Germany grew stronger, Hitler appears to have thought that at some time the Western powers

would give Germany a mandate without concessions on his patt except, conceivably, a return to the League.°° Comments to this effect began to appear in Germany’s diplomatic conversations and in its press in the early months of 1936, and Hitler himself referred to it in his Reichstag speech of 7 March about the Rhineland.°’ The triumph of Italy in East Africa contributed its share to accentuating the colonial question.®* The subject was clearly in the air and was beginning to play a greater role in the thinking of the Berlin government. This may explain why Hitler allowed Schacht to try his hand at securing a return of colonies to Germany in August 1936. Schacht had long been interested in the question of colonies for Germany, primarily as a soutce of raw materials, and he appears to have seriously believed that some of

Germany’s economic problems could be solved by the return of the colonies lost at the end of World War I. In his years as Hitler’s economic assistant, he would bring up the colonial subject whenever possible. He urged upon Hitler the need for colonies in Africa, arguing that expansion in Eastern Europe led into areas as densely populated as Germany itself (and not realizing that Hitler expected to depopulate them by force). In September 1935 he had impressed upon S. R. Fuller, President Roosevelt’s unofficial emissary, the importance he attached to Germany’s securing colonies for economic

reasons. pression out the colonies

Fuller’s report to Roosevelt in October obviously made a considerable imon the president.”’ At another meeting Roosevelt suggested that Fuller sound Germans about the idea of leasing mines and other economic concessions in to meet their economic needs. When Fuller raised this possibility with Hitler

and Schacht, the reception was interested rather than enthusiastic, although Schacht him-

“. .. vom 7.9.1935,” “... 64. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 47, 263; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferenz vom 26.8.1935,” 69. See also the excerpts f. 101/7, and 94, 70, £. 101/6, Z.Sg. Brammer, Bundesarchiv, vom 29, Januar 1936,”

from

a letter of Lammers

to several state and party agencies of November

1935, quoted in Kuhne,

“Stidwestafrika,” p. 766; and the last paragraph of D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 181.

765.84/2809. 65. Domarus, 1:557—59; Dodd telegram 229, 30 November 1935, State

1935 in which this assertion is 66. The account of a supposed meeting of Hitler with an old friend in December attributed to him rings true (D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 15, 57). No.

on 24 February 1936 (D.D.F., 2d, 1, 67. Von Neurath mentioned it to the Romanian minister, Comnen, for the press campaign, see ibid., Nos. 15, 267); No. (ibid., after soon Comnen to it mentioned 237); Rosenberg Japan see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 195, 196; for in campaign this of reception the for 134, 181, 233, 234; 2, No. 128; C, 5, No. 3. G.D., and 1:595 the reference in Hitler’s speech of7 March see Domatus,

68. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 208. d, pp. 204 ff. 69. See, e.g., U.S. 1933, 1:532-33; G.D., C, 1, No. 222; Hildebran

extends this distinction to other conservative 70. G.D., C, 3, No. 544. Hildebrand (pp. 228-29, 263-64) in contrast to Hitler’s schemes of eastward materials raw supporters of Hitler who saw colonies as sources of

settlement. as American consul general and does not cite 1. US. 1935, 2:282-86 (Schmokel mistakenly identifies Fuller Hull, 28 Fuller to Roosevelt, 11 October 1935; Roosevelt to the relevant documents from Hyde Park); Park, P.P.F. 2616. October; Roosevelt to Fuller, 14 November, all Hyde

218

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

self had had similar ideas a decade before.” Before the meeting with Hitler, Schacht urged Fuller to impress upon Hitler the great cost of armaments as an argument for reducing the rearmament program in Germany. In this manner, Schacht was trying to enlist Fuller in his own struggle for policy and power in the German economy. In the winter of 1935-36, the German economy began its shift from a rearmament boom in which unutilized resources were put to work into a period of economic crisis with competing priorities during which Schacht struggled with party leaders, especially Goring, over the control and direction of the German economy.” Eventually he was to lose that struggle, out of which the Four-Year Plan would emerge as the symbol of his failure; but while engaged in it, better relations with the western powers

looked

to

Schacht like a way to cut armament costs and bring relief to Germany’s raw material shortages by securing colonies.’* He wanted to try his hand at negotiations to accomplish such gains for Germany; although there is no direct evidence on the subject, it appears that he consulted Hitler, who authorized him to go ahead. Since Hitler planned to make no concessions in return for colonial gains, presumably he felt that there was nothing to be lost by allowing Schacht to make the effort. Schacht went to Paris in August 1936 and discussed the colonial question with Léon Blum.” Blum, who was most interested in some permanent accommodation with Germany if that was at all possible and who was prepared to pay a price for it, was apparently favorably inclined to the idea of returning some colonies to Germany. In any such program, the Cameroons would be the obvious contribution of France. Though any definite steps toward actually handing over territories, even if a mandate of France, would be subject to agreement by the British, the impression Berlin received from the Paris talks was that a positive response would be forthcoming.’ For the time that the German government thought that there was such a possibility, the German press was instructed to keep quiet on the subject.’’ Hitler touched on the topic briefly in his opening proclamation to the Nuremberg party rally on 9 September, but in the most general terms.’’ Early in October, however, the Germans were to learn that they were not to receive any presents of colonies. The British government had gone the way of unilateral concessions once in the Anglo-German naval agreement of 1935; they were not about to repeat that performance. They now reinforced the inclination of the French government, hinted at by Blum to Schacht and subsequently indicated by FrancoisPoncet to Hitler, not to discuss any colonial concessions to Germany except within the 72, Fuller memoranda of his talks with Hitler and Schacht on 1 April 1936, are in Hyde Park, P. P. F. 2616; cf. Schmokel, p. 85. See above, p. 123, for Roosevelt’s authorization.

73. Schweitzer, Big Business in the Third Reich, pp. 537-47. 74. D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 352, 355.

75. Schmokel, pp. 97-99; Earl R. Beck, Verdict on Schacht (Tallahassee: Florida State University, 1955), pp. 1069; Joel Colton, Léon Blum, Humanist in Politics (New York: Knopf, 1966), pp. 213-15; Farnsworth, Bult, peds9;

Wilson (U.S. chargé in Paris) telegram 797, 26 August 1936, State 862.2222/25; Dodd telegram 270, 2 September 1936, State 751.62/336; Wilson telegram 832, 4 September 1936, State 751.62/367; Dodd to Moore, 28 August 1936, Hyde Park, R. Walton Moore Papers, D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 63, 196, 211, 213, 229; the key British documents ate in Foreign Office C 7626/5740/18, C 6637/C 6639/C 7159/C 7461/C/7500/97/18.

76. See especially von Neurath’s comments to the Hungarian foreign minister, Csaky, while in Budapest in late September 1936, reported in Stewart (Budapest) telegram 40 of 22 September and dispatch 475 of 24 September 1936, State 762.64/52 and 54; also Schacht’s comments at the Bank for International Settlements’

meeting in December BilbSy/52ae

1936, reported in Bullitt telegram 1255, 15 December

1936, State 462.00 R 296

77. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 8. September 1936,” “. . vom 19. September 1936,” “. .. vom 29. September 1936,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, f. 143, 169, 193. 78. The full text of Hitler’s proclamation in NSDAP, Reichsleitung, Der Parteitag der Ebre vom 8. bis 14. September

1936 (Munich: Eher, 1936), pp. 30-47. Hildebrand ties Hitler’s reticence to his reluctance to have colonial

agitation disturb von Ribbentrop’s mission to England.

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

219

framework of a general European settlement. The Franco-German talks were, therefore,

interrupted.” When the French tried to reopen the colonial question within the kind of general framework London had suggested, it would quickly become apparent that Germany was notinterested.*° Schacht’s star continued on its declining path, a path that was not interrupted by any gratuitous colonial concessions to Germany. The visit of David Lloyd George to Germany shortly after Schacht’s trip to Paris was equally spectacular, equally fruitless. The former British prime minister had repeatedly spoken in Parliament in favor of concessions to Germany and continued to do so after Hitler came to power, most recently after the remilitarization of the Rhineland. He planned a trip to Germany to look at the social and economic experiments of the National Socialist regime and asked for an interview with Hitler. On 4-5 September 1936 the two met at Berchtesgaden and talked at length about the war in which they had played such different roles.*! They also discussed German-English relations and the problem of a new Locarno, the whole visit having been urged by von Ribbentrop as a

part of his efforts to secure British acquiescence in German policies. No concrete tesults were expected or attained; both men came from the meeting confirmed in their views

and prejudices. Lloyd George was more enthusiastic about Hitler and concessions to him than ever; Hitler delighted in this confirmation of his hope that England could be lulled by pleasant assurances and anti-Communist effusions into a policy of detachment.* Considerable reinforcement was also given to the positive image that Hitler wanted to project at this time by the staging of the Olympics. Held in elaborate surroundings in Berlin, attracting tourists and the attention of the entire world, the whole

spectacle

served as ideal propaganda for the new Germany. Every effort was made to avoid incidents and unfavorable publicity; Hitler even agreed to allow Jews to participate in the competition.*> Foreign diplomats in attendance were entertained lavishly, and other visitors were suitably impressed. Such graciousness even extended to Sir Robert Vansittart,

the permanent

undersecretary

in the

British

Foreign

Office,

who

was

generally thought to be unfriendly to Germany.** Rarely had Germany looked more contented and prosperous to the outside world. The struggle for the direction of Germany’s economy was hidden from the view of those who could see a Germany in which there were jobs for all, even if they were in the army—in which the term of service was increased from one year to two years some ten days after the Olympics ended. While public attention was focused on the speculations and negotiations for a new Locarno, the travels of Schacht and Lloyd George, the Olympic games, and, soon after,

the romance of Edward VIII and Wallis Warfield Simpson, a shift was quietly under way in the foreign policy of Belgium. There were two major issues in Germany’s relations 79. G.D., C, 5, No. 574; D, 1, No. 56; Eden, p. 568; D.D.F.,, 2d, 3, Nos. 276, 334, 54, 393; Memorandum

of

Wigram, 29 October 1936, Foreign Office C 6701/97/18. 80. These negotiations are examined in chapters 17 and 18.

Martin 81. G.D., C, 5, No. 526; T. Jones, pp. 243-51; Schmidt, Statist auf diplomatischer Biibne, pp. 336-40; Gilbert and Richard Gott, The Appeasers (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1963), p. 36.

1942, in Picker, p. 361, and 82. Hitler kept Lloyd George in fond memory; see, ¢.g., his comments on 20 May

22 August 1942, in Trevor-Roper, p. 657. Olympic 83. See the reports of August-September 1935, of Charles H. Sherrill, member of the International LeHand for President Committee (including a report on a talk with Hitler on 24 August 1935), to Miss been US. minister in euigenciee Roosevelt, in Hyde Park, P. S. F. File Germany, Confidential. Sherrill, who had to him in Roosevelt’s puband ambassador in Turkey, died shortly before the Olympic games. For references

lished correspondence see F.D.R., Personal Letters 1928-45, 1:436, 452.

84, On D.D.F, report August

C, 5, Nos. 489, a, 2 310; the effort to impress Sir Robert Vansittart see Colvin, pp. 108ff£.; G.D., be found in Mastny’s may Hitler with n conversatio his on comments 2d, Nos. 85, 100. Vansittart’s 03; Phipps telegrams 251 of 6 79, 11 August 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413202-2 and 211-Saving of 13 August 1936, Foreign Office C 5750/C 5871/4/18.

220

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

with Belgium: the territory of Eupen-Malmédy, ceded to Belgium under the Treaty of Versailles, and the general problem of political relations as defined by the Treaty of Locarno. Since the German government expected to secure the return of EupenMalmédy at some time in the future, Hitler and his diplomats were careful to remind the Belgians from time to time that Hitler’s periodic assurances to the world that he had no further territorial demands beyond whichever one he was insisting on at the time did not in fact apply to that territory.8° The German government followed developments in Eupen-Malmédy with great interest, though unwilling to enter into any comprehensive discussion of that issue because such discussions would force its real aims into the open.%6 To calm the Belgians and perhaps wean them away from their close relationship with France, the Berlin government made several informal approaches to Brussels, primarily through von Ribbentrop, in 1934 and 1935.87 It may be doubted that such gestures reassured the Belgians, especially since Germany was suspected, and quite correctly, of dealing with the Belgian Rexist opposition, a Fascist party established in 1935.88

From the point of view of the Belgians, the growing strength of Germany presented a serious menace and most difficult policy problems. Belgium’s close relationship with France was a source of anxiety in domestic affairs because of the division between the Flemish and Walloon elements, the former engaging in vehement anti-French agitation.

The failure of France to act decisively when Germany remilitarized the Rhineland suggested that the Belgian tie to Paris was no longer the great source of strength in foreign affairs that the government in Brussels had once thought it to be. Under these circumstances, Belgium looked for new approachesto the problem of maintaining its security. In the summer of 1936, there began a drift toward a neutral position in which Belgium would accept from others guarantees of its independence but would refuse to obligate itself to aid them in turn. In short, Belgium would only be guaranteed, not a

guarantor. The government still hoped that the negotiations for a new Locarno would in fact produce a treaty providing Belgium with a substitute for the lost assurances of the past; but as the obduracy of Germany made that prospect ever more unlikely, the Belgian government leaned increasingly itt the direction of neutrality, with Germany naturally urging it on.®? The decisive turn in Belgian policy came in October, signalized by a speech of the king to the cabinet and subsequently confirmed in public statements by the government. The new policy in effect cut Belgium loose from its Western allies by restricting itself to the defense of its own territory. It would rearm for that purpose, and getting domestic

support for rearmament had been an important factor in leading to the new policy, but it would not engage itself further. Domestic pressures as well as foreign dangers had moved Belgium out of the Locatno framework. Since the Germans could be and were 85. G.D., C, 1, No. 142; 2, No. 310; 4, Nos. 108, 381, 403, 471. Count Davignon, before moving from Warsaw

to his new post as Belgian minister in Berlin, had expressed the view that Belgium ought to return EupenMalmédy—but that it would be a bad precedent (Szembek, 22 January 1936, p. 151). 86. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 342, 477, 491, 508, 534; D.D.B., 3, No. 164; 4, No. 2; Jaques Davignon, Berlin 1936-1940,

souvenirs d'une mission (Paris-Brussels; Editions Universitaires, 1951), pp. 43-46; German Foreign Ministry to

Richthofen (Brussels), 12 May 1936, T-120, 2742/5864/E 429973.

87. G.D., C, 2, No. 443; 3, No. 336, n. 3; B.D., 2d, 4, No. 421; Morris (U.S. minister Brussels) dispatches 579 of 2 October and 636 of 16 November 1935, State 755.62/11 and 14; White (counselor Berlin) dispatch 2358, 4 October 1935, State 755.62/13.

88. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 460, 507, 527, 543, 582, 604, 629. Louis De Jong, The German Fifth Column in World War II

(trans. C. M. Geyl; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956), p. 199, is mistaken in thinking Degtelle received financial support only from Italy; at least as of September 1936, his group was getting help from Berlin G.D., C, 5, No. 582). 89. D.D.B., 4, Nos. 77, 88, 92, 103, 120-23, 126; D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 282; 2, Nos. 260, 362, 416; 3, Nos. 14, 47, 97, 128, 172, 287, 296, 300, 307, 325, 344; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 349, 391, 444, 494; van Oversttaeten, pp. 212-14,

225-26, 229-30.

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

221

confident that France and Britain would not violate Belgian neutrality, they no longer needed to worry about a broad assault in the west if Germany moved east. Conversely they could be reasonably certain that Belgium would have no help until it was too late if the Germans themselves moved in the west. It was not until April 1937 that Britain and France formally released Belgium from its obligation to provide mutual assistance under the Locarno agreements, but the real shift was by then already an accomplished fact. Overshadowing all other events in the summer of 1936 and dominating world attention for long thereafter were the outbreak of civil war in Spain and the intervention of various European powers in that conflict.°' Hitler himself had paid little attention to Spain. As he saw Spain, its neutrality in World War I had confirmed its unimportance in international affairs; Spain’s supposed antagonism to France in North Africa suggested it might become a possible secondary ally against France in the future.?* During the early years of National Socialist rule in Germany, the problems of Spain attracted little attention in Berlin.°> An extensive apparatus of National Socialist organizations was developed in the German colony in Spain to assure theit subservience to the regime in Berlin and help to advance German interests abroad. In this regard Spain was not unique, though the seizure of relevant archives in the early stages of the civil war in 1936 has made such activities in Spain better known than most.** Though individuals from the foreign organization of the NSDAP, the AO (Auslandsorganisation), were to play an especially prominent part in German aid to Franco, there is nothing to suggest that the AO in Spain differed greatly from similar establishments among Germans in other 90. The best available survey of Belgian policy, though written before the publication of the Belgian docu-

ments, is still Jane K. Miller, Belgian Foreign Policy between Two Wars, 1919-1940 (New York: Bookman, 1951). There is a good account in Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs 1936, pp. 351-60. A useful analysis that stresses the internal political and military factors in the change of Belgian policy is Pierre Henri Laurent, ale

Reversal of Belgian Foreign Policy 1936-1937,” Review of Politics, 31, No. 3 (July 1969), 370-84. See also G.D., C, 5, Nos. 606, 610, 634; Lipski Papers, No. 63. A British review may be found in Foreign Office C 8323/4/18.

In assessing French reaction to the Belgian step, it must be noted that on the day before the king’s speech the Belgian ambassador in Paris had assured the French foreign minister that no decision had yet been taken (D.D.B., 4, No. 126). The repercussions of the Belgian step and the negotiations that followed can be traced in in van ibid., Nos. 129ff. and D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 346ff. The full explication of the king’s position may be found Overstraeten, pp. 230-34, 237-39.

Deutung 91. A recent survey of the literature in Rainer Wohlfeil, “Der spanische Burgerkrieg 1936-1939, Zur und Nachwirkung,” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 16, No. 2 (April 1968), 101-19. 92. Hitlers zweites Buch, pp. 140, 217. before 1936 in Marion 93. Thete is some useful information on German-Spanish relations in the period 1936-1939 (Berlin: Einhorn, Die dkonomischen Hintergriinde der faschistischen deutschen Intervention in Spanien Akademie-Verlag, 1962), chap. 2. appeared in Schwarzrotbuch, 94. The documents wete seized in July 1936 in Loyalist Spain, and some of them (Barcelona: Asy-Verlag, kalisten archo-Syndi Deutsche-An the by published Dokumente tiber den Hitlerimperialismus,

comments on this publication in the 1937). The author knows of no serious evaluation of this material. The

dem spanischen Biirgerkrieg 1936-1939 otherwise often useful book by Manfred Merkes, Die deutsche Politik segeniiber assertion to which he takes exception. Merkes’s (Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1961), pp. 15-17, are even sillier than those

unproved and most unlikely. Since those that the document on p. 318 of the Schwarzrotbuch is a forgery is Socialist

stationery of various National publishing the Schwarzrotbuch clearly had access to supplies of letterhead said—without the slightest proof—to collection the in document only the that striking is it Spain, in agencies with contents that only tangentially and stationery letterhead on not few very the of one be forged should be the Schwarrotbhuch wished to forge of editors the Had rebels. the with support the assertion of German telations of the document, furthermore, are in accord evidence, they could easily have done much better, The contents files in a general way. with information to be found in the German Foreign Ministry er in Spanien (Paris: Edition du Carrefour, 1936), Verschwor und Spione , (pseud.?) en The book by Franz Spielhag manuscript as Merkes states), and includes same the (not ts is based on the same collection of documen n of the Editions du Carrefour, a Comintern discussio a For tbuch. Schwarzro the in printed not items t importan Miinzenberg, eine politische Biographie (Stuttgart: Deutsche publishing firm in Paris, see Babette Gross, Willi Verlags-Anstalt, 1967), pp. 253-58, 276-78.

222.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

countries. In Spain, as elsewhere, the AO was in an uneasy relationship with the regular German diplomatic service, the two cooperating but often in conflict with one another at

the same time. At least as significant as both these arms of German policy in the actual conduct of relations between Germany and Spain were the official and unofficial dealers in weapons. Some German firms had long been interested in arms sales to Spain.°° Of greater importance, because of the contacts developed through them, were the attempts to include German military equipment in the German-Spanish trade balance in the year preceding the civil war. Efforts on the part of rightist elements within the governing coalition in Spain to use a tie to German suppliers of weapons for their own purposes met with German interest in arms exports. Nothing concrete came of this scheme, but in the course of trying to make it work, the then chief of staff, General Francisco Franco,

developed—if he did not already have—a great interest in German weapons for the Spanish army.°’ Not only had the talks involved Franco personally as well as the sending of Spanish officers to Berlin, subsequently there were other contacts of a less formal and

official nature that are still shrouded in doubt because of the lack of adequate documentation. The importance of those contacts lies in the fact that they took place in the period between the Spanish elections of 18 February and the military uprising of 17 July 1936. The February elections in Spain brought victory to the Left, which was, however, not sufficiently united to establish a Popular Front government. The moderates attempted to steer the Spanish republic through the storms; the radical Left was divided between those who wanted a Socialist state and those who, as anarchists, were not sure they wanted a state at all. The radical Right, which had tried to dismantle the republic

from the inside during the preceding years, now turned to the idea of overturning it by force. The government tried to protect itself by transferring Franco and other generals opposed to the republic to less sensitive posts but was reluctant to arm the workers lest they overturn rather than defend republican institutions. The official discussions of German arms deliveries to Spain had ceased by the spring of 1936, but now unofficial ones were held. One document of 17 June 1936 alluding to

this subject was published by the Loyalists after it was seized in a Spanish office of the German Labor Front.?* Another of 6 July is included in the postwar publication of German Foreign Ministry documents. Of special interest is the suggestion in this document that the German who figured prominently in the operation was a “Herr Feltjen” who was in the aircraft industry and was identified in the German Ministry of War as a zealous gunrunner. This indicates the at least extremely likely possibility that the man referred to was Colonel Josef Veltjens, a retired World War I air ace whom Hermann Goring regularly employed for officially sponsored missions that were too shady or

95. A detailed study of the AO is Donald M. McKale, The Swastika Outside Germany (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1977). 96. Some relevant information may be found in the Schwargrotbuch, pp. 297-313. 97. The negotiations can be followed in G.D., C, 4, Nos. 303, 330, 445, 450; 5, Nos. 133, 215; von Bulow

memorandum of 20 August 1935, T-120, 2373/4602/E 190194195.

. Wi Schwarzrorbuch, picture 183 on p. 318 (see above, n. 94). Other documents are quoted in Spielhagen, pp: 8-42, 99. G.D., C, 5, No. 433, The relevant portion of the document has been printed in German in G.D., D, 3:3, n.

1. The translation of the key words: “wie ich bei meinen Freunden im anderen Hause erfahren habe,” into “as I have heard from friends of mine elsewhere” is inaccurate. The author of the letter was liaison man from the Foreign Ministry to the Ministry of War, and it is to contacts in the latter agency that the passage obviously refers. Possibly the weapons deals referred to were with the Carlists, a monarchist group also plotting against the Spanish republic (see Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Civil War [New York: Harper & Rowe, 1963], who had access to the Carlist archives).

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

Eas

“undiplomatic” to be exposed to the light of day,10 Certainly the evidence is clear that Veltjens played a role in certain arms deliveries to Franco during the civil war, arms deliveries that were kept separate from the bulk carried through regularly organized channels and, unlike that bulk, were regularly paid for in foreign exchange.!° Hither

through Veltjens or someone in a very similar position there were some contacts; in addition, General Sanjutjo, the most prominent, though not necessarily the most important, of the Spanish plotters, had visited Germany in February 1936.10 Such contacts may have encouraged some among the Spanish conspirators to hope for aid from Germany in a coup, but they went forward for reasons of their own, expecting to win quickly. Had those expectations been fulfilled, the new regime in Madrid would presumably have turned to Berlin for the military supplies needed to keep in subjection a largely hostile population; but nothing suggests that Franco and the other enemies of Spanish democracy expected a difficult struggle in which outside assistance would be vital to them. After all, they controlled or expected to control the military

forces of Spain. Nor did the plotters look to national socialism for political inspiration. Determined to return Spain to an ancient form of government uncontaminated by any ideology stemming from the preceding two or three centuries, the officers cooperated with but looked down upon the minuscule Spanish Fascist patty, the Falange, whose

insignificance at the time was matched only by that of the Spanish Communist party— even though in the blaze of battle these splinter groups were later to cast their shadows over the contending parties.!°? Had the coup been successful, it would have affected the international balance by one single and significant change: the replacement of a Spanish regime friendly to France by one antagonistic to it. It was the partial success and partial failure of the coup that set the stage for massive intervention by other nations. The first onslaught of the military uprising succeeded in many cities in Spain and Spanish Morocco, but several setbacks suggested the possibility of imminent failure. In some cities the coup failed in its initial stages, in others armed workers rallying to the defense of the republic recaptured key centers. The prospective new chief of state, General Sanjurjo, lost his life when his plane crashed because it was overloaded with the 100. On Veltjens’s World War I career see Walter A. Musciano, Eagles of the Black Cross (New York: Ivan Obolensky, 1965), pp. 183-85. According to this source, Veltjens died in October 1943. 101. On Veltjens’s activities during the Spanish Civil War see the following documents: Sonderstab Wilberg to

Ministry of Finance, 2344/37 g.Kdos. of 9 August 1937, in Bundesatchiv, RFM, R 2/20, f. 73; 2541/37

g.Kdos. of 24 August 1937, ibid., f. 100; 4969/39 g.Kdos. of 17 January 1939, ibid., R 2/23, f. 35; 6822/39

g.Rs. of 9 June 1939, ibid., f. 207. The references to “Velschen” and “Vetschew” in the diary of Alfred Jodl for 27 and 30 March 1937 refer to these activities (TIMWC, 28:353). For a pictute of the Veltjens business in the total delivery system in 1937 see the “Bericht nebst Anlage der Deutschen Revisions- und Treuhandaktiengesellschaft Berlin tiber die bei der ROWAK Handelsgesellschaft m.b.H., Berlin vorgenommenen Priifung des

R Jahresabschlusses zum 31. Dezember 1937” (hereafter cited as Rowak Report), p. 8, in Bundesarchiv, RFM,

2/27, f. 46. There are indications that Veltjens may also have been involved in German schemes to supply Gollancz, defective weapons to the Loyalists in Spain (Thomas, p. 296; Ian Colvin, Chief of Intelligence (London: 1951], pp. 33-34; Jakob Leonhard, Als Gestapoagent im Dienste der Schweizer Gegenspionage (Zurich; Europa-Verlag, During the 1946], p. 11; but see Merkes, p. 67). The book by Glenn T. Harper, German Economic Policy in Sspain is not Veltjens material; published on solely based is 1967), Mouton, Hague: (The Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939 mentioned. Germany and the S oviet In August 1940, Veltjens served as Goring’s agent for atms sales to Finland (Weinberg, in the black market in operations purchasing German of charge in him placed later Goring 127). p. Union, January 1943, quoted in Western Europe (see Géring’s order of 13 June 1942 and Veltjens’s report of 15 TMWG, 5:525-31, and Géring’s testimony in ibid., 9:331). 102. Thomas, p. 101.

in the book by Hugh Thomas cited 103. A useful account of the civil war’s origins and course may be found University Press, 1962), is Columbia York: (New 1936-1941 Powers, Great above. Dante A. Puzzo, Spain and the

Hitler, Franco und Gibraltar, Die Frage des good but not sufficiently critical of its sources. Donald S. Detwiler,

1 and notes, is very helpful. spanischen Eintritts in den Zweiten Weltkrieg (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1962), chap.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

general’s gorgeous uniforms. The ait force and the navy rallied to the side of the government. Only in northwest Spain and Morocco could the conspirators consolidate their initial success; in Morocco they had the one real army, the Army of Africa with its Moroccan troops, under General Franco who was newly flown in but well-known to it as its former leader. But if Spain was to be conquered from North Africa in 1936 as it had been in 711, then that army had to be transported across the Straits to the Spanish mainland. Since the government forces controlled the ait and sea and Franco himself had had to be flown to Morocco by a plane secretly chartered in England, only foreign assistance in the form of air transport could save the uprising. For such aid, Franco turned to Hitler and Mussolini. The Italian dictator had recently successfully concluded his conquest of Ethiopia in defiance of the League and was looking for new adventures. He had followed up his association with the Spanish dictator Primo de Rivera by a secret arrangement promising support to the Spanish monarchists against the republic in March 1934.!°4 Once assured that the present uprising was supported by the elements he had promised to aid, Mussolini decided to send some airplanes as the first installment of what was to become a majot commitment. The German response to Franco’s plea, however, was made quite

independently, though the parallel policies of the two dictators were to play a powerful role in bringing their countries closer together, a theme mentioned earlier and to reappear frequently hereafter. The appeal for German aid was taken to Hitler by two officials of the AO in Morocco, Adolf Langenheim, who as head of the Tetuan party local (Ortsgruppe) was the highest National Socialist dignitary in Spanish Morocco, and Johannes Bernhardt, the economic expert of the local National Socialists. Bernhardt, who during his years as a businessman in Morocco had developed contacts with the officers of the Spanish army there, was the moving spirit.!° Carrying letters from Franco to Hitler and Goring, Langenheim and Bernhardt, accompanied by a Spanish officer, flew to Germany where the head of the AO, Ernst Wilhelm Bohle, arranged for them to confer with Rudolf Hess, who in turn saw to it that they were sent to Bayreuth to meet Hitler, there for the

annual Wagner festival.!°° The German Foreign Ministry favored a neutral attitude, wanted to reject Franco’s request for planes—a request which had also been made through diplomatic channels—and had nothing but discouraging advice for Bohle.!%” The officials of the Foreign Ministry, with whose views von Neurath concurred after he returned to Berlin from Bayreuth, thought it risky for Germany to become involved in an internal dispute in Spain when such aid was sure to come to public attention. Hitler would decide otherwise. In the key conferences with Hitler at Bayreuth on 26 July, neither von Neurath nor von Ribbentrop was consulted. Present were Goring, von Blomberg, the minister of war, and Admiral Canaris, the chief of the German armed forces intelligence office. Canaris had been in Spain repeatedly since he first worked there in espionage activities during World War I. He spoke the language fluently, had kept up his contacts, and knew Franco. It is probable that he advised support of the insurgents; he certainly was to play a key role in pushing for German support of Franco thereafter and became, if he was not 104. Journal ofModern History, 24 (1952), 181-83; U.S. 1937, 1:294; Puzzo, p. 42. 105. On Bernhardt, unless otherwise noted, see Merkes, p. 19; Harper, pp. 12-13; and the sources cited by

them. Spielhagen, pp. 120-29, passim, and in three unnumbered activities of Bernhardt and Langenheim in prior years. 106. Merkes, p. 20; Interrogation of Bohle,

5 November

photocopies, brings information on the

1946, Deutsche Bank Investigation, Annex, Exhibit 404.

The letters of Franco have not been found; that he wrote to Goring as well as Hitler would fit in with knowledge on Franco’s part of earlier arms deliveries via Veltjens. 107. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 2, 5, 10.

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

aye)

already, a valued friend of the Spanish leader.!°8 There is no evidence of von Blomberg’s views at that time.' Goring subsequently claimed that he himself had strongly urged aid be given; and since he was not only a close friend of Hitler—and quite probably the backer of Veltjen’s or others’ arms deals—but also the chief of the air force that would provide the planes Franco was requesting, his advice no doubt cattied weight. Goring asserted that he used as arguments the need to prevent the spread of communism and the desite to test his air force.!!° The supposed danger of communism may well have influenced Hitler even though in reality the military revolt in Spain gave the Communists their first real influence. There is important circumstantial evidence that military arguments of an economic nature were advanced and played an important role in the German decision to aid Spain. Goring had been placed in charge of raw material imports and was soon after given control of the Four-Year Plan to make Germany economically ready for war. Hitler subsequently referred to the importance of Spanish raw materials to Germany.!!! Goring was to occupy a key role in German-Spanish economic relations with Bernhardt as his main agent. Certainly no one could then have predicted that in 1937 Germany would import from Nationalist Spain alone about as much as it had imported from all of Spain in 1935, would shift the bulk of these imports into categories useful for rearmament, and

would be able to avoid paying foreign exchange for any of them;!!? but it is surely likely that Goring and Bernhardt urged on Hitler the possible advantages to Germany of access to Spain’s important mineral resources on terms congenial to Germany’s rearmament needs. It is significant that the earliest contemporary document I have found that deals with the actual organization of aid to Franco is a report on a conference between Goring and his associates on 30 July in which the two subjects discussed were the Spanish situation and the problem of raw materials and foreign exchange.!!3 Intertwined in the discussion were the special staff General Wilberg had set up to handle aid to Spain, the training of air force personnel in long-distance flying, the sending of an expeditionary force and transports, the problem of raw materials and foreign exchange, the plans for the forthcoming Nuremberg rally, and the need to discuss with Hitler the use of the rally for propaganda about Germany’s problems in obtaining raw materials. If all these issues were interrelated on the afternoon of 30 July, there is little reason to doubt that they

were equally related in the late evening of 25 July.'4 There is later evidence in 1936 that Hitler wished to keep the attention of the Western powers focused elsewhere; that was, as will be shown, a motive for German action in continuing a policy of limited aid to Franco during a lengthy struggle. There is 108. Colvin, Chief of Intelligence, pp. 30-34; Karl Heinz Abshagen, Canaris, Patriot und Weltbiirger (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1950), pp. 159-64. the most reliable information on Canaris is in Helmut Krausnick (ed.), “Aus den Petsonalpapieren von Canaris,” Vierteljabrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichie, 10, No. 3 (July 1962),

280-310. 109. Merkes (p. 24) claims that von Blomberg was opposed to aid, citing Hossbach, pp. 41—42, as his source.

Hossbach, however, expressly states that he was on leave at this time; the cited passage deals with the later request for German divisions. For this issue, raised in December 1936, see pp. 231-32, below.

110. TMWC, 9:280-81. 111. See his speech of 13 September 1937, in Raoul de Roussy de Sales (ed.), Adolf Hitler, My New Order (New York: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1941), pp. 425-27. 112. Rowak Report, pp. 3-8, R 2/27, f. 41-46.

113. “Aktenvermerk tiber die Besprechung beim Herrn Generaloberst am 30.7.36,” 1 August 1936, Nuremberg a document 3890-PS (National Archives).

up to handle deliveries to 114, Additional indirect confirmation can be seen in the fact that Rowak, the firm set

with assignments and from Franco from the German end, was entrusted later in 1936 and in 1937 by Goring Report, passim), Rowak (see Peru and Chile, Bulgaria, Norway, from imports designed to lead to raw materials and Portugal (Reichsand in 1938 was being assigned similar responsibilities in North China, Iran, Afghanistan, RFM, R SVP, ie WS) finanzministetium, Abt. I, to Abt. V, Wi 3735-405 I geh. of 27 July 1938, Bundesarchiv,

226

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

nothing to suggest this as an original motive, since the whole concept of transporting Franco’s army across the Straits into Spain was designed to bring a quick victory. If that came as expected, then it was hoped Franco would remember where his help had come from. The fact that German aid was from the first—even before the establishment of formal nonintervention machinery—placed in the hands of special and partially camouflaged organizations suggests that Hitler had given himself an out in case the whole enterprise should fail. Certainly a government on the other side of France that was friendly to Germany would be of advantage to Hitler’s plans. Common action with Mussolini’s Italy would bring Italy and Germany closer together, but there is no evidence that this was apparent when Hitler first acted. It was clear that the Spanish rebels would fail if they could not move their army, and Hitler decided to help them do so.!!®

It has often been said—and correctly—that Hitler postponed decisions; he certainly did not do so in this case. The military dependence of Franco would provide a lever for German influence in Spain, but it should not be thought that the Spanish leader was in any way ptepated to become a conscious tool of foreign powers. Perhaps precisely because he knew how much he needed the assistance of Hitler and Mussolini, Franco

was as sensitive and prickly as any Spaniard in upholding his own honor and dignity. Hitler and Mussolini would find Franco as difficult as Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt later found Charles de Gaulle; in the same years that Churchill was to complain about having to bear the Cross of Lorraine, Hitler might have voiced similar sentiments about the Yoke and Arrows of Franco’s Spain. Not only would the requested planes be sent from Germany but contingents of German forces as well. In Berlin, a special staff under air force General Helmuth Wilberg

was created in the Ministry of War, where it started to function formally on 1 August 1936, although it was already operating on 26 July, the day after Hitler’s decision.!'° Simultaneously Franco and Bernhardt established an agency to handle the Spanish end of the special relationship between Germany and the insurgents. This organization, of which Bernhardt was the sole director, was called Hisma for short (Compafiia HispanoMarroqui de Transportes, served as cover for the transportation of Franco’s troops,

handled German supplies in Spain, arranged the repayments Franco would make, and became the major agent for German penetration of the Spanish economy.!!7 Under the auspices of Hisma, the Germans were ferrying Franco’s troops by 28 July. The first installment of the German expeditionary corps left Hamburg on the night of 31 July—1 August under Major Alexander von Scheele and began operations in Spain a week later. Other air force units soon followed. Their dispatch, the subsequent sending of armored units, and the provision of military supplies to Franco’s own forces were to lead to the creation of a German trading company to parallel Hisma. This organization, called Rowak (Rohstoffe- und Waren-Einkaufsgesellschaft), was also directed by Bernhardt in accordance with Géring’s orders. Bernhardt thus controlled both ends of the economic transactions, drew munificent sums for himself, and bribed his way through the Spanish economy.''® With the special staff of Wilberg and Rowak in Germany and the military 115. I disregard the postwar comments of Joachim von Ribbentrop on this subject as not sufficiently reliable to be of use. 116. The financial accounts of Sonderstab Wilberg always refer to 1 August 1936 as the beginning date; see Bundesarchiv, RFM, R 2/19, passim.; Merkes, p. 28. General Schweickhard

replaced Wilberg in 1938; the

earliest document on which the author has seen his name is dated 28 April (R 2/21, f. 219). 117. A good summary of its history to 1940 is the report of the German Ministry of Economics, “Entstehung, Entwicklung, und gegenwartiger Stand des Rowak/Sofindus Konzerns,” 15 March 1940, T-71, roll 32, frames 426049-70. Sofindus (Sociedad Financiera Industrial Ltda.) was a holding company established by Hisma for its Spanish subsidiary interests. 118. See Herbert Feis, The Spanish Story (New York: Knopf, 1948), pp. 280-82; Rowak Report, pp. 23 and 27, R 2/27, f. 85 and 89; Deutsche Revisions- und Treuhandaktiengesellschaft to Ministry of Finance, “Betrifft

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

22m,

headquarters under Scheele and Hisma in Spain, the institutional framework for German support of Franco had been created in a few days. It soon became apparent that Franco’s victory would take far longer. The transport of Franco’s army by German and Italian planes made it possible for the insurgents to join their Moroccan holdings to the atea in northwest Spain that had fallen under the control of General Mola upon the captute of Badajoz on 14 August, thus enabling the rebels to organize and maintain a position against the republic. But in the very days that the first German aid was being given, it became increasingly evident that the strength of the republic was vastly greater than its opponents had anticipated. Though this was not immediately recognized in Germany, the Nationalists, as they came to be called, had in fact been losing ground while German help was being organized.!"9 Additional German and Italian support would be needed if Franco were to win what in August and September of 1936 looked increasingly like a civil war rather than a quick coup. During August and September German supplies and personnel wete sent to Spain in small but still significant quantities. This was in pursuit of Hitler’s original decision, reaffirmed on 24 August.!2° By then General Wilberg had conferred with Franco, and a special German military representative was now appointed in the person of Lieutenant Colonel Walter Warlimont.'?! Warlimont joined Admiral Canaris on his second trip to Rome to coordinate German and Italian aid policies before continuing on to Spain. Just before Canaris and Warlimont left for Rome, Hitler sent a secret emissary to Mussolini, Prince Phillip of Hessen, instead of von Neurath, who did not wish to attract attention

to Germany’s policy. The prince—whose marriage into the Italian royal family made his trip seem natural—was to become Hitler’s emissary to Rome on a number of occasions; this time he was to assure Italy of Germany’s intentions in Spain, preclude GermanItalian rivalry there, and suggest that both powers be represented to General Franco by special liaison officers. Mussolini immediately agreed to the German suggestions.'”? The close contacts between Germany and Italy on this matter were to become an increasingly important facet of the diplomacy of the period; suffice it to say that at no time since 1933 had the two worked together so harmoniously.! In Spain Warlimont conferred with Franco and other leaders while the German commitment slowly increased. There were the usual frictions between the Germans in Spain and between German and Spanish officials; but these problems had no influence

on policy formulation.'24 The series of decisions about Spain that Berlin had to make in the last four months of 1936 grew not out of such squabbles but out of diplomatic repercussions and military developments of the conflict. These decisions, in the order in

which the occasion for them atose, may be listed as, first, the response to the Franco-

Rowak,” 2 June 1938, p. 13, Bundesarchiv, RFM, R Py Pails Nol NX.

119. The German chargé in Madrid reported on 23 and 25 July on the trend against the insurgents, but nothing suggests that this was known to Hitler when he made his decision (G.D., D, 3, Nos. 4, 11).

navy see G.D., D, 3, 120. Merkes, p. 30; Einhorn, pp. 90-93. On the aid to Franco at this time by the German the German naval of activities the on Carls Admiral by report the and 84; No. 3, 2d, No. 27; D.D.F.,,

Potsdam, cited by detachment in Spanish waters in July and August 1936 in the Deutsche Zentralarchiv

Einhorn, e.g., on pp. 91 and 119.

of Warlimont, 121. For this and other evidence of Warlimont subsequently cited see the statements

17

DZA Potsdam, 60 951, £. 74. 123. See Merkes, pp. 30-32; D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 81, 179.

,

we Mission materials. September 1945, to Harold Deutsch, in National Archives, DeWitt C. Poole 60 951, f. 71-72 (this is the full 122. Von Neurath to Dieckhoff, 24 August 1936, DZA Potsdam, Biito RAM, to Dieckhoff, 27 August 1936, text of the letter from which an excerpt is in G.D., D, 3, No. 55); von Neurath

this appears to me to be the main 124. Thus other firms tried unsuccessfully to break Bernhardt’s monopoly; thrust of the lengthy report by Willy Messerschmidt in G.D., D, 3, No. 80.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

British proposal for a nonintervention agreement; second, the problem of further military commitment to Spain; third, the timing of recognition of the Franco regime; and

fourth, the level of German commitment as it became clear that without major deployment of German and Italian troops in Spain the triumph of Franco would be long delayed. The proposal of France and Britain of an international policy of nonintervention in the civil war was designed to keep that war from spreading to the rest of Europe and to minimize its impact on their own domestic situation, a motive especially strong in bitterly divided France. In view of the weakening Italy had suffered as a result of its military investment in the Ethiopian venture and the unready state of Germany, this policy in reality warded off nonexistent dangers at the expense of the legal government of Spain,

but this miscalculation was not readily apparent to the British and French at the time. The British, who were most insistent on this policy, were no doubt influenced by their own experiences with Spain which suggested that a victory for the insurgents would in fact not be likely to lead to the domination of Spain by foreign powers, but the unwillingness of the democratic states to assist the Spanish republic was to make that republic increasingly dependent on Russian assistance, which in turn provided a further argument against support by the Western powers for their potential friends on the peninsula.!?5 During negotiations, both the Germans and Italians delayed in order to make sure that their first assistance reached Franco. Germany eventually agreed to the nonintervention agreement on 24 August 1936, the same day that Hitler decided to send further military

aid to Spain. A nonintervention committee was established in London in September 1936, and

Germany was to play its role in the melancholy farce until 1939. In view of the large number of Italian soldiers in Spain and in order to keep friction with England within tolerable limits, the Germans generally allowed Italy to take the lead on the committee’s stage. In the wings, Germany went forward in disregard of whatever platitudes were currently being recited to an increasingly skeptical world audience. But the role of the committee cannot be dismissed erttirely. It provided a face-saving device for France and England. It also helped to convince von Ribbentrop and Hitler that they could disregard British and French susceptibilities as long as those two countries were not themselves the object to attack—and by the time Germany was ready for that, they would hardly be in a position to defend themselves effectively.!2¢ A second substantive question for Germany in the fall of 1936 was whether it should make further military contributions to the insurgents for control of Spain against a government that was receiving public support in many parts of the world and was beginning to obtain

some

aid from France

and, as yet indirectly, from

the Soviet

Union.'?” Germany’s most important and spectacular aid to Franco in the fall of 1936 125. As Mussolini told Goring on his visit to Rome in January 1937: “The English Conservatives have a great fear of Bolshevism, and this fear could easily be exploited politically. This task would fall principally on Germany, since it is rather difficult for Italy to convince the English Conservatives in view of events in the Mediterranean” (Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 87; German text in DZA Potsdam, 60 951, f. 88). 126. There is no study of the nonintervention committee as such, but extensive discussion of it may be found

in the works of Thomas, Merkes, and Puzzo, the memoirs of Anthony Eden, and the books of David I. Catell,

Soviet Diplomacy and the Spanish Civil War (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1957), and P. A. M. van det Esch, Prelude to War, The International Repercussions of the Spanish Civil War (The Hague: Mouton, 1951). Important

additional information on the policy of France may be found in D.D.F., 2d, 3, and in David W. Pike, Conjecture, Propaganda, and Deceit and the Spanish Civil War, The International Crisis Over Spain, 1936-1939, as seen in the French

Press (Stanford: Institute of International Studies, 1968). The parallel policy of the United States is covered by F. Jay Taylor, The United States and the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939 (New York: Bookman, 1956), and Richard P. Traina, American Diplomacy and the Spanish Civil War (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1968). 127. On aid from the Soviet Union, see the works of Thomas and Catell as well as Armsttong, Politics of

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

Pas)

was the Condor Legion, a special air force that became the major instrument of tactical ait support for the Nationalists during the civil war. There is at this time no available evidence as to when the decision to send this force was made and how that decision was attived at. The first commander of the legion, General Hugo Sperrle, went to Spain by way of Rome on 31 October accompanied by the Prince of Hessen and carrying general instructions for the new program dated 30 October.!28 The legion itself became operational early in November, absorbing the ait force units sent earlier.!29 The decision to send the Legion, a force consisting of four to five thousand men,

with planes, antiaircraft guns, and related equipment, was presumably taken sometime during October. When the Italian foreign minister Galeazzo Ciano met first with von Neurath and later with Hitler on 21 October and 24 October, additional military effort in Spain on the part of both countries was mentioned. It is not certain whether the decision to send the legion had been taken just before or followed after, perhaps as a result of these talks.'°° The text of the general directive for the legion’s commander stresses the need to speed up operations in Spain in order to bring about the prompt capture of Madrid, which in turn would justify diplomatic recognition of Franco by Germany and Italy and thus pave the way for the tendering of greater aid. This suggests that dissatisfaction with the slow progress of operations was an important factor in Hitler’s decision to dispatch the legion to Spain. The close connection of this problem with that of diplomatic recognition raises the third of the policy questions that Berlin faced in its handling of developments in Spain. The issue of which group, Loyalists or Insurgents, was to be considered the legal government of Spain was precipitated by the failure of the Insurgents to seize the whole country either in the initial uprising or in the fighting that ensued. In the period of warfare from August 1936 on, the sympathies of Germany were obviously with Franco, but as yet its formal diplomatic relations were with the government of the republic. In view of Germany’s preference, recognition of the Franco government, installed in Burgos at

the end of September, was largely a matter of timing. To avoid needless provocation of Britain and France, to assure adequate cover for the early shipments of aid to Franco, to

secure information from the Republican side, and to protect the large number of Germans still living in the area controlled by the government in Madrid, the Germans continued official relations with that government for some time. During that period, the only activities of the German diplomatic service, beyond those implied in the reasons for maintaining relations, were to handle various incidents mainly resulting from German intervention and to make trouble for Spanish diplomats in Germany.'*! As Franco’s Aftican legions approached Madrid during October, the Berlin government first decided to extend recognition to Franco when he took the capital, and they al ee Totalitarianism, pp. 38-45.

ll 1 an

a

i

128. G.D., D, 3, No. 113. Merkes (p. 33) has reversed the chronology. He suggests that the Condor Legion was

sent in response to Soviet aid to the republic, especially the international brigades which he himself states first appeared in the fighting on 8 November. The instructions of 30 October in fact refer to possible future rather Office W than past assistance by Russia. A British assessment of German, Italian, and Soviet aid in Foreign

16391/9549/41.

:

18 October 129. The financial accounts use 7 November 1936, as the beginning date. In an interrogation of 1945, now in the National Archives, Sperrle gave 1 November

1936 as the beginning date for the Condor

command of the Legion; that may refer to the day on which he attived in Spain from Rome and assumed Karl-Heinz Volker, Die German air force units in the area. On the composition and activity of the legion see Merkes, PP. 33-36. Deutsche Luftwaffe 1933-1939 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1967), pp. 149-54; record is in G.D., C, 5, German the 52-60; pp. Papers, Diplomatic his in is talks these of 130. Ciano’s account

No. 618. 131. Merkes, pp. 45-47.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

coordinated this policy with Rome.!32 When the Insurgents were held at bay by Madrid’s defenders, Hitler changed his mind. Again there is no direct evidence to explain Hitler’s reasons. Hitherto the Germans had tried to use the promise of diplomatic recognition as an incentive for Franco in the hope of speeding up the tempo of his campaign—not for the last time to be a major concern in Berlin and Rome. As Franco’s offensive became stalled in street fighting in the capital, however, this may have seemed an increasingly pointless condition. Awareness of the fact that in any case the struggle in Spain would go on for a long time may well have impelled Hitler to make his formal commitment. It was announced on 18 November, with Germany and Italy acting at the same time.!*? The ptestige of the two dictators was now tied to Franco’s fate; they could hardly afford to see him lose; they would soon face the question of whether they wished merely to prevent such an eventuality or whether they would move beyond that goal to help him win quickly and decisively. The fighting in Spain in November and early December 1936 showed the strength but also the weakness of the two sides. With Germany and Italy providing air support,

and later armored support as well, the trained Army of Africa could make substantial progress against the militia of the Republic. As the forces of the Republic gained experience and discipline and as arms purchased in France and Russia arrived, the pace of Franco’s progress was slowed. Furthermore, the casualties among his experienced soldiers could not be replaced readily from the part of Spain he occupied in view of the antipathy of the local population. The addition of small but effective international brigades to the Republican side in the struggle for the capital helped to bring the Insurgents’ offensive to a halt. As it became clear that the Republic would hold Madrid and the Nationalists faced a continuing struggle, morale in the Franco camp began to sag and

the spirits of the Loyalists rose. Under these circumstances, Germany and Italy were confronted with the question of what to do. They could hardly let Franco fail without great loss of prestige as well as the loss of all they had invested. If they provided a great deal of assistance to Franco, they could help him win quickly but at great cost to themselves and at the risk of major international ‘complications. The third possibility was to provide Franco with enough help to carry on but not enough to finish the war quickly. Under these conditions, the Italian government decided to send large contingents of Italian soldiers, after first assuring themselves of future political collaboration by a secret

agreement dated 28 November 1936.'*4 Although Admiral Canaris as representative of the German Minister of War informed a special Italian conference on 6 December that it was most unlikely that Germany would send regular units of the German army to Spain, Mussolini decided to send Italian soldiers by the thousands.!35 He felt committed and believed the outcome of the struggle in Spain of great importance for Italy’s future. Similar action had been urged on the German government by General Wilhelm Faupel, the new German representative to Franco. Faupel, who spoke fluent Spanish as the result of his work with the Argentinian and Peruvian armies after his service in World War I, had been charged by Hitler to represent German interests in Nationalist Spain. A 132. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 95, 109; and the sources cited in n. 130, above.

133. Merkes, pp. 47-67. Merkes argues that Berlin and Rome acted out of excessively optimistic assessments of the situation in Spain. I believe he has missed the evidence which shows the two powers awate of the slow progress of the Insurgents. Furthermore, Hitler’s December decision on troop shipments, reviewed below, certainly reveals him speculating on a long conflict on the Iberian peninsula. 134, Text in G.D., D, 3, No. 137; and Documents secréts de la 2e guerre mondiale, La politique allemande en Espagne

(1936-1943) (Paris, 1946), No. 1.

135. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 133, 136, 139, 151, 156. The reference by Mussolini to von Blombetg’s views in the last

of the documents cited must be based on statements by Canaris on 6 December. Von Blomberg had seen Hitler on 3 December (TMWC, 32:335).

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

261

strong sympathizer with national socialism, he had directed the Ibero-American Institute in 2 ee and had had close ties with the patty’s foreign organization before going to Spain.'°° There he quickly recognized the military inadequacies of the Insurgent forces and suggested on 4 December that a German division and an Italian division be sent to Spain, that German officers train a portion of Franco’s army, and that the resulting force make a concerted push to break the front of the Republic. It was his view that unless this were done the wat would drag on and the Insurgents might lose.!37 Although the evidence is not quite conclusive, it would appear that Franco himself expressed similar

views.138 The reaction in the German Foreign Ministry to these calls for help was extremely negative. There the officials had been opposed to German intervention in Spain from the beginning. They were now faced with the problem of warding off a British-French effort to initiate a multilateral approach to mediation in the Spanish Civil War.!3? At the same time, the special treaty Franco had signed with Italy provided an excellent excuse for allowing Italy to play a leading role in the whole dangerous enterprise.!4° Furthermore, the well-known xenophobia of the Spaniards was certain to hurt any power intervening in Spain on such a scale, while the perils of complications with France and Britain looked enormous.!*! In the face of this situation, Faupel returned to Germany to argue the issue

in person. !42 A conference was held in the chancellery in Berlin on 21 December. Present were Hitler, Goring, von Blomberg, von Fritsch, the commander in chief of the German army, Hossbach, the chief representative of the military to Hitler, General Faupel, and

Colonel Warlimont, who had just returned representative at Franco’s headquarters.'4? meeting or had a separate session with Hitler decided to ask for three German divisions, sending them, as did von

from his tour Von Neurath about the same not one. Von

Fritsch, Hossbach,

of duty as German military was either present at this time.!*4 By then Faupel had Blomberg strongly opposed

and Warlimont.

It is not certain what

GGring’s views were, though apparently he too objected.'*° The arguments were obvious: 136. Merkes, pp. 68-69; Einhorn, pp. 125-30; Jacobsen, p. 474. 137. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 144, 148. Cf. the conference of Goring with a number of high-ranking Luftwaffe officers

on 2 December 1936 (TMWC, 32:334—36). 138. This would seem to have been the thrust of Faupel’s telegram 592 of 9 December 1936, which has not turned up (see G.D., D, 3, No. 148, n. 1, and 151, n. 1). Some details of Franco’s plea for help and the negative reaction in Berlin leaked out at the time; see Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 55,” 17 December 1936, in

Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.S¢. 101/29, £. 543-47.

Ronald Strunk, who had earlier reported on the Italo-Ethiopian war for the Vé/kischer Beobachter and was now in Spain, appears to have had views similar to those of Faupel and may have supported his pleas in Berlin; see the reports of the U.S. consul at Seville on Strunk’s statements reported in telegrams of 29 November and

11 December 1936, U.S. 1936, 2: 582-83, 611. 139. On Germany’s unwillingness to participate in mediation see G.D., D, 3, Nos. 146, 147, 152.

140. Ibid., No. 142. 141. Ibid., Nos. 145, 155. Cf. also the first sentence of ibid., No. 169.

refers to 142. The precise dates of Faupel’s stay in Germany are not known. Hassell’s telegram of 17 December Faupel had written the possibility of Faupel’s stopping in Rome on his return trip to Spain (ibid., No. 156). does not mention from Spain on 10 December (No. 148) and was back by 30 December (No. 172). Merkes W 18547/62/41. Faupel’s trip. See also Phipps telegram 442-Saving, 19 December 1936, Foreign Office 143. The main source for this conference is Warlimont’s

statement cited in n. 121, above. He has alluded

1939-1945 (Bonn: briefly to the meeting in his published memoirs, Im Hauptquartier der deutschen Wehrmacht

und Hitler, p. 42. The allusion Athenaum, 1964), p. 26. Hossbach tefers to it in his memoirs, Zwischen Wehrmacht Paul List, 1950), pp. 129-30, is based on in the memoirs of Ernst von Weizsacker, Evinnerungen (Munich:

U.S. military attaché inBerlin at discussions by Faupel with the Foreign Ministry. The statement made to the evidence on the views held confirmatory important is 2:612) 1936, (U.S. December 14 on War of the Ministry 79. there. See also Dodd, Diary, 25 December 1936, p. 374; Pike, p. 1936, DZA Potsdam, 60 964, f. 41. 144, See the letter of von Neurath to von Hassell of 22 December

145, Warlimont

asserts that Goring opposed, Weizsacker

;

that he favored the dispatch of troops. Since

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the great risks of war with the Western powers, problems of supply, interference with the ptogress of Germany’s own rearmament program. Either at the same or another meeting, von Neurath urged the arguments of the Foreign Ministry. Hitler may have made up his mind eatlier;!#° he now formally decided against sending German troops on a large scale. He stated that he was interested in focusing European attention on Spain for a long time, not a quick victory for Franco, especially if it endangered Germany’s own teatmament program. Continuation of the civil war would divert attention from Germany. To make sure Franco was not defeated, the Germans would send additional help; and preparations were to be made to increase that aid if disaster threatened the Nationalist cause. But Faupel would have to return to Spain without the promise of German divisions. The bigger costs, especially in troops, the Germans would gladly leave to Italy. The Germans themselves would draw from the bloody turmoil in Spain three enormous advantages—important raw materials for themselves,'4’ the immobilization of the

Western powers during their preoccupation with Spanish problems, and the inability of Italy to return to cooperation with those powers while intervening heavily in the civil wat. That war would thereby continue the process begun by the Italian war against Ethiopia. The more deeply Italy was committed, the closer it would become to Germany. The longer the civil war lasted, the more

difficult it would be for Italy to leave the

German orbit again.'48 Germany would help to keep Franco from losing, but if his victory were long-postponed that would help rather than hurt the Thitd Reich. Almost a year after the meeting on 21 December 1936, Hitler was to repeat his views as to the advantages for Germany

of a lengthy conflict in Spain at the notorious conference on 5 November 1937 recorded in the Hossbach Memorandum.'4? German policy toward the Spanish Civil War had stabilized in accordance with that view by the end of 1936 and was to remain essentially unchanged until the war burned itself out in 1939. The implementation of that policy cannot be examined here; its foundations had been laid by the decisions of the last months of 1936. ‘ The process of decision-making in the case of Spain shows two simultaneous transitions in the development of German foreign policy between 1933 and 1939. As German strength increased, Hitler was more willing to become involved in adventures beyond the borders of the Reich. For the first time since the disastrous course of events in Austria in 1934, German prestige was committed to a cause in another country. Surely the Rhineland triumph bolstered Hitlet’s confidence in this regard. Yet, in the very process of

foreign adventure, Hitler was still mindful of the handicaps under which Germany labored. The inadequacy of its armaments and raw materials still suggested caution; Spanish ores might help with both, but the risks and costs had to be kept within limits. Warlimont was present and Weizsicker almost certainly was not, Warlimont is more likely to be correct. 146. See above, n. 135. The indirect evidence on the Hitler-Blomberg meeting of 3 December 1936, suggests that at that time Hitler was disinclined to send further troops.

‘

147. On the earliest shipments see Einhorn, pp. 117-19.

148. Von Hassell had made this argument in a detailed report of 18 December which reached Berlin on 19

December (G.D., D, 3, No. 157). He had asked von Neutath to show this report to Hitler (letter of 18 December, DZA Potsdam, 60 964, f. 40), and von Neutath on 22 December wrote him that he had done so

(DZA Potsdam, 60964, f. 41). A fine summary of the policy of Mussolini in 1936 and its implications for Italy’s relations with the Western powers and with Germany is in Ferdinand Siebert, Italiens Weg in den Zweiten Weltkrieg (Bonn: Athenaum, 1962), pp. 48-53. 149. Since Merkes does not understand the general line of German policy in this matter, he asserts (pp. 127-28)

that those who accept the statement in the Hossbach memorandum have been misled; in fact it is Merkes who

has misled himself as has already been pointed out by Detwiler (pp. 141-42, n. 31).

Germany Ascendant: The Power Shift of 1936

Zo

The other shift clearly evident in Germany’s Spanish adventure is the eclipse of the Foreign Ministry. For Hitler, that Ministry was not the control agency for the management of Germany’s foreign affairs—he would perform that role himself—but merely one possible instrument to be used or not as the exigencies of the moment suggested. The foreign organization of the party, the chief of military intelligence, the Air Ministry—any one of them could serve as an instrument when the occasion suited. If using all of them at the same time led to squabbles between them, that was no substantial problem if Hitler’s policy was served. In that policy and its implementation, the interaction between short-term opportunism and long-term consistency comes out clearly. No one should underestimate the shrewdness with which Hitler seized on the opportunity that Franco’s uprising provided and with which he limited German involvement to maximize the advantages and minimize the risks of intervention.

Chapter 12 The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 he general shift in the world situation that took place in 1936 due to Germany’s spectacular success in the Rhineland influenced its relationship with most countries. The reverberations of the new situation could be felt in the smallest country and the furthest part of the globe. An examination of Germany’s relations with a number of countries both inside and outside Europe will show how the common theme of recognition of Germany’s actual or at least potential predominance in Europe transcends the peculiar circumstances growing out of the specific issues of each relationship. In every case, the issues remain, but—like the colored pieces of a kaleidoscope—once severely

disturbed, they fall into an entirely new pattern even though it contains the same pieces that were there earlier. Perhaps because the trend toward a rapprochement with Germany was already under way early in 1936, this is especially obvious in the case of Lithuania. In his speech of 21 May 1935 Hitler had expresSly excluded Lithuania from the countries with which Germany would sign a nonaggression pact, and he had repeated his strictures at the gathering of the Reichstag in Nuremberg on 15 September of that year.! This vehement antagonism was ostensibly based on the interference of Lithuania in the rights of the Memel Germans assured them by the Memel Statute.? It is interesting how concerned Hitler became about democratic procedures in countries other than Germany; the “benefits” of ending democracy were obviously to be reserved to the inhabitants of the Reich. Hitler did not appreciate the irony in his denouncing the Lithuanian government for allegedly mistreating Germans just because they were Germans at the same session of the Reichstag which passed the infamous Nuremberg laws against German Jews because they were Jews. The actions of the Lithuanian government, culminating in the prosecution of many Memel Germans in the Kovno trial of 1934-35, had aroused objections both inside and outside Germany at the severity of the sentences imposed on those convicted at the end of March 1935. In the spring and summer of 1935, as the Germans maintained economic pressures against Lithuania, the signatory powers of the Memel Statute repeatedly intervened with the Lithuanian government to urge a more conciliatory course.? The British 1. Texts in G.D., C, 4:171—72 and 632-33; Domarus, 1:510-11, 536. 2. See above, pp. 67-69. 3. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 13, 39, 42, 62; U.S. 1935, 1:249—-54. The pressures on the Lithuanian government, especially

by the British, can be followed in the reports by the U.S. chargé a.i. in Kovno (Kaunas), C. Porter Kuykendall: dispatches 199 of 18 March 1935 (State 860 M.O1-Memel/346), 221 of 23 April (ibid., /361), 230 of 29 April (ibid., /368), 235 of 6 May (ibid., /369), 267 of 25 June (ibid., /387), 276 of 12 July (ibid., /390), and 283 of 24

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 235 consistently took the lead in these representations, which eventually bore fruit in a relatively free election held in the Memel area in September. A united front of the German parties won an overwhelming victory in these elections; and, under further pressure, primarily from the British, the Lithuanian government entrusted the direction of local affairs to the United German front.4 British attempts to promote a German-Lithuanian rapprochement in the winter of 1935-36 were not so successful to begin with.> Two factors—one acting on the Germans and the other on the Lithuanians—were to bring the two together. The Germans were increasingly concerned about the impact of the economic measutes they were using against Lithuania. These measures, in practice, bore most heavily on the Memel Germans, while the Lithuanian government was finding new trade partners to offset the impact of Germany’s steps on the rest of the economy.® The Lithuanian government, for its part, was obviously impressed by Germany’s great success in the Rhineland. In his speech of 7 March 1936, Hitler acknowledged the political concession Lithuania had made in the September election and the formation of the local Memel government by dropping his previously voiced objections to treaties with Lithuania.’ In the following months, the Lithuanians reluctantly came to agree to a new economic treaty with Germany that could be used to benefit the Memel Germans.’ The differences between Germany and Lithuania were by no means settled definitively, but the uneasy truce of 1936 surely reflected the stronger international position of Germany as compared with the preceding years. Furthermore, the Germans, in the future, could expect more support on the Memel question from Italy, the one signatory power that had been most unwilling to insist on Lithuania’s observance of the Memel Statute.? When Ciano was in Berlin in October 1936, von Neurath reminded him of the fact that “Italy’s attitude has so far been far from friendly toward us” and secured Ciano’s promise that Italy would mend its ways in this regard.!° As for Germany’s long-run aims in regard to Memel, they were best served by the maintenance of an uneasy status quo; Germany, in Hitler’s eyes, was not yet ready for the international repercussions of the forcible seizure of Memel. But he did not want the future possibility of such a seizure deprived of its excuse by a truly effective international guarantee of the rights of the Memel Germans.'! Such a guarantee, Hitler feared, would i

el

ae

te

SS

en

SSS

July (State 760M.62/108).

von 4. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 239, 255, 300, 305, 345, 356; Plieg, chap. X; Gentzen, pp. 88-90; Memorandum of Neurath RM 710, 23 September 1935, T-120, 1468/3015/D 597747; Kuykendall dispatches 335 of 17 October

860 1935 (State 860 M.01-Memel/434), 343 of 24 October (State 760M.62/113), 365 of 18 November (State to M.01-Memel/446), 370 of 22 November (ibid., /447), 373 of 29 November (ibid., /448), and enclosure 6 dispatch 380 of 5 December (ibid., /450). see also Kuykendall 5. GD., C, 4, Nos. 377, 378, 422, 456 (on the meeting mentioned in this document 1935, State 860 dispatch 435 of 24 February 1936, State 860 M.01/462); Dodd dispatch 2470, 15 November 1935 December 28 of 392 /451), (ibid., 1935 December 12 of 385 dispatches M.01-Memel/443; Kuykendall

(ibid., /452), 402 of 3 January 1936 (ibid., /455), and 424 of 4February 1936 (State 760M.62/118).

m of Grundhert IV Ba 367/36, 21 6. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 495, 548, 549, 554, 578; Gentzen, pp. 81-82; Memorandu

January

1936, T-120, 3611/9798/E

3070/6606/E

496493494;

687675-677;

Memorandum

Memorandum

of von Neurath RM

of Roediger, 31 January

1936, T-120,

93, 7 February 1936, T-120, 2383/4619/E

198244. ion pact—subject to rather 7. The reference to Lithuania and the possibility of a Getman-Lithuanian nonageress and

read by Hitler to the Reichstag elastic conditions—was included as part 6 of the German proposals delivered to the Locarno powers.

C, 5, Nos. 329, 441, 512; U.S. 1936, 1:266; 8. The negotiations and their difficulties may be followed in G.D.,

Kuykendall dispatch 460, 6 April 1936, State 760 M.62/120. on the Memel issue was probably not 9. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 306, 308. The reluctance of Italy to pressure Lithuania unrelated to Italy’s own policies in the Tirol area. 10. G.D., C, 5, No. 622. on 23 October 1935 are recorded in the 11. Hitler’s views as expressed to the German consul general in Memel

236

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

probably be implemented by the appointment of an international commissioner who would see to it that the Memel Germans were accorded in real life the rights guaranteed them by international agreement. Such an arrangement was the last thing Germany wanted. In fact, in Danzig, another area Germany had lost after World War I, Berlin was

trying very hard to have the international commissioner removed precisely because his protection of the rights of the Danzig Germans was too effective. The problem of Danzig was to dominate German-Polish relations in 1936 as the Germans worked, eventually successfully, to demolish the League of Nations’ guarantee of the constitutional rights of the Germans in the free city; but before the course of that campaign is traced, a word must be said about other issues affecting German relations with Poland. The long-standing feud over the transfer into foreign exchange of the German payments to Poland for railway transportation across the corridor had apparently been settled by the agreement of 7 April 1936.2 That settlement had been reached through the personal intervention of Hitler and Goring at a time when the Rhineland crisis made concessions to Poland appear desirable in the broader context of European affairs. As difficulties arose in the implementation of the new payments system, the Germans became less accommodating; as Hermann Goring expressed it in late May, “It is, however, no longer so necessary as it seemed to be a few weeks ago, on account of con-

siderations of foreign policy, to meet the Polish desires to so great an extent.”!3 The remaining financial problems of the transit traffic were eventually settled by agreement on 31 August 1936; and by that time the other major economic issue between Germany and Poland, the fate of the industrial complex in Polish Upper Silesia known as I. G.

Kattowitz-Laura, had also been settled. The bargaining had been hard, but these running sotes in German-Polish relations were finally treated.'* Mote important than these questions were the general problems of the relationship between Germany and Poland in a Europe transformed by the remilitarization of the Rhineland. The refusal of France to move in the face of this German step had been expected by the Polish foreign minister, Beck, but not by some of Poland’s military leaders. Poland now followed a carefully balanced policy. While willing to work with Germany to prevent the creation of a new security system including the Soviet Union and while also endeavoring to avoid having to side against Germany in the negotiations for a new Locarno, the Warsaw government simultaneously wanted teassurances from France that its alliance with that country was still effective. In addition, the weakening of

any French assistance because of the remilitarized Rhineland suggested the need for greater Polish military strength. Beyond formal reassurances from France, therefore, Poland wanted French financial aid. Both the formal assurances and funds were forthcoming from Paris; the summer of 1936 saw France and Poland drawing closer together and exchanging visits of theit leading military figures. Most of the concessions, however, were made by France: Poland would neither draw closer to Czechoslovakia nor abandon its policy of cautious friendship with Germany.'5 In fact, in order to reassure Germany latter’s memorandum of that date (ibid., 4, No. 378). 12. See above, pp. 146-47, 194. 13. G.D., C, 5, No. 356. 14, Ibid., No. 491, p. 942. For restraints on the German press in this regard see “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 4. April 1936,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/7, f. 243. 15. Roos, pp. 237-73. In addition to the sources cited there, see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 139, 173, 245, 293, 308, 332,

518; D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 445, 455, 487, 488, 497; 2, Nos. 35, 118, 215, 170, 349, 364; 3, Nos. 153, 158, 169, 259,

271, 275, 301, 308, 326, 451; U.S. 1936, 1:356-57; Smutny (Czech chargé a.i. Warsaw) report 69, 22 August

1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413347-349 Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 7-8, 12-21.

(changed excerpts in Prager Akten, No.

71);

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 237 that Poland was not drifting into the hostile camp, the Polish undersecretary for foreign affairs, Jan Szembek, was sent on a special mission to Berlin in August 1936. By that time, the Danzig problem had entered a new stage as a result of Getman moves. In mid-June 1936, Hitler decided to reopen the Danzig question. The precise timing, causes, and putposes of this decision are shrouded in secrecy,! and scholats who have worked on this subject have turned up little new evidence. With or without Hitler’s prior authorization, in early June 1936 the National Socialists in Danzig under the leadership of Gawleiter Albert Forster stepped up dramatically their campaign against the surviving Opposition parties in the free city. Since the failure of the National Socialists to gain a two-thirds vote in the elections precluded legal steps against opponents under an enabling law, terror and propaganda were the instruments of Forster’s policy.!7 The president of the Danzig Senate, Arthur Greiser, was both Forster’s rival in Danzig and uncertain about the policy Hitler wanted followed. He had written Sean Lester, the League high commissioner, on 3 June congratulating him on the extension of his term

and expressing Greiser’s “especial pleasure at the appointment.’”!8 As late as 16 June, as the incidents in Danzig increased, Greiser tried to secure a letter from Lester to use in

Berlin in an effort to have Forster either removed or at least curbed.!? This effort to calm the situation, though for the moment supported by the German Foreign Ministry and Goring, was soon reversed. When Forster saw Hitler on 19 June he not only must have received approval of his course, but, in view of what followed, Hitler either reaffirmed or newly approved a policy of further provocation in Danzig.2? Perhaps the League’s recent humiliation in the Ethiopian case suggested to Hitler that this was a propitious time to move against that hated institution at another point. Perhaps the internal turmoil in France in the first days of the Popular Front government suggested that Poland’s reactions to changes in the free city would be restrained by awareness of the weakness of its principal ally. Perhaps Hitler simply acted in response to Forstet’s urgings, allowing him to make another attempt at the destruction of the opposition parties in Danzig now that the situation that had imposed caution six months earlier had passed. Whatever the reason, Forster was authorized to move ahead in a program calculated to provoke trouble. The new provocation in Danzig took the form of an intentional slight to the high commissioner by the officers of the visiting German cruiser Leipzig together with an inflammatory attack on the high commissioner and the League by Forster, an attack whose text, significantly, was published in Germany before it appeared in Danzig on 27 June.?!

Furthermore, when Lestet’s complaints were discussed by the League council in Geneva on 4 July, Greiser, who had previously been carefully coached in Berlin, delivered himself of a tirade against Lester, the institution of the high commissioner, and the League and

showed his best party manners by thumbing his nose and sticking out his tongue at the journalists reporting the council session. With the League deflated by the setback on Ethiopia, Greiser could be most heroic by contrast with his more subdued appearance the preceding January. He returned in triumph to Danzig by way of Berlin, while the Nr. 24,” 6 July 16. On the secrecy at the time see the perceptive report by Dertinger, “Tnformationsbericht ; 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f. 265-69.

p. 182. The account in Breyer, 17. Leonhardt, pp. 226-30; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 373, 394; Szembek, 20 June 1936,

pp. 202ff. is quite superficial. This letter was subse18, Gallman (U.S. consul Danzig) dispatch 258, 7 August 1936, State 860K.00/237. of Nations (League of quently quoted by Lester in his 12 September report to the council of the League Nations, Official Journal, Novembet 1936, pp. 1359-62).

19, Gallman dispatch 269, 9 September 1936, State 860K.00/240.

202G:D AG, 55Noi373: 2d, 2, Nos. 390-96; 3, Nos. 11, 15. 21. On the Danzig crisis see ibid., Nos. 417, 419, 429; D.D.F.,

238

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Polish government, as the legal representative of Danzig in international affairs, was asked by the council to settle the dispute over the Lespzg incident. It is abundantly clear from the record that the Germans wanted Lester removed; from Hitler on down, all German officials parroted this demand for months to all diplomats and to the world. Lester’s defense of the rights of the Danzig opponents of national socialism in accordance with the League’s guarantee of the constitution of the free city stood in the way of complete nazification of the atea and was, therefore, to be terminated. There was also some thought of ending the position of the high commissioner,

but on that point—as well as the further thought of perhaps annexing Danzig to the Reich—the reaction of Poland would be decisive. Germany would push, but not too far.

Berlin could find out just how far it was safe to push in Danzig by watching the reaction inside Poland and by talking with Beck. Greiser spoke with Beck at Geneva and invited him to speak with Goring on his way back to Warsaw through Germany.” The Polish government had been warned beforehand of both the Lepzig incident and the Forster speech, but they were not ready for Greiser’s frontal assault on the

League’s position in Danzig. Both the personal position of Beck as the foreign minister identified with the policy of cooperation with Germany and the basic position of Poland in Danzig were at stake. Beck’s policy of working with Germany appeared to have blown up in his face, while the removal of the League from Danzig was bound to threaten Poland’s rights in the free city. Unlike the Germans, who did not recognize the advantages of the institution of the high commissioner until the German population had been expelled from Danzig after another war, the Poles saw quite clearly the dangers of a

direct confrontation between Germany and Poland in Danzig. They believed that they had no interest in protecting the Germans opposed to national socialism in Danzig, but they were very much concerned about the protection of their own interests; and they thought, probably erroneously, that the two issues could be separated. The leading figure in Poland after Pilsudski’s death, General Edward Smigly-Rydz, had expressed the view on 30 June that when Germany was ready for war in two or three years, that war would start over Danzig.”? In the crisis at Geneva, Beck warned Warsaw to take precautions and cautioned the Germans that Poland would react immediately to any unilateral German step changing the status of the free city.” The clear Polish response was immediately recognized in Berlin; obviously a change in the person, not the institution, of the high commissioner was all that Poland would tolerate. GOring first reassured the Polish ambassador, Lipski, and then Beck on 5 July

that nothing would be done to interfere with Polish rights in Danzig and did not push the subject when Beck maintained a teserved view of any institutional alterations.” Under these circumstances, the alarm expressed over the crisis by Britain and France only provided German diplomats with opportunities to denounce Lester, while Beck found a quiet way to dispose of the Lempzig incident and National Socialists in Danzig were instructed not to interfere with Polish rights.2° Some tension remained, however,

because Polish public opinion had been greatly disturbed, and all of Beck’s enemies used the Danzig uproar against him. Just as Greiser had tried to redeem himself for his prior friendship with Lester by taking an extreme position at Geneva,2’ so Beck had to stand firm lest he be accused of allowing his German policy to injure Poland’s vital interests at

22. G.D., C, 5, No. 430. 23. Szembek, 30 June 1936, p. 185. 24. Lipski Papers, No. 57; Szembek, 5 July 1936, p. 186; cf. D.D.F,, 2d, 2, Nos. 396, 410.

25. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 434, 438; Lipski Papers, No. 58; Szembek, 6 July 1936, p. 186. 26. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 436, 437, 443, 467; Lipski Papers, Nos. 59, 60; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 401, 413, 427, 430. 27. Cf. Leonhardt, p. 222.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 239 a most sensitive point.” When Szembek visited Germany in August, therefore, he could assure his German

hosts of Polish willingness to let changes be made in Danzig as long as Polish interests were not affected. Furthermore, he had been instructed to explain that the exchanges of visits of the leading French and Polish military figures, General Gamelin and General Smigly-Rydz, did not imply that Poland was drawing closer to France or abandoning its policy of working with Germany. In any case, Poland would not help the Czechs. He was to make clear, however, that Poland would protect its own interests in Danzig, as else-

where, peacefully and in cooperation with Germany if possible, but by fighting if it became

necessary.

In his conversations

with Hitler, von

Ribbentrop,

Géring,

von

Neurath, and others in Berlin, Szembek poured forth reassuring comments while declining to pursue hints of possible changes in the status of Danzig or any future replacement for the Upper Silesian Minorities Statute scheduled to expire in 1937.2? The Germans for their part all reassured him of their lasting devotion to the German-Polish Pact, promised not to interfere with Polish rights in Danzig, and urged the removal of Lester. Though warned by the well-informed Belgian minister in Berlin that the Germans had in no way really given up their territorial claims on Poland, Szembek returned to Warsaw greatly pleased and reassured. Germany in the weeks of the Olympics had been impressive indeed, and the protestations of friendship had sounded sincere, underlined as they were by the calm German reception of the exchange of French and Polish military visits. Szembek, at least, was convinced.*”

Neither Smigly-Rydz nor Beck, however, wete as certain of German sincerity as Szembek. Though as enthused as Szembek by the anti-Soviet and anti-Communist tirades that he recounted having heard in Berlin, the other Polish leaders were suspicious that these were, as Smigly-Rydz put it, merely “a camouflage and pretext for the pursuit of a policy of aggression.”3! Though more perceptive than the undersecretary, the inspectot-general of the Polish army did not quite recognize that the tirades were both sincere and a pretext; that the National Socialist leaders both detested communism and the Soviet Union and used anti-Bolshevik slogans to cover aggressive policies they intended to pursue in any case. The events in Danzig in the fall of 1936 certainly removed some of the cover from German policy. As the National Socialists in Danzig took advantage of the situation to move more drastically against the opposition, Lester prepared his last report, filed on 12 September, and resigned in view of the obvious determination of the powers at Geneva to pay no attention to the violations of the Danzig constitution. The League heard Beck’s report on his handling of the Leipzig incident, entrusted him with settling the problems between the high commissioner and the Danzig Senate, and generally turned its back on internal developments in the free city, though without abandoning the formal presence of the League and its theoretical rights.>* The Germans now had a free hand inside Danzig, and 126, 139; Schliep (Warsaw) report PV 28. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 458, 472, 473, 476; D.D.F, 2d, 3, Nos. 16, 32, 44,

Pol V 2151: Unterredung Greiser17/7-36, 21 July 1936, T-120, 1315/2371/D 495821-823, and “Vermerk Warsaw) report 62, 14 July, Czech docuPapeé,” 27 July, ibid., frames D 495835-837; Slavik (Czech minister No. 68). ment in T-120, 1040/1809/413341—342 (excerpt in Prager Akten,

German accounts in G.D., C, 5, Nos. 506, 513; 29. Szembek’s account of his talks is in his Journal, pp. 188-203; p. 407; PDF R2dSsINowls9. Trial, Schmidt Guido 1936, August 21 see also von Papen to Hitler, G.D., C, 5, No. 551; von Papen to Hitler tele30. Szembek, 23 September 1936, p. 204; Lipski Papers, No. 61;

gram 115, 8 September 1936, T-120, 2500/4939/E 272464.

d well by Roos, pp. 257—59. 31. Szembek, 30 September 1936, pp. 206-08. The issue is summarize p. 206, 7 5, Nos. 524, 557, 566, 573; Szembek, 30 September 1936,

32. Leonhardt, pp. 260-64; G.D., C, October, pp. 208-09; Memorandum

4. The basis of Greiser, 6 October 1936, 1412061315/ 2371 /D 495841-84

basis for the establishment of the free city had on which the powers excused their policy was that the original of some Germans against other Germans defense the not sea, the to access Poland’s of been the protection

240

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

a new high commissioner had to be located who would mediate between Germany and Poland without interfering with the illegal measures taken against the opposition and the Jews. This task was eventually accomplished by the designation of Carl J. Burckhardt as high commissioner in February 1937 with the clear understanding that his role would be sttictly limited.33 The report circulated to its missions abroad by the German Foreign Ministry on 11 February 1937, summarizing the League’s handling of the Danzig issue just before Burckhardt accepted the appointment, appropriately commented that “although Danzig had originally set itself further goals, the settlement arrived at in Geneva can surely be considered progress.”*4 What was meant by “progress” had been evident in Danzig in the interim. Immediately after the League decision formally turning the problem over to Poland, the Poles had begun to examine the next steps.** They preferred to have a high commissioner in Danzig to keep from confronting Germany directly over every incident affecting Polish interests in Danzig. Little did they realize how quickly this issue would arise. Forster received Hitler’s approval on 12-13 October to outlaw the Danzig Socialist party and to proceed against the other remaining non-National Socialist parties as well. He was told by Hitler not to rush things too much during these violations of the constitution, and he was given similar cautions by von Neurath.*° The National Socialist gawleiter of Danzig was, however, not the type of person to go about his business quietly and carefully. Greiser had put on a show in Geneva; he would top that by a performance where it really counted, in Danzig. Forster immediately moved rapidly against the opposition by a series of drastic measures and also told his followers that the disappearance of the Poles would follow that of the opposition parties from Danzig. Once before, in November 1935, Forster had allowed his enthusiasm to unveil Germany’s real aims, thereby alarming Poland and forcing Hitler to tell his trusted but overexuberant aide to restrain himself.4’ Now, after

his triumph over Lester, Forster outdid himself. The Four-Year Plan then being proclaimed in Germany would prepare the country for wat. Germany would take Danzig first, and the rest would follow. The League had no business in Danzig, nor had the

Poles. Forster told his party followers that Hitler wanted them to be quiet and careful, but he can hardly have expected them to listen quietly—or the Poles to pay no attention—when he also told them that Hitler would be entering Danzig in a few months and when the district party chief in introducing Forster proclaimed that Poland would have to be eliminated altogether.** It is hardly surprising that an uproar in German-Polish relations ensued, with Berlin hard put to calm the aroused suspicions of Warsaw. Since the German government was indeed not yet ready to move toward the “further goals” alluded to in these undiplomatic (Gordon [Geneva] telegram 45, 27 January 1937, State 860 K.00/276). 33. Burckhardt’s own account may be found in his Meine Danziger Mission, 1937-1939 (Munich: Callwey, 1960). Some devastating comments in Johann W. Brigel, “The Neutral Appeaser,” Wiener Library Bulletin, 14, No. 3 (1960), 56. The negotiations are covered by Gallman (Danzig) dispatch 324, 13 January 1937 and Cudahy (Warsaw) dispatch 1480, 29 January 1937, State 860 K.00/274 and 280. See also memorandum of Skrine Stevenson (London), 15 October 1936, Foreign Office C 7282/33/55.

34. “Pol V V635/37,” 11 February 1937, T-120, 1315/2371/D 495896, 35. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 575, 579; Szembek, 8 October 1936, pp. 209-10. 36. On Forster in Germany see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 584, 594, 609, 605. This last document is a memorandum by

Weizsacker of which much has been made by Burckhardt and Denne (pp. 115-17). Denne, whose research is often careless, has a distorted account of the whole crisis of October 1936, ignoring the Polish protests (p. 74).

See the comments by Fritz T. Epstein, Jahrbuch fiir die Geschichte Mittel- und Ostdeutschlands, 11 (1962), 475. 37. G.D., C, 4, No. 454; Schliep (Warsaw) report P VI 17/11.35,

3 December 1935, T-120, 2787/6023/H

044685-687. 38. Text in Emessen, pp. 123-26. The reference to the Four-Year Plan will also be examined in the following chapter.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 241 speeches, Hitler eventually agreed to restrain Forster once again. Appropriate assurances were given to the Polish government, and the Polish protests were answered by suitably accommodating replies. While the Getmans would not allow any increase in Polish rights in Danzig, they promised scrupulously to observe the existing ones; and, like the Poles, the Germans for their part now saw some usefulness in the high commissioner as a buffer against the extension of the other powet’s influence in the free city.? A major threat to German-Polish relations was averted, but if anyone in Warsaw still had illusions,

they must have been both blind and deaf; for the benefit of the latter, Goring explained to Ambassador Lipski that Hitler would someday demand an extraterritorial passage across the Polish Corridor in exchange for unspecified compensation elsewhere.“ The summer and fall of 1936 thus saw German relations with Poland enter a new phase. While Germany still wanted to maintain the truce entered in the first year of National Socialist rule, was generous with soothing assurances and cetemonial courtesies,*! and would restrain the more exuberant advocates of expansion when their

excessively frank statements aroused Polish ire, the consolidation of German power in Europe provided the basis for a more aggressive policy. Still unwilling to challenge Poland at points where the Poles made their resistance firm and obvious, the National

Socialist leaders were now more willing to try for gains. Though in retrospect the removal of Lester from Danzig symbolized the disastrous fate awaiting both Germans and Poles, the triumph of the National Socialists over the representative of the League with Polish connivance in 1936 certainly marks the end of an epoch. The Germans in the Saar had ended their own freedom when they cast their votes for union with Germany in 1935; those in Danzig lost it in 1936. Poland would have to look to its interests as best it

could. With any prospective French aid held off by the remilitarized Rhineland—to say nothing of the defensive strategy of Paris—this would be no easy task. Another way in which Danzig illustrates the changing situation in 1936 is that, as in

the case of German policy toward the Spanish Civil War, the key decisions were made by Hitler without consultation with the German Foreign Ministry. Hitler either gave Forster instructions himself or allowed Goring to handle the issues. The Foreign Ministry could only plead for information. What makes this particularly interesting is that in the case of German-Polish relations, Hitler had no need to worry about “softness” in the Foreign Ministry. On the contrary, as he well knew, the policy of cooperation with Poland was quite unpopular in the Wilhelmstrasse, and any tightening in the relationship would only be welcomed there. Nevertheless, he found it more congenial to his work habits to meet

party cronies in Munich than to carry forward the business of government in the Berlin chancellery. His self-confidence, not surprisingly, had grown, and he would conduct

Germany’s

affairs as he saw fit.

As applied to the Soviet Union in 1936, such conduct meant primarily the use of

real or imagined Soviet actions as excuses for whatever he planned to do. The Franco-

Soviet Pact had provided the pretext for remilitarizing the Rhineland; in August 1936,

Russian moves were cited to explain the extension of the term of service in the German atmy; and at the Nuremberg party rally in September denunciations of the Soviet Union filled the autumn air. At all times, the supposed use of Czech airfields by the Russian air 4, 5, 12, 13, 43, 45, 61; 39. Szembek, pp. 211-216; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 623, 628, 630, 635, 636, 639; 6, Nos.

Polish position by Count Josef D.D.F.,, 2d, 3, Nos. 387, 465, 466, 470, 488, 494, 514. A detailed exposé of the

1355 from the U.S. Potocki, chief of the western department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in dispatch

Chargé a.i., Rose, of 2November 1936, State 860 K.00/263. 40, Szembek, 3 November 1936, p. 214; Lipski Papers, p. 270.

Polish veterans by the head of 41, See material on the reception in Berlin in October 1936 of a delegation of

chief of the German-Polish Institute, SAthe German veterans organization, Hanns Obetlindober, and the roll 17, setial 38. T-81, 0/2, 250-d-18-2 EAP in Arnim, von Achim Prof. rer Brigadefiih

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

force provided a fine talking point for Germany’s political and diplomatic leaders. The contempotary evidence, however, shows that the fairy tales about the “Soviet aircraft carrier in Central Europe” were never believed by those who assiduously spread them and that German military planning was at no time seriously concerned about the Soviet menace that was supposedly keeping the German general staff awake at night.* Behind the fury and the fancy, German-Soviet relations in 1936 proceeded in essentially the same manner that they had before. From the German side, the fulminations in public were not allowed to interfere with trade relations between the two countries. The more extensive schemes that Schacht and Soviet trade representative David Kandelaki had talked about had foundered early in 1936. A routine trade agreement providing for a continuation of the former level of exchange was worked out instead and finally signed on 29 April.3 In subsequent months, the German interest in raw materials needed for rearmament, especially manganese—an alloy used in making steel of which 50 percent of the world’s production was mined in the Soviet Union—led the Berlin government to consider more extensive trade arrangements. Hermann Goring, whose Four-Year Plan set up later in the year was ostensibly directed against the Soviet Union, was especially interested in better economic relations with Russia in view of Germany’s shortage of foreign exchange. He began to take a direct part in pushing for a higher volume of trade and provided the political cover for his cousin, Herbert Goring of the Reich Ministry of Economics, who played an active part in informal efforts to accomplish that purpose. While the Germans wanted raw materials, the Soviets wanted

military equipment, especially for their navy. Very little came of the whole project, but this episode is deserving of comment because of the light it sheds on the foreign policies of both countries.“ On the German side, the priority of the economic needs of the armaments program is obvious. Equally obvious is the assumption that the use of the armaments—at least against the Soviet Union—was not expected immediately; hence the willingness to supply some military equipment to Russia. The Soviet interest in naval equipment was simultaneously being expressed to the United States where the Russians wished to buy a battleship.*? During the period of the nonaggtression pact with Germany, Moscow would again solicit German aid in building up the Red navy; this was a field of armaments in which the Soviet Union looked abroad longer than any other. What is more interesting is the repeated hints made by Russian diplomats during the course of the economic talks, and even aside from them, especially in the fall of 1936, suggesting that better economic

relations might lead as well to better political relations with Germany.“ The German remilitarization of theRhineland and the fact that Germany could now build fortifications there obviously increased Russia’s danger by vitiating any value that the Franco-Soviet Pact might have had. There were, in any case, no military arrangements between France and the Soviet Union to provide for the pact’s implementation, 42. On the German use of the Soviet menace while disbelieving it see G.D., D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 3, 361; U.S. 1936, 1:303; Briigel, Tschechen und Deutsche, Match 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413199-201. 43. G.D., C, 5, No. 302; Hencke (Berlin) to Tippelskirch (Moscow), 25 1097/2082/451014-17 and 31-32. 44. On these talks see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 312, 341, 342, 347, 535, 549, 590,

C, 5, Nos. 141, 205, 392, 427, 517; pp. 354-55; Mastny report 31, 13 March and 8 April 1936, T-120, 591, 615; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 269;

Niclauss, pp. 190-93. 45, See U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, pp. 458ff. 46. In addition to the sources cited in n, 44, above, see the Memorandum by Diirksen, head of the eastern section of the APA, of 12 October 1936, in EAP 250-d-18-05/4, T.81, roll 11, serial 32; “Informationsbericht Nr.

38,” 13 October 1936, “Privater Sonderbericht,’ 17 October 1936, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f.

375-79, and 385-93; Excerpt from a Memorandum by Tippelskirch (Moscow), 28 November 1936, T-120, 2792/6025/H 047369; D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 292; Hilger, p. 265.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 243 and itbecame increasingly clear that there would be none.‘” It is hardly surprising that Maxim Litvinov, the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs, was quoted as denouncing the Blum government for being much too willing to mollify Germany.48 The shift in Soviet instructions to the French Communist party, directing them not to Oppose atmaments expenditures, the implementation of the policy of the Popular Front against fascism promulgated at the Seventh Congress of the Comintern in August 1935, the efforts to maintain reasonably good relations with Italy during the period of sanctions,’ and the instructions to the Communists in Spain to restrain radical social experimentation on the Republican side, all point to an essentially defensive posture against any

threat from Germany combined with a casting about for possible allies. In the year that the great purge was beginning to shake the whole structure of the Soviet Union, it is

hardly surprising that Stalin should be most cautious in foreign affairs. The best explanation of the friendly hints to Germany would appear to be that, in this context, ditect reassurance might be one good way to avert any danger from Germany.*° The Soviet hints were never taken up in Berlin, and in response to Hitlet’s speeches

wistfully commenting on the wonders he could do for Germany if he had Russia’s major agricultural and industrial areas, the Soviets could only reply with the comment that they were ready to defend themselves. But just as the Germans were not nearly as alarmed by the Soviet Union as they pretended, so the Russian government was not neatly as unwilling to accommodate itself to Germany as it claimed. Both powers were playing for time.

The country most frequently attacked in German propaganda, especially in 1936, as a tool of Soviet policy was Czechoslovakia. It was pictured as a threat to Germany’s heart. As previously indicated, the German government and military never believed in the reality of these dangers, but once the temporary calm enjoined by the risks of the Rhineland occupation had passed, the press campaign against Prague was renewed vigorously.*! Simultaneously, the appearance of members of the Sudeten German party on the National Socialist list of candidates for the Reichstag in the “election” that was to ratify Hitler’s Rhineland move suggested to the Czech government the long-term implications of Germany’s continued relationship with that political party allegedly loyal to Czechoslovakia.* The Czech government, however, did not really need such intimations of danger

from Germany. The geogtaphic and military realities were sufficiently obvious without

them. Seen from Prague, the remilitarization of the Rhineland was an obvious prelude to

German advances in Central and Southeast Europe. Any failure of the Western powers to react vigorously would both embolden Germany to move rapidly and, by enabling it

to establish a fortified barrier against France, made future help from the West even more problematical. Recognizing these dangers, the Czech leaders reassessed their situation.* 47. U.S. 1936, 1:358-59. 48. Ibid., pp. 345—46. 49. See G.D., C, 5, No. 334; evidently based on intercepted documents. Beloff, 2:54. 50. Note Molotov’s interview of 12 March, published in Pravda on 24 March 1936,

J 51. See D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 512; 2, Nos. 39, 343. 1, No. 502; Mastny report 36 of 52. On the Reichstag election list and Czech protests about it see D.D.F.,, 2d,

1040/1809/413123-125 and 118; von 25 March and report 39 of 31 Match 1936, Czech documents in T-120, Lammers to von Neurath, 7 April 622094096; E 3469/8911/ T-120, 1936, March 31 Biilow to Lammers,

with the Sudeten German party 1936, ibid., frames E 622105—106. On German government and patty relations

Deutschen in der Tschechoslowakei, Nos. 36, 38, 39, in early 1936 see G.D., C, 4, No. 285; 5, Nos. 44, 284; Kral, Die Ministry, No. 6/36, 20 February 1936, Czech Foreign Czech the of chiefs section the to comments Krofta’s 41;

document in T-120, 1041/1809/414084. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 28, 32; eta 53. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 256; 2, Nos. 84, 182; U.S. 1936, 1:290-95; Krofta’s circular to all Czech mission,

9 March

1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413214-215;

244

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

They believed that Hitler would move against Austria first and then turn on them, an assessment as logical as it was accurate.>+ Where could they turn for help or for a reduction of hostile pressures? The other hostilities that Czechoslovakia faced were those of Hungary and Poland. Hungary was simply unapproachable from Prague. Since Poland was an ally of Czechoslovakia’s own ally, France, it might have been possible to persuade the Poles that the German threat to Czechoslovakia ultimately menaced Poland as well, but the Polish foreign minister, Beck, too much influenced by his anti-Czech proclivities and the hope of possible territorial gain in Teschen and elsewhere at Czechoslovakia’s expense, would not be swayed. Neither French nor Czech efforts in 1936 produced any change in either the policy or personnel in Watrsaw.>° Where else could help come from? As might be expected, the Czech leaders thought of their allies of the Little Entente,

Romania and Yugoslavia, but quickly discovered that though still willing to stand together against Hungary—which presented no real threat to any of them—these countries could not be persuaded to assume the risk of opposing Germany. This was especially true of Yugoslavia which was steadily moving toward the German orbit.°’ Help would have to come from a greater distance. The possibility of help from England was realistically judged remote by the Czech leaders. Still reasonably confident that France would come to their aid if they were attacked by Germany, they were fairly certain that England would not fight in that contingency unless it were clearly a part of a broader German offensive.°° The question of how England regarded the role of Czechoslovakia in Europe was thus of the greatest importance, and it was in this context that the issue of the Sudeten Germans assumed significance. If the British government and public could be reassured that the Sudeten Germans were treated decently and had no just grievances, London might be induced to look at the broader significance of Czech-German relations. If, on the other hand, the leaders of the Sudeten German party and the German government could convince the British that Sudeten German grievances were the real issue, then the aims of Germany might be successfully hidden behind the slogan of self-determination. The year 1936 therefore saw the beginning of a race between these two views of the Sudeten question: a pretext for aggression or a grievance to be corrected. The British would urge the Czechs to make concessions to the German minority, and the Prague government was increasingly inclined to make them; but the longer the discussion of such concessions, the more they appeared to be the kernel when they were really only the shell.*? Simultaneously, the Sudeten German party, seconded by Berlin, made every effort to stimulate British concern about the internal development of comments to the section chiefs of the Czech Foreign Ministry Nos. 8/36, 11/36 (excerpt in Prager Akien, No. 63), 15/36, of 12 March, 2 April, and 3 June 1936, Czech documents in T-120, 1041/1809/414086, 414089 090, 414096; Mastny report 28, 12 March 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413128-130. 54, D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 175; Krofta’s comments, No. 23/35 of 11 July 1935, Czech document

in T-120,

1041/1809/414163. 55. The most recent summary in Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, Patt 1, Sections A and B. For Bene3’s similar evaluation see his comments to the German minister on 16 October 1936, in G.D., C, 5, No. 614, p. 1110. See also Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 59, 81, 84, 98, 145, 194; 2, Nos. 54, 55. 56. Celovsky, pp. 77-79; Szembek, 11 May 1935, p. 77, 26 February 1936, p. 163, 21 December 1936, p. 220; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 25, 75; 3, No. 215; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 39, 49. Only in July, at the time of the crisis

over Danzig, was Beck a little more friendly (Krofta’s comments, No. 17/36, 9 July 1936, Czech document in

T-120, 1041/1809/414098-099). 5 Celovsky, pp. 72-73; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 374, 540; U.S. 1936, 1:368-70; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 44, 50,

BYtOre JUISE 58. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 475; U.S. 1936, 1:339-42. 59. On British efforts to get the Czechs to make concessions see D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 110, 255; 3, No. 505; Brigel, Tschechen und Deutsche, p. 288; Mastny report 79, 11 August 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413202-203.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 245 Czechoslovakia. This meant trips to London by Konrad Henlein and other Sudeten Getman leaders to assure the British of their loyalty to the Czech state and their sole interest in the welfare of the Sudeten Germans within Czechoslovakia, while in fact the internal

affairs of the Sudeten German party were being supervised from Betlin with the Getman government picking the leaders, setting the policy lines, and giving or withholding financial support as the situation appeared to dictate.“ Henlein, nevertheless, was a convincing advocate in London; the process of obscuring the fact that Hitler was not the least bit interested in the Sudeten Germans was well under way by the fall of 1936. In addition to its relations with France and England, Czechoslovakia had an alliance

with the Soviet Union on the one hand and faced the alternatives of fighting Germany or trying to reach an accommodation with it on the other. This complex of questions was seen by the Czech leaders, especially by Benes himself, as a whole; and Czech foreign policy in the mid-1930s can be analyzed intelligently only if Bene’’s perception of the situation is clearly understood. Explained in detail to Anthony Eden on his visit to Prague in April 1935, it was to be repeated with only slight variations on subsequent occasions, variations that can be accounted for by changed circumstances. The basic view, however, remained unchanged.*! As BeneS saw it, Czechoslovakia had to follow and depend on France, but it could

not and would not fight Germany by itself. For centuries the Czech people had lived in the same political structure with the Germans. They had survived German control. If they had to, they would survive German control again. But German control of Bohemia—and such steps leading toward that control as the German annexation of Austria—would threaten the status of France, Italy, and Great Britain as great powers in Europe. Because the Czechs could survive as a people but the other three nations could not survive as great powers if Germany were allowed a free hand in Central Europe, the other three had an enormous stake in Czech independence. It was they who were, therefore, threatened most by Germany’s advance. If they recognized this fact and helped Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovakia would certainly defend itself. If they did not, they would suffer as seriously, if not more setiously and permanently, than the Czechs; furthermore, it was in this context that Benes saw the Czech alliance with the Soviet

Union. Bene§ had no admiration for communism and no special affection for the Soviet Union, but he thought it essential that Russia be brought into the picture. Preoccupied with its internal development and worried by the possibility of German and Japanese aggression, the Soviet Union would be a threat to others only if it were nor brought into an alliance with the Western powers and Czechoslovakia; for it would then align itself with Germany at the expense of the countries that lay between. As a result of such an atrangement,

Germany would dominate

Central Europe, and all the dangers for the

other powers would result as if Germany had secured that domination by itself. From all this Bene’ concluded that it made sense for Czechoslovakia to have a

No. 465), 66 (will 60. For Henlein’s related propaganda efforts in England see Kral, Nos. 47, 49, 54 (G.D., C, 5,

on 20 July be G.D., C, 6, No. 228); Foreign Office R 7511/234/12. The record of Vansittart’s talk with Henlein party in 1936, 1936 is in Foreign Office R 4395/32/12. For German direction of the Sudeten German 364, 372, 480, 505, 508, 559, 579 especially during its internal troubles in the summer, see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 353, 1918-1945, pp: 29, 94-95. (Kral, No. 58); Kral, Nos. 45, 46, p. 93, Nos. 55, 56; Germany and Czechoslovakia, in T-120, 1143/2028/ document Czech 1935, April 4 on Eden with talk Bene’’s on 61. The memorandum

1935, ibid., 1041 /1809/414146-147. 444408418; summarized by Krofta in his comment No. 13/35, 11 April

by the latter on 28 May. 1936, D.D.F., 2d42; Bene’’s views expressed to the French minister Lacroix, reported ibid., Nos. 351 and 475. Similar views were in Krofta and Bene§ of views the of analyses Lacroix’s and 255, No.

(U.S. 1938, 1410-14; noted by later expressed by Benes to the U.S. minister Carr on 28 February 1938 April 1936, G.D., C, 5, No. 284, 16 of Hisenlohr minister by the German Celovsky, p. 69). See also the analyses and the minutes of den’s visit in Foreign Office C 2930/55/18.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

defensive alliance with the Soviet Union, that the Franco-Soviet Pact was equally important, and that Italy and Britain both should recognize that German policy toward Austria and Czechoslovakia thteatened them at least as much as the two countries menaced directly. If, however, others did not see the dangers, then Czechoslovakia, which could

not act by itself, would have to make at least an attempt to come to some arrangement with Germany. The situation in the summer and fall of 1936 suggested that the three Western powers did not see the dangers: Italy was moving closer to Germany, while France and Britain were unwilling to act decisively against the German threat. Czechoslovakia therefore would explore the possibility of a new agreement with Germany that did not run counter to Czechoslovakia’s existing treaty commitments but would render them less vital by reducing the threat from Germany that was supposed to make them operative.°2 The explorations of Germany’s attitude made by the Czech government during the spring and summer of 1936 through the official diplomatic channels produced formal German affirmations that the German-Czech arbitration treaty of 1925 was still in effect and that Hitler’s speech at the time of the remilitarization of the Rhineland offering nonageression pacts to Germany’s neighbors applied to Czechoslovakia. The German diplomats, however, clearly did not wish to enter into detailed negotiations; furthermore, they

wanted any new German-Czech treaty to eliminate Czechoslovakia’s alliance system.® There appeared to be little promise for the Czechs in this approach. The real issue was whether there were possibly other elements in the German government that preferred a different policy and could obtain Hitler’s approval. A conversation between Géring and Vojtéch Mastny, the Czech minister in Berlin, on 29 February 1936, apparently suggested

to Benes that there might be other currents in Berlin and thus helped pave the way for the secret feelers put forth several months later.®4 The informal negotiations between Germany and Czechoslovakia began in August 1936 and ended in January 1937.°° One of von Ribbentrop’s assistants in his Dienséstelle office, Albrecht Haushofer, son of the famous geopolitician, had urged in April 1936 that

Germany take advantage of its strerigthened position after the Rhineland occupation to attempt a settlement with Czechoslovakia that would exchange German recognition of the boundary for Czech concessions to the Sudeten Germans. There would be an increase of trade—which had fallen off drastically in the preceding years—and a news62. In retrospect, Benes’s view was certainly more perceptive than that of most contemporaries. The only point he overlooked was the possibility that another period of German control, if of the National Socialist variety, might include the physical extermination of his own people. In pre-World War II Europe, that omission is hardly surprising. On this issue see my “Germany and Czechoslovakia, 1933-1945,” in Czechoslovakia Past and Present, 1 (The Hague: Mouton, 1969), pp. 765-67.

63. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 268, 515; 6, No. 62; D.D.F., 2d, Nos. 26, 182, 442, 475; U.S. 1936, 1:326-27, 339-42; Mastny telegram of 12 March 1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413072, and Mastny report 77, 23

July 1936, ibid., 413195196. 64. There is a brief discussion of the G6ring-Mastny talk on which Mastny March 1936, in a lengthy retrospective analysis of German-Czech relations report No. 52 is in T-120, 1040/1809/412815—818, and has been published von Miinchen 1938 (Prague: Academia, 1968), No. 55. It should be noted

reported only orally to Bene’ on 9 by Mastny of 23 March 1938; this in Vaclav Kral (ed.), Das Abkommen that Mastny thought that although

Hitler’s long-term aims wete anti-Czech, he would abstain from war in the short run because time was working for him (see Mastny’s report 48, 25 May 1935, Czech document in T-120, 1041/1809/413521—528 [excerpts in

Prager Akien, No. 50)). 65. I published an account of the “Secret Hitler-BeneS Negotiations in 1936-37,” in the Journal of Central European Affairs, 19, No. 4 (Jan. 1960), 366-74. There are additional details from the Czech archives in Robett

Kvacek and Vaclav Vin’, “K Némecko-Ceskoslovenskym sondazim ve tiicatych letec (Concerning the German-Czech soundings in the 1930s),” Ceskoslovensky Casopis Historicky, 14 (1966), 887-96, and Robert

Kvacéek, “Ceskoslovensko-némecka jednani v roce 1936 (Czech-German negotiations in 1936),” Historic a Voenstvi, 5 (1965), 721-54. There is a detailed account in Briigel, pp. 355-61. Sources cited in these accounts

will not be referred to in the notes unless quoted or also published in a Western language elsewhere.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 247 papet truce. Such a settlement, publicly heralded as a broadening of the 1925 arbitration treaty, would pave the way for a loosening of Czechoslovakia’s ties to France and the Soviet Union. Haushofer was authorized to proceed; the way for him to discuss the matter with Mastny was prepared by a meeting between Mastny and Count Maximilian Karl zu Trauttmannsdorff, another dabbler in diplomacy, on 14 August 1936.6 Haushofer talked with Mastny about a possible German-Czech understanding on 18 October. After Mastny had conferred with Bene’, he repeated his earlier invitation to Haushofer to come to Prague to meet with Bene’. With the authorization of Hitler and von Ribbentrop, Haushofer and Trauttmannsdorff went to Prague where, on 13-14 November, they met with Beneé as well as the foreign minister, Krofta. These discussions had been kept secret from the German Foreign Ministry, but the German secret police were kept informed, in part because the SS through the Volksdeutsche Rat was playing an important role in Germany’s contacts with German minorities abroad.’ Though insisting on this secrecy, Bene’ himself had hinted to the German minister in Prague that he would like some special treaty with Germany as it was evident that the negotiations for a new Locarno were not leading anywhere.®* The discussion in Prague indicated that an agreement was theoretically possible. The fears of the Germans over Czech-Soviet relations were countered by Benes—an important point because the German negotiators appear to have been seriously influenced by

German propaganda on this question.® On the other side of the same issue, Benes made it clear that Czechoslovakia would abide by its two defensive alliances. An agreement with Germany would take the form of a nonaggression pact with a Czech reservation about its obligations under the League covenant; such a treaty would remove Czech fears of an attack by Germany and German fears of Czechoslovakia joining the Soviet Union in an attack on Germany. The settlement would also provide for increased trade, a common policy on the Habsburg question, a press truce, and restrictions on the political activities of émigrés. The increase in trade would be so handled as to benefit the Sudeten ateas—a process similar to that followed in the trade settlement between Germany and Lithuania to provide relief for the Memel Germans. Furthermore, the agreements arrived at could enable the German government to push for improvements in the status of the Sudeten Germans. Haushofer and Trauttmannsdorff returned to Germany to lay these plans before Hitler on 25 November. In the interim, the Czech government had asked

the Austrian secretary of state for foreign affairs, Guido Schmidt, who was in Berlin on 19-21 November, to sound out the German government about the possibility of a German-Czech agreement and had also raised the possibility of a press truce with Goebbels through Mastny.”° 1933 (see 66. Trauttmannsdorff had been involved in unofficial negotiations in German-Austrian relations in Stablhelm Seldte’s Franz for affairs foreign of charge in was he 1934 of fall the In 71). 49, Nos. 2, C, G.D.,

1934, T-120, veterans organization (see Ministry of the Interior to Foreign Ministry, I A 965/372, 11 December the Foreign Ministry 2696/5717/H 024508) when Seldte tried unsuccessfully to secure a position for him in an aide of theMinister (Memorandum of von Bilow, 25 October 1934, 2371/4601/E 188795). In 1936 he was of the Colonial Policy office Berlin the of head as time a for served he II War World in Seldte); of Labor (also Office of the NSDAP. 67. On the Volksdeutsche Rat see Jacobsen, pp. 176-225, 605-07. 1936, Czech document in T-120, 68. G.D., C, 5, No. 614. See also Krofta’s policy directive of 16 September

1040/1809/413231; D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 154, 167.

320, 352; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 550, 587. 69. In this connection see D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 376, 425, 446; 3, Nos.

see G.D., D, 1, No. 188, p. 295. 70. For Guido Schmidt’s action in Berlin in behalf of the Czech government a comments, No. 24/36, 26 November 1936, Czech document in

For the Goebbels-Mastny talk see Krofta of a possible Czech-German agreement at this 120, 1041/1809/414117; G.D., C, 6, No. 78. For British views time see Foreign Office R 7381 /1799/12.

248

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II Now that the real possibility of a German-Czech agreement loomed out of the mist

of generalities, what would Hitler do? He had always held out hope of agreement; later

he was to complain that no one had ever taken him up on his offers. For once a country was doing what Ambassador Dodd had suggested in the spring: “. . . that the best present chance is to call Hitler’s bluff for peace, since the powers concerned do not seem willing or capable of calling his bluff for war.”’! The auspices were not particularly favorable. Goring had shifted from his earlier views—if those had been sincere in the first place. While in Budapest for the funeral of the Hungarian prime minister, Gombos, Géring had told the Hungarian foreign minister that the conquest of Czechoslovakia would be easy. The Czech fortifications “would slow down the German troops, but they would in no way alter Germany’s plans against Czechoslovakia.” The German foreign minister, von Neurath, was continuing to take a hard line: Germany would sign a nonagetession pact with Czechoslovakia only if it ended its alliances;’? and the Foreign Ministry was doing its best to keep the Sudeten German party functioning according to German directives.” Hitler himself had indicated to Guido Schmidt that German relations with Czechoslovakia could be improved only if the Czechs gave up their relationship with the Soviet Union, a condition he had not included in his earlier offer of a nonageression pact with Czechoslovakia.’® Under these circumstances it is not surprising that Hitler when confronted with Haushofet’s proposals struck out the suggested nonaggression pact and entirely ignored the possibility of using German influence to improve the lot of the Sudeten Germans. He was interested in an increase in trade, he would have liked to neutralize Czechoslovakia in case of a Soviet attack, and he wanted émigré activities restricted. Coopera-

tion on the Habsburg issue only raised a question in his mind. Clearly Hitler could not cate less about the Sudeten Germans; any satisfaction they recetved would only undermine his case against Czechoslovakia as a whole. He was interested primarily in settling the side issues in German-Czech relations. He would have liked to neutralize Czechoslovakia—it would fall all the more easily under German control once it broke its alliances—but the price of a nonaggression pact that would limit his own options was more than he would pay. Knowing that Germany was in no danger of attack itself, he saw no teason to tie his own hands. Furthermore, he was not about to alienate Hungary

to whom he was urging the concentration of revisionist desites against Prague. As for the negotiations, if Haushofer could secure everything Germany wanted without significant concessions, he was welcome to try again. Haushofer and Trauttmannsdorff, after giving Mastny what appears to have been an expurgated account of the meeting with Hitler, returned to Prague for another talk with

BeneS on 18 December 1936.’° The discussion concentrated on the Sudeten German question and on Czech-Soviet relations and then turned to the contents of a possible agreement. Haushofer presented Hitler’s refusal of a nonaggression pact as a refusal to conclude such a pact unless Czechoslovakia gave up its rights and obligations under the League covenant,

something the Czechs

obviously would

not do. Bene§, therefore,

ptepared a treaty that merely reaffirmed the 1925 arbitration treaty and provided for nonintervention into each other’s internal affairs, an expansion of trade, and assurances that outstanding questions would be settled in a friendly way through diplomacy. There 71. U.S. 1936, 1:278. 72. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 158 (German text in Acta Historica, 7, Nos. 3-4 [1960], p. 374).

73. G.D., D, 1, No. 188, and C, 6, No. 11. 74. Kral, Die Deutschen in der Tschechoslowakei, Nos. 58 (G.D., C, 5, No. 578), 60; G.D., C, 6, No. 31.

75. G.D., D, 1, No. 181, p. 283. 76. English text of Benes’s memorandum in Germany and Czechoslovakia 1918-1945, No. 28 (note the omission on p. 105); cf. Edmund A. Walsh, Tofal Power (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948), pp. 31, 53.

The Consolidation of Germany's Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 249 might also be some sort of police agreement against subversion, although Bene§ insisted that he would not join the Anti-Comintern Pact. Though stating that they would have to check with Hitler again, Haushofer and Trauttmannsdorff agreed that both sides should now prepare drafts and then confer again, with other government agencies (including eventually the regular diplomats) being brought in. The evidence suggests that the German emissaties were sincere in their optimism, though they would soon be disillusioned. Benes believed that definitive agreement was imminent and prepared a draft agreement and accompanying communiqué.”’ The atmosphere in the Czech Foreign Ministry had been optimistic for some time, and both Benes and Mastny thought that only minor details needed to be worked out.”* Trauttmannsdorff made another trip to Czechoslovakia early in January 1937 and then helped Haushofer to prepare a draft treaty for Hitler whom Haushofer saw again in that month, probably around the 15th. Haushofer

presented a draft treaty along the lines he had discussed with Benes and very similar to the treaty prepared by Benes. Hitler was not interested and told Haushofer to draw out the negotiations, in effect dropping them. Other than reproaches from von Neurath about going behind his back, never again would the Czechs hear about this subject from

the Germans.” What had happened and what does it reveal about German policy toward Czechoslovakia? Hitler was willing to have explored the topic of German-Czech relations, but

his offer to sign a nonaggtession pact with Czechoslovakia was as false as his offer to return to the League.®? If there were short range gains to be secured as a result of Germany’s strengthened position, well and good. But unworried about attacks by others, he was not about to restrict his own freedom of action. Haushofer and Trauttmannsdorff might be sincerely concerned about the problems of the Sudeten Germans; Hitler was not. Haushofer recognized this and saved his records of the episode as evidence of Hitler’s perfidy; he showed them to a friend while working in the opposition to Hitler

that would eventually cost him his life.§! Ironically, Hitler followed only one piece of advice given him by Haushofer,

and that was

to continually raise Sudeten

German

demands as a means of aborting any German-Czech agreement if that suited Germany.” Along that road no new

agreement with Czechoslovakia

could be signed, and even

public reaffirmations or extensions of old agreements like the 1925 arbitration treaty could only increase the danger of action by Britain and France when the time came for Germany to break such a treaty. 77. The English text of the draft agreement only is in ibid., No. 29; German texts of both plus accompanying date of 9 March remarks by Bene’ are among the Czech documents in T-120, 1040/1809/412843-847. The

of Mastny’s 1936, under which this item was filed in the Czech archives, may have been taken from the date teport to Bene on his talk with Goring (see n. 64). on a conver78. A good view can be obtained from the report of the U.S. minister in Prague, J. Butler Wright, in Vienna, on 7 sation with Ferdinand Veverka, previously Czech minister in the U.S. and then minister December 1936, in U.S. 1936, 1:375-79. pp. 125-26. For subse79. Germany and Czechoslovakia 1918-1945, No. 32 (G.D., C, 6, No. 288); Wiedemann, 1937 by the Germans see quent Czech reference to these negotiations as having been broken off in January on 6 August 1938, in UiSal 9385 1:540— Bene’’s comments to Hugh Wilson, the U.S. ambassador to Germany,

comments in Germany and Cxechoslovakia 41; Mastny’s general report of 23 March 1938, cited in n. 64; Krofta’s of the secret negotiations see knowledge French On 63. No. 1918-1945, No. 34, and Hungarian Documents, 2,

D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 448, 460, 464. 1936; see Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 80. An assurance to this effect had been given to the Hungarians in May 20. skampfers Albrecht Haushofer und seiner 81. Rainer Hildebrandt, Wir sind die Letzten; aus dem Leben des Widerstand Freunde (Neuwied/Berlin: Michael, 1949), pp. 20395152:

1938 (G.D., D, 2, Nos. 107, 109; note that Haushofer 82. This was the way Hitler instructed Henlein in March sche Mittelstelle at the second of these meetings). Hitler is also

was present as a representative of the Volksdeut expected a change in the leadership of the Soviet supposed to have broken off the negotiations because he thesis from the German side. this support to evidence rary contempo no find can I Union;

250

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

For the Czechs, the only other conceivable approach was to reassure the Western powers by concessions to the Sudeten Germans. This meant, eventually, direct negotiations with Konrad Henlein and his associates, a route that the Czech government was

most reluctant to follow. At the same time as the were taking place, Bene was in indirect contact but these feelers did not lead to direct talks until for direct German-Czech negotiations at some

informal negotiations recounted above with Henlein through an intermediary; the fall of 1937.°° Perhaps out of hope time in the future, or out of fear of

weakening their alliances, or out of concern about internal political repercussions—or all three—the Prague government never used the 1936—37 negotiations as a sign of their

own good will and good faith in an appeal to the Western powers. That field would be left mainly to Henlein and his mentors in Berlin.** To the other countries of East Central and Southeast Europe the growing strength of Germany’s position as a result of the remilitarization of the Rhineland was to become obvious in the summer and fall of 1936. The history of the German-Austrian agreement of July has already been told. The relations between Germany and Hungary continued to be marked by a certain closeness as in previous years, but Germany’s far stronger position led it to subordinate its policy toward Hungary first to its interest in wooing Yugoslavia and subsequently, especially after the fall of the Romanian foreign minister, Titulescu, to a rapprochement with Romania. In the case of all three countries, as well as

Bulgaria and Greece, Germany continued to use economic policy as a handmaiden of both domestic rearmament and foreign political influence. The Hungarian government was worried lest Germany’s offers of nonaggression pacts at the time of the Rhineland coup might actually lead to some sort of Eastern Locarno that would blunt Hungary’s revisionist aspirations toward Czechoslovakia. The Germans reassured them on this point, particularly in regard to any German-Czech agreement, though they refused to agree to any special formal ties to Hungary.®> As a matter of fact, throughout 1936 the Germans continued to urge the Hungarians to con-

centrate on Czechoslovakia as their main enemy and to arrive at an accommodation with Yugoslavia. When the Hungarian regent, Admiral Horthy, met Hitler in August 1936,

this was the main topic of their conversation, with Horthy explaining the difficulty of coming to any afrangement with the Serbs who controlled Yugoslavia and Hitler urging him in this direction anyway.’’ Both expressed their antipathy to Czechoslovakia, and Horthy indicated his approval of the annexation of Austria by Germany. Such exchanges were all very general and very pleasant; when von Neurath visited Budapest in September, however, the atmosphere was not quite so friendly. Each country was afraid that the other might under some circumstances drag it into war, but a 83. The intermediary, Prince Max of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, was to play an important tole in Henlein’s activities in 1937—38; for his activities in the winter 1936-37 see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 76, 96; D, 2, No. 1. For his earlier activities in German-British relations see above, p. 169, n. 45.

84. There is no major study of Czech propaganda abroad in the 1930s. A very one-sided account, using Czech documents captured by the Germans in 1939, is Rudolf Urban, Demokratenpresse im Lichte Prager Geheimakten (Prague: Orbis, 1943). 85. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 63, 130, 296, 305, 320; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 87, 90, 118; 2, Nos. 5, 6, 8, 13, 18, 20, 37; D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 181, 205, 208, 220. The Hungarians, of course, were in principle pleased over

Germany’s gaining “equality of rights” and hoped to imitate it with German support (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 466; G.D., C, 5, No. 305, n. 5, 413; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 15, 19). 86. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 49, 171; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 135; 2, Nos.

3, 4, 7, 53; Hoensch,

Ungarische

Revisionismus, pp. 41-45. 87. On the Hitler-Horthy meeting see Miklos Horthy, Ein Leben fiir Ungarn (Bonn: Athenaum-Verlag, 1953), pp. 178-80; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 148 (Allianz, No. 13), 151-53; 2, No. 31 (Horthy Papers, No. 22); G.D., C, 5, No. 516; Macartney, p. 150.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 251

more immediate difficulty was the resumption of German complaints about the treatment of Hungary’s German minority and Hungary’s dissatisfaction with the German minister in Budapest, an especially touchy point since the latter was von Neurath’s sonin-law.®* At the time of von Neurath’s visit, the man who had come in a way to be the symbol of German-Hungarian friendship, the Hungarian prime minister, Gombds, lay fatally ill in a Munich sanatorium. His death on 6 October provided an occasion not only for a great display of official mourning in Munich but also for Géring’s trip to Hungary for the funeral.” While in Budapest, Goring explained to the Hungarian foreign minister that Germany would annex Austria and that Czechoslovakia would be occupied as well, expressed some reservations about Romania, and waxed enthusiastic about Yugoslavia,

while Kanya attempted to reassure him that the policies of Gomb6s would be continued. Goring also devoted considerable attention to trade relations between Germany and Hungary, relations which were becoming quite a problem for the Hungarians because of the large debts Germany was running up.” This trade question and the German remonstrances about the German minority were of serious concern to the Hungarians, but Germany’s turn toward Yugoslavia and Romania worried them even more.”! Before death removed him from the scene, GOmbds had expressed the notion that

Germany was friendliest when it was weak, but now that it was growing stronger and its friendship was desired by others, Hungary was no longer important to it, for this reason Germany was playing up to Yugoslavia and Romania.” This trend in German policy became startlingly apparent in November when German press attacks on the new Hungarian government of Kalman Daranyi culminated in an article in the Vd/kischer Beobachter on 15 November that suggested Germany would not support revision of all aspects of the peace treaties. Simultaneously, rumors circulated suggesting that Hitler had inspired this article by Rosenberg and that the Hungarian-Romanian territorial dispute over Transylvania was the one referred to as perhaps not in need of revision.”’ Since Hitler, as we now know, expressed precisely these views to a prominent Romanian politician on the following day, the rumors wete accurate indeed. Romanian foreign policy had been directed by Nicolae Titulescu since 1933. He had played a leading role on the European scene as an outspoken advocate of collective security, a position most recently exemplified by his strong support of sanctions against Italy. He had been very much concerned as German power increased that if Germany and the Soviet Union ever went to wat with each other, Romania would be crushed

between them. He was, therefore, torn between the desire for a treaty with the Soviet Union similar to the Czech-Soviet treaty which might keep the danger of war away from

Romania and the fear that if war came and Soviet aid were provided, the Russians would

keep Bessarabia—as they had in 1878—or for that matter, never leave Romania at all. As the Rhineland occupation both dramatized and further increased the weakness of France, for this issue became pivotal in Romanian policy. Titulescu toyed with the idea of trying C, 5, Nos. 555, 556; Stewart (U.S. chargé 88. On von Neurath’s visit see Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 156; G.D.,

1936, State 762.64/52 and 54. é a.i. Budapest) telegram 40 of 22 September and dispatch 475 of 24 September dignitaries, may be found in other as well as himself Hitler involving 89. Matetial on the ceremonies in Munich, bis 31.X11.36, Band 6,” Bundesarchiv, Epp the Ritter von Epp papers, “Beilagen zum Tagebuch vom 1.VII.36

18/4. No. 14); G.D., C, 5, No. 589. Schacht had euOn the Géring visit see Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 158 (Allianz, 1:488-89, 494-95). 1936, (U.S. June 19 on Budapest in dealt with the economic matters when 1936 5, No. 612; 6, Nos. 22, 51, 60, 70. On the negotiations in late

91. On the economic situation see G.D., C, “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom about the German minority see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 71, 97, 98; 427. f. 101/8, Z.Sg. Brammer, hiv, Dezember 1936,” Bundesarc cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 61. 92. Stewart dispatch 409, 9 June 1936, State 762.64/48;

17.

Hungarians also had some information about the 93. Macartney, pp. 177-78. In the winter of 1936-37, the 2, Nos. 59, 63). ons, which naturally alarmed them (Hungarian Documents,

secret German-Czech negotiati

moe

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

a treaty of mutual assistance accompanied by Soviet recognition of the Romanian possession of Bessarabia, but nothing came of this concept. There was strong domestic Opposition to a treaty with Russia. King Carol of Romania was opposed, and Titulescu himself was never quite certain it was a good idea.** When the Romanian government was reconstructed during Titulescu’s absence at the end of August 1936, he was dropped

from his post as foreign minister. Even if his successor, Victor Antonescu, pleaded loyalty to France and the Little Entente, there can be no doubt that, both symbolically and politically, Romania had abandoned a long-trodden path even if it had not yet firmly decided on a new coutse.”° The German government had been relatively unfriendly toward Romania because of its foreign policy, and Germany was not yet a major importer of Romanian oil.°° The occasional dabbling of National Socialist agencies in the internal politics of Romania had hindered rather than helped relations between the two countries, and these activities continued to disturb the picture in 1936.9” Rosenberg, the head of the APA, was using his

other position as editor of the V/d/kischer Beobachter to fannel money to supposedly sympathetic politicians in Romania through Radu Lecca, a shady figure in the extremist

Christian National party who would become notorious as the leading figure in Romania’s anti-Semitic activities during World War II. Lecca was to provide support for Octavian Goga, Germany’s favorite among those on the Romanian lunatic fringe; but though formally received by Hitler and von Neurath in August 1936, Goga was not to play any significant role until the end of 1937. The most important individuals in the 1936 tapprochement were King Carol himself and Georges Bratianu, a Romanian political leader whose family had long played an influential role in that nation’s history. Bratianu had been in Germany in January 1936 in pursuit of his own policy of closer relations with Germany and opposition to ties with the Soviet Union. In Berlin he met von Neurath; and the Polish ambassador, Josef Lipski, arranged for him to meet Goring as well.°® Goring was taking some interest in Romanian affairs,» and he saw Bratianu

again on his visit to Berlin in November 1936. Bratianu then went to Paris for a few days and on his return to Berlin had méetings with von Neurath and Hitler, the reception having been arranged by Goring. In these conversations, Bratianu received assurances from both Goring and Hitler that Germany would oppose Hungarian revisionist aspirations as long as Romania was not tied closely to the Soviet Union. Von Neurath was less friendly, but Bratianu could tell who formulated German policy. Hitler referred to Rosenberg’s Vé/kischer Beobachter article as an indication of German policy. The personal inclination of Bratianu toward a rapprochement with Germany and a general position not unlike Poland’s was only reinforced by his visits to Paris and Brussels.! King Carol as well as the new leaders of the Romanian government were most 94. On Titulescu’s policy in 1936 see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 53, 300, 380, 385, 396, 397, 399, 432; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 159, 160; U.S. 1936, 1:368-70; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 4, 6; 2, Nos. 9, 26, 29; Seba (Czech minister

Bucharest) telegram of 8 March

1936, Czech document in T-120, 1040/1809/413079-080.

An interesting

report on Titulescu’s views in January 1935 is quoted in M. Andreyeva and L. Vidyasova, International Affairs (Moscow), 9, No. 7, 123.

95. The change in Romania is analyzed very well in Toynbee, Swrvey of International Affairs 1936, pp. 517-24. For German views of it see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 528, 576; for Polish rejoicing see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 42, 43. Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 228, 362. For a recent Romanian account, see Optea, Titulescu’s Diplomatic Activity, pp-

102-6, 158-68. 96. On German petroleum imports in the early and mid 1930s see Hillgruber, pp. 81, 248-51. 97. See G.D., C, 5, Nos. 397, 440, 492, 497, 498, 576. 98. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 102; Lipski’s report of 27 January 1936 has not been published; see Lipski Papers, p. 273. 99, D.D.F., 2d, 1, Nos. 93, 149.

100. Documents on Bratianu’s visits to Berlin from the German archives will appear as G.D., C, 6, Nos. 36 and

38 (part already in G.D., D, 5, No. 228, n. 3). Most important are Lipski Papers, Nos. 62 and 63. Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 3; No: 372.

The Consolidation of Germany's Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 253 pleased by the signs of better relations with Germany. Though they would not abandon theit ties with France or turn openly against the Soviet Union, the Romanians were gratified by Germany’s announced unwillingness to support Hungarian revisionism and looked to better trade relations as well as better political relations with as much enthusiasm as Berlin.1°! From the perspective of Germany, another breach had been made in both the Little Entente and France’s influence in Europe. The burial of collective security proceeded apace. While the Hungarians were being urged ever morte insistently to concentrate all their revisionist aspirations against Czechoslovakia, the Czech’s Romanian ally was being directed toward the German orbit.!° During 1936, it increasingly seemed as if Yugoslavia were already within that orbit. The rapprochement between Yugoslavia and Germany was to make further progress in 1936. In the crisis over the Rhineland, Yugoslavia leaned to the British rather than the

French view of the situation but could not in any case join in sanctions against Germany. Yugoslavia’s participation in sanctions against Italy had severely damaged its foreign trade and had helped open the way for Germany to take first place as Yugoslavia’s trade partner. For Yugoslavia to drop its trade with Germany under these circumstances— while sanctions against Italy were still in effect—would lead to absolute disaster for the country. Belgrade did not want to give up ties to Paris but could not be expected to join any measures against Germany.!0 The economic ties that bound Yugoslavia to Germany were strengthened during 1936. Géring appointed his associate Franz Neuhausen as his special representative for Southeast Europe with headquarters in Belgrade.'°4 Goring’s interest in Yugoslavia was heightened by the responsibilities he was assuming in the field of foreign exchange and taw materials. In view of Yugoslavia’s mineral resources—especially the Bor copper mines—G6ring redoubled efforts to develop economic relations with Belgrade. In this regatd he saw eye to eye with Hjalmar Schacht who toured the capitals of Southeast Europe in June 1936 and whose efforts were concentrated on Yugoslavia with Goring’s blessings.!°5 There could be no doubt that Germany was not only acquiring a predominant influence in Yugoslavia’s foreign trade but was also beginning to play a greater role in its domestic economy. Efforts were even being made to use German-Yugoslav trade for the support of the Far Right in Yugoslav internal politics, especially the Zbor organization of Dimitrije Ljoti¢.!°° The Yugoslav government was beginning to see that all was not necessarily perfect in an economic tie to the Third Reich, but by late 1936 there was little that could be done about that.'”” Perhaps even more worrisome for the Yugoslavs was the rapprochement between Germany and Italy. The Belgrade government which had once looked to Paris for proDocuments, 2, Nos. 47, 50. See 101. G.D., C, 5, No. 576 and pp. 1003-44; 6, Nos. 42, 80, 82, 83, 92; Hungarian 1143 /2028/444464. also Jan Masaryk to Krofta, 28 November 1936, Czech document in T-120,

policy in the winter 1936-37 see 102. For German pressure on Hungary to follow an exclusively anti-Czech

of these talks bracket the German-Czech G.D., C, 6, Nos. 53, 98, 145. It should be noted that the dates

soundings discussed above.

Documents, 1, Nos. 40, 57, 139; Girsa 103. G.D., C, 5, No. 114; D.D.F,, 2d, 1, No. 432; 2, No. 120; Hungarian T-120, 1040/1809/413078. in document Czech 1936, March 10 of telegram Belgrade) (Czech minister 104. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 105, 224. see Hoptner, pp. 46-47, 98-100; U.S. 1936, 105. On Schacht’s visit to Belgrade, as well as his general aims,

Dokumente zum Konflikt mit Jugoslanien und 1:500-02; G.D., C, 5, No. 376 (excerpts in Auswartiges Amt, 1936, Bundesatchiv, 2d, 2, Nos. 300, 302; “Informationsbericht Nr. 19,” 3 June , No. 21); D.D.F.,

Griechenland , he Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f. 225-29. National Socialist gauleiter of East Prussia, Erich 106. Hoptner, p. 103. These negotiations were handled by the APA ate memoranda of 17 and 18 August 1936, Koch, Relevant documents of the foreign trade section of the Archives); G.D., C, 6, Nos. 91, 104. See also (National 912-PS document g by its chief, Malletke, in Nurember

Hory and Broszat, p. 30. 107. See G.D., C, 5, No. 592.

254

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

tection against Italy had found France immobilized by Germany. The Soviet Union hardly provided an alternative protector against either Italy or Germany for a country that did not even have diplomatic relations with Moscow.!% Under these circumstances,

and with German prodding, Yugoslavia turned toward a rapprochement with its traditional enemies, Italy and Bulgaria; and by the end of 1936 that shift was very largely completed. Here was another reorientation in alignments following upon Germany’s ascendancy. From Belgrade, neutrality looked like the only way out of the dilemma; for Yugoslavia as for other European countries, if they would not pool their strength, each would be forced to rely on its own isolated weakness. From the German point of view, this meant Yugoslavia’s acquiescence in the annexation of Austria and in whatever Berlin might have in mind for Czechoslovakia. The French recognized the danger, but their efforts in late 1936 failed to reverse the tide in Southeast Europe by promises of assistance in return for expressions of solidarity against any enemy. Of the countries directly affected by this plan, Yugoslavia was strongest in its objections.'!° The Little Entente had become almost meaningless. While German relations with Yugoslavia were growing closer in 1936, those with Bulgaria had already reached a stage where Germany dominated Bulgaria’s foreign trade, and some Bulgarians were becoming alarmed about the extent of their country’s dependence on the Third Reich. When

Schacht was in Sofia on his Balkan tour, there was

some tesentment of his complacent assumption that Bulgaria was in effect a German colony, but there were no subsequent signs of any change in the situation.'!! The supply of arms to Bulgaria was playing an increasing role in the tightening of Germany’s hold on that country, while that hold was being utilized to direct Bulgarian agriculture toward those crops and its mining toward minerals, most useful to Germany’s war-directed

economy.!!2 Arms exports by Germany also played a part in its relations with Greece.!!% Germany occupied an increasing role in Greek foreign trade, especially in taking Greek tobacco exports, and Schacht stopped in Athens on his tour in order to help that process along.''* As yet, however, Greece was too remote from Germany’s immediate concerns to call for attention to the problems and attitudes of that country.!'5 Of far greater importance to Germany was its effort to reestablish a major role for itself in Turkey. Exchanges of diplomatic pleasantries in the first years of the Hitler regime gave way in

1936 to a very definite process of economic alignment.'!® In this process, the secretary general of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, Numan Menemencio§lu, played as active a part 108. A brief survey in Hoptner, pp. 173-76. 109. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 449, 452, 534, 538, 586; 6, Nos. 20, 27; D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 299; Allianz, No. 16; Hoptner, pp. 43-45, 62-63; Campbell (Belgrade) dispatch 274, 20 November 1936, Foreign Office R 7105/1627/92. 110. G.D., C, 5, No. 540; 6, No. 19; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 36, 40, 48, 51; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 418; 3, Nos.

448, 457, 467, 468; U.S. 1936, 1:383-84; Hoptner, pp. 55-58. 111. U.S. 1936, 1:491-92. 112. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 171; Rowak Report, 31 December

1937, p. 12, and Anhang, p. 3, Bundesarchiv, Reichsfinanzministerium, R 2/27, f. 50 and 65. On the German-Bulgarian arms trade and efforts to counter it by other countries see D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 240; G.D., C, 4, No. 557, n. 1; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 138; Krofta to Bene&, 25 September 1935, and Czech Foreign Ministry circular of 14 December 1935, Czech documents in

T-120, 1041/1809/413485 and 413495.

Klaus Sohl’s polemic, “Die Kriegsvorbereitungen des deutschen Imperialismus in Bulgarien am Vorabend des zweiten Weltkrieges,” Jabrbiicher fiir Geschichte der UdSSR and der Volksdemokratischen Lander, 3 (1959), pp. 91— 119, contains information primarily on the period from 1937 on. 113. G.D., C, 4, No. 539. 114. U.S. 1936, 1:489-91; G.D., C, 5, No. 383; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 428; Dimitri Kitsikis, “La Gréce entre PAngleterre et Allemagne de 1936 a 1941,” Revue Historique, 238 (July—Sept. 1967), pp. 91-95. 115. For German-Greek relations in 1936 see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 110, 482, 501. 116. G.D., C, 1, No. 394; 4, Nos. 566, 572; 5, No. 100.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 255 as the German negotiators, offering to turn overt to Germany the import quotas of other countries like the United States.!!’ The course of negotiations for new agreements, however, did not turn out to be so smooth in spite of a visit by Numan to Berlin in May and a trip by Schacht to Ankara in June 1936. The British did what they could to counter the German efforts; and the Turks themselves began to have reservations about the foreign trade practices of Hitler’s Germany.'!® The new convention governing the Straits that Turkey secured in the summer of 1936 also raised some questions about GetmanTurkish relations, though these were soon smoothed over.'!? The real diplomatic tug-ofwar ovet Turkish policy still lay in the future; in 1936 both the Germans and the Turks were content to move slowly toward improved trade relations. While Germany’s reoccupation of the Rhineland by diverting attention elsewhere and forcing a revision of the peace settlement had greatly facilitated the realization of Turkey’s ambition to revise the Straits regime, the rapprochement of Germany with Italy—Turkey’s potential enemy in the Mediterranean—cast a shadow over GermanTurkish relations. Germany’s interests in the Middle East beyond Turkey were of small significance before 1937. There was some trade, especially with Egypt, but it had declined during the depression and was not yet receiving the attention it would in the years just prior to the outbreak of war.'2° German efforts over a two-year period to develop an oil concession in Iraq were dropped in 1936 when a German government guarantee was refused because Germany would soon be producing enough synthetic oil of its own.'?! The attention paid to occasional incidents only confirms the general picture of disinterest. The assassination of the Afghan minister to Berlin by an Afghan student in June 1933 naturally caused considerable excitement—especially since the victim was a brother of the king of Afghanistan,

and a prominent Afghan exile intervened on behalf of the

assassin—but did not substantially affect the slow development of closer relations between Germany and Afghanistan.'2? Rosenberg’s APA was playing a part in this process, but his role did not become important until 1937 and 1938. Almost as spectacular as the assassination would have been the return to the Egyptian government of the world-famous head of Nefretete which had been brought years before to the State Museum in Berlin under rather dubious circumstances. Though favored by Goring and

117. Ibid., 5, No. 287.

Kiepenheuer & 118. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 316; 3, No. 203; Hans Kroll, Lebenserinnerungen eines Botschafiers (Cologne;

T-120, 2612/ Witsch, 1967), pp. 97-100; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 27. April 1936,” 3391/8632/E 604860— 5650/H 004078-079; Rahn (Ankara) to Pilger (Berlin), 15 and 22 April 1936, T-120,

874. 119. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 328, 462, 464, 468, 481, 483, 493, 633.

The Third Reich and the Arab 120. On German economic interests in the Middle East see Lukasz Hirszowicz,

East (London:

dissertation of Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1966), pp. 15-17. The Berlin Free University

-Gesellschaft, 1963), does not deal Mohamed-Kamal El Dessouki, Hitler und der Nahe Osten (Berlin: Ernst-Reuter

Zweiten Weltkrieg Berlin: Deutscher with the years before 1937. Heinz Tillmann, Deutschlands Araberpolitik im spite of its polemical tone but has in 1937 after petiod the for Verlag der Wissenschaften, 1965), is very useful ; little to add to Hirszowicz for the pre-1937 period. det Marine, “Olversorgung der ando Oberkomm by ted supplemen be should Hirszowicz in account 121. The

984-PS (National Archives); Fritz Grobba, Kriegsmarine,” 29 April 1940, pp. 3-5, Nuremberg document pp: 91-94, 157-58; Foreign Office E 1967), idt, Manner und Machte im Orient (Gottingen: Musterschm

708/708/65. 7 June and Dodd dispatch 1054 of 21 July 122. On the assassination see Gordon (Berlin) dispatch 2464 of 1935, T-120, 1522/3088/D 625157; January 10 Biilow, von of dum 1933, State 701.90H62/7 and 9; Memoran Malletke of the APA, 11 January by dum Memoran Note of 14 January 1935, T-120, 2389/4621/E 202263, See also Malletke’s notes on Afghanistan of 17 Archives). (National 1360-PS document g Nurember 3, p. 1937, Grobba, p. 56. There is a good survey of January 1936, Nuremberg document 1354-PS (National Archives); 6271/593/97. N Office Foreign in 1936 Getman-Afghan relations as of December

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Goebbels, this propaganda gesture was vetoed by Hitler himself.” The measures taken in accordance with National Socialist racialist views certainly did nothing to assist the slow development of better relations with Iran and the building up of German cultural and economic influence there.!*4 A trade consortium agreement signed with the Iranian government on 30 March 1936 on behalf of several German firms by Ferrostaal A. G. was to open the way for German economic penetration of Iran. The first deliveries were signed for in December 1936; they were to be locomotives and freight cars for the new Trans-Iranian Railway.'*° This route would become a major avenue for American supplies to the Soviet Union in World War II; the official history of that operation refers to the first American railway troops riding to Tehran “on a train drawn by a little prewar Ferrostaal locomotive” and having “to get out and push the train up the more difficult grades.”!7¢ None of these matters could compare in importance with the impact on the Middle East caused by that aspect of National Socialist racial policies that went beyond prohibiting a minute number of Iranians and other so-called “non-Aryans” from marrying “Aryan” Germans to a policy of forcing the emigtation of Jews from Germany. Some of these Jewish refugees would

no doubt have gone to Palestine in any case, but the

pressure of Jewish migration to the mandated territory was increased by the German policy of using Jewish migration to Palestine as a device for expanding German foreign trade and countering the threat of a worldwide Jewish boycott of German goods. Special agreements that evidently had Hitler’s support were arrived at in the summer of 1933 under which Jews who left Germany for Palestine were accorded less onerous conditions for the transfer of their property abroad by way of an agreement providing for additional German exports to Palestine.!?” Thus, as an unintended by-product of National Socialist

persecution of the Jews, the Third Reich was strengthening the Jewish position in Palestine, a development that affected both the Arabs and the Germans in that country. The latter, a small group of the Templar religious sect who had migrated to Palestine in

the nineteenth century, were not likely to cause much trouble—whatever the sentimental concerns of German party and diplomatic officialk—but the Arabs were in a vety different situation. Increasingly worried by the increases in Jewish migration to the Holy Land, the majority coming from countries other than Germany, the Arab leaders were beginning to think about Germany as a possible ally both against the Jews and against the British and French mandatory authorities in the Middle East. The Arab uprising in Palestine which began in April 1936 and led the Peel Commission to advocate the partition of Palestine in the summer of 1937 would precipitate new policy questions for Berlin. When that 123. On this incident see Memorandum by von Bulow, 4 October 1933, T-120, 2374/4603/E 191014; Memorandum by von Bulow, 9 October 1933, 1522/3088/D 625373-374; Stohrer (minister in Egypt) telegram 82, 13 December 1933, ibid., D 625376, and his note on a meeting with Hitler on 7 March 1934, ibid., D 625378-379.

There is a characteristically distorted reference to the incident in Hanfstaengl, pp. 222-23. 124, On a dispute over racial matters with Iran in 1936 see the notes by Hermann von Harder of the APA’s foreign trade section of 11 and 13 July and 24 August 1936, Nuremberg document 913-PS (National Archives). On the growth of Getman-Iranian trade see Tillmann, pp. 18-19. 125. For relevant documents from the files of the German Ministry of Economics see T-71, roll 84, frames

587557ff. From these papers, which deal with the covering of deficits German firms expected to incur from deliveries to Iran, one can obtain a general idea of the program. 126. T. H. Vail Motter, The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia (W ashington: Government Printing Office, 1952),

p. 347.

127. On the agreement and the attendant policies and practices see G.D., C, 1, Nos. 369, 399; D, 5, No. 575; T-

120, 3404/8817/E 613758-890, passim; Hirszowicz, pp. 26-27; Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews

(Chicago: Quadrangle, 1961), p. 95; Jacobsen, pp. 156-57; Jacob Robinson, And the crooked shall be made straight (New York: Macmillan, 1965), p. 95. A copy of the German Ministry of Economics circular of 28 August 1933 implementing the agreement is in Foreign Office C 8300/6839/18.

The Consolidation of Germany’s Position in Central and Eastern Europe in 1936 257 time came, the German government would have to weigh such factors as the friendship of its new Axis partner, the possibility of antagonizing Britain by close association with the Arabs, interest in expanding foreign trade and hurrying Jewish emigration, the possibility of a Jewish state, and the potential assistance to Germany from Arab states and national movements. The Germans were to find the problems of the Middle East no easier, even if more remote, than anyone else. The Third Reich, however, did have a major potential asset in its efforts to penetrate the Middle East after the initial consolidation of its power in Europe by the end of 1936. This asset was its enmity to Britain, France, and the Jews; in other words, its enmity to all the presumed enemies of the Arabs with the possible exception of Italy. The widespread assumption that Germany was one country that though friendly to Italy did not aspire to political control in the Middle East and was actually or potentially hostile to the British and French, whose rule was the main object of Arab nationalist hostility, provided Germany with a possible welcome in the Arab world. The developments of subsequent yeats would show how Germany could and would take advantage of that situation and how the other major powers would respond to this new factor in a part of the world from which they had thought Germany expelled with the defeat of its Ottoman ally.'”8

that in the spring of 1933 Hitler turned eal 128. There is a story in the memoirs of Fritz Grobba (pp. 94-95) s inability to protect it in any ) es Germany’ of because bia Saudi-Ara the possibility of an oil concession in of 1938 and 1939 (pp. 182—83)—this crises c diplomati In view of Grobba’s unteliability—he confuses the evidence. g confirmin without accepted be cannot account

Chapter 13 On to War:

The Axis, the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the Four-Year Plan he halting steps in the direction of a rapprochement between Italy and Germany in the first half of 1936 have already been traced. The slowness of the process and the petiodic recurrence of suspicion and friction must not be allowed to obscure the importance of the shift in the European balance implied by the new alignment. If the conversion of Italy from a barrier to a reluctant supporter of German expansion was less speedy and spectacular than the similar shift of the Soviet Union in 1939, it was no less significant. At the level Germany’s strength had reached in 1936, the influence of Italy— however much the product of imagination rather than reality—immeasurably facilitated the creation of that image of power Hitler needed to frighten off potential challenges abroad and hesitations at home. If historians have found it proper to point to the difficulties that marked German-Italian relations after the formation of the Axis, as they have found it necessary to call attention to the inner contradictions of the “hollow alliance” between Germany and Japan,' we must remember that the observer of the international scene in the 1930s was influenced more by the image of strength and health than by the postmortem discovery of all manner of congenital defects in those alignments. Policy was made on the appearance of the day rather than the archival research of subsequent decades, and few modern leaders understood this more clearly than Adolf Hitler. If the landmarks along the road to a German-Italian alliance were marked more by bombast than by substance, this was not necessarily unintentional; both parties were often more interested in impressing other powers wit h the strength that the appearance of solidarity provided than in tying their own hands by detailed treaties or dovetailed policies. The Axis in the pre-World War II period, therefore, must be seen both from the point of

view of diplomacy and as it presented itself by means of propaganda; its importance resulted from the existence of both, even though they might at times be in conflict with each other. If the Ethiopian conflict had pulled Italy away from an alignment with Britain and France while pushing it closer to Germany, the end of that war in Africa ought to have allowed a return to the earlier relationship. This was not to be. Mussolini’s vanity had been wounded by the imposition of sanctions; it annoyed him at the same time as its eventual ineffectiveness influenced his negative assessment of British will and power. In his hour of triumph, the delays in ending sanctions angered him. At the same time, the German-Austrian agreement that he himself had urged now operated to reduce a most, if not the most, important barrier to agreement with Germany. Moreover, the new officials 1. Johanna M. Meskill, Hitler and Japan: The Hollow Alliance (New York: Atherton Press, 1966).

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Mussolini had appointed to high positions in the Italian Foreign Ministry, Count Ciano 5 paseo dp Bastianini, were sympathetic to a policy more closely attuned to erlin. The triumph in Ethiopia led Mussolini to create an issue made to order for trouble with the Western powers and friendship with Germany. The king of Italy was proclaimed emperor of Ethiopia on 9 May 1936, and the countries of the world were expected to recognize him as such. Recognition became increasingly a matter of prestige in Mussolini’s eyes, assuming a political importance out of all proportion to its actual significance. With or without the formal title, Italy would exercise control over that part of Africa only as long as its military forces occupied it; but as in his decision to move forward in Rast Africa in the preceding year, Mussolini had engaged his prestige, a dictator’s most precious possession. The importance of the issue must also be seen in an international context in which the Japanese puppet state of “Manchukuo” was not recognized by the powers as an independent country and in which Franco would have to wait almost three years for recognition from major powers other than Germany and Italy. It was precisely in this field that a concession by Britain was psychologically most difficult to obtain. London might quietly acquiesce in events that could not be changed

without war, but the extension of formal recognition was more than the British public could be expected to accept. At the same time, however, this was also one field where

Germany could easily afford to be gracious. Recognition of Italy’s rule in Ethiopia cost Germany nothing; and the more noise was made about the whole question, the more valuable the German gesture could be made to appear in Mussolini’s eyes. Berlin’s willingness to accede to Italy’s desire for recognition at a time and under circumstances of Italy’s choosing was, therefore, made known to Rome with Hitler’s approval in late June 1936.4 The fact that Germany asked for no concessions in return sweetened the gesture and made it easier for the German ambassador, Ulrich von Hassell, to coordinate with Mussolini and Count Ciano during the following weeks a joint policy of Germany and Italy toward the abortive negotiations for a new Locarno.° The common aversion of the two powers toward any new system of security in Western Europe would provide a platform for diplomatic contact and cooperation for the balance of 1936.° The Spanish Civil War not only afforded another common bond between Germany and Italy but, as already indicated, inhibited a return of Italy to closer relations with Britain and France. This became particularly obvious as Italy engaged itself in Spain more directly and extensively than Germany was prepared to do. Furthermore, this Italian policy implied a deterioration in Italian-Soviet relations, which had been rather good in preceding years. Although Mussolini always recognized the anti-Bolshevik explanations of Axis policy a propaganda facade for steps Italy and Germany wished to take in any case, his joining in this chorus in 1936 affected Italy’s relations with the Soviet Union, then just beginning the process of liquidating its own Communist party with a ruthlessthat as Italy cut ness that Mussolini and Hitler could envy. It is not surprising, therefore, the coordinaEast, the and West the in itself off from possible alternative associations

by the world at tion of its policies with those of Germany should be increasingly noted ministet— foreign Italian new the of visit a by heralded was large.’ This coordination a 2. See D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 338. to the accreditation of diplomats, may be related it as especially question, n recognitio the on s 3, Document ; found in ibid, 3. 118; Hungarian

pp. 8-9; D.D.F., 2d, 3, Nos. 114, 4. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 390, 409, 479; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, Documents, 1, Nos. 108, 115. c Papers, pp. 13-14; D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 6. 5. G.D., C, 5, No. 442; D, 1, No. 155; Ciano, Diplomati 6: See py 274 s 1, No. 140. 7, U.S. 1936, 1:335-38, 350-53; 2:447; Hungarian Document

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Mussolini’s son-in-law—to Berlin. The question of a formal visit by Ciano to Berlin had been ventilated in a most informal and still partially unclarified manner in late July 1936 by an unofficial emissary of Hans Frank. The current excitement over the situation in Spain and, it would appear, the hostility of the German foreign minister, von Neurath, had led to a postponement of the proposed venture.’ Although Hitler stressed his good relations with Mussolini in his meeting with Horthy on 22 August, von Neurath was still exerting a delaying influence

on the rapprochement with Italy.° The trip of the prince of Hessen to Rome at the end of August 1936 to coordinate German and Italian policy in Spain and the repeated appearances of Admiral Canaris in Italy on similar missions have already been alluded to. They helped pave the way for an exchange of unofficial visits in late September. Hans Frank went to Rome again, and Filippo Anfuso, Ciano’s secretary, who had previously served as vice-consul in Munich and in the Italian embassy in Berlin, was introduced to Hitler by the prince of Hessen.!? In these informal contacts, Mussolini and Hitler reassured each other’s emissaries of their dislike, distrust, and lack of regard for Great

Britain—a common bond that needed expression since each was suspicious of possible flirtations with England by the other. The road was to be prepared for an eventual visit of Mussolini to Germany—Hitler having been in Italy in 1934—but there was agreement that Ciano would go first. By this time it was already evident that the war in Spain was likely to continue for some time, keeping the two powers closely aligned in a common enterprise. Ciano’s trip would not only afford him an opportunity to meet with Germany’s leaders but would signal the creation of a new relationship. What precisely that relationship might be and how it could be most appropriately presented to the world, remained to be discussed before Ciano and his entourage headed north. For four weeks the German and Italian governments exchanged views about the agreements to be reached in the forthcoming meeting, hoping to straighten out all differ-

ences of opinion beforehand.'! Disregarding minor details, one can see in these preliminary negotiations both those interests that drew the two countries together and those that kept them apart. They were Both opposed to a new Locarno agreement that went beyond a simple promise of nonaggression between Germany and France—anything else would restrict Germany’s freedom of action in Central and Eastern Europe. Both were willing to support Franco, though Italy more so than Germany; at the same time, both recognized that any request for territorial concessions from Franco would be fatal to his reputation and prospects in Spain. The two countries agreed that bolshevism was an abomination. Both were pleased that the German-Austrian Agreement of 11 July had removed a major source of friction between Berlin and Rome, and both hoped that improvements in Italian-Yugoslav relations would assist the breakup of the Little Entente. 8. This incident is not mentioned in Frank’s memoirs. The sources used ate a somewhat dubious account in

Anfuso, pp. 22-23, and von Neurath’s memorandum of 4 August 1936, in G.D., C, 5, No. 554, n. 2. The third

edition of Anfuso’s memoirs, published by Cappelli in 1957 under the title Da Palazzo Venezia al logo di garda (1936-1945), contains additional material for the last years of the war but not for the period covered here. 9. On the Horthy visit see pp. 250f., above; on von Neurath’s views at this time see G.D., C, 5, No. 523. 10. On Frank’s trip see his In Angesicht des Galgens, pp. 233-34; G.D., C, 5, No. 553; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp.

43-48. On Anfuso’s trip see his Rom-Berlin im diplomatischem Spiegel, pp. 23-29; Magistrati, “La Germania e Pimpresa italiana di Etiopia,” pp. 602-03.

11. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 554, 562, 568, 572, 583, 585, 586, 588, 593, 595, 597, 599, 600, 602, 603, 608, 613, pp.

1122-24; D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 330; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 49-50; Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht No. BO) 21 October 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f. 399-407.

It should be noted that Italian sources available for the second half of 1936 are very meager: Aloisi’s diary ends in June 1936; the memoits of Magistrati and the diary of Ciano both begin with 1937. The eighth series of

the publication of Italian documents will eventually cover this period, but the editors decided to begin with the last rather than the first volumes of this series in order to document the events of the spring and summer of 1939,

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With Germany willing to recognize the Italian empire in Ethiopia, Italy was prepared be gracious about Germany’s minute economic interests there. The two were now also agreement as to their policy toward the League of Nations: Italy would sabotage Operations as long as it stayed inside, and when Italy left the League the German offet

to in its to

return to Geneva, once made to delude the British but long since consigned to oblivion,

would be withdrawn formally as well. Pleasant but hardly very meaningful words would be exchanged about economic cooperation and Italian diplomatic support for a return of colonies to Germany. At the same time, the record of the preliminary talks illuminates some divergencies between Germany and Italy. Each had its own ideas about the tactics to be followed in the negotiations with Britain and France about a new Locarno, and each adhered to its

own procedure. More important, neither was prepared to defer to the interests of the other in its general policy toward the Balkans. Here in particular the Germans wanted to be quite certain not to restrict their own ambitions in any way. The strong position Italy had secured through the Rome protocols was being undermined by the growth of German influence in Southeast Europe, and Berlin was not about to give up the advan-

tages it expected to harvest from that trend. The two nations would also follow different routes in their policies in East Asia. Italy was willing to go further toward at least de facto recognition of Manchukuo than was Germany, while the Germans, as they explained to

Ciano after his arrival, had decided to negotiate a different set of agreements with Japan. As for the formal aspects of the visit, there is something of the unconscious humor that

dogged the whole Axis relationship in the fact that beforehand Ciano wanted his visit trumpeted about in a big way while von Neurath preferred a more subdued staging; but by the time it was all over, Ciano was tired and annoyed by the extensive ceremonies.'” Since both parties were greatly interested in the propaganda effect of their relationship on other powers, especially England, all had to smile for the photographers. While Ciano was in Germany he met with von Neurath, Goring, and Hitler.!? With Goring’s role confined on this occasion primarily to economic issues, von Neurath can-

vassed with Ciano in their talks on 21-22 October a wide range of topics in addition to those foreshadowed by the preparatory negotiations. Agreement being reached without much difficulty, von Neurath went on to explain Germany’s reluctance to recognize Manchukuo lest its interests in China be jeopardized. He urged Italian support in the dispute over Lithuania’s administration of Memel and also asked that Italy recall Eugenio Morreale from Vienna. Morreale had acted for Mussolini in the Austrian capital when Italy still maintained its opposition to any form of German influence there; he was now

to be removed as Cerruti had been and as von Hassell and Attolico were in later years.'*

Like the Minotaur, the Axis claimed victims each year. Had Ciano been more perceptive,

he might have recognized that the Axis would some day claim far greater sacrifices: von Neurath explained to him that while the time to take Danzig and the corridor from and Poland had not yet arrived, the Germans “wished to wait for the propitious moment The manner.”!” to settle our differences with the Poles as fat as possible in a peaceful record does not divulge Ciano’s thoughts on this subject; he merely referred to Italy’s journey, he good relations with Poland. In line with the exchanges that had preceded his and Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 41,” 12. Compare G.D., C, 5, No. 562, with Anfuso, pp. 35 and 38,

26 October 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f. 415-17.

.

26 October 1936, p. 359; Ciano, Diplomatic 13. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 618, 620-22, 624; D, 3, No. 106; Dodd Diary, 2d, 3,

Documents, 1, Nos. 161, 164, 168; D.D.F., Papers, pp. 52-60; Anfuso, pp. 30-38; Frank, p. 234; Hungarian

a : Nos. 395, 408, 410, 412, 413; Kitsikis, p. 104. 1936 (Aloisi, February 19 on Hassell von of recall the g demandin of 14. Mussolini had alluded to the possibility p- 351). 15, G.D}, CG, 5, No. 620.

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asked Germany to help Italy improve its relations with Yugoslavia, a prospect that fitted

in well with German policy at the time. The meeting between Hitler and Ciano provided an opportunity for mutual admiration. Matching this admiration in intensity was theit common dislike of Britain. Ciano fed Hitlet’s antagonism by giving him some British diplomatic documents,

stolen in

Rome, that contained nasty but accurate evaluations of the National Socialist regime, its leaders, and its aims. The German dictator and the Italian foreign minister agreed not

only in their hostility to the English but on the use of antibolshevism as a screen for the ptocess of rallying other countries to them, thereby paralyzing England while the two powers continued their armament programs. The suggestion Hitler made for coordinating German

and Italian policy toward Yugoslavia complemented

Ciano’s requests;

Germany and Italy would jointly urge Hungary to concentrate its revisionist aspirations against Czechoslovakia, thereby facilitating Belgrade’s alignment with themselves. The

one potential stumbling block to German-Italian cooperation was brought in by Hitler in a manner as spectacular as it was discreet: he showed his Italian guests the window of his Berchtesgaden residence through which one could see Austria clearly and close by. But nothing was allowed to spoil the exchange of pleasantries. A common front was shown to the world. Mussolini might subsequently negotiate with the British,!® but he thought of himself as allied to Germany by ties that were real even if not concrete. The term may have originated elsewhere and earlier, but it was Mussolini who in his speech in Milan on 1 November 1936 gave the term “Axis” its public definition. He expected to play a major role in shaping the policy and reaping the benefits of this combination. Like Hitler’s domestic German allies before 30 January 1933, Mussolini could not afterward complain that he had been misled about Hitler’s

intentions. As Ciano recorded in his report on the conversation at Berchtesgaden, Hitler had told him: “In three years Germany will be ready, in four years more than ready; if five years are given, better still.””!” For Germany, the association with Italy had both short- and long-range advantages. In the immediate situation it meant that Germany could safely continue to disregard the British and French suggestions for a new Locarno. The slow but perceptible growth of German influence in Central and Southeast Europe could continue unchecked, especially

in Austria. In a broader perspective, the Axis provided Germany full assurance that it could move forward with its rearmament program without fear of anyone taking preventive action. As its potential enemies slowly awakened to the danger that faced them, that danger was magnified automatically by the junction, however tenuous, of Italy to Germany. The economic problems of German rearmament, signalized by the establishment of the Four-Year Plan simultaneously with the creation of the Axis, could not be taken advantage of by others had they been so minded. It was this same deterrent effect on potential resistance to the growth of German power that lay behind the other international association into which Germany entered in the fall of 1936. On 23 October

1936, the same day on which Ciano and von Neurath signed a confidential protocol embodying the policies on which they had agreed in the German Foreign Ministry at Wilhelmstrasse 74, across the street in the Dienststelle Ribbentrop at Wilhelmstrasse 64 Joachim von Ribbentrop and the Japanese ambassador, Mushakoji Kintomo, initialed the Anti-Comintern Pact.!8 16. Eden, pp. 478ff.

17. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 58. See also Wiskemann, chap. IV, and Mario Donosti (pseud. of Mario Lucciolli), Mussolini e ’Europa; la politica estera fascista. (Rome: Leonatdo, 1945), part 2, chap. 1. 18. Gerhard L. Weinberg (ed.), “Die geheimen Abkommen zum Antikominternpakt,” Vierteahrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichte, 2, No. 2:(April, 1954), 201.

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If German policy toward East Asia had been subject to various crosscurtents in the first part of the National Socialist regime, that confusion was compounded in subsequent years. In China during 1935 and 1936, the German military advisers continued their work of trying to assist Chiang Kai-shek in the formation of a modern army. Military equipment from Germany was reaching the Chinese Nationalist government, and when the quality of that equipment left something to be desired, General von Falkenhausen, the chief of the advisory staff, did what he could to have the situation mended. As Chiang consolidated his power, the possibility of his extending government control to the Canton area suggested that the German military advisers there as well as the industrial projects of Hans Klein would be included in his orbit. Germany might lose repayment from the local warlord, but its influence would continue.!?

What most interested Berlin, and especially the Ministry of War, about Klein’s projects, however, was neither influence nor payment but return shipments of raw materials from China. These materials, especially the tungsten needed for Germany’s armaments industry, provided the incentive to support Klein and to clear up the difficulties with Chiang and other elements in China—including German diplomats and businessmen there—that Klein generated in his never-ending feuds.”° In the process of supporting him, the German government agreed to move its legation from Peiping to

Nanking and subsequently to raise its status to that of an embassy.*! When the Chinese government was particularly obliging in the dispatch of tungsten, the Germans were first moved to send thank-you telegrams and then special gifts—a ceremonial sword for Chiang from Hitler and a special car for him from von Blomberg.” The Nanking authorities may have been reminded of gifts exchanged with barbarians in bygone days. The exchange of Chinese raw materials for German military supplies became a subject of increasing importance for both parties in 1936. Chiang sent a special mission to Germany to discuss the trade program. This mission, which was received by Hitler on 27 February just before he met the new

Chinese ambassador, Tien Fong, was to place

orders in Germany within the framework of a 100 million mark revolving credit that would be repaid by Chinese raw materials.2? As Rowak and Hisma had been organized to handle the sending of German military supplies in exchange for raw materials from Spain, so a special company, the HAPRO (Handelsgesellschaft fur industrielle Produkte m.b.H.) was created for analogous trade with China. Klein expected to play the same 19. On the military advisers in Nanking and in Canton in 1935 see Altenburg (German consul general Canton)

July report 564, 3 June 1935, T-120, 2988/6681/H 096433; Plessen (German legation Nanking) report 701, 10 2988/6680/H T-120, 1935, August 13 Brinckmann, to Falkenhausen von 096438; H frame ibid., 1935,

096326—330.

Ministry, 20 August 20. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 338, 432, 517, 552, n. 1; German Ministry of Education to the Foreign period see German 1935, T-120, 2988/6680/H 096323—324. For Rheinmetall and Solothurn deliveries in this 098691-693. 2991/6691/H 1936, March 17 259, report legation Nanking

China during the For an excellent sutvey of Germany’s increasing dependence on imports of tungsten from dargestellt am Beispiel 1930s see Jorg-Johannes Jager, Die wirtschafiliche Abhéngighkeit des Dritten Reiches vom Ausland der Stablindustrie (Berlin: Berlin Verlag, 1969), pp. 156-58. 21. Rabenau,

Seecki; Aus seinem Leben, p. 713; von

Neurath

memorandum

RM

540, 27 June 1935, T-120,

2383/4619/E 198120-121; U.S. 1935, 3:523. Ausl. VII, 11 November 1935, T22. German Ministry of Economics to Foreign Ministry, Nr. 3866/35 geh. 32, 13 November, ibid., frame H 096334; 120, 2988/6680/H 096333; Foreign Ministry to Nanking telegram Ausl. VII, 14 December 1935, T-120, geh. 4406/35 Nr. Ministry, Foreign to German Ministry of War

20 November 1935, T-77, 81/804743-744. 2991 /6691/H 098586; telegrams of Kung and Chiang to Blomberg, Drechsler, Dewtschland-China-Japan 1933-1939, 23. Rabenau, p. 717; Meier-Welcker, pp. 687, 691-92, 696; Karl 1964), pp. 15-18; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 64, 156, 254, Das Dilemma der deutschen Fernostpolitik (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, Memorandum of Voss, IV Chi 356, 29 746; 81/804745— T-77, 1936, 270; Seeckt to Blomberg, 8 January telegram 54, 19 March 1936, ibid., Trautmann Februaty and 4 March 1936, T-120, 2988/6680/H 096355—360;

é frames H 096383—384, and following documents on serial 6680. October 1937. For information in lan Four-Year-P the of jurisdiction general the under 24, HAPRO was placed

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

role in HAPRO that Bernhardt performed in Rowak and Hisma, but von Blomberg exercised a closer supetvision, using his economic expert Colonel Thomas to keep an eye on

developments. In view of the grave doubts of German Foreign Ministry in Berlin about the whole operation, the in stages to make certain that Chinese payments in foreign not get too far behind.» As a counterpart to the special Chinese trade mission that the projects moved forward reasonably well in the

diplomats in China and the German shipments were sent exchange or raw materials did to Germany and to make sure complicated situation in East

Asia, von Blomberg sent General von Reichenau to China in late May 1936.2° Von

Reichenau had moved from his position in the Berlin to head military district VII in Munich in a political flavor appear to have interested him up Germany’s army. In spite of the misgivings

armed forces office (Wehrmachtamt) in October 1935, but military missions with more than the routine work of building of the German foreign minister and the

German ambassador to Tokyo, Herbert von Dirksen, then home on leave in Germany,

von Reichenau went out for several months, seeing Chiang Kai-shek, the German diplomats in China, and, of course, his brother who was working with Klein.?’

The reason for von Neurath’s and von Dirksen’s objections to this trip by von Reichenau, beyond their general distrust of Klein’s projects, was the fear that so spectacular an action as the dispatch of a famous general on the active list to China, coming

on top of a German credit agreement giving China terms more favorable than those accorded China by any other country, would seriously imperil Germany’s relations with Japan.?® Out of fear of such repercussions, the diplomats had been successful in persuading von Blomberg to order a German general in Peiping to cancel his acceptance of a position as military adviser to General Sung Che-yuan, the key figure in the HopeiChahar political council governing parts of North China. Any German role there would have looked like participation on the Chinese side in the complicated tug-of-war over Japan’s efforts to extend its influence from Manchuria southward. Here the clash between China and Japan was too obvious and clear-cut for Germany to take sides.2? The hopes for delivery of key raw materials from China, however, were evidently too strong to be sacrificed to the objections of Japan when they concerned an area not as exposed as the provinces of China adjacent to Manchukuo. The relationship of Germany’s need for raw materials for its armaments program and its lack of foreign exchange for purchasing them to its policy in East Asia was brought out particularly clearly in a ministerial conference in Berlin on 27 May 1936.20 With Goring, Schacht, and von Blomberg for once in agreement, von Blomberg stated: “Certain hopes for the future can be placed in China. Anything that antagonizes it about it see esp. T-77, rolls 123-24, which contain HAPRO’s reports for 194143. For Klein’s views see his telegram to the Ministry of War of 20-21 November 1935, in 1-77, 81/804741—742. 25. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 217, 235, 238, 239, 281; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 246; Blomberg to Falkenhausen, W.Stb. 2688/36 geh., 25 Match 1936, T-120, 2988/6680/H 096411-Y12. A detailed account on Klein’s projects may

be found in a report by an official of the Reichsbank, Rosenbruch, who was a member of the Kiep mission discussed in the text of 3April 1936, T-120, 2787/6022/H 044486—492.

26. G.D., C, 5, No. 306. 27. On Reichenav’s activities in China and German-Chinese trade problems in the summer of 1936 see G.D., C, 5, Nos. 386, 461, 495, 502, 504, 536; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 476; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 37,” 10 October 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Se. 101/29, f. 373. 28. G.D., C, 4, No. 433; 5, Nos. 238, 239, 306, 338, 346; von Dirksen, Moskan-Tokio-London, p. 185. 29. The relevant exchanges for the period 25-29 February 1936 may be found in T-120, 2988/6681/H

096489494. Lindemann, the German general involved in the incident, has given his version in his memoirs, I”

Dienste Chinas, pp. 502-05. 30. A record of the conference, by Lieutenant Colonel Wilhelm Lob, in 1301-PS, TMIWC, 27:144—-48. Lob was

an ait force officer who played an important role in Géring’s economic projects in 1936-37 (see Berenice A. Carroll, Design for Total War, Arms and Economics in the Third Reich [The Hague: Mouton, 1968], pp. 125ff,).

On to War: The Axis, the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the Four-Year Plan

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politically must therefore be avoided. [We] must proceed with caution in the rapprochement with Japan; recognition of Manchukuo at this time would destroy the current operations of Klein in China.” When Géring responded with the comment that a common front involving China and Japan against the Soviet Union could probably be created, he added to the issues of recognition of Manchukuo and rapprochement with Japan the third of the themes interacting in German activities in the Far East in 1935-36 beyond the developing interest in the raw materials of China. Germany’s concern with Manchukuo growing out of its need to import soybeans and soybean products has already been discussed in Chapter 5. The import and foreign exchange crisis of 1935-36 suggested to Berlin the wisdom of following up on the illfated adventures of Ferdinand Heye by a more orthodox approach. A special trade mission was planned in the summer of 1935, and to avoid antagonizing the Chinese the “study commission” headed by Minister Kiep was to go to China, Japan, and Thailand as

well as Manchuria, though its main focus of attention would be on the Manchurian soybean trade.*! The mission’s primary purpose, in fact, was to arrange a trade and compen-

sation agreement with the Manchukuo authorities, satisfying Japan by dealing with those authorities and thereby recognizing them de facto, while minimizing Chinese objections by avoiding any legal recognition of the puppet regime the Japanese had installed in Hsinking.3? The commission spent several months in East Asia, eventually arriving at an

agreement with the Manchukuo authorities on 30 April 1936. Where Germany’s rearmament program was even indirectly involved, Germany would ignore Chinese protests over its dealing with the puppet regime of Manchukuo just as it had ignored Japan’s objections to the HAPRO trade agreement with Chiang Kai-shek. In each case, the Berlin government gave priority to the foreign trade require-

ments of its rearmament program while attempting to keep to a minimum the political effects of such measures upon its relations with China and Japan.** As the Germans themselves saw their foreign economic policy, they had concentrated on the Danubian area in 1933-34, on Latin America in 1934-35, and on the Far East in 1935-36.*4

In view of the repercussions that Germany’s relations with China and Japan always had on the attitude of the other, it is not surprising that some of the more adventurous

elements involved in National Socialist foreign policy should have attempted to mediate the differences between Nanking and Tokyo, thereby eliminating the constant problems of choice between the two. This first German effort at mediation in the Far East, which foreshadows that of 1937-38, cannot yet be traced in detail, but there is enough informa-

tion to provide an outline of the affair. The key figures were Hermann Kriebel and Edmund Fuerholzer, both examples of the amateur in diplomacy upon the National Socialist scene. Kriebel began as a Bavarian staff officer, served in the China expedition

in 1900-1901 at the time positions during and after with Hitler. Together the key roles in the attempted

of the Boxer Rebellion, and after occupying prominent staff World War I organized in Bavaria paramilitary units associated former corporal and the retired lieutenant colonel had played putsch of November 1923 and together they served their jail

31. Trautmann telegram 105, 22 July 1935, T-120, 2992/6692/H 098833.

wirtschaftung (Wohlthat) to Kiep, BOAT GAD AOAn yi O2;mOSs 01922) 3:374; Reichsstelle fur Devisenbe Wirtschaftliche Studienkommission die fiir on “Instrukti 004047; 0/H 2612/565 T-120, September 1935, 7 004048. H frame Ostasien,” 24 September 1935, ibid., 537; Weinberg, “Recognition of Manchoukuo,” 33. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 448, 479, 552; 5, Nos. 195, p. 499, No. 1936,” “... vom Daunte 36; oun - vom 154-55; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 30. April

20 fur

pp. PLBy,

403; Memorandum of Gaus, zu IV Chi 5136 1, Juni 1936,” Bundesarchiv Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/7, f. 285, 353, of von Bulow, 4 May 1936, T-120, 2373/ dum Memoran 098837; 21 January 1936, T-120, 2992/6692/H 4602/E 190263-264. G.D., G5eNo; 510, 34. See the Foreign Ministry’s circular of 17 August 1936,

266

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

terms in Landsberg. Chiang Kai-shek. He general in Shanghai. dictator, and he used

Kriebel had later joined those German officers who worked with remained in touch with Hitler and in 1934 became German consul His long acquaintance with Hitler gave him direct access to the it when the possibility of a special diplomatic scheme arose in the

fall of 1935.35 Fuerholzer, like Kriebel, had been involved in the ultranationalist move-

ments of post-World War I Bavaria but had gone to the United States in 1926 where he dabbled in German-American political activity while keeping in touch with the National Socialist party in Germany. He worked from 1933 on in the German news service, Transocean, mainly as its Far Eastern chief with headquarters in China.*° In mid-October

1935, Fuerholzer

had a conversation

with the Chinese

prime

minister, Wang Ching-wei, who requested on behalf of himself and Chiang Kai-shek that Hitler help arrange for a compromise between China and Japan, a compromise that would lead to cooperation between the three countries in economic matters as well as in the struggle against communism. Kriebel was in Berlin at that time, and Fuerholzer flew

to Germany so that they could jointly approach Hitler.*” In Germany, this scheme was brought to the attention of Hitler and von Ribbentrop at a time when von Ribbentrop was already working on an anti-Comintern agreement with the Japanese military attaché, Oshima Hiroshi. Oshima indicated that his superiors in Japan were indeed interested in an agreement with China, and Hitler thereupon gave his approval in principle to the concept of German mediation. While Kriebel was on his way back to East Asia, however,

relations between China and Japan over Japanese intrigues in North China had deteriorated to such an extent that Berlin decided that nothing could be done for the time being after all.2° The wounding of Wang Ching-wei in an assassination attempt had removed him from the scene during the key part of the negotiations, a factor of great importance in view of his favorable attitude toward the idea of an accommodation with Japan. Although the subject appears to have been touched on again subsequently, the German government maintained its reserve in view of the obvious lack of any Japanese interest in better relations with the Nanking government.” Berlin was interested in aiding a Chinese-Japanese rapprochement, but only if there appeared to be some chance of success. The Fuerholzer-Kriebel soundings had come into tangential relations with another set of informal discussions: the von Ribbentrop-Oshima talks about an anti-Comintern pact. There are still gaps in the record of those negotiations, because they too were conducted through special channels and largely behind the backs of the foreign ministries in both Berlin and Tokyo. The picture in this case, however, is much clearer than in regard 35. On Kriebel’s career see Albrecht von Thaer, Generalstabsdienst an der Front und in der O.H.L. (ed. by Siegfried A. Kaehler) (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1958), p. 190, n. 119; Heinrich Bennecke, Die Reichswebr und

der Rébm-Putsch (Munich: Olzog, 1964), p. 9; Jacobsen, p. 27. From April 1939, Kriebel served as the chief of the petsonnel and administrative section of the Foreign Ministry until his death in February 1941. Hitler later remembered him as a diplomat who though “one of our men” was still ignorant enough to write him that the Japanese were not strong enough to settle with the Chinese (Hitler's Table Talk, Trevor-Roper edition, 2 February 1942, p. 277; similarly, Wiedemann, pp. 174-75). In earlier years, Hitler had paid more attention to

Kriebel’s views on Hast Asia (see the report on the Hitler-Strasser talk of 22 May 1930, in Otto Strasser, Aufbau des dentschen Soxialismus [2d ed., Prague: Heinrich Grunoy, 1936], p. 132). 36. On Fuerholzer’s career see his papers in T-81, Serials 53 and 185-89. He was subsequently active in various German foreign propaganda operations in Europe and the United States. 37. G.D., C, 4, No. 416; Chinese ambassador Berlin to Kriebel, 18 October 1935, T-120, 2991/6691/H 098604;

Lammers to Kriebel, St.S. Nr. 3445/35, 19 October 1935, ibid., frame H 098605; Fuerholzer to Trautmann, 21 October 1935, T-81, Roll 32, Serial 53, frame 28931, and Fuerholzer’s letter to Hitlet’s adjutant, Captain Wiedemann, 1 October 1938, ibid., frame 29257; Memorandum by Fuerholzer on a conversation with an unidentified Japanese official on 9 and 10 August 1935, T-81, roll 33, frames 29810-812.

38. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 433, 451, 452. 39, For further documentation on the episode see ibid., Nos. 466, 479, 493.

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267

to the attempted German mediation.” In May or June of 1935, at the same time that von Ribbentrop was negotiating the naval agreement with England, he made contact with Oshima through an intermediary, Friedrich Wilhelm Hack, who had once worked for the South Manchurian Railway Company—the key instrument of Japanese expansion on the mainland of Asia—and had met the Japanese military attaché in Germany through his subsequent activities in the arms trade.*! Von Ribbentrop appears to have been interested in some agreement of an anti-Soviet character; but Oshima delayed any response until von Ribbentrop at his first personal meeting with Oshima on October 1935 insisted that the Japanese general staff be asked its views as to the attitude either Germany or Japan should take in case the other were involved in war with the Soviet Union. Oshima thereupon secured instructions from the Japanese general staff that the idea of cooperation against Russia deserved investigation and was told that a representative of the general staff would be sent to Berlin to look into the matter. Up to this point, von Ribbentrop may not have had Hitler’s full approval of his ideas, though it is difficult to imagine that he would have acted at all lad he thought that

the Fuhrer would be opposed. While Oshima and von Ribbentrop awaited the Japanese emissaty, a project for a pact with Japan vas worked out in the Dienststelle Ribbentrop by Hermann von Raumer, its Far Eastern specialist. To avoid an open breach with the Soviet Union, the pact with Japan would ostensibly be directed against the Comintern. Hitler approved the idea on 25 November 1935, a few days after he had also agreed to try to secure the adherence of China to this scheme in the course of German mediation between that country and Japan. With the Japanese emissary in Berlin conferring with Oshima, von Ribbentrop, and von Blomberg, and with everyone in agreement on an

anti-Comintern pact that Britain and Poland would be asked to join, all seemed to be going forward to a normal agreement.4? _ Immediately thereafter, however, there was a

setback in the negotiations. In the first place, von Neurath argued strongly against tying Germany to Japan. He was greatly concerned about the repercussions of a German alignment with Japan on its relations with England. It was von Neurath’s view that Japan really had nothing to offer Germany, and for a while he appears to have cooled Hitler’s receptivity to von Ribbentrop’s brainstorm. At the same time, there is evidence that—possibly under the influence

of General

Beck, the German

army chief of staff, and General

Ott, the

German military attaché in Tokyo—Minister of War von Blomberg began to have second thoughts. Berlin was willing to let the project languish for a while; only the German ambassador in Tokyo, Herbert von Dirksen, was still pushing. If there was reluctance in Berlin, equal hesitation could be seen in Tokyo. There the Japanese Foreign Ministry did its best to restrain the enthusiasm aroused among the military by the special emissary from Berlin. The military revolt in Tokyo on 26 February 1936 would eventually give the more adventurist element in the Japanese government an opportunity to push forward with the pact, but the confusion attendant upon the revolt and its suppression contributed to a temporary delay. Equally important in reinforcing on Sommer and the sources 40. There is an excellent account in Sommer, pp. 23-42. The account here is based he lists unless otherwise noted. feelers in 1945, see RobertJ. C. 41. For some of Hack’s later adventures, especially his role in Japanese peace Press, 1954), pp. 104-8; cf. Heinkel, proto: Butow, Japan’s Decision to S.urrender (Stanford: Stanford University International Military Tribunal for the Tadaichi, Wakamatsu of Testimony 42. G.D., C, 4, No. 416; 5:271, 273;

w Far East, Proceedings, pp. 33700—713. not know about the von Ribbentrop43, Sommer is incorrect in thinking that the German Foreign Ministry did 1936 (Sommer, pp. 28-30). See of summer the in Dirksen von by informed until Oshima negotiations of the subject between von discussion a to refers which 1936 especially von Ditksen’s letter of 1 January

No. 479). Neurath and Hitler before 9 December 1935 (G.D., C, 4,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

doubts in both Berlin and Tokyo was the general concern aroused in the world by a Soviet-promoted leak of information about the negotiations. There had been rumors about fabricated and real leaks concerning the GermanJapanese negotiations all through 1935.44 Then, in December 1935 and January 1936, the Soviet government, which had learned of the negotiations through its espionage apparatus,> began to release reports about them to the world press, presumably with the hope of preventing any agreement. There was an immediate flurry of press reports, diplomatic inquiries, and carefully worded denials. Though the denials were, particularly those of von Neurath, mote a product of hope than of honesty, the international uproar

caused by the rumors of a German-Japanese alliance resulted in greater caution by both prospective allies.4¢ In Berlin, both Géring and von Blomberg voiced reservations about Japan at the conference on 27 May 1936, discussed previously.” The German Foreign Ministry, in fact, would have preferred to drop the whole idea, although Ambassador von

Dirksen still argued for continuation of the negotiations.*® The summer and fall of 1936, on the other hand, saw both Japan and Germany once

again interested in an agreement. In Japan, the influence of the military was stronger than ever after the immediate repercussions of the February incident had passed. That incident, one of a long series in which Japanese ultranationalists hoped to demonstrate their

superior ability to direct Japan’s domestic and foreign policies by the murder of—they hoped—large numbers of high government officials, left the Japanese Foreign Ministry more intimidated than ever while simultaneously impressing on the leaders of Germany the idea that Japan was at least on the way to a form of government as fine as their own.” The Soviet agreement with Outer Mongolia, published on 8 April, coming after the French ratification of the Franco-Soviet Pact also increased the attractiveness of Germany to the Japanese leaders as a possible restraining influence on Soviet policy in the Far East, which in those years was directed toward the containment of Japanese expansion on the mainland of Asia.°° Hack was sent by the Germans to Tokyo in the spring of 1936 to help revive the negotiations there as he had helped start them the year before—and he unwittingly kept the Soviet Union informed of their progress by confiding in Richard Sorge, a key agent of Moscow in Japan.*! Hitler himself considered the whole problem of German policy toward Japan in June and July of 1936. In the context of his decision to intervene in Spain and to move closer to Italy, he also saw Japan as possibly associated in some way with Germany. He 44. Presseisen, p. 77; G.D., C, 4, No. 238; U.S. 1935, 3:481—82; note on a conversation with Otto Strasser on 4

March 1935, from the political archive of the Czech Foreign Ministry, Czech document in T-120, 1143/2028/ 444433, 45. Walter G. Krivitsky, In Stalin's Secret Service (New York: Harper, 1939), chap. 1; F. W. Deakin and G. R. Storry, The Case of Richard Sorge (London: Chatto & Windus, 1966), p. 162. 46. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 475, 479, n. 6, 504, 511; 5, No. 155; D.D.F,, 2d, 1, No. 62; U.S. 1936, 4:19-20, 31-32, 93; Dodd, Diary, 26 February 1936, pp. 315-16; Memorandum of Dodd, 29 February 1936, Dodd Papers, folder 1936-D. 47, TMWC, 27:147. Cf. G.D., C, 5, No. 306, where von Blomberg is reported as having told von Reichenau

that a rapprochement with Japan was out of the question and that von Ribbentrop’s negotiations had been broken off.

48. G.D., C, 4, Nos. 479, 573; 5, No. 197. 49. D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 244; see also “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 27. Februar 1936,” Bundes-

archiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/7, f. 139. 50. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 59, 196; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 13. 51. Deakin and Storry, pp. 182-85. The special messages to Berlin mentioned in this account that Sorge helped

encipher for General Ott, the German military attaché in Tokyo, appear to be those referred to in G.D., C, 5, No. 197. The mission of Hack is not discussed in Chalmers Johnson, Ax Instance of Treason, Ozaki Hotsumi and

the Sorge Spy Ring (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964). It should be noted that Sorge’s photocopying of German embassy Tokyo documents starting early in 1936 presumably enabled the Soviet government to decipher the German diplomatic codes. The leaks referred to by Krivitsky may have done so in 1935.

On to War: The Axis, the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the Four-Year Plan

269

discussed this possibility with von Ribbentrop and Oshima at Bayreuth in late July when the decisions to aid Franco and to send von Ribbentrop to London were made, and it is clear from subsequent events that Hitler decided to go forward with the negotiations at that time. There was some thought of including England in whatever arrangements might be concluded, but this idea fell by the wayside as the negotiations for a GermanJapanese agreement went forward in the fall of 1936.5 Hitler disregarded those, especially the German ambassador to China, who warned against relying on Japan; on the other hand, he would not yet commit himself to Japan to such an extent as to cut off the economic relations with China that the Germans hoped would help their armament program.°> To protect the economic relationship with China, Germany would not allow its negotiations with Japan to include the recognition of Manchukuo.* The Japanese, for their part, wanted to keep their commitments to Germany from antagonizing the Russians to an extent that would interfere with the economic interest most important to Japan—the fisheries negotiations with the Soviet Union. Within these limitations, what sort of agreement could Germany and Japan work out, and what would be its meaning? The text of the treaty, initialed on 23 October and formally signed on 25 November 1936, provided merely for cooperation between the two powers in opposing the Communist International, opened this cooperation to other countries that might wish to join, and set a five-year term to the treaty. A supplement called for a police commission to implement the cooperation. Since it was well known that the Communist parties of Germany and Japan had been effectively suppressed long before, it is not surprising that sectet agreements in addition to the published ones were immediately suspected. The German government had acknowledged the truth to Ciano when he visited Germany in October, but otherwise Berlin and Tokyo publicly denied the existence of secret agreements. There was, in fact, a whole series of them.*> By these additional agreements,

Germany and Japan promised to do nothing that might in any way assist Russia in case of an unprovoked attack or threat of attack by the Soviet Union on the other partner and agreed to sign no political treaty with the Soviet Union not in accord with the AntiComintern Pact without the consent of the other. These secret commitments, however,

were modified by equally secret reservations. The Japanese, with German consent, excluded from the scope of their obligations any treaties on fisheries concessions of border questions—precisely the subjects of greatest immediate importance in JapaneseSoviet relations. The Germans, on the other hand, responded with a tortuous explanation superficially reconciling the new agreement with the German-Soviet treaties of Rapallo and Berlin which governed German-Soviet relations but were now declared in accordance with the new pact as they were no longer effective insofar as they diverged from it. Another secret exchange papered over this curious piece of logic. The immediate international repercussions of the Anti-Comintern Pact were very of negative. The Soviet Union broke off the fisheries negotiations with Japan in spite the of spectacle Tokyo’s reassurances. The British government was affronted by the to be Getman ambassador to London spending most of his time on projects that seemed ima-von Ribbentrop meeting of 22 July 52. G.D., C, 5, Nos. 362, 509; von Dirksen, p. 186. For the Hitler-Osh , 1936 see Sommer, p. 34. onsbericht Nr. 37,” 10 October 1936, BSR GD aeGre: WNlessS63; 461) 495, 502; Dertinger’s “Informati

trade relations was to play a major role in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29 f. 373. The volume of these in 1937-38; in 1936 Germany sent Japan of support full toward policy the resistance to a switch of German of military supplies to China (G.D., D, 1, No. over 23 million marks and in 1937 over 82 million marks worth 576; see also Drechsler, pp. 51-53). C, 5, Nos. 608, 621, 637. 54. Weinberg, “Recognition of Manchoukuo,” p. 156; G.D., nternpakt,” pp. 197—201, and Sommer, pp. 494— 55. Texts published in Weinberg, “Abkommen zum Antikomi

99.

270

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

directed as much against England as anyone else. In Japan, the international uproar over

the agreement strengthened the hand of those opposed to a closet alignment with Germany. There was alarm everywhere about the secret agreements all suspected existed but only the Soviet government knew in authoritative detail.°° Certainly the Chinese government was alarmed by what appeared to it to be a radical departure in German policy, and the German diplomatic and military representatives had to exert considerable effort to calm the anxieties of Chiang Kai-shek.*’ The German-Japanese agreements were, as has been shown, not nearly as extraotdinary as was suspected. They constituted a form of anti-Soviet alliance, but simultaneously converted that alliance into an association of dubious strength by a variety of reservations. This self-mutilation of the alliance was indicative of the nature of the relations between Germany and Japan and of each to the Soviet Union. On the basis of the agreement they could move jointly; on the basis of the reservations, each could go its own way. There were other possibilities as well. As many opponents of the pact in Japan feared, it could very easily be made into an alliance against the Western powers, and

Germany was to attempt that in 1938-39. The confusion in the policy directions, especially of Germany, was involuntarily revealed by von Ribbentrop himself when he told Stalin in August 1939, at the time of the signing of the German-Soviet

Non-

Aggression Pact, that the current joke in Berlin was that Stalin himself would join the Anti-Comintern Pact.%® Such reflections on the tenuous nature of the German-Japanese alignment must not

be allowed to obscure its real importance in other respects. In Berlin, von Ribbentrop had again triumphed over the doubts of the Foreign Ministry; he would look upon the association with Japan as his special contribution to the world’s wisdom.*? As in the case of the alliance between Germany and Italy, the will of Hitler rather than the terms of any agreement defined German policy; and since he thought of the pact as an option for Japan, he would eventually sacrifice Germany’s position in China to that option. Similarly, in its repercussions on the outside world, the propagandistic effect, the images

produced, and the fears created were perhaps more significant than the textual contradictions. The most powerful disturbers of the peace of Europe and Asia had drawn together, with Italy associated with them. England, France, the Soviet Union, the United

States, all had to remember that if they were involved in difficulties on one side of the globe, they were threatened on the other side as well. The alliance of the victors of World War I had fallen apart soon after the Armistice; whatever the internal frictions in that association, it dominated world events as long as it held together even superficially. Now a new globe-spanning alliance was obviously in the process of formation; who could predict with assurance whether it would lead to joint control of world affairs or joint suicide in a disaster brought on by the confident advocates of the new dispensation?©? 56. U.S. 1936, 1:392—405, passim; G.D., C, 6, No. 105; Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 46,” 19 November

1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, £. 479-81; Foreign Office files F 7223 and F 7504/303/23. 57. Sommer, p. 57; Drechsler, pp. 25-26; and documents to be published as G.D., C,.6, Nos. 15, 56, 64, 66, 74,

75. The Chinese for a moment considered replacing the German military and Italian air advisers with British officers (Foreign Office F 7567/166/10).

The decision of Hitler to break the agreements with China for the exchange of military supplies for raw materials did not come until 1937; General Georg Thomas confused this with 1936 in his memoirs, “Gedanken

und Ereignisse,” Schweizer Monatshefte, 25 (December 1945), 537-58. 58. G.D., D, 7, No. 213, p. 191. 59, The Foreign Ministry maintained its frigid distance from the anti-Comintern Pact; von Neurath’s assistant von Kotze acknowledged receipt of the originals of the signed documents and appended documents in a coolly formal note to von Ribbentrop of 29 January 1937 (DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM 60964, f. 57). 60. The joint suicide concept was mentioned by one of the strongest Japanese advocates of an alliance with

On to War: The Axis, the Anti-Comintern Pact, and the Four-Year Plan

24d

. Repeated reference has been made in this and preceding chapters to the relationship of internal economic problems in the winter of 1935-36 to the timing of Hitler’s decision to remilitatize the Rhineland and to the role of trade questions in Germany’s telationship with the United States, the Far East, Spain, and Southeast Europe in 1936. These economic issues were, as has been shown, generally facets of Germany’s rearma-

ment policy, that is, they concerned the problem of importing those materials Germany needed for rearmament. This problem became particularly acute in 1936 for several reasons. By 1936, the boom in the German economy that had been produced by the government’s enormous deficit spending for armaments and investment in armaments and related industries had led to full employment in the German economy. Under such circumstances, further expansion of government expenditures for arms could easily lead to inflationary pressures. Countering such pressure, the maintenance of the deflationary tax program of the Bruning government during the National Socialist period helped restrain consumption; the restrictions on dividends and private investment reserved the flow of

capital to those industries involved in rearmament; and the enforced investment of all accumulating savings in government bonds served the same purpose.®! The destruction of the trade unions meant that the workers could not take advantage of the improved employment situation to press for higher wages. The control of foreign trade was used not only to conserve foreign exchange but to make certain that the available foreign exchange was utilized for such imports as the government thought wise and to subsidize such exports as seemed likely to produce additional foreign exchange in those markets where it was most needed. This policy had been complicated by the devaluation of the pound and the dollar in earlier years, a difficulty accentuated by additional devaluations in Europe in 1936. Hitler, however, was determined to avoid devaluation for political

and psychological reasons; and although the possibility of devaluation of the mark was apparently considered seriously in the summer of 1936, no steps in that direction were allowed.®? The vatious manipulations used in the preceding years to assist Germany’s foreign trade program were, however, no longer so useful; there was increasing resistance

abroad and fewer resources at home for use in that program. The setious difficulties in Germany began with a crisis over food imports in the winter of 1935-36, continued with raw materials shortages in the spring and summer of

1936, and came to a head in decisions that focused attention on the whole structure of

the German economy. The scholarly dispute over the nature of that economy, between those who argued that it was organized for total war and those who pointed to the fact that it was not fully mobilized until the latter part of World War IT, has been resolved by the thoughtful analysis of Berenice Carroll who has shown how the National Socialist economy was geared to war from the beginning, how substantial and steady increases in its orientation toward armaments continued year by year, and why total mobilization was postponed until Germany was faced by precisely that type of war Hitler had most wanted

to avoid.

Impressed by the immense problems Getmany had faced during the stalemate of

aS en S i

in a speech on 23 December Germany, Matsuoka Yosuke, then president of the South Manchurian Railway, The Diplomats [New York: 1936 (cited in Sommer, p. 53, and Gordon A. Craig and Felix Gilbert [eds.] 619). p. 1963], , Athenaeum may be found in Rene Erbe, Die 61. An excellent survey of the fiscal policies of National Socialist Germany (Zurich: Polygraphischer Verlag, Theorie modernen der Lichte im nationalsozialistische Wirtschaftspolitik 1933-1939 1958), chaps. 2, 3, and 4.

;,

igh

a

alistische Vierjahresplan (Stuttgart: 62. Ibid., p. 189; Dieter Petzina, Autarkiepolitik im Dritten Reich, der national-soxi Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1968), p. 44,

X. 63. Design for Total War, especially preface and chaps. I, IV, V, and

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

World War I because of its enemies’ access to and its own lack of key raw materials, Hitler looked toward war in the future not as a long wearying struggle but as a quick series of strong blows bringing down one enemy, to be followed by a subsequent repetition of that process with another enemy. Such a strategy—encapsulated in the term Bhitzkrieg, “lightning wat”—prtesupposed not the total mobilization of all of a nation’s resources but a substantial headstart over potential enemies who would be knocked out before either side had been forced into total mobilization by a drawn-out conflict. Such a strategy was cumulative, in a manner of speaking, because its success in the first instance

would give Germany control of added territory and resources and thus a better chance for success the next time. It would also avoid the imposition on the home front of such sacrifices as might remind the population of the rigors—and hence the ultimate outcome—of the last war. On the contrary, success would further consolidate support at home for the next successful war. A rapidly built air force as well as what came to be known as psychological warfare and fifth-column activities would all play important roles in putting the lightning into the expected wars.® As shown in the first chapter, such wats would be fought for land on which the Germans could grow the food they needed to support themselves independently of any imports; the bread crisis of the winter of 1935-36 reinforced Hitler’s fixation on this primitive concept of the need for greater land area in the struggle for survival. He had made this point in his talk to the German generals right after his accession to power. He had repeated essentially the same point a year later in a speech to the generals and high SA and SS officers on 28 February 1934.7 It would reappear in Hitler’s memorandum on the Four-Year Plan. Furthermore, the conquests that brought Germany agticultural land would provide other taw materials that it lacked, a point of which Hitler must have been reminded by observing the difficulties that even limited sanctions had caused for Italy. As the German economy moved into a foreign exchange and resource allocation crisis in 1936, therefore, Hitler had to define his policy as against alternative solutions.

There was the possibility of leaving the military forces at approximately the levels planned for 1936-37. From a purely economic standpoint, such a policy would take care of the crisis. The financial needs, as Schacht pointed out, could be covered at a substan-

tial level, with the increased tax revenue from a growing economy being used to retire some of the Mefo-bills originally printed to pay for rearmament. The level of arms production could be maintained, with exports taking up the slack after an army of fixed size had been adequately equipped and sufficient stockpiles of weapons and munitions created.°° The problem of foreign exchange could be dealt with successfully because Germany could earn enough for the imports needed to sustain an army of about forty divisions. Furthermore, in one key area in which imports for the military services were essential, that of petroleum products, Germany was approaching self-sufficiency in 1936. Facilities for the production of petroleum products from coal were reaching the levels needed for a very large proportion of Germany’s requirements if it did not expand its 64. See the somewhat similar analysis in Alan S. Milward, The German Economy at War (London: Athlone Press,

1965), pp. 7-14. 65. It should be noted that the French air attaché in Berlin clearly perceived this strategy of rapidly building up an ait force that could win a short, violent conflict for a country lacking the resources to fight a long wat (D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 252). 66. See above, pp. 23-24.

67. Bracher, Nationalsozialistische Machtergreifung, pp. 749-50.

68. Note the comment by the deputy director of department IV of the German Foreign Ministry inserted into

his memorandum

of 14 February 1935, “that it was extremely desirable to provide opportunities for export for

out armaments industry against a slackening in the home demand from about 1937 onward” (G.D., C, 3, No. 491).

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forces—and hence its needs. But it was precisely in this area that the requirements of a further rapid expansion of Germany’s military forces would precipitate drastic changes in the organization of the German economy. Still another possibility would have been a total economic mobilization with a drastic shift of economic resources to military production. Such a policy of preparing Germany by arming in depth for a war of attrition like the preceding conflict had long been urged—though

unsuccessfully—by

General Georg Thomas,

the key person in

military-economic planning in the German military hierarchy.”” While the restriction of atmaments expansion necessarily implied that over a period of time Germany would lose its military headstart over other countries and could not attack them with hope of quick success, the policy advocated by Thomas implied a drastic reordering of the German economy preparatory to fighting the kind of all-encompassing war of attrition Hitler hoped to avoid by a sequence of brief, victorious wars. It is hardly surprising that as he faced the economic choices of 1936 Hitler should follow the advice neither of Schacht nor of Thomas. In the fall of 1935 Hitler had turned to Goring to decide a dispute between Schacht and the Minister of Agriculture, Darré, concerning the use of foreign exchange for food

purchases. Goring decided in favor of Darré.”! When it became evident early in 1936 that there would be shortages of oil—or the foreign exchange needed to pay for importation—to cover the needs of an expanding military force, Hitler was asked to step into the bureaucratic fighting over the issue. Again Hitler turned to Goring, placing him in charge of fuel in Match and giving him broad authority over the whole field of raw materials and foreign exchange in April.’? Goring was a personal associate who could be expected to catry out Hitler’s ideas ruthlessly; he was directly involved in the oil question in his role as ait minister and commander in chief of the German air force; and he was close to Wilhelm Keppler, Hitler’s economic adviser, who had been especially interested in the development of the synthetic oil industry.” Under these circumstances, Goring began to

build up his position in the economic sphere, creating and absorbing agencies and feuding with other agencies for both policy and power.” The immediately pressing gap in the foreign-exchange situation in the summer of 1936 was met by an emergency measure requisitioning the foreign-exchange holdings and claims of German individuals and companies; the needs for the next few years wete to be covered by more basic changes in economic policy.” 69. See Wolfgang Birkenfeld, Der synthetische Treibstoff 1933-1945, Ein Beitrag zur nationalsoxialistischen W irtschaftsund Ristungspolitik (Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1964), p. 50; Annex 1 to “Aufzeichnung tuber die Versorgungslage auf dem Betriebsstoffgebiet und ihre Auswirkungen fiir die Wehrmacht,” 9 March 1936, in the 1301-PS, TMWC, 27:132. In this table, the percentage figures on production in the 1938 column apply to of needs the to relation in adjusted are figures the when 1938; by expanded as military the for estimated need need in military forces at the 1936 level, they range from 33 percent to 100 percent coverage of the estimated each category. Wolfgang 70. On Thomas see his Geschichte der deutschen Webr- und Riistmigswirtschaft 1918-1943/45) (ed. by II. chap. Carroll, and 1966); Boldt, H. hein: Boppard-am-R Birkenfeld;

historians see 71. For a view of this crisis considerably more favorable to Darré than that taken by other

Petzina, pp. 31-33. 36-48. 72. Carroll, pp. 122-25; Birkenfeld, pp. 79-81; Beck, Schacht, pp. 84-85; Petzina, pp. 2 November 1934, Nuremberg docu73. Catroll, p. 124; Birkenfeld, p. 36; Memorandum by Wilhelm Keppler,

opposed financial requests of ment NI-15655. Note the report that Keppler at a conference on 25 March 1936 grounds that Germany would soon the German navy connected with developing oil sources in Iraq on the

der Kriegsmarine,” 29 April 1940, p. 3, cover its requirements from home production (OKM, “Olversorgung

Nuremberg document 984-PS). 157-73; G.D., C, 5, No. 260; D.D.F., 2d, 2, 74. Carroll, pp. 125-27; Meinck, Hitler und die deutsche Aufriistung, pp.

RM 418, 12 May 1936, T-120, 2383/4619/E No. 130; von Neurath’s memoranda RM 384, May 1936, and

198300—301, 304—5. 75. Petzina, pp. 46-47.

274

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II The internal feuds of the summer of 1936 were, in one way, nothing unusual in the

National Socialist system; rather, they were typical of the government of the Third Reich. If they provoked a redefinition of policy in explicit terms by Hitler himself, it was because they touched on the basic direction of the German economy—a subject that interested him greatly—trather than the usual bureaucratic squabbling that he tolerated or perhaps even enjoyed as a means of keeping full control of basic policy while others worried and argued about the details.”° Schacht had not given up hope; his trip to Southeast Europe in the summer of 1936 may be seen as an effort on his part to show that the maintenance and extension of his trade policy could best serve the interests of the Reich, while his attempts to secure colonial concessions from the Western powers pointed to what he considered a reasonable way to obtain access to raw materials (as an unconscious alternative to Hitler’s view of East European conquests). The new organization Goring was setting up was having its troubles, and Germany’s foreign-exchange situation was at its most difficult in the days just before the opening of the Olympics on 1 August. The crisis is reflected by a circular sent to all German missions abroad by the Foreign Ministry on 30 July.””7 On the same day, at a conference in Go6ring’s office, there was a discussion of the raw materials and foreign-exchange situation, the forthcoming annual Nuremberg party rally, and Goring’s plan to discuss both subjects with Hitler, primarily to urge Hitler as well as Goring to speak on economic problems at the rally.” During August the crisis came to a head: Hitler and Goring discussed the subject at least once and probably more often than that.’”? On one of these occasions, on or before 26 August,

Hitler handed Goring a memorandum embodying his views on the situation and containing his policy directives. Years later, on the night of 13-14 October 1941, Hitler referred to having written memoranda on only a few questions of vital importance such as the Four-Year Plan.®° When several years after that occasion he gave a copy of the Four-Year Plan memorandum to Albert Speer, then Minister of Armaments and War Production, he still thought of it as evidence of the lack of understanding of Schacht and the opposition of the Getman business community to his own far-sighted plans. The text of the memorandum shows Hitler’s memory accurate in this regard; it also shows his negative reaction to a memorandum on the proper way to deal with the economic crisis written by Carl Goerdeler, former price commissar and later leader of the opposition to Hitler.81 The proposals of others that Germany restrict the further expansion of its armaments to fit its means provide a part of the background against which Hitler reasserted his views and his plans. The memorandum was prepared by Hitler in Berchtesgaden right after the Olympic games. During those August days, he received Horthy, von Blomberg, and von Neurath

76. The most detailed survey of this crisis is in Arthur Schweitzer, “Foreign Exchange Crisis of 1936,” Zeitschrift Jur die gesamte Staatswissenschaft, 118, No. 2 (April 1962), 243-77. 77. G.D., C, 5, No. 485. 78. “Aktenvermerk tiber Besprechung beim Herrn Generaloberst am 30.7.36,” Nuremberg document 3890-PS

(National Archives). 79. It should be noted that Géring requested a memorandum on the foreign exchange and raw materials question from former Price Commissar Goerdeler on 7 August, enclosing with his request memoranda by Thomas and State Secretary Trendelenburg of the Ministry of Economics (Gerhard Ritter, Carl Goerdeler und die deutsche Widerstandsbewegung [Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1955], p. 76). 80. Trevor-Roper, Hitler's Table Talk, p. 57; Wilhelm Treue (ed.), “Hitlers Denkschrift zum Vierjahresplan

1936,” Viertehabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 3, No. 2 (April 1955), 184, n. 2. An English text of the memorandum is in

G.D., C, 5, No. 490, with a memorandum by Speer of 22 August 1945, concerning Hitler’s giving him the original memorandum in 1944, On Hitler’s memorandum see also Carroll, p- 95, n. 8; Petzina, p. 49.

81. The author shares the doubts of Treue (p. 192, n. 16) that Hitler directed his polemics as strongly and personally against Goerdelet as Ritter supposed.

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27

as well as Goring. It was at this time, on 24 August, that he signed the law extending the term of compulsory military service from one to two years; in Mein Kampf he had referred to such a term as the absolute minimum for turning out really trained soldiers.®2 In his memorandum, he referred to making the German army the first in the world in the shortest possible time—the days when for propaganda purposes he talked about Germany’s Gieichberechtigung (equality of rights) were long since past. How was this army to be used and how could the German economy equip and sustain it? With attacks on the doubters and the skeptics, he set forth the same doctrines to be found in Mein Kampf and in his second book in terms attuned to the situation of the moment. The armed forces of Getmany were to be made stronger, they were to be ready for war within four years, and they were to be used for a war in which Germany would solve its long-term needs for food and raw materials by territorial expansion. This irreversible goal dictated the means to be taken in the interim to take care of the short-term deficiencies. If foreign exchange was in short supply, whatever there was must be used for the importation of raw materials needed for armaments. Furthermore, the raw materials should be used immediately for war production, not stockpiled for some future contingency.*° There was no point to major efforts to expand exports to areas Germany could not control politically. Under no circumstances could the armaments program be restricted to make foreign exchange available for foodstuffs or other imports not related to the armaments program. The way to conserve foreign exchange even within the armaments category was the same as the way to protect Germany against the effects of blockade once it was ready to attack: by rapid development of the synthetic industry, first in regard to petroleum products, second with synthetic rubber, and finally with any other materials that could be synthesized inside the Third Reich. No financial considerations of competitive prices were to be allowed to play a role in decisions of this sort—the dominating consideration would be that something could be produced at home, not that it might be purchased more cheaply abroad. This same standard was to be applied to such taw materials as iron and steel, in which the exploitation of low-grade domestic ores

would require enormous capital investment and result in products of very high cost—but domestic high-cost products that would be financed by the state if private industry should prove recalcitrant. The basic thrust of this policy was clear, and it is hardly surprising that its implementation should have been turned over to Géring, a man with political and military interests, rather than Schacht or Thomas with their fiscal and technical preoccupations.” Hitler wanted a domestic economy geared to a series of wars of short, hard blows during which any threatened blockade would not prevent Germany’s military forces, with overwhelming first-line strength but few or no reserves, from crushing its enemies. The Foutr-

Year Plan would make this possible by increasing domestic production of synthetics and products from low-grade ores. This would simultaneously conserve the limited foreign exchange available to Germany to be used for those imports that were essential to the atmaments industry and simply could not be produced at home, while it would also the reduce Germany’s vulnerability to blockade when war came. When presented to decree his rally, German people in Hitler’s proclamation and speeches at the Nuremberg on the Four-Year Plan of 18 October, and Goring’s speech of 28 October, the whole this step see D.D.F, 2d, 3, Nos. 192, 198, 82. Mein Kampf, 2:604—05. For contemporary French perceptions of

s letter to Mussert of 20 August 200. For another report on Hitlet’s views at this time see Rost van Tonningen’ in his Correspondentie, 1:321—22.

1936, to fight with the weapon types then 83. This point is of some importance since it suggests that Hitler expected ! already in production or about to go into production. Géring’s lengthy exposé of his policy to in dum memoran Hitler’s to references the by confirmed is 84. This 36:554, 563. Schacht of 22 August 1937, Nuremberg document 493-EC, TMWC,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

project was wtapped up in the anti-Bolshevik propaganda that Hitler was simultaneously recommending to Count Ciano as the screen behind which Germany and Italy would unite against England. The real nature of both Hitler’s aims in war and his intended use of the coming victory was revealed in his speech of 12 September, in which he visualized a Russia freed of bolshevism, no longer ruled by Russians but rather exploited by Germans. In this perspective, the relationship of an uneconomic forcing of the German economy in the Four-Year Plan can be seen as integrally related to a policy of ruthless exploitation of future conquests made possible by that plan’s execution.® The one aspect of the Four-Year Plan that remains to be discussed is the reference to time limits—four years in both the title of the plan and the text of the memorandum and eighteen months for self-sufficiency in gasoline that also appears in the text. What did these time limits mean? The beginning of the new time span is provided by Hitlet’s initial request in 1933: “give me four years and you will not recognize Germany”; a request to which National Socialist propaganda made repeated reference during the mid1930s as the rearmament boom brought the appearance of prosperity to the country, and which Allied soldiers derisively chalked on the ruins left standing in 1945. After 1933, Hitler made several references to the time limits of a second period at the end of which he would be ready for war. On 24 September 1935, after the party rally of that year at which he had already referred to the need for building up the synthetics industry, Hitler told the leaders of the party that he needed about four years until he would be ready to make war.8° On 24 October 1936, he told Ciano that Germany would be ready for war in three years but would prefer to have four or five years for preparation. When these and other time estimates are examined, they might be shown to be inconsistent, unrealistic, and therefore insignificant or at least evidence for a lack of

planning. The more reasonable deduction to make would be that Hitler was determined to launch the first of a series of wars in a few years but was not going to tie himself down to precise dates and enemies until the last minute. This combination of long-range planning with opportunism in detail, of a fanatically held goal with a flexibility of means, fits with all his other activities and all the available evidence. It was certainly in these terms that Géring, the confidant entrusted with the implementation of Hitler’s schemes, understood the commission given him. When he read Hitler’s memorandum to a council of ministers on 4 September 1936, Goring explained that Goerdeler’s proposal as well as any other proposals to limit the armaments program had to be rejected. On the contrary, the arms program had to be accelerated. In this circle, which included Schacht, there was

still a little of the camouflage to be found in the memorandum and speeches: the inevitable war is specified as being against Russia and the current situation is referred to in the terminology applied before World War I to the days immediately preceding the formal orders for mobilization (drobende Kriegsgefahr).87 When Goring discussed such matters in the more intimate circle of his air force generals on 2 December

1936, he

could be more explicit. “We are already at war; only the shooting has not yet started.”8 85. This point is explained in considerable detail in Bracher, Nationalsozialistische Machtergreifung, pp. 752-56 (Petzina’s critique of this interpretation [p. 194] is totally mistaken as it attributes to Sauer, the author of this part of the book, the belief that the Four-Year Plan involved total mobilization of the economy, something

Sauer does not claim). The speech of Gauleiter Forster in Danzig on 20 October 1936, cited in the preceding chapter, reflects Hitler’s comments to him at this time (see especially Emessen, p. 125). 86. See Losenet’s report in VierteHahrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichte, 9, No. 3 (July 1961), 281. (The date of 29 September

is in error; see Domarus, I: 542, and Sekretar des Fiihrets, “Daten aus alten Notizbiichern,” p. 8.)

87. Text of the minutes by Lob as 416-EC in TMWC, 26:488-91. The significance of GGring’s use of the term “drohende Kriegsgefaht” has been overlooked by other commentators; it was widely known at the time because of its role in the extensive debate about the circumstances surrounding the outbreak of World War I. 88. Memorandum

by Bodenschatz,

2 December

1936, 3474-PS, TMWC,

32:335 (The German

reads; “Wir

befinden uns bereits im Kriege. Nur wird noch nicht geschossen”). The same document records G6ring’s

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2a

The years after 1936 would be devoted to building up Germany’s military might until it was ready to start shooting.®° Combined planning of the German army, navy, and air force for the moment when Germany was at the point of launching hostilities had been inaugurated before 1936 but really developed in that year for the first time. The army continued its concentration on Czechoslovakia. The navy argued for its previously developed plan for a war in the Atlantic Ocean from bases on both sides of the Atlantic to be secured by negotiations— with Franco—or to be seized from France in the Western Hemisphere and from Norway to prevent any blockade of Germany.” Goring’s phraseology on 2 December should be read in connection with his proposal of 23 November that Germany could win only if it began hostilities by a surprise attack on the enemy’s ait force and its bases.”! But the time for executing any such plans was not yet at hand, and Hitler would delay his choice in the interim. The most important issue as he saw it was the acceleration of Germany’s armament program, and he believed that the directives and powers he had given to Goring with the Four-Year Plan would assure that program’s completion. While the Four-Year Plan prepared the basis for the wars Hitler intended to wage, there would be, as he assured the world on 30 January 1937, no more surprises.”

ene ee rapid building of more ordered had Raeder November 11 on n; insistence on a speed-up in airplane productio WG, 35:529-30). i recognized by Four-Year se as pointing to a war launched by Germany was ages

Le

eo

ee

in D.D.F., 2d, 3, No. 417, esp. p. 648. Francois-Poncet at the time; see his report of 28 October 1936, 45-57, 156. pp. Gemzell, in is 90, The best account of these plans at present

91. Ibid., p. 175. 92. Domarus, 1:668.

Chapter 14

Conclusion

2 a few years the whole European and world situation had changed. At the beginning of the 1930s, world attention had been focused on the Great Depression and the settlement of problems still remaining from what was generally called the Great War or the World War. In spite of the aggression of Japan against China in the fall of 1931, nothing was further from most minds than the possibility of another worldwide conflict of the great powers, partly because in the thinking of most such a conflict could only be perceived in terms of the immense casualties and costs of the last war. By the end of 1936, it still appeared unbelievable and inconceivable to most people that anyone or any group could want to bring about such a conflict, but the possibility of its taking place now loomed as a distinct reality. That possibility was associated in the thinking of most with the growing might of Hitler’s Germany. The interaction of three factors may be seen as responsible for this revolutionary change in the international situatiort. In the first place, the peace settlement at the end of the war had left a Europe that was in reality quite different from what many imagined. It was widely believed that Germany had been disproportionately weakened by the peace settlement, with its former enemies left in control of the continent. The reality was otherwise. Having accepted the principle of nationality as the basis for the organization of Europe, the victors of 1918 necessarily created a Europe—insofar as their influence teached—in which the Germans were the most numerous people after the Russians and in which by virtue of its skills and resources Germany remained potentially a most powerful country. The prior defeat of Russia had both removed the danger against which Otto von Bismarck had tried to protect Germany by an alliance with Austria~-Hungary— the dismemberment of Austria-Hungary by an all-powerful Russia—and had simultaneously helped open the way for the appearance of a large number of new or newly enlarged states in East and Southeast Europe that, whatever the rights and wrongs of their respective external boundaries and internal institutions, were all certain to be far weaker

than Germany. In recognition of these facts, the Treaty of Versailles. had placed a number of restrictions on Germany, but these restrictions neither altered the basic realities nor eliminated the drastic weakening that Germany’s enemies had suffered in four years of bitter war.! Self-deception and propaganda had obscured these facts from the eyes of many; but once the last of the major restrictions on German power had been eliminated with the remilitarization of the Rhineland, the hard realities returned the illusions of prior 1. The author discussed this matter at greater length in a paper read at the 1968 meeting of the American Historical Association, “After 50 Years, the Defeat of Germany and the European Balance,” published in Central European History, 2, No. 3 (Sept. 1969), 248-60.

Conclusion

279

years to the shadowy dream-world whence they had sprung, though some still failed to perceive this. Germany had emerged from the World War re/atively at least as powerful if not more powerful than when it entered that conflict, with its erstwhile enemies relatively weaker than in 1914 and in any case divided among themselves. The historical importance of Adolf Hitler lies precisely in the fact that a country of such potential might took him as its leader and gave him its support. This was no case of a skillful prince leading a small state to new heights or laying the foundation for some successor’s mighty adventures. Rather it was the assumption of authority in one great power that already had the potential for vastly greater power by a man determined to consolidate and increase the strength already there for great adventures that would enable him to dominate the globe. The nature and practical implementation of that ambition, insofar as they relate to

foreign policy, have been the subject of this book. The second factor in the reversal of the world situation in the 1930s, then, is the policy of Adolf Hitler, and I have tried to

show how the traditional separation of foreign from domestic policy cannot be applied. From the military indoctrination of youth to the creation of a vast synthetic oil industry, from arithmetic examples that show how much mental defectives cost society—with the implication that therefore they should be killed—to the preparation of shipyards for the building of super-battleships to challenge England’s supremacy on the seas, all aspects of the Third Reich must be seen as an integral whole. The emphasis here has been on the development of Germany’s position in Europe because it was in that development that the path to the future was delineated most clearly. And Hitler trod that path with a combination of caution and bravado, of opportun-

ism and consistency, that leaves the observer torn between wonder and fear. Some outside observers thought he might founder in the conflicting currents of German politics ot succumb to the economic problems of an unorthodox fiscal system, while some inside Germany hoped that they could contain or restrain his wilder plans; but all such speculations proved false. In the first year and a half of his rule, Hitler ruthlessly gathered power into his own hands while at the same time beginning the military preparations for the wats he planned to wage, thereby binding to himself the military leaders of Germany who were the only possible challengers to his control of the country. In this initial period, the danger of foreign reaction to his enterprises was still such as to deter him

from excessive risks, but even as he exercised caution he also moved boldly in some fields. The concordat with the Vatican and the new relationship with Poland both repre-

sented shrewd applications of his principle of trying for bilateral agreements for immediately useful objectives, agreements that could and would be broken as soon as it suited him. The departure from the League of Nations and the disarmament conference at the earliest possible moment pointed to the consistency of his long-term objectives. And he would never risk compromising those objectives by entering any new multilateral agreements, whether asked by other powers or urged by his own associates. At times Hitler could do; would let others go ahead on some more risky venture and see how well they to underlings his allowed he occasions several on Danzig in both in Austria in 1934 and pull would he great, too be to out turned risks the if or failed they When test the ground. he could always back temporarily and try another approach. Having seized the initiative, while. a for back produce a relaxation of international tension by simply holding ent that governm of style personal a ed Unwilling to submit to routine, Hitler develop r and Whateve nts. instrume and means its in flexible was cleat in its ends but entirely Foreign the of ats bureaucr The him. with fine was goods whoever could deliver the he despised them; the most Ministry whom he had inherited could work for him though his hand at foreign policy if unlikely adventurer could get a hearing and a chance to tty

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

his scheme appeared plausible. His own associates could feud with each other and build up rival organizations as long as each would follow theit leader’s commands on such topics and at such times as he chose to issue them. Sometimes orders were not issued at all, or not for a long time. The multiple confusions in German policy toward East Asia in

the early years of National Socialist rule can be explained in large part by the fact that Hitler had as yet no clear idea of what he wanted in regard to that distant area and that under such circumstances every German agency and ministry could have its own policy or even several. But such drifting was carefully circumscribed: when a question needed prompt action, like Franco’s request for help in July 1936, then Hitler made his decision; and any agency that did not want to carry out his plan soon found that another agency had been assigned the implementation of that particular policy. What counted most in Hitler’s eyes was the rearmament of Germany which would enable it to move forward by threat or by force. He would accept no external limits on the expansion of Germany’s forces, and he would launch the Four-Year Plan when the strictures of Germany’s economy threatened to impose internal limits. Shrewdly taking advantage of the love of peace and fear of war in other countries in those years when war would have been most dangerous for Germany, he built up Germany’s strength to the point where others could no longer contemplate war as an answer to German aggression except as a most dangerous undertaking. And there could be no doubt of the popularity of this policy inside Germany. The plebiscites held in 1933, 1934, and 1936 cannot be taken as an accurate gauge of public opinion, but all German and foreign observers agreed as to Hitler’s popularity within the country, a popularity that would in turn enable him to demand greater exertions from the people in the future. The development of German might and a generally united German population under Hitler’s leadership has to be seen against a third element, the weak and disunited

powers threatened by Germany. The new nations created out of the wreckage of the Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires were all too small and too weak, either alone or

together, to play a really significant role in restraining German ambitions. Poland could take temporary advantage of its powerful neighbors in the years of their travail; but once Germany and Russia had recovered even a part of their strength, either the enmity or the

friendship of those great powers could be fatal to Poland. Czechoslovakia had secured defensible boundaries at the peace conference and the comparative stability of its democratic institutions could put some strength behind them, but even then it could not be expected to stand up to Germany alone. Any serious danger to the European order could be held off only by the great powers. Of these, Italy had been so torn by the war that its fragile institutions had crumbled before the blaring trumpets of Mussolini’s Blackshitts, and he was more interested in upsetting than maintaining the status quo. There may have been a teal possibility of rallying Italy to an anti-German coalition, because its fear of an Aanschluss and its desire for influence in the Balkans collided with Hitlet’s policies, but whatever the chance for such a development, Britain and France had ruined it forever by

wavering between firmness and complaisance toward the Ethiopian conflict. Every concession made to Mussolini after that fiasco only confirmed his assessment of the weakness of the Western democtacies and increased his admiration for the way Hitler took advantage of it—along with a desire to do likewise. The Soviet Union had been slow to recognize the danger of national socialism and, once it realized the threat, wavered between attempts to rally all other possible enemies of Germany to its side and efforts to make a direct arrangement with Hitler himself. Neither policy could be implemented with success in the years reviewed here; Hitler was not yet interested in an alliance with the Soviet Union, and many of the potential allies of Russia were as fearful of it as they were of Germany. Weakened domestically by the

Conclusion

281

upheavals accompanying the second Five-Year Plan and the beginning of the great purge, weakened externally by threats from Japan in the Far East and poor relations with most countries that might be aligned against Germany, the government in Moscow could

only view with alarm a rising menace in Central Europe that had declared the seizure of vast parts of Russia to be its avowed objective. The United States had compounded its isolationist proclivities with a singleminded preoccupation with the Depression, regrets over its entrance into the last war, and a determination to stay out of the next one. The economic part of the new administration’s foreign policy, the reciprocal trade agreements program, found considerable support among the American public; but the moment the administration gingerly tried steps on the political road, the reaction was very different, as shown by the defeat of the effort to have the United States join the World Court. The American public was certainly disenchanted with Germany and becoming alarmed by developments in Europe, and the American government was perhaps better informed than any other; but neither the anguish of American newspaper readers nor the papers gathering dust in the State Department and White House files could affect the situation in Europe. On the contrary, the absence of any active American role and the general expectation that that absence would continue could only encourage German adventures and discourage any thoughts of resistance. Great Britain and France had gone their own ways after the great wat had seen them fighting alongside each other for over four years. The British thought themselves secure after exertions so great and so costly that it seemed unbelievable that they had actually made them and inconceivable that they could ever make them again. Having become certain that neither they nor anyone else had really wanted the last war, they were all the more certain that no one could possibly want another. With such perspectives, differences and difficulties among nations were by their very nature calls for negotiations in which the British expected to contribute their part, assuming that others would do like-

wise. When the French refused to follow this prescription in the disarmament negotiations, the British would go ahead and do it on their own in the Anglo-German naval

agreement, only to find that with the government of National Socialist Germany this approach did not work. But thereafter domestic concerns would distract British attention for some time; Wallis Simpson seemed much more interesting than Adolf Hitler. That left France as the sole watcher at the gate. But France was both internally divided and externally impotent. Existing internal divisions were exacerbated by the impact of the depression which came later in France than in most other countries and,

therefore, mote nearly coincided with the first years of Hitler’s rule in Germany. The great bitterness associated with these internal divisions broke into riots several times in the 1930s and confronted the changing governments in Paris with serious difficulties in governing the country at home, to say nothing of taking bold steps in foreign affairs.? war, Whatever the wisdom of French policy toward Germany in the years right after the The present. longer no were policy firm a for by the 1930s the energy and decisiveness has action military of risks smallest the even take to evidence of French unwillingness at plan no was there that said be may it summary, of way By points. several been cited at smaller the and France all to maintain the most important guarantee for the safety of in the Rhineland. Furcountries of East and Southeast Europe, the demilitarized zone

Germany was of an thermore, French contingency planning for any aggressive move by into a shell was withdrawing toward proclivity this essentially defensive nature, and letter of Jesse Strauss (U.S. ambassadot Paris) to 2. A doleful report on French conditions may be found in the France: Jesse Strauss; in FDR and Foreign Affairs, F. S. P. Park, (Hyde 1936 January 20 Franklin D. Roosevelt of Personal Letters, 2:555—56. FDR, in printed is 3:166-70). Roosevelt’s answer of 13 February

282

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

accentuated by the anticipation of the French that their unwillingness to do anything about the remilitarization of the Rhineland opened up the prospect that Germany would soon construct fortifications there. Although they did not yet know it, France’s Eastern allies had already been practically written off in 1936. The most they could hope for in the way of help from France was an expedition to Salonika on the pattern of the Allied effort in that theater in World War I? This fixation on the military strategy of the earlier conflict is of broader significance than its relevance to the peripheral operation at Salonika that the French general staff pondered in 1936 and would propose in a slightly different form in the winter of 1939— 40. It illuminates the nature of the French position in Europe. A victor in the war, it had won only in the company of allies who were now either distant or hostile in attitude towatd France. And for itself, victory had been so costly as to seem unrepeatable. But

even if repeatable, the strategy of victory had been essentially defensive; the Germans had been defeated by the successful crushing of theit offensive. The importance of this fact has generally been discussed from the German side; that is, for its implications as

support for the stab-in-the-back legend and for the inability of the German people to perceive and assimilate the reality of their defeat in the war. The ending of the war in the downfall of German hopes of entering Paris rather than an Allied march to Berlin, how-

ever, had implications for French attitudes as well. It seemed to suggest that defensive rather than offensive strategy would win out in modern war.* The defensive approach was confirmed for the French by another aspect of that defensive victory which symbolized for France its triumph in the war—Verdun. The calamitous casualties suffered in that battle, as well as the rest of the war of course,

paralyzed French military and diplomatic thinking. In a sense, the German strategist of that operation, Erich von Falkenhayn, had been proved correct in the belief that if you were once caught in a war of attrition, the way to win was to utilize acts of attrition more effectively than the other side. The change in German military leadership in the summer of 1916 meant that the evidence of the French mutinies in 1917 and the near-collapse of the French armies in the early summer of 1918 failed to make much of an impact on a German leadership that looked for victory in spectacular breakthroughs, but the reality of French enfeeblement was there all the same. It would weigh like lead on the French themselves, leading them to rash use of what strength they had in the 1920s and to abdication from a leading role in Europe in the 1930s. Hitler shrewdly recognized that the key question he faced was whether France would or would not move quickly. If it did not move quickly, its opportunity for easy victory would pass; and then he could pick the time to attack and defeat the French. Since his early years in power coincided with the years of French retreat from a vigorous policy, he could take advantage of the situation to accentuate and reinforce the French unwillingness to risk war. Until 1936, France could act alone if it wished to; thereafter it

would feel unable to move without allies. Hitler knew that a direct attack on France would bring it such allies, Great Britain if no other, but nothing suggested that other steps of his would bring about such a danger for Germany. It is not surprising that by May 1936 German diplomats wete confidently predicting that before long—after beginning the fortification of its western border—Germany would take over Austria and that no one would try to stop it.5 3. This summary is based on D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 23; 3, Nos. 9, 38, 67, 394. On this French military abdication in

Europe see also Lipski Papers, p. 275. 4. The arguments of some German generals with Hitler about strategy during the winter of 1939-40 as well as earlier suggest that not only French military thinking was affected by this line of reasoning. 5. So von Neurath to Bullitt on 18 May 1936 (U.S. 1936, 1:300-01; note von Neurath’s comment at the same time “that the German government knew just as well as the Russian that all talk of Russian military assistance

Conclusion

283

The pattern of German policy and foreign reaction was well established. Germany would move aggressively, accompany each move by new assurances and promises, and hope that others could be lulled into acquiescence. This process would continue—with Germany taking and keeping the initiative—until one of two contingencies occurred. The increasingly aggressive moves of Germany might eventually either so arouse the British and French as to lead them to resist or to help the desperate resistance of one of the victims.® The other possibility was that Britain and France might acquiesce in every move of Germany until Hitler was ready to attack them at a time or times of his own choosing. There was, of course, always the theoretical possibility that the Germans them-

selves might get rid of him, but in 1936 nothing looked less likely. In the face of this situation, fear of war seemed not only sure to lead to war but even to make it more devastating when it finally did come. But lives lost in a preventive wat ate lost as surely as those lost in a war started by others; and without the most obvious and dire dangers, democracies will never find preventive war a readily trod path. To open the gates of Janus because someone else is certain to do so later looked like an unconscionable risk. Perhaps things would somehow change; perhaps the dictator would die and his successors follow other policies. We now know that none of this happened,

but who could know it then—and

know it surely enough to gamble lives on that

knowledge? In 1938, as we now also know, Hitler was so worried about his health that he wrote his last will.’ On the other hand, we know, too, that in 1939 his fiftieth birthday

suggested to him that he ought to start a war soon while he was still in his prime. But who could make judgments on the basis of such facts, even had they been available elsewhere in the world of the 1930s? The answer is, of course, that those who aspire to

positions of national leadership must be prepared to make precisely such judgments and to stake their reputations and the lives of their people upon them. There are no policies without risks. But those who take the greater when they think they are taking the lesser tisk may still be accorded the charity of compassion for having listened in their hearts to the sentiment King George V voiced to his ministers, that having taken his people through one war he could not bear to lead them into another. That lead would have to come from elsewhere. And it did.

secretary of to Czechoslovakia at the present moment was nonsense” ibid., p. 303). Similarly Herbert Scholz, 1, No. 97). legation at the German embassy in Washington, on about the same date (Hungarian Documents, of 25 March 1936 6. For analyses along these lines see Fran¢ois-Poncet’s report on the German situation 1936, 1:308-09). See (D.D.F., 2d, 1, No. 503) and Alexis Léget’s comments to Bullitt on 21 May 1936 (U.S. also Vansittart’s memorandum on Office A 9996/9996/51. Foreion

“The World

Situation

and British Rearmament,”

16 December

1936,

Journal ofModern History, 27, No. ihe ser Gein L. Weinberg (ed.), “Hitler’s Private Testament of May 2, 1938,” 4 (Dec. 1955), 415-16.

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Chapter 15

The Position of Germany in 1937

y the beginning of 1937 Germany was unquestionably the most powerful country in Kurope. Although there were great gaps in her rearmament program, the head start

she enjoyed over other powers provided not merely statistically measurable advantages in terms of divisions and airplanes; but, more important, it gave her an aura of strength and

confidence in an apprehensive world.! The armaments boom had created full employment in Germany while others still struggled with the great depression; the Olympic games of 1936 had shown to large numbers of foreign visitors a united and determined country; and the confidence exuded by Germany’s leaders contrasted markedly with the doubts and hesitations of others. There was a self-reinforcing aspect to this situation. Success easily breeds confidence in those who attain it while discouraging both internal and external opponents. And the psychological dominance of Germany was all-pervasive. The new status of Germany was not some recondite development hidden from the eyes of all but the most observant. Quite the contrary, the world’s news agencies sent their best international reporters to Germany, and the world press, radio, and newsreels were filled with impressive, even

frightening, reports about the Third Reich. Any who had doubts could read or hear about the role of German planes in the Spanish Civil War, and even those in other countties who were opposed to the National Socialist regime necessarily pointed to German sttength as a key argument to underline their warnings about the future or their insistence on such measures as rearmament in the present. The trading practices of the Third Reich impinged on those in the business world;

her literary and artistic censorship was a subject for discussion by writers and artists. The religious persecutions in Germany had wide repercussions abroad, what was known or imagined about Germany’s contacts with people of German background in other countries as close.as Czechoslovakia and as fat away as Chile excited apprehension everywhere. In short, Germany was news. In the eyes of all inside and outside Germany, the figure of Adolf Hitler stood out as come the embodiment of the Third Reich. A strange and ominous man, he had jokes and caricatures were there while and power; seemingly from nowhere to incredible of sense underlying an thinly but covered merriment that about this curious petson, the Royal Air Force is the memorandum of 18 November 1936 comparing the German with

1. An example 18, FO 371/19947. See also prepared in the Central Department of the Foreign Office, C 8249/2928/ in and Possible Rate of Expansion Committee of Imperial Defence, “The German Army: Its Present Strength (New York: C 1134/136/18, FO 371/20731; Ian Colvin, None So Blind

Peace and War,” 13 January 1937, Harcourt, Brace & World, 1965), pp. 133-35.

288

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

admiration or apprehension, of fear or hate. Mad or sane, brilliant or confused, in full

conttol or buffeted by conflicting advice, he was seen as without doubt the key figure, center stage in an extraordinary drama. No review of the specific details of Germany’s position on the international scene of 1937 and no examination of the interaction between Germany and other powers leading to the outbreak of the Second World War can ever be complete unless those details and that interaction are seen within a framework of a world whose eyes and ears wete focused on Germany and its leader. Within Germany itself, the National Socialist regime was firmly in control. The other political parties had disappeared, independent political and other organizations wete practically nonexistent, and a system of mass propaganda and indoctrination was reinforced by censorship and secret police. The originally narrow margin of popular support for the coalition that had placed Hitler in the chancellorship in 1933 had by 1937 swollen to an overwhelming majority. If jokesters referred to the theft of next year’s election returns, all observers testified to the mass support enjoyed by the regime. The few doubters were silent, and if they. complained, did so about specific aspects of the regime rather than the whole system. The only possible internal challenger of the National Socialist movement was Germany’s army, the air force being largely a creation of the new regime and the navy a small and peripheral structure. The army, in the process of rapid expansion, found the

new regime far more congenial than its predecessor and contained few critics of the Hitler government. The circumstances surrounding the removal of the army’s commander-in-chief early in 1938 followed by the pursuit of what looked like increasingly dangerous foreign policies opened a few eyes, but before that development, real enthusiasm, cautious professionalism, or determined blindness reigned supreme. The natrow perspectives of the German military leadership may be illustrated by an aspect of the murders of 30 June 1934. Included among the victims of the mass slaughter for which Hitler took personal responsibility were not only two generals but the wife of one of them, a woman who had been the wife of Germany’s minister of defense and chancellor and who had never been accused of any allegedly illegal action whatever. This murder was not considered an affront to the army; but in 1938 the marriage of Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg—who had been implicated in the slaughter operation—to a woman with a “past” was considered incompatible with the army’s “honor.”? Officers who began by turning their “non-Aryan” comrades out of the army in 1934 would end up by turning their politically compromised comrades over to the hangman ten years later. By 1937, the first of these processes had been completed, but there were not yet any candidates for the second. The domestic consolidation of National Socialist Germany was not only the background for the aura of power just described, it had been and continued to be the prerequisite for the expansionist policy Hitler preached before and after 1933.3 He had seen and continued to see it as necessary for the foreign policies in which he believed, and these apparently domestic concerns, therefore, must be recognized as a part of German foreign policy. Because the National Socialist revolution came to Germany in stages after Hitler came to power, the process of consolidation continued in the very years when its earliest stages first enabled Hitler to mount aggression against his neighbors; that process would in fact continue into the last days of the Third Reich. The steps taken to strengthen National Socialist control and penetration of Germany’s life and institutions 2. It is worth noting that even the brilliant book by Klaus-Jiirgen Miiller, Das Heer und Hitler: Armee und nationalsoxialistisches Regime 1933-1940 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1969) fails to make this comparison. 3. The most recent comprehensive treatment of the subject puts the issue beyond question; Norman Rich, Hitler's War Aims: Ideology, the Nazi State, and the Course ofExpansion (New York: Norton, 1973).

The Position of Germany in 1937

289

must accordingly be recognized as the internal aspect of German foreign policy in the years immediately preceding the beginning of war in September 1939. Germany’s international position was specifically influenced by actions she herself had taken as well as by the policies of other powers.‘ She had left the League of Nations, but most of the disadvantages that step might have had for Germany in the long run had been obviated by the failure of Britain and France to give to the League the kind of success in the face of Italy’s attack against Ethiopia that might alone have revived an institution already badly damaged by Japan’s earlier flaunting of the rules and departure from the halls of Geneva.> The halfhearted sanctions imposed on Italy had not merely failed to strengthen the League, but had torn the ties of France and England to Italy and had helped to push the latter to Germany’s side; the real effect of sanctions had been to provide Germany with a form of political absolution from Rome for the National Socialist coup in Austria of 1934 and its attendant murder of Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss. By the end of 1936 the joint intervention of Italy and Germany in the Spanish Civil War had given them a common cause—in spite of a certain rivalry there—and in any case prevented any real rapprochement between Italy and England regardless of endless negotiations and periodic agreements between them. While German policy in Spain will be discussed in more detail in a later chapter, it should be noted here that Hitler’s decision of December 1936 not to increase German support of Francisco Franco—at the time when Benito Mussolini decided on a very substantial increase in the Italian troop commitment to Spain’—practically guaranteed that the civil war would last a long time and thereby help assure that the German-Italian association cemented by their joint venture in the Iberian peninsula would not be easily broken. The smaller European countries were afraid of Germany. Each hoped that by adroit maneuvering, preferably at somebody else’s expense, it could avoid a dangerous confrontation with Berlin. Such states of intermediate strength like Poland and Yugoslavia did their best to get and remain on good terms with the German colossus. The major European powers other than Italy were uncertain about their relationship with the new Germany. The Soviet Union was alarmed at Germany’s increasing might, and though she had no common border with that country, feared that at some point Germany might well attack het to seize some portion of Soviet territory. Once the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin, had recognized this danger, he alternated between trying to come to an agreement with Germany and abetting the formation of some anti-German alliance; but neither policy had attained much success. Hitler as yet felt no need for an agreement with Russia, and the prospective allies of the latter were about as suspicious of her as they were of Germany. The government of France was confronted by both domestic discord and foreign danger. The two forms of trouble reinforced each other. The internal quarrels of the Third Republic were accentuated by differences of opinion over foreign affairs, especially the policies to be followed toward the Spanish Civil War, the Soviet Union, the con-

tinuing aggravation with Italy, and the growing threat of Germany. The domestic turmoil in France, moreover, encouraged both Germany and Italy in the assumption that they

No. 233. 4. A good summary is in André Frangois-Poncet’s report on the year 1936, D.D.F., 2d, 4,

rs

crisis with 5. The British government has begun publication of its diplomatic documents on the Ethiopian is a fine study of the volume 14 of the second series of the Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939. There The Limits of Foreign Policy: crisis over Japan’s challenge to the League over Manchuria in Christopher Thorne, en Sons, 1973). Putnam’s P. G. York: (New 1931-1933 of Crisis Eastern Far the and League the The West, (Tiibingen: 1933-1936 Berlin—Rom Achse der Entstehung Die ini: Hitler-Mussol Petersen, 6. A useful survey in Jens Niemeyer, 1973). 7. See above pp. 230ff.

290

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

had little to fear from France,’ while the allies of France on the continent could not expect much help from a country quite likely to be without a government at just the

moment when decisive action would be needed. This concern extended to the British government. Though doubtful, as will be seen,

about the ability of the French army to bring effective assistance to any part of Central or Eastern Europe, the British were still confident that the French army would be a match for the German if Germany attacked in the West. They were, however, justifiably alarmed about the weak state and inadequate expansion of the French air force. The evidence suggests that the French government was partly unaware and partly unconcerned about the problem in 1937—there would be a rude awakening in the crisis over Czechoslovakia—but the constant prodding from London reflects the anxiety felt there over French weakness in a critical area, a weakness inadvertently accentuated by the measures the French government had taken in 1936 to nationalize parts of the French aircraft industry and to reduce the work week.? It is indicative both of the problems faced by the British and French in developing an effective policy in the face of a rising German threat and of the extent to which this threat eventually pushed the two powers together into a firm alliance that the London government was at first reluctant to raise this question in Paris for fear of then having to agree to joint Anglo-French staff talks.!° Two considerations were at work here, both growing out of World War I. The British military and political leaders were very wortied—and rightly so—lest the French then urge them to build up a large land army of the kind the British had developed in what was generally referred to as the “Great Wat.” In the psychological atmosphere of 1936-37, such an idea was inconceivable to the English public and government alike. If there was one subject on which unanimity could be found in the United Kingdom, this was it. There might be differences over the wisdom of General Douglas Haig’s conduct of the 1917 battle in Flanders; there were none over the conviction that Britain could never go to Passchendaele again.'! The second factor holding back London from staff conversations was the great debate about responsibility for the outbreak of the World War. Britain’s real or imagined share of that responsibility was generally tied to two aspects of British policy: the prewar staff conversations held by English military and naval officers with their French, and to a lesser extent Belgian, counterparts, and the fact that England had not made her own prospective position sufficiently clear to Germany to deter the latter from the gamble of war. Though more recent scholarship has largely eliminated the former and entirely removed the latter as factors in the outbreak of the war, both were very much in people’s minds during the 1930s. The view that a clear British stand might have obviated war will be seen as repeatedly held up, first as an incentive to British firmness and later as an-element of what it was hoped would be an effective warning to Germany once London had decided to take its stand; but the concern lest staff conversations involve Britain in war 8. For French recognition of this aspect in the formulation of German foreign policy, see Bullitt (Paris) tel. 184 of 10 February

1937, U.S. National

Archives, State Department

Decimal

File (hereafter cited as State),

862.014/203. 9. For some

of the relevant documents,

see C 3571, C 4601, C 5215, C6808/122/17,

FO

371/20694;

C

5604/185/18, FO 371/20734; R 6741/1/22, FO 371/21162; D.D.F., 2d, 2, Nos. 308, 357, 419. For a French

report on the German ait force, see ibid., 4, No. 292. The French, prodded by the British, began to look at the

question mote seriously, especially when they concluded that Italy, to say nothing of Germany, was producing mote modern warplanes than France (ibid., 7, Nos. 198, 213, 271). On the general problem, see Jacques Minart, Le drame du désarmement francais (Paris: La Nef, 1959). 10. The subject is reviewed in detail in the papers included in the volume Les relations franco-brittaniques de 1935 a 1939 (Paris: Editions du Centre de la Recherche Scientifique, 1975). 11. See, for example, the discussion between the British secretary of state for war, Leslie Hore-Belisha, and the

French military attaché on 10 February 1938 reported in D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 206.

The Position of Germany in 1937

291

or even arouse domestic fears of such involvement long held back the coordination of British and French military planning.!? With the Foreign Office taking the lead, and with the clearly growing menace of Germany providing the impetus, the United Kingdom moved from cool reluctance at the beginning of 1937 to an enthusiastic advocacy at the end of the year, with Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain himself taking the lead in urging on the French a coordination they had scarcely dared to hope for.!3 Not only the arguments over the origins but also consideration of the course and outcome of the war had their effects on the policies of England and France. The terrible cost of the war and the apparent triumph of defensive over offensive weapons had produced an essentially defensive approach to warfare in both countries, with the French reluctant to consider any offensive land strategy and the British looking to a new blockade as the tool of victory if war did come.'# Both countries thus pinned their hopes on strategies with two characteristics important for the international situation: neither could do anything effective to provide immediate assistance to any country that might be threatened by Germany, and both relied on a strategy geared to a long war. Both factors would operate to make them even more reluctant to take risks in the face of German moves, because any such move, if not directed against themselves, would require them to help a country which like Serbia in the previous conflict could be helped only by an allied victory in a long and costly war. This reluctance to risk war with Germany was reinforced by the continuing feeling, especially in some citcles in England, that the peace settlement at the end of the wat had

been unfairly harsh to Germany.!> Whether or not correct, this attitude obscured from the eyes of many that a defeated Germany had emerged from the settlement relatively stronger than in 1914 and that in these circumstances any further concessions, howevet justified, that strengthened Germany would necessarily lead to an even greater unbalancing of the European situation.'° The discrepancy between what many imagined had happened at Versailles to weaken Germany and the reality of a potentially enhanced German power position in Europe was so great that it took years of vehement shocks before the public in Great Britain, and to a lesser extent elsewhere, recognized that they

faced the real, not the imagined, power relationships left by the peace settlement. Outside Europe, the smaller countries were primarily affected by worry about German aims—especially if they contained citizens of German background—and by 12. Ibid., 9, No. 37.

C 13. This process—and the arguments—can be traced in C 6436, C 6790, C 7692, C 8237, C 8434, C 8468,

8473, C 8474, C 8683/122/17, FO 371/20694; C 7717/18/17, FO 371/20687; C 7848/822/17, 20696; C 1141, C 1142, C 1634, C 1759, C 6941, C 7843/271/18, FO 371/20738. The British were at the beginning of 1937 by the report of a Royal Air Force mission to Germany, C 1450/185/18, 20733; Earl of Avon (Anthony Eden), Facing the Dictators, 1923-1938 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, On 548, 556. Eden did feel that perhaps the situation was not quite as serious as often presented.

FO 371/ stimulated FO 371/ 1962), pp. 7 October

the relation of these 1937 he minuted on a report on the French air force: “I should like to add one word on the state of the repotts to policy. While it is no doubt true that there is much that is unsatisfactory about not to exaggerate their weakness, French Air Force and that of the French Navy, we should, I think, be careful

of the shortcomings of the while at the same time over-estimating the strength of the dictator States. We know whether, despite all their doubt myself I and us, from withheld are States democracies; those of the totalitarian least equal, and in the case of the imperfections, the French Air Force and the French Navy are not today at £.159). latter superior to the respective Italian forces” (C 6436/122/17, FO 371/20694, in the World Wat and the blockade the of role the about beliefs exaggerated somewhat of 14. The influence in the interwar years planning and thinking British on war future a in anticipated effects of its repetition Too Serious a Business: European Armed remains to be examined in detail. There is a beginning in Donald C. Watt, Press, 1975). Forces and the Approach to the Second World War (Berkeley: University of California Press, Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame 15. See essay 6 in Donald C. Watt, Personalities and Policies (Notte

1965), pp. 117-35.

the European Balance of Power,” 16. I have dealt with this in “The Defeat of Germany in 1918 and 248-60. 1969), (Sept. 3 No. 2, History, European

bs

Central

292

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

German trade practices. The possible doubts about the loyalty of a portion of their own citizens became

an issue of increasing significance, especially in a number

of Latin

American nations. The triumph of National Socialist elements in the cultural and other otganizations of these minorities, which was largely completed in 1937, seemed to point in alarming directions. Whatever the reality of the threat this process posed for the countries involved, the impressions created were damaging for both Germany and the people of German background abroad. The public posturing and secret agitation of organizations that came to look increasingly like local parts of a worldwide threat were a hindrance to good relations with Germany and to the domestic peace of the affected countries.!7 Germany’s trade practices had mixed effects on these nations. On the one hand, the German government was often willing to pay high prices for products otherwise difficult to sell in years when world trade was still in a depressed state.'* On the other hand, the requirement that each trading partner of Germany use the proceeds of sales to Germany only or almost only for purchases there created all sorts of difficulties. If the Germans ran up large clearing debts, as they frequently did, the other country could either make what were in effect forced loans to Germany or reduce those debts only by increasing its imports from Germany, taking whatever Germany was willing to export at whatever prices Germany might ask.!? This procedure, established at German insistence, reduced

the other country’s free foreign exchange available for purchases in third countries where it might have found lower prices as well as products it needed more than the German ones. The most disconcerting aspect of all this was that Germany at times re-exported what she had imported, so that a country might find itself underbid in the world market for its products by its own earlier shipments to Germany. An official in the British Foreign Office used a rough, but not unfair, example to

show how this system worked: Germany buys from Sweden, on clearing account, 1,000 tons of iron ore, out of which she makes 500 tons of iron. She buys from China, on barter terms, 10 tons of

wolfram, and from Turkey, on clearing terms, 20 tons of chromium ore. Out of these materials, for which she had not paid a pfenning in currency, she makes 500 tons of fine steel. With her own resources of secondary raw materials, fuel, power, labour and technical skill, she makes, let us say, 10 tanks, 2 turbines, and 100 typewriters.

17. The best accounts of this question are in Alton Frye, Nazi Germany and the American Hemisphere, 1933-1941 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), and Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Nationalsoxialistische Aussenpolitik 1933— 1938 (Frankfurt/M: Alfred Metzner, 1968), chaps. II, 3, and IV, 4. The direct role of the foreign section (AO)

of the National Socialist party in this process is described in Donald M. McKale, The Swastika Outside Germany (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1977). Documents for 1937 are to be published in G.D., C, 6, Nos.

137, 168, 184, 237. 18. Or when circumstances made foreign sales difficult. Thus when British firms boycotted Mexican oil in retaliation for Mexican nationalization of the oil industry, the German navy took the oil and used it for its operations in Spanish waters in 1937-38. See Germany, Oberkommando der Kriegsmarine, “Olversorgung der

Kriegsmarine,” 29 April 1941, pp. 6-8, Nuremberg document 984-PS, National Archives; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 154, 386; D, 5, No. 600, n. 4; cf. Josephus Daniels, Sdirt-Sveeve Diplomat (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North

Carolina Press, 1947), pp. 251-53; Wilhelm Meier-Dérnberg, Olversongung der Kriegsmarine, 1935 bis 1945 (Freiburg: Rombach, 1973), pp. 39-42. In this fashion, one of the Spanish republic’s best friends contributed substantially to its defeat. 19. A fine analysis of this process as it affected Latvia and Estonia is in Hans-Erich Volkmann, “Okonomie und Machtpolitik: Lettland und Estland im politisch-6konomischen Kalkiil des Dritten Reiches (1933-1940),” Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 2, No. 4 (1976), 484-86. The whole range of issues is ably summarized in the same

author’s piece “Aussenhandel und Aufristung in Deutschland, 1933 bis 1939,” in Friedrich Forstmeier and

Hans-Erich Volkmann

1975), pp. 81-131.

(eds.), Wirtschaft und Ruistung am Vorabend des Zweiten Weltkrieges (Diisseldorf: Droste,

The Position of Germany in 1937

295

The tanks are put into service, and (because she has nearly enough already) she releases four of last year’s models for export. Two go to China, two to Turkey; and they pay not only for the wolfram and the chromium, but for ten bales of cotton and 100 tons of soya beans. The turbines go to Sweden, and mote than balance the import of iron ore; while 99 of the typewriters are sold in the United Kingdom and bring in £200, which is spent on one of the relatively few raw materials which she cannot obtain through a clearing, such as copra. Thus the German army gets ten brand-new tanks in place of four obsolescent ones, and German industry gets ten bales of cotton, 100 tons of soya beans, one typewriter (times are hard, and thete is room for economy here) and £200 worth of copra—all without any loss of [foreign] exchange. True, she has to do without her Turkish delight and birds’ nest soup because Turkish cotton and Chinese wolfram ate more important to her; but she has added six tanks to her collection, kept 1,000 men at work for two months, and, since

the Swedes want to be paid for their iron ore, she has obliged them to buy German turbines where they would probably have preferred English ones.” Although it is difficult to generalize about a multidimensional matter of this kind, it may be safe to say that in the first years of National Socialist foreign trade policies, many of her partners felt the advantages of the new system; but by 1937 the balance appeared to be turning as the disadvantages became more important in daily practice and as a slow recovery of world trade and prices occurted.7! A concrete example of the kind of difficulty that could easily arise out of these trade practices was the German dispute with Brazil and the United States over GermanBrazilian trade in the spring and summer of 1937. Eventually an accommodation was wotked out as a result of which Brazil in practice shifted to Germany exports previously sold in the United States and imports hitherto derived from England while re-equipping her own army with German artillery. The special limitations and subsidies that figured so largely in Germany’s foreign trade practices, however, brought some friction into German relations with the largest country of South America and exacerbated her already bad relations with the United States, which favored freer rather than more restrictive trade

practices.” The controversy produced between Germany and the United States in the example just cited was merely a continuation of the abrasive effects of German trade policies on her relationship with the United States. Although it was in this field that the two powers were actually most in contact on a regular basis, it would be quite erroneous to assume that the volume of records in the archives is a safe guide to the intrinsic historical impor-

20. Note of 27 January 1938 in C 542/65/18, FO 371/21666, ff.37—38. 21. For British analyses of these procedures, especially when involving German

credits, see C 2889/664/18,

FO 371/20745; E 557/557/34, FO 371/20832. For warnings about the experiences of others, see London’s

explanation to Southern Rhodesia when considering a barter with Germany for tobacco, and to Thailand when see considering a deal with Germany for tin (W 13574/816/50, FO 371/21227). On German policy in 1937, G.D., C, 6, No. 362.

440, 444, 445, 475, 22. Published documentation on this episode are G.D., C, 6, Nos. 203, 406, 415, 421, 428, of Hjalmar Schacht and 482, 488, 512, 521; U.S. 1937, 11:332-43; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 288; see also the arguments

Moffat Papers, Herbert Feis in State 632.6231/216, and the entry in Pierrepont Moffat’s diary for 21 July 1937,

see Frank D. McCann, Jr., The vol. 39. For an account of this issue relatively favorable to the German position,

6. The account Brazilian-American Alliance, 1937-1945 (Princeton, N,J.: Princeton University Press, 19713), chap. Steiner, 1970), pp: 247— in Hans-Jiirgen Schréder, Deutschland und die Vereinigten Staaten 1933-1939 (Wiesbaden: E. Hilton, Brazil and 56, though dubious in its basic approach, is useful for its material. The account of Stanley 1975) is extremely Press, Texas of University (Austin: Rivalry Trade of Politics The the Great Powers, 1930-1939:

Germany and the United States, but also valuable, not only for its account of Brazil’s economic relations with

for its relating these matters to trade with Britain and Italy.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

tance of a subject.23 As described in the preceding part, German-American relations had deteriorated extraordinarily in the first years of the National Socialist regime, but this deterioration was primarily a result of political and ideological rather than economic factors. A series of incidents of minor practical but major symbolic importance during 1937 illustrate this aspect of the growing mistrust and disdain each country felt for the other. They all reflect an underlying hostility based on the extreme divergence of American from German institutions and perspectives. When the mayor of New York, Fiorello

LaGuardia, made some nasty personal comments about Hitler in public, he could be sure of local approval; but the German government was incensed and protested officially in Washington. Secretary of State Cordell Hull formally expressed regret but tried to explain the American government’s lack of authority to restrain such comments, an explanation the German authorities found hard to accept.” A talk by Cardinal Mundelein to several hundred priests of the Chicago archdiocese in May 1937, in which the cardinal deplored the persecution of the Catholic church in Germany and referred to the “Austrian paperhanger,” was used by Berlin not only as further grist for its animosity toward the Vatican but as the subject of a press campaign and diplomatic protests in Washington.?> While that incident and the religious questions touched on in it occupied public attention, another competed with it: the exceedingly dubious circumstances surrounding the arrest, trial, death sentence, and execution of an

American citizen in Germany for supposedly having some anti-Nazi leaflets in his possession.”° As the new German ambassador, Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff, wrote in a private letter to German Foreign Minister Constantin’ von Neurath about his first impressions of the United States: “That we can in any case count on little understanding, to say nothing of sympathy, here is shown by yesterday’s speech by Cardinal Mundelein. Catholics,

Protestants,

Jews,

Freemasons,

Pacifists,

Socialists,

Democrats,

Commu-

nists—all have something to object to about us.”?7 In the letter just quoted, Dieckhoff also mentioned an event that would provide the occasion for aggravations which should be mentioned here as symptomatic even though its main effect on German-American relations would not be felt until 1938. The German dirigible Hindenburg was destroyed in a terrible accident on 6 May 1937 as it was about to land at Lakehurst, New Jersey. The Germans thereupon decided to build no further zeppelins unless they could purchase noninflammable helium to replace the highly flammable hydrogen hitherto used for their dirigibles. Helium, however, was an American monopoly, controlled by the government, with its sale subject to license. In a long and acrimonious

dispute, the American

secretary of the interior, Harold

Ickes,

refused to approve a license and, almost a year to the day after the Hindenburg disaster, finally had his way.”® There is some evidence now to show that Hitler did have ulterior 23. This is an area in which Schrddet’s book is defective. 24, A summary of this incident is in Arnold A. Offner, American Appeasement: United States Foreign Policy and Germany, 1933-1938 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969), p. 84; German documents will be published as G.D., C, 6, Nos. 246, 278, 279. The U.S. was complaining at the same time about articles in

German newspapers (ibid., No. 265). 25. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 652-60, 665-69, 671-73, 683; Friedrich Engel-Janosi, Vom Chaos zur Katastrophe (Vienna: Herold, 1971), p. 173. Parts of Cardinal Mundelein’s speech in New York Times, 19 May 1937. 26. William E. Dodd, Jr., and Martha Dodd (eds.), Ambassador Dodd’s Diary (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1941), 22-27 April 1937, pp. 402-14, passim; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 397, 404; U.S. 1937, 2:395-405. The Germans claimed

that one reason they could not release Helmut Hirsch, the person involved, was that a previously released prisoner had made unfriendly speeches about Germany after returning to the U.S. 27. Dieckhoff to von Neurath, 20 May 1937, Deutsches Zentralarchiv Potsdam (hereafter cited as DZA), Biro RAM, Akte 60964, f.143. Since in this letter, Dieckhoff also complained that the area around the German em-

bassy was becoming increasingly Black in population, it is hard to see whom, if anyone, he considered friendly. 28. There is a good summary of the helium controversy in Offner, pp. 239-44.

The Position of Germany in 1937

205

military motives in mind in his interest in the helium purchase,? but certainly at the time ideological distaste was the key consideration. And with that feeling in the background, Ickes could stand his ground against President Franklin Roosevelt and all the other members of the cabinet. The two countries, which before 1933 were probably closer than any other major powers but which had become alienated in the first yeats of the new German regime, continued to move apart. The two most important countries in East Asia, China and Japan, were both tied to Getmany, the former by trade agreements and the presence of German military advisers, the latter by the Anti-Comintern Pact. Germany had not only made a successful comeback in the Far East but had developed good relations with the Nationalist government of China led by Chiang Kai-shek and with those elements that were by stages strengthening their grip on the government of Japan. The special agreements with China were providing Germany with important raw materials, especially wolfram, and foreign exchange, while China received military and

industrial supplies.*° The significance of this tie was underlined by an invitation to Chinese minister of finance Hsiang-hsi Kung to Berlin, where he conferred in well-pub-

licized talks with Hitler, Hermann Goring, and Hjalmar Schacht in June 1937.3! Within China, at the same time, in spite of the continuing internal friction between the military

advisers and those Germans involved in trading operations, the position of the German advisets was as strong as ever and in fact given increased official recognition.” In regard to Japan, there was some consideration of the possibility of strengthening the AntiComintern Pact by more extensive German-Japanese agreements,** and by adding Italy to the Anti-Comintern Pact system.*4 The apparently strong position of Germany was, however, threatened by several factors. In the first place, if the Chinese Nationalist movement consolidated its hold on

the country and proceeded with the process of modernization—in which the Germans were aiding them—there was no guarantee that the Chinese might not eventually squeeze out the Germans as well as other foreigners. The war that started in 1937 kept this from happening, but the possibility was certainly in the background. Of more immediate significance was the presence in Japan of a considerable element that was dubious about the connection with Germany. These men had restrained the enthusiastic advocates of an alignment with Germany and would do so again. Especially in the first half of 1937, as the political parties made a final effort to influence Japanese policy in a moderate ditection, the tie to Germany came into question.*> Nothing practical grew out of the Anti29. Fritz Wiedemann claims in his memoirs (Der Mann der Feldherr werden wollte (Dortmund: Blick und Bild Verlag, 1964], p. 103) that Hitler wanted to take helium in such small quantities that the U.S. would not tecognize this violation of the license and use it for balloons. L. Mettcker & Sohne, 30. G.D., C, 6, No. 157; D, 1, 576; Emil Helfferich, Ein Leben, 4 (Jever, Oldenbourg: C. pp. 98, 99-100, 263— above, (see Klein Hans of projects the and HAPRO on material 1937 1964), 133-48. For 65), see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 304, 314. z vom 10. Juni 31. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 409, 418, 429, 431, 434; D, 3, No. 292; “Bestellung aus der Pressekonferen as Bundesarchiy, Brammet), cited (hereafter collection Brammer Koblenz, Archives Federal German 1937,” Z.Sg, 101/9, £.429; U.S. 1937, 3:287, 649-50. 42 of 3March 1937, Gauss (consul 32. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 214, 349; Linnell (U.S. consul general, Canton) dispatch

482 of 28 May 1937, State general, Shanghai) dispatch 785 of 1 May 1937, Peck (counsellor in Peking) dispatch 893.20/595, 598, 601.

und Japan zwischen 33. The evidence on this subject for 1937 is very inadequate; see Theo Sommer, Deutschland

C, 6, Nos. 401, 359, 413; D.D.F., 2d,55 den Machten 1935-1940 (Tiibingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1962), p. 54: G.D., No. 261. 34. See n. 37, below. sending of the Japanese ambassador to Rome, 35. Sommer, pp. 54-55; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 250, 294, 359, 442. The

nts there belongs in this context; von Sugimura Yotaro, to Berlin in February 1937 to check up on developme to Hassell to von Neurath,

12 February 1937, DZA

Potsdam, Biito RAM, Akte 60964, £.65; Drummond

296 Comintern

Hitler's Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II Pact; the commissions

for combating the Third International that were to

have been established were stillborn, and the special functionary sent to the German embassy in Tokyo for that purpose ended up in charge of decorating the embassy on official holidays.3° As for the plan to have Italy join the Anti-Comintern Pact, that was running into a whole series of difficulties, most of them generated by the ineptitude of Joachim von Ribbentrop, the enthusiastic proponent of the scheme, and by his feuding with the German Foreign Ministry and its regular officials.*” Even among Japanese supporters of closer ties to Germany there were few enthusiastic

admirers

of the Berlin regime; most were

guided by the belief that an

association with Germany strengthened Japan and threatened her potential enemies in the competition for empire. And if Japan secured the control of East Asia to which many of her leaders aspired, there was no assurance, as the Germans would soon discover, that

any of the “co-prosperity” in the greater Japanese empire was to extend to them. The most serious problem Germany had to face in East Asia, however, was the incompatibility of her ties to China with those to a Japan that was striving to halt the consolidation of China.** The half-open, half-concealed clash between the two East Asian countries had challenged German ingenuity in the period 1933-36. The outbreak of hostilities in July 1937 would confront the policymakers in Berlin with even more difficult problems. There was another group of countries outside Europe whose relations with Germany and the European situation in general must be considered. These are the selfgoverning Dominions of the British Commonwealth. While the dissolution of the French colonial empire did not come about until during and after the Second World War, the First World War had hastened the process by which important portions of the British Empire attained an independent status in international relations as well as in the management of their internal affairs. The separate representation of the various Dominions in the League of Nations had been used by American opponents of that institution as a sign of excessive English influence when in reality it was a symbol of the weakening of London’s power.? + The anniversary of the landing of Australian and New Zealand forces at Gallipoli in 1915 became, appropriately enough, a national holiday of Australia; and Parliament Hill

in Ottawa was graced with a monument to the role of Canadian forces in the capture of Vimy Ridge in 1917; but Australians and Canadians alike were determined not to fight again at either location if there were any conceivable way to avoid it. Pressure from the Vansittart, 5 March 1937, C 2090/3/18, FO 371/20710. 36. Sommer, pp. 49-51; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 192, 269, 325, 359, 450; James W. Morley (ed.), Deterrent Diplomacy:

Japan, Germany and the USSR, 1935-1940 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), p. 47. For material on

German-Japanese intelligence contacts in 1937, see Case 3/2, PG 48900, Bundesarchiv/Militararchiv. 37. Sommer, pp. 82-83; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 235, 281, 292, 388; von Neurath to von Ribbentrop, 23 April 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biito RAM, Akte 60964, £107; von Neurath to von Hassell, draft, not sent, of 1 June 1937, National Archives T-120, 3527/9175/E 645552; Motley, pp. 43-44. The British government was reading one

of the relevant codes, apparently the Japanese one, and followed the negotiations, F 10344/26/23, FO 371/21028.

In April 1937 von Ribbentrop made arrangements for one of his assistants, Albrecht Haushofer, to go to East Asia, but paid no attention to his recommendations (Sommer, p. 124, TMWC, XXXIII, 169). 38. The dilemma is described in Trautmann’s report 89 of 27 January 1937, G.D., C, 6, No. 162; excerpts in

Sommer, pp. 56—57. 39. One of the few historians who has paid attention to this relating to this issue are cited here. The opening of the British additional documentation. See the piece by Reinhard Meyers 1975). The account in Ritchie Ovendale, “Appeasement” and Dominions, and the Policy of “Appeasement,” 1937-1939 (Cardiff: not definitive.

subject is Donald C. Watt. archives for the 1930s now in Tradition und Neubeginn the English Speaking World: University of Wales Press,

Several of his essays provides substantial (Cologne: Heymann, The United States, the 1975), is helpful but

The Position of Germany in 1937

297

Dominions had already influenced British policy in the Rhineland crisis of 1936.40 As the menace from Germany increased, the government in the United Kingdom was increasingly interested in having the Dominions recognize the dangers this posed for themselves." These dangers, combined with the implications of the American neutrality legislation of 1937 with its prohibition on the export of war materials to belligerents, underlined the importance of building up a munitions industry in the Dominions and India which would have the added advantage of immunity from German air attack.42 But these very dangers led the Dominions to pressure the London government into concessions to Germany. At the Imperial Conference of 1937, the United Kingdom delegation did its best to explain the dangers confronting them and the policies London was following to deal pee the situation, but the record shows the skepticism of the Dominions delegations. London had made its first tentative gestures to Germany on the colonial question. The broader policy aspects of this matter will be discussed later, but here was an issue that vitally and directly affected several Dominions.

South Africa, Australia, and New

Zealand all held former German colonies under mandate. After considerable soulsearching, the United Kingdom government decided to give the Dominion representatives a general outline of its thinking on this issue, though the record does not give a very

clear picture of the reaction of the latter.44 The English were especially interested in pushing General J. B. M. Hertzog, the prime minister of the Union of South Africa, who was always telling the British to make concessions to Germany on all issues, including the colonial field, but refused to give up former German Southwest Africa himself and also did not want German East Africa, now the British mandate of Tanganyika, returned

either.*> In fact, the Union government had just reiterated its determination to maintain control of Southwest Africa and would continue to do so, while indicating a willingness to pay Germany monetary compensation that the latter did not want.*° Just precisely what the Germans did want other than lots of concessions in and outside Europe they were never prepared to specify, as will be recounted, but the Dominion leaders knew that

Germany had various vaguely defined demands. *’ 40. See above, pp. 201-2. Note the reference to the repercussions in Australia and New Zealand of Mrs. Simpson’s presence alongside Edward VIII at the memorial at Gallipoli on the latter’s Mediterranean trip, in

the analysis of the abdication crisis by the French ambassador to London of 3 December 1936 (D.D.F., 2d, 4,

No. 92). 41. ie the review of imperial defense prepared by the chiefs of staff subcommittee of the Committee of Imperial Defence on 22 February 1937 for the 1937 Imperial Conference in CAB 32/127. Cf. J. M. McCarthy, “Australia and Imperial Defence: Co-operation and Conflict, 1918-1939,” Australian Journal of Politics and History, 17, No. 1 (April 1971), 19-32. 42. See the memorandum by Sir Thomas Inskip of 10 May 1937, C 3856/205/62, FO 371/20701. As Watt has pointed out (Personalities and Policies, p. 156), nothing substantial was then done about these schemes. by the 43. The account in Watt, Personalities and Policies, pp. 154-56, 165, 412-15, must now be supplemented

preparaminutes of the meetings of the conference in CAB 32/130, the proceedings and papets of the cabinet papers in FO tory committee and of the United Kingdom delegation in CAB 32/127, and the related 372/3200-3202.

records. Unless otherwise noted, the discussion of the conference here is based on these

in its series, Although the Canadian Department of External Affairs has published relevant documents

125, 129, 137, 141, they add Documents on Canadian External Relations, 6, 1936-1939 (Ottawa, 1972), esp. Nos. Public Record Office as well astonishingly little. The Australian collection, which includes documents from the

Department of Foreign as Australian archives, is considerably more informative. See especially Australia, Government PubAustralian (Canberra: 1937-1938 1, 1937-49, Policy, Foreign Affairs, Documents on Australian lishing Service, 1975) (hereafter cited as Australian Documents), Nos. 27, 28, 39. , FO 371/20221; C 2124/270/18, FO 44, In addition to the records cited above, see C 3562, C 4135/37/18

371/20734, f£.55-56. been turned over to Portugal, a 45, C 989/37/18, FO 371/20721. A tiny portion of German East Africa had a British mandate. substantial piece had become a Belgian mandate, but most of it had become

J . 46. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 403, 500, 563; D, 1, No. 15; C 209/37/18, FO 371/20718 Hitler, Goring, and with talks his on report his ministers prime Dominion the all sent 47. Lord Lothian had

298

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The Commonwealth prime ministers strongly urged that Britain use her influence to pressure Czechoslovakia into concessions to its German minority, arrange some colonial concessions, and recognize the Italian conquest of Ethiopia.** Ray Atherton, the second man in the American embassy in London, summarized the import of the conference to Jay Pierrepont Moffat, chief of the European division of the Department of State, in terms the latter recorded in his diary: He said that the attitude of the Dominions at the Imperial Conference had made a very deep impression on the English Cabinet; that in effect the Dominions had said you fought once before to protect yourself from a threat in the low countries; we agree that this is a vital interest and would be prepared to help you again in that field. On the other hand, we would not be prepared to help if you became involved in Eastern Europe. As you cannot destroy Germany, make friends with her and if necessaty buy her off in Eastern Europe.*? It should be noted that this attitude of the Dominions was known in Germany. The South African government relayed its impressions of the conference to Berlin, not only through conversations between Prime Minister Hertzog and the German minister in Pretoria, but also through the contacts of Oswald Pirow, the South African minister of defense, who had long been an advocate of concessions to Germany and who would still describe himself as a convinced adherent of National Socialism long after the Second World War.5° The Union’s secretary of state for external affairs even told the German minister that the Union would not go to war with Germany and had so informed the London government.*! The pressure of the Dominions, most strongly by South Africa but to a considerable degtee by the others as well, was indeed understood in Berlin.** When Hitler referred to the divisions within the Commonwealth as restraining British intervention in Central Europe during the famous conference of 5 November 1937, he had substantial grounds for that opinion. The warning about the cohesion of the Commonwealth, if eventually it did come to war, that Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King had given Hitler on 29 June was disregarded as it did not fit in with the dictator’s preconceptions.** The fears of the Dominions reinforced those of England and may be regarded as the British Schacht in early May 1937. 48. U.S. Ambassador Bingham to Hull, 16 June 1937. Roosevelt’s comment (of 7 July) was that this was “discouraging” (Library of Congress, Corde/] Hull Papers, Folder 99-A). 49. Moffat Diary, 29 July 1937, Moffat Papers, vol. 39. To Moffat’s comment that “it seemed that the tail was

wagging the dog,” Atherton responded that “one sensed the feeling that Britain had to take her Dominions into account in developing their policy or else weaken the bonds of Empire.” 50. “I still support National Socialism because I consider it the appropriate form of government. I do not allow myself to be confused by the horror stories which are spread about National Socialism” (Pirow statement of 16 November 1961, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Zeugenschrifttum [hereafter cited as IfZ, ZS] 283). See also Watt,

Personalities and Policies, pp. 404fE. 51. G.D., C, 5, No. 580. 52. Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 103,” 1 July 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, £.5. For British awareness that leaks from the Imperial Conference had encouraged Germany, see R 5224/770/67, FO

371/21140; R 4236/4067/67, FO 371/21141. For French knowledge of this encouragement to Germany, see D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 15; cf. ibid., No. 22. 53. Mackenzie King had promised the British Dominions Secretary, Malcolm MacDonald, on 22 June that he would warn Hitler to this effect (C 6349/5187/18, FO 371/20750, £.354), and the record shows that he did so (C 5187/5187/18, FO 371/20750). It is obvious, however, that the Canadian prime minister was favorably impressed (C 6349/5187/18, FO 371/20750, f£.350-51). See also G.D., C, 6, Nos. 370, 425. For a general survey of German-Canadian relations, based to a considerable extent on Canadian archives, see Fritz Genzel, “Die deutsch-kanadischen Beziehungen,” in Manfred Funke (ed.), His#ler, Deutschland und die Machte: Materialien

zur Aussenpolitik. des Dritten Reiches (Dusseldorf: Droste, 1977), pp. 327-38.

The Position of Germany in 1937

299

equivalent of the weakening effect that the horrendous and apparently vain suffering of World War I was having on the morale of the French. This brings the survey back to Europe, where Germany stood unchallenged and still growing in strength. The initiative lay with her, and other countries would react to her measures or their fears and expectations of what those measures might be. This meant that during 1937 Germany could make her preparations as she saw fit for the execution of policies of her own choosing, policies which could involve either seizing the initiative when it suited her or taking advantage of opportunities created by events and the actions of others. The following chapters will show what those preparations were like and to what purposes they were put. They will also show that the course of German policy was not to be substantially affected or diverted by any initiative for a settlement that might be advanced by othets in the hope of stabilizing European peace and averting another war.

Chapter 16

Hitler’s Preparations 1937-38

y 1937, Hitler’s general views on Germany’s future policy were firmly established, and the basis for implementing that policy was, in his judgment, being assured. Germany was not large enough to feed the existing, to say nothing of an increased, population, and her boundaries must therefore be expanded. That expansion he saw in terms far beyond the borders of 1914, which had been almost as inadequate as those established by the peace settlement. Revision of the Versailles settlement might be a subject of propaganda for consolidating opinion at home or undermining resistance to German moves abroad, but it could never be a guide for policy. In fact, the utilization of the revision theme was a two-edged sword: it might well bring concessions to Germany, but it implied limitations on those concessions, limitations that would hem Germany within borders that were not only too confined but that when broken would reveal the true nature of Hitler’s aims. For this reason, general talk about the “wrongs” done Germany must pave the way not for righting those “wrongs” but for a series of wars for which the German people would be psychologically prepared by propaganda and the militarization of German life at the same time as the will of others to resist was being undermined by promises and threats.! Only wars could secure for Germany the vast agricultural lands and areas providing raw materials she needed, but Hitler thought of such wars as entirely different from the last great conflict. It was this difference in the conception of war that gave him an advantage in foreign policy even as it would lead to trouble with some of his military leaders. Almost everyone else could conceive of another war only as a repetition of the recent conflict. Abroad, fear of such a disaster would incline potential enemies to great concessions in the hope of averting it, while attuning what military plans and preparations they did make to precisely that type of holocaust. Inside Germany, most of the military leaders also believed that another war, if it came, would be most likely to follow such a pattern; this was what made many reluctant to run the tisk of a general war which they feared Germany would lose in the end as she had lost the last one. This was also the concern that led some

of them, and of these General Georg

1. See above, chap. 1. 2. One could add that this concern also affected German as well as French and British military thinking once wat had started in 1939.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

301

Thomas, the leading specialist in the relationship of the economy to military affairs, was the most articulate, to argue that Germany ought to make her own military preparations conform to the needs of that kind of war—that is, to direct a// her energies and resources to the establishment of a broad basis for a war of attrition. Few had wanted or expected that sort of war before 1914, but Germany had lost in part, it was thought, because her

pteparations had not been oriented toward the type of war she had in the event been obliged to fight and would surely be forced to fight if war came to Europe once mote.

There were, however, three fatal flaws in this point of view. In the first place, during the

time it would take Germany to make adequate preparations of this kind, her potential enemies could easily catch up with the head start Germany’s rushed rearmament had provided. Second, the reason that they would be likely to get ahead of Germany was that their economic base was already broader than Germany’s—the very factor that had made a wat of attrition so fatal for Germany in the past and would make it equally fatal in any future conflict. Finally, the kind of total internal economic mobilization required by preparation for a war of attrition would surely remind the German people of their former experience with such a project and could therefore be exceedingly detrimental to German morale. The wars that Hitler had in mind, however, were of an entirely different type.* He was as doubtful of Germany’s ability to win a war of attrition from her existing base as were most of his advisers, but he never meant to become involved in that kind of war. He neither wanted nor expected nor planned for such wars; even the later war against

England that would follow German domination of continental Europe would be decided by the clash of battleships, not mutual strangulation by blockade.‘ For his first wars, he

wanted to build up a quick and substantial head start over others in rearmament—a rearmament in breadth rather than depth—and to utilize the temporary military superiority in a short, isolated war that would strengthen Germany for the next such war by broadening her population or industrial base, giving her forces useful experience, and

terrorizing potential opponents. Such a policy—the Béitzkrieg theory—tequited two things: rapid rearmament and isolation of potential opponents. If the former fell into the sphere of domestic and the latter into that of foreign policy, the integral relationship of the two should not be overlooked. The specific requirements of Hitler’s view of war for German rearmament and for Germany’s relations with other countries must be discussed separately only because the sources and the issues make it convenient to do so. Most of this chapter will be devoted to rearmament

needs, and subsequent chapters will deal with aspects of the

foreign relations.

One should mention, however, that at least a few contemporary obsetvers recognized Hitler’s intentions. The British military attaché in Berlin, Elliot Hotblack, reported

at the beginning of 1937 that the German army was being ptepared to fight both in the east and in the west in a series of “select little wars.” The Foreign Office comments on this report point out the dilemma such a policy would create for the maintenance of collective security: the aggressor could start a little war and thereby shift the responstHitler’s bility, if it turned into a big one, onto the friends of peace. It was, of course,

to each hope and expectation, to be reinforced by threats and propaganda adapted

3. See above, pp. 271-77.

ele

Droste, 1973), pp. 306 and 383ff., for Hitler’s 4. See Jost Diilffer, Weimar, Hitler und die Marine (Disseldorf:

essentially subordinate part of a German agreement with Raeder that submarines would be an important but navy dominated by battleships, cruisers, aircraft carriers, and destroyers. . The

1937, C 972/136/18, FO 371/20731 5. Memorandum by the British military attaché in Berlin, 25 January objected because it considered the Office War the circulated; and printed report this Foreign Office wanted report too “political.”

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

occasion, that no one would be willing to assume that awesome responsibility. The rearmament program Hitler wanted was then not merely one of increasing the size of the armed forces allowed Germany by the peace treaty. Internal restructuring of German society and its outlook would provide not only the basis for larger armed forces but the willingness to use those forces ruthlessly. The first years of National Socialist rule were designed to bring about this transformation of German society, and Hitler could feel confident by 1937 that much of it had indeed been accomplished.°® Even the potentially most difficult of the internal problems, the struggle with the Christian churches, did not substantially hamper the process.’ The denunciation of the National Socialist regime in the papal encyclical “Mit brennender Songe” (“On the Condition of the Catholic

Church

in the German

Reich”)

in March

1937, though

damaging

German-Vatican relations, did no more than embarrass the government temporarily. Without formally denouncing the concordat signed in 1933, Hitler simply went ahead with his policy of a step-by-step throttling of Christianity, which might otherwise compete with National Socialism’s claim on the total allegiance of the German people.® There would be no ideological competition on the road to wat. Preparing for the wars Hitler anticipated fighting had implications for the size and composition of Germany’s military establishment. In the first place, it must be big; big by comparison with the standing forces rather than the reserves of other countries, because Hitler expected to fight short wars in which the forces available at the outset, not the reserves that could be mobilized in a long drawn-out struggle, would be decisive. Rudolf

Nadolny, the German delegate to the disarmament conference, had in April 1933 revealed Germany’s intention of building up a standing army of 600,000.? If Hitler allowed a professional diplomat, whose advice he frequently ignored and whom he soon after let resign, to know this much of his intentions, the figure—which equaled the 1933 standing armies of France, Poland, and Czechoslovakia combined—must be taken as the

lower limit of his original concept.!° The policy of rapidly building up a very large standing army, furthermore, would minimize the disadvantage of the Versailles requirement that Germany keep its soldiers on long-term enlistments, with a resulting (and intended) absence of large, trained reserves. That absence might retard the first stages of rearmament but would soon lose its significance in a situation where those who had—or would have had—their military training a decade earlier would not be called up anyway. It is in this context that the continuous pressure for building up the size of Germany’s army with which Hitler hurried on his generals must be seen. More than mete size, however, was affected by Hitler’s views. There were implica-

tions for the composition of Germany’s armed forces. If the military stalemate of the World War were to be avoided, the specific form which that stalemate had taken—the balance of offensive and defensive capability in trench watfare—had to be surmounted. Of the devices utilized during the war in efforts to break the stalemate, the artillery 6. The best account of this process is in Karl Dietrich Bracher, Wolfgang Saur, and Gerhard Schulz, Die

nationalsoxtalistische Machtergreifung, 2d ed. (Cologne: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1962). 7. John S. Conway, The Nazi Persecution of the Churches, 1933-45 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1968).

8. The documentation for the ctisis in German-Vatican telations is extensive; see the suggestions for further

treading in Charles F. Delzell (ed.), The Papacy and Totalitarianism between the Two World Wars (New York: John Wiley, 1974); G.D., C, 4, Nos. 482, 503; 6, Nos. 108, 215, 231, 242, 251, 260, 261, 271, 272; D, 1, Nos. 633-42, 647, 651, 661, 667-69, 671-73,

676-82, 684, 686, 705; 7, p- 516; Friedrich Engel-Janosi,

Vom

Chaos Rur

Katastrophe (Vienna: Herold, 1971), pp. 174-76, 284-86. 9. See above, p. 128. 10. No precise figures appear in Hitler’s own earlier comments; he refers to a “decisive land power” and “vast military power” in Gerhard L. Weinberg (ed.), Hitlers zweites Buch (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1961), p. 163.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

303

barrage in its various forms, gas canisters and shells, tunneling, airplanes, and tanks, the last two seemed the most likely means of shortening the war of the future. Hitler himself was always enormously interested in problems and aspects of motorization. From the earliest years of political activity to his nightly ramblings during World Wat I, the subject fascinated him; he referred to it in 1928 as the “general motorization of the world, a matter of immeasurable significance for the future.”!! He not only roared around Germany in big automobiles, he campaigned repeatedly by aitplane; and in this respect, the opening of the famous propaganda film Trivmph of the Will by Hitler’s arrival at the Nuremberg party rally by airplane quite accurately reflects an important theme in the Fuhrer’s life. It is no coincidence that of the few German generals with whom Hitler developed any close personal relationship and who reciprocated with strong sympathy for national socialism, the most prominent were Heinz Guderian, the advocate of armored warfare, and Albert Kesselring, the air force leader.!2

The armored units of the German army were organized not as support groups integrated into regular infantry divisions—the fatal error of the French army in the face of the warnings of Charles de Gaulle—but as separate armored divisions, provided in 1937 with the first corps headquarters ever responsible solely for armored units.!> The building of the air force had been entrusted to Hitler’s friend and associate Hermann G6ring, an air ace in the war who had surrounded himself as much as possible with friends of similar background.'* Together—knowing they had Hitler’s full backing— Goring and his associates pushed forward with the rapid development of aircraft production, training units, active squadrons, and extravagantly elaborate headquarters buildings.!5 The hurried build-up of the Lwfiwaffe was a means both of frightening potential enemies into concessions without war!® and of gaining a speedy victory if war came by making possible sudden overwhelming attacks on both military and civilian targets. We know now that the capabilities of airpower were enormously overrated during the interwar yeats, but contemporary expectations and terrors were very real.!7 And for those who needed to have their expectations enhanced or their terrors exaggerated, the use of 11. Ibid., p. 123; cf. Paul Kluke, “Hitler und das Volkswagenprojekt,” Verteljahrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 8, No. 4 (October 1960), 341-83. 12. Clear traces of this affinity, combined with a distaste for the “old-fashioned” other generals, can be found

in the postwar apologias of both: Heinz Guderian, Erinnerungen eines Soldaten (Heidelberg: Vowinckel, 1951), and

Albert Kesselring, Soldat bis zum letzten Tag (Bonn: Athenaum, 1953); see also Miller, Das Heer und Hitler, p. 47. both It was precisely this mutually understood relationship of loyalty and sympathy that made it possible for led men to tetain Hitler’s confidence in World War II in spite of differences on specific military questions that tolerate differHitler to distrust others. Within the military as in the party hierarchy, Hitler was quite willing to ences as long as he was convinced of an individual’s subjective loyalty to himself. (New 13. A brief summary in Larry H. Addington, The Blitzkrieg Era and the German General Staff, 1865-1941 military Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1971), chap. 2. Such actions were taken by the French as Germany was ready attaché, Gaston Renondeau, as sign of an intended attack on Czechoslovakia as soon

(D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 151). War II have never 14. Studies of the development and fate of the German air force before and during World BodenKarl-Heinz Udet, Ernst which in factor personal important very adequately taken into account this is a beginning in Edward L. schatz, Bruno Lérzer, Josef Veltjens, and others must be considered. There 1919-39 (Lincoln: University Homze, Arming the Luftwaffe: The Reich Air Ministry and the German Aircraft Industry, of Nebraska Press, 1976). 1933-1939 (Stuttgart: Deutsche 15. In spite of its apologetic tone, Karl-Heinz Vélker, Die Deutsche Luftwaffe } Verlags-Anstalt, 1967) remains useful. Homze’s work is far more substantial. that a few squadrons of bombets over him told had Goring that 1931 June in comment Hitler’s Note 16. held true

flag and that the same thing London—if it came to it—would suffice to have the English raise a white ache 1931 [Frankfurt/M: Societats-Verlag, for Paris (Edouard Calic [ed.], Ohne Maske: Hitler-Breiting Gebeimgespr 1968], p. 95). See also Homze, pp. 54-56, 106.

ent after the experience of World War I 17. The persistence of myths about the effectiveness of air bombardm

its own historian. into the Vietnam conflict and beyond deserves, but awaits,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

German planes in the destruction of Guernica, the holy city of the Basques, in the spring of 1937 would serve as a shocking stimulus at the time, with a frightening reminder in Pablo Picasso’s famous painting. The first important memoirs of a German air force general published after World War II were entitled “Trump or Bluff? Twelve Years of the German Air Force.”!8 Replacement of the word “or” by “and” would provide an accurate description of the mission Hitler assigned his air force. A most important by-product of the emphasis on motorization and the largest possible air force was the extent to which it increased the difficulties of Germany’s economic position. With no domestic sources of natural rubber and almost no oil wells, Germany faced the problem of either finding ways to finance vast imports of rubber and petroleum products or deriving these critical materials synthetically from raw materials plentiful within her borders. The former meant dependence on foreign trade; the latter a vast new industrial undertaking. The establishment of the Four-Year Plan in 1936 and the appointment of Géring as its head show how Hitler meant to answer this question.'? The Four-Year Plan took over the rudimentary synthetic oil and rubber industries already in existence and expanded them rapidly, if not always efficiently.2? The accounts, which, with considerable justification, criticize the deficiencies in these programs and stress the extent to which they failed to cover Germany’s total needs of the key raw materials they were to provide, have overlooked three very significant aspects of the issue. In the first place, the needs themselves were steadily and rapidly rising as more motorization and a larger air force automatically required more rubber and oil. Any production level measured against a rising rather than a fixed demand level is likely to look inadequate even if substantial progress has been made and considerable technical experience with new processes acquired by a growing corps of experts. Second, the intended use of military power as a means of first threatening war and then fighting brief wars against selected and isolated enemies would reduce the importance of great stocks of supplies. One could give the impression of vast preparations and, if it came to war, one would have the ability to launch a vigorous first blow. Finally, in synthetic materials as in atms production and army expansion, the first stages are slow and cumbersome; dramatic results do not appear for years, and some of the early delays turn out to be blessings in disguise as they permit modifications of design or correction of other early mistakes. The activities of the Four-Year Plan, moreover, were by no means limited to pro-

duction of synthetic oil and rubber. A great variety of other projects was undertaken; but only three spheres of action became important and need to be discussed here: the production of synthetic fibers, the working of low-grade iron ore, and the effort to increase food production. Germany imported great quantities of fibers and pushed the output and use of synthetics in order to reduce her dependence on foreign suppliers and to conserve available foreign exchange for the importation and stockpiling of such strategic materials as nonferrous metals.*! Some progress was made in this field, even if the dramatically successful competition of synthetic with natural fibers still lay in the future. Certainly one of the most critical deficiencies of the German economy from the point of view of preparing for and waging war was the dependence on imports of 18. Herbert Joachim Rieckhoff, Trumpf oder Bluff? 12 Jabre deutsche Luftwaffe (Geneva: Interavia-Verlag, 1945). 19. See above, n. 3. The decision to try to improve domestic aircraft engine production, rather than import engines, had been taken for similar reasons earlier (Homze, pp. 82ff,). 20. Dieter Petzina, Aufarkiepolitik im Dritten Reich: Der nationalsoxialistische Vierjabresplan (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1968); Wolfgang Birkenfeld, Der synthetische Treibstoff 1933-1945 (Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1964). Petzina’s analysis of the financing of synthetic rubber (pp. 84-85) shows that considerations of military needs were vastly more important than those of conserving foreign exchange. Homze, pp. 142ff., covers the

impact for the aircraft industry. 21. A summary in Petzina, pp. 86, 100-101.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

305

Swedish iron.” As long as Germany controlled the Baltic Sea in the summer and could secure shipments along the Norwegian coast when the Gulf of Bothnia was frozen in the

winter, all was well; but here was an obvious vulnerability. In this regard, there was, or at

least appeared to be, the possibility of reducing dependence on imports by the massive utilization of low-grade domestic ores which would have the additional advantage of requiring less foreign exchange. The expansion of Germany’s iron and steel industry on the basis, at least in part, of greater exploitation of low-grade domestic ores was vehemently opposed by the leaders of German industry for two main reasons. In the first place, there could be no question that the utilization of what the industrialists referred to derogatively as “potting soil” (Blumenerde) would tequite enormous capital investments for the production of preposterously expensive and necessarily noncompetitive steel products. For an industry that had long played a key part in Germany’s export trade, this price problem was naturally a matter of great importance. Second, the idea of a great increase in steel making capacity right after several years in which the depression had left much of Germany’s—and other countries’—capacity idle, looked like an unreasonably risky policy to men who were quite happy to see their existing plant utilized to capacity because of huge armaments contracts but doubted that such a situation would continue indefinitely, and especially if capacity were further expanded.?* Had the leaders of the Third Reich read the orthodox Marxist analyses of national socialism as a tool of monopoly capitalism, they would presumably have capitulated in the face of this opposition; but they were, in fact, not hampered by such theories. As Goring explained to the leaders of Germany’s iron and steel industry on 17 March 1937, Hitler considered it essential that Germany’s domestic ores be utilized to an extent sufficient to cover her needs in wartime;2* and when his listeners did

not take this seriously, G6ring moved forward on his own, leaving Germany’s industrial magnates to learn of the key decisions from the newspapers. On 15 July 1937 the “Reichswerke Hermann Goring” company was established, with the German government providing the initial capital. The industrialists were informed of this a week later and given the option of cooperating or being left out. As for the management of what came to be one of Europe’s largest firms, Goring had a bureau-

cracy ready at hand. The Prussian State Ministry had no real functions to perform in the Third Reich and was at Géring’s disposal in his capacity as Prussian prime minister. The agency that had once been Otto von Bismarck’s tool in the unification of Germany thus ended up in charge of excavating and processing “potting soil.” Though all the extravagant goals set for Goring’s enterprise were not met, it performed a large and increasing role in Germany’s preparations for and eventual conduct of war.” The last major field that needs to be mentioned is the agricultural one. Here the corpotative approach to economic and social issues had led to the creation of the vom Ausland 22. On this subject, see Jérg-Johannes Jager, Die wirtschaftliche Abhdngigkeit des Dritten Reiches dargestellt am Beispiel der Stablindustrie (Berlin: Berlin Verlag, 1969). the archives of the 23. A discussion of this issue from the point of view of the Vereinigte Stahlwerke, based on Treue and Wilhelm problems. these about information one-sided) (rather August Thyssen-Hiitte, gives some Econ-Verlag, 1969), pp. Helmut Uebbing, Die Feuer verlischen nie: August Thyssen-Hiitte 1926-1966 (Diisseldorf;

76ff.

document NI-090, 24, “Sitzung des Arbeitskreises der eisenschaffenden Industrie am 17.3.1937,” Nuremberg i) earlatons , National Archives. and its successor Organizations/1s 25. A history of the “A. G. fiir Erzbau und Eisenhiitten Hermann Goring” Riedel, Evsen und Kohle fir das Dritte greatly needed; for an introduction see Petzina, pp. 104-8, and Matthias For a perceptive analysis of the 1974). idt, Musterschm (Gottingen: ft NS-Wirtscha der in Reich: Paul Pleigers Stellung of 29 July 1937 in D.D.F., report ncet’s Francois-Po see field, meaning of Géring’s new powers in the economic an, Hitlers industrielle Kriegsvorbereitung, 2d, 6, No. 296. Some useful material is summarized in Anja E. Bagel-Bohl 1936 bis 1939 (Koblenz: Wehr & Wissen, 1975).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Reichsnabrstand, the Reich Food Estate, as the organization of all involved in agriculture.”° Headed by the racialist dreamer R. Walther Darré, this organization had concentrated on maintaining the supposedly racially valuable peasantry on the land and raising the undoubtedly depressed prices of agricultural products. In Germany, as elsewhere during the years of the depression, the latter objective was seen as involving at least to some extent a limitation of production; only if the surplus stocks glutting the market were reduced could prices and farm income recover. Given the German need for food imports, this was potentially risky from the point of view of National Socialist foreign trade policy. And even before Géring assumed an increasing role in agricultural affairs from March 1937 on, the Reich Food Estate devoted considerable attention to increasing agricultural production—though most of the resulting increment was taken up by the increase in population that the regime was also stimulating as much as possible.?” What was referred to as the “Battle of Food Production” (Emdhrungsschlacht) was fought inside Germany indecisively until by military conquest she could impose starvation on others. Thus with major emphasis on enormous investments in synthetic oil and rubber complexes, with an elaborate program in a variety of other areas including iron and steel, synthetic fibers, and other materials, the Four-Year Plan moved forward in 1937 and 1938 in the development and implementation of schemes to prepare Germany for the type of short war Hitler wanted to wage, and by which he expected to add to Germany areas that contained those raw materials she lacked and could not fully replace with synthetics.*® These steps ran directly counter to the policies Hjalmar Schacht advocated,

causing Schacht to give up the Ministry of Economics in the fall of 1937.2? Géring’s triumph, signalized by the appointment of his stooge Walther Funk as Schacht’s successor, was complete. In foreign trade policy, this meant rejection by Germany of any participation in the World Raw Materials Conference held at Geneva in 1937. Though proclaiming herself a “have-not” nation, Germany was interested in conquering, not sharing, the world’s wealth; and Hitler forbade any German role in cooperative international approaches to the problem of access to adequate supplies of raw materials.>° The policy line set by Hitler and implemented under Goring’s direction also precluded any serious discussion by the German government of the colonial question. The details of this will be examined in the next chapter, but its relationship to the economic policy of preparation for a series of short continental wars should be noted here. Schacht had quite seriously, even if mistakenly, thought of colonies as at least a partial answer to Germany’s trade and economic problems. He hoped for a revived German colonial empire, especially in West Africa, a region flowing with cocoa and vegetable oil if not with milk and honey. In the international setting of 1936-37, however, any such program presupposed German concessions in Europe; and Schacht’s schemes would founder on 26. See Bracher, pp. 647ff.

27. Summary in Petzina, pp. 91-96. 28. The best account is in Berenice A. Carroll, Design for Total War: Arms and Economics in the Third Reich (The Hague: Mouton, 1968), chaps. 5 and 7.

29. For Schacht’s contemporary account of his resignation to an old acquaintance, Ernst Jaeckh, who passed on this account to the British government, see C 6900/3/18, FO 371/20711 (which went to the PM). Published documents are in TMWC, 36:282—91, 549-64, 567~78; G.D., C, 6, No. 357.

30, The documentation on this issue and Germany’s refusal to take part in any international approach to it is extensive. See U.S. 7937, 1:638, 804-5, 806, 809, 819; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 139, 334, 509; William E. Dod4d, Jr., and

Martha Dodd (eds.), Ambassador Dodd's Diary (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1941), 23 February 1937, p. 386; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 62,” 27 January 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, f£.131-35; Memorandum on raw materials for Lord Halifax, 9 February 1937, C 1282/37/18, FO 371/20719. The

German Foreign Ministry had agreed with Schacht in urging German participation (G.D., C, 6, No. 113). The vast attention given to the problem at the time illustrates the extent to which the alleged economic roots of Germany’s complaints were taken seriously, the expectation being that her policies would become more moderate if her “grievances” were met at least in part.

Hitler's Preparations, 1937-38

307

Berlin’s total unwillingness even to consider that possibility in 1937, just as they had been checked for the same reason in 1936.3! German policy was oriented toward agetession, not concessions, in Central Europe, and her economic policy was to be oriented toward ptepating for that. The organizational chaos in the economic field, even more pronounced in 1937 than in earlier and later years,2 must be seen as the aftermath of Hitler’s decision, foreshadowed in the establishment of the Four-Year Plan in 1936, to

reject both the limiting of military production advocated by Schacht and the total mobilization of the economy urged by Thomas. The adopted line was rather to steer a course of rapid preparation in specific areas that would give Germany the means to fight the type of wars Hitler intended, wars that required limited autarchy through synthetics to make possible total autarchy by conquest. The difficulties of a substantive as well as an organizational kind that existed during this period of internal turmoil were noticeable inside Germany and observed by other powers. The observations pointed to problems in the German economy that were largely self-created.*> Inside Germany, the warnings of Schacht, Thomas, and others had the

opposite effect from what they intended; as Berenice Carroll has aptly stated: “As the strain on the Germany economy increased in the late nineteen-thirties, . . . Hitler only grew the more certain that his own analysis was correct: Germany could never achieve ‘world power with her own economic resources—she must expand them through conquest.’ Before the development of the military basis for war inside Germany in 1937-38 can be examined further, it is necessary to show briefly how Hitler’s concept, with its refusal to consider the possibility of concessions that might bring the return of colonies that Schacht wanted for economic reasons, also temporarily cut across the strategic concepts of the German navy.*> Dedicated to the belief that Germany could win another wat—seen as waged first against France and the Soviet Union—only by an offensive strategy against the Atlantic and Mediterranean supply routes of France, the leaders of the German navy were convinced of the necessity of acquiring bases outside Germany’s limited coastline, bases from which surface warships and submarines could attack those supply routes. They hoped to seize some of these bases by surprise attack with combined forces, the lightly defended French colonial possessions in North and Central America

being considered prime candidates for such operations. The commander-in-chief of the German

navy, Admiral Erich Raeder, however, hoped that these potential conquests

would be supplemented by bases acquired before the outbreak of hostilities through negotiations with friendly powers—here he thought of Portugal and Franco’s Spain— and by the return of colonies to Getmany.*° While Schacht wanted the Cameroons to ease Germany’s shortages of raw materials, the German navy based its examination of naval strategy in wartime in the winter of 1937-38 on the assumption that the 31. See above, pp. 218-19.

Hugh R. 32. Berenice Carroll used as a title for her chapter (8) dealing with this subject a quotation from Empires.” Private of Confusion Trevor-Roper: “A 33. See, e.g., D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 243; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 237, 324; Memorandum

of Sir Robert

; Vansittart, 6 July 1937, C 5933/665/18, FO 371/20733. serving to sput Hitler on 34. Carroll, p. 104. She also notes the irony in Thomas’s gloomy memoranda probably appears to me to or to hasten his timetable when Thomas had intended the opposite. This type of explanation

class discussed in the be more plausible than the concept of internal concern over trouble with the working

“ Ant La t age works of Timothy Mason. Kampf fir einen maritimen Der Skandinavien: und Hitler Raeder, Gemzell, Carl-Axel in is survey best 35. The oY Operationsplan (Lund: Gleerup, 1965); cf. Differ, pp. 374-76. and 36. Raeder outlined his ideas to Hitler, Rudolf Hess, Lutz Schwerin

von Krosigk, Joseph Goebbels,

excerpts from Raeder’s presentation in Constantin von Neurath on 3 February 1937, Jod/ Diary, TMWC, 28:350; Gemzell, pp. 49-57, 61-63, 95-96.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Cameroons would have been returned to Germany before a war started and would provide a naval base for operations in the Atlantic.’ These ideas could not yet influence Hitler, and, furthermore, the navy could at this time secure neither priority in armaments production for naval construction nor full control of naval aviation.*8 On all these issues, Hitler’s insistence on a rapidly built-up army and air force in line with his own strategic concepts gave strength and success to the opponents of the navy in the internal squabbles of the spring and summer of 1937. He pushed the navy to build up its strength—the immediate goal was the fourfold increase over the Versailles tonnage that would still leave it nominally in compliance with the Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935—but he was not willing to sacrifice rapid expansion of the army and air force to the material needs of the navy’s construction program; that position would not be modified until later. In only one field could the navy move forward essentially in accordance with its own preferences, which in this instance were largely shared by Hitler: the construction specifications for its ships. Since the initiation of the “pocket battleship” construction program in the Weimar years, these specifications had been oriented toward types suitable for offensive operations in the Atlantic. This aim continued with ships under construction in the mid-1930s, ships designed for attacks on French transoceanic supply

routes and fleet action against the French navy being equally, and intentionally, suitable for similar action against Britain. The British Foreign Office and Admiralty with astonishing credulity continued to accept false German notifications of ship specifications as accurate. When asked after World War II, the former British naval attaché in

Berlin could only explain his own and his associates’ acceptance of false figures for the battleships Bzsmarck and Tirpitz, for example, by the fact that Raeder, though an inveterate liar, seemed very sincere, qualities that would stand him in good stead both when on trial and when writing his memoirs.*? The British were misled enough not only to refrain from carefully checking out such clues to violations as came to them but to negotiate an additional naval agreement with Germany in 1937.49 Disregarding the testrictions of her naval agreement with Britain, the German navy could move in this one area as its leaders thought best; ship specifications was one field in which it did not have to argue with the army or the air force and about which it was no longer necessary to deceive the German public.*! Hitler himself, to be sure, was very interested in these technical matters, but once the concern about international repercussions which had occa37. See Raeder’s directive of 3 November 1937 for the “Kriegsspiel 1937/38” cited in Gemzell, pp. 58-59.

38. On the problem of naval aviation, see in addition to Gemzell, p. 174, the study prepared after World War Il: U.S., Office of Naval Intelligence, “German Naval Air, 1933 to 1945: A Report Based on German Naval Staff Documents,” 15 January 1947 (Washington: ONI, mimeographed). All studies of the war at sea stress Germany’s deficiencies in this regard. 39. Donald McLachlan, Room 39: A Study in Naval Intelligence (New York: Atheneum, 1968), pp. 136-40. It should

be noted

that Raedet’s

lies served

first to mislead

the British, later to exculpate

himself at the

Nuremberg trial, and finally to provide a basis for German apologias for the German invasion of Norway. For a tabulation of the true as opposed to the announced tonnages of German warships as of 18 February 1938, see

TMWC, 34:188; cf. Differ, p. 313. The inherent problem for Raeder’s continuous deceptions was that during

the war he wanted to stress that he had always thought and planned for a war with England, while after the war he wanted to prove the opposite. See also Albert Speer, Spandaner Tagebiicher (Berlin: Propylaen, 1975), p. 472.

40. On this episode, which illustrates the final British attempt to limit the naval arms race on an international basis by a series of bilateral agreements as well as the German interest in building up a navy with pretended but no real regard for treaty limitations, see Donald C. Watt, “Anglo-German Naval Negotiations on the Eve of the Second World Wat,” Journal of the Royal United Service Institution. 103 (1958), 201-7, 384-91; Diilffer, pp. 4026, 410, 413-19; G.D., C, 5, Nos. 571, 638; 6, Nos. 35, 40, 50, 68, 94, 136, 160, 179, 206, 260, 275, 282, 308, 367, 369, 399, 438, 451, 495; D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 15, 69, 81; 6, Nos. 91, 119, 143, 260, 298, 458. 41. The original “pocket battleship” program in the 1920s had been justified to the Reichstag by fairy tales about defending communications with East Prussia to preclude domestic and foreign opposition because of their true purpose of offensive naval warfare in the Atlantic.

Hittler’s Preparations, 1937-38

309

sionally enforced restraint in the earlier years was dropped, his pressure coincided with the inclination of the navy toward larger ships, heavier gun calibers, and shorter construction times.‘ The main emphasis of German rearmament in the mid-1930s was concentrated on the air force and the army, with the navy receiving very substantial funds but not priority for the long lead-time required in the construction of large ships. Although Hitler wanted a large fleet in the not too distant future, the air and ground forces at first had priority. The emphasis on the army and air force, however, was also not without problems. While

the many technical and organizational issues of rearmament had few implications for long-term policy,’ the question of the proper command structure overall of Germany’s armed forces had some very significant repercussions on policy issues, in part at least because it was never fully resolved in the Third Reich and therefore festered at times in the background and at times in the open. During the years of the Weimar Republic the problem of how Germany’s military forces were to be directed as a whole was not of great importance. There was no legal air force. The army tried, with some success, to assert its complete independence of all out-

side control. The navy wanted to do the same thing and—though this has been obscured by the emphasis of scholarship and publicity on the army—largely succeeded, at least in regard to planning and personnel. That success was to carry over at least partially into the National Socialist period. Two factors were responsible for the navy’s success in both etas. One was the fact that all matters pertaining to the sea were outside the general experience of German government leaders of all parties; this gave the navy a partial immunity to outside interference. The reluctance of outsiders was reinforced by a second element: personal continuity. From 1928 until the end of World War II the German navy had only two chiefs, Admiral Erich Raeder until 1943 and Admiral Karl Donitz there-

after. Having already served for five years as head of the navy when Hitler came to power, Raeder was in an excellent position to withstand any effort to make him and his naval staff subordinate to any overall command structure.“ If personal continuity on the inside and diffidence about naval matters on the outside protected the navy, personal and political factors would protect the new air force. Hermann Géring was made air minister as well as commander-in-chief of the German ait force from the very beginning, and in addition jumped in rank sufficiently to give him rank at first equivalent and later superior to that of the chiefs of the other branches of the armed forces. His cabinet status placed him on a par with war minister Werner von Blomberg, to whom, though not yet equal in rank, he could nevertheless give orders in

certain areas as plenipotentiary for the Four-Year Plan. In any case, Goring’s personal closeness to Hitler guaranteed that the air force, which was the former’s pride and joy even more than the dozens of other agencies he accumulated, would be effectively independent of any military command structure below the chief of state himself. The importance of these special factors assuring independence to the navy and air force will be seen in the impact of the attempt to establish a central overall command (Frankfurt/M: 42. Diilffer, rather than Michael Salewski, Die deutsche Seekriegsleitung 1935-1945, 1, 1935-1947 On the trend Bernard & Graefe, 1970), appeats to me to understand Hitler’s role in these matters correctly. 383-86. pp. Differ, see toward bigger and bigger battleships, of German emphasis— 43, It might be argued that one important exception to this was the long-term impact these planes were unsuited strongly urged by Hitler—on dive-bombers. Useful for tactical support operations,

posed technical for distant and strategic operations; and the requirement that planes be able to dive-bomb

long-range bomber type of the obstacles to the development of the true four-engined bomber, the obvious

with its four engines mounted 1930s and 1940s. Germany’s failure in this field symbolized by the Heinkel 177 but this was unanticipated. in tandem in two nacelles—had an impact on Germany’s strategic capabilities,

121-28, 163-68, is much better. Volket’s discussion (pp. 207-9) is unconvincing; Homze, pp. 1-4,

pp. 246-47, 209. 44, For Raeder’s eatly success in securing direct access to Hitler, see Diilffer,

310

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

structure upon the relationship between that structure and the command and general staff of the army.*> As first General Walther von Reichenau and after 1 October 1935 General Wilhelm Keitel together with his chief assistant Alfred Jodl attempted to create an atmed forces command structure in the office of the minister of war, there followed a

direct clash between them and the commandet-in-chief and chief-of-staff of the army. Given the independence of the navy and the air force, the developing “Armed Forces Office” (Wehrmachtamt) with its “National Defense Section” (Abreilung Landesverteidigung) threatened to become a sort of competing army general staff at a higher level. In von Reichenau’s time, the conflict was muted, in part because von Reichenau did not build

up the National Defense Section to the point where it might, by the number, rank, and qualifications of its officers, be seen as an effective staff for directing German military operations. Whether von Reichenau missed the opportunity because of laziness—he was not a man for organizational busywork—or calculation—he still hoped to become commander-in-chief of the army himself; by the time he was shifted to command Military District VII in October 1935 the chance to do so before the outbreak of war had passed.*° His successors, the team of Keitel and Jodl, were enthusiastic advocates of a

centralized armed forces command structure and moved as rapidly as they could to effectuate that concept. Their efforts produced a major clash with the army leadership in which organizational, ideological, and foreign policy issues were intertwined.*”

The new team in the Armed Forces Office saw itself as new in more ways than one. They not only wanted to assume the role of staff planners for all the armed forces in theory and the army in practice, they saw the role of such a staff in a different way. The general staff tradition of the Prussian and then German army before, during, and after the World War had insisted on a major advisory role in broad strategic-political matters. The risks to be run, the basic nature of military deployment, and at times even the details

of foreign policy had been considered within the proper sphere of general staff advice, if not direction.*® If there had at times been a dangerously exaggerated tendency toward military control of decisions that were very properly political—a tendency personified by Erich Ludendorff—the orientation ‘of Keitel and Jodl was in the opposite direction. Personally fascinated by Hitler and impressed by the dynamism of his movement, they now wanted the military to operate as a purely technical executive arm of the Fihrer; they

would merely translate his commands as transmitted by the minister of wat into formal military directives, the more detailed elaboration of which could then be left to the separate general staffs of the branches of the armed forces. No one along the route, neither they themselves nor most assuredly the staffs of the army, navy, or ait force, had any business giving advice about the wisdom or unwisdom of the orders given. If Hitler with the Féihbrerprinzip, the leadership principle, had transferred

the rule of absolute

obedience to superior orders from the infantry company to the political arena, they now wanted it returned to the military establishment at the very top. That in this attempt they would clash with an army leadership insisting on its own responsibility to give advice and weigh risks, and that they would find themselves in full accord with Hitler’s preferences was to be expected.” When the first outline for a German surprise attack on Czechoslovakia had gone in 1935 from the Armed Forces Office over von Blomberg’s signature to the high 45. The best survey is in Miller, chap. 5. 46. A serious study of von Reichenau is badly needed. 47. The first author who recognized the interrelationship of the policy and organizational issues was Gemzell, but it has been most clearly discussed by Miller. 48. Gordon Craig, The Politics ofthe Prussian Army, 1640-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1956). 49. It should be noted that although there was a short clash between Hitler and Jodl in the fall of 1942, Keitel and Jodl both retained Hitler’s confidence until 1945, a confidence they reciprocated more than fully.

Hitler's Preparations, 1937-38

ld

command of the army, the army chief-of-staff, General Ludwig Beck, had rejected the

whole idea and simply refused to work on it.5° It was then, and continued to be, his judgment that any such attack would lead to a general war which Germany must lose. In June 1937 the Armed Forces Office once again prepared and von Blomberg issued an overall plan for the employment of Germany’s armed forces, and once again this created difficulties.°! The general directive stated that Germany had no need to be concerned about an attack from any quartet because of the opposition to wat in almost every country and because of the inadequate preparations for war in the Soviet Union as well as other nations. Germany herself had no intention of launching a general European war, but there were certain specific situations in which she could take the initiative—presumably leading to a limited, not a general war. In addition, there were general deployment plans for a defensive wat in the west against France, called “Red,” and for an offensive war against Czechoslovakia, called “Green.” When this outline was sent to the high command of the German army, Beck, pre-

sumably with the support of the commander-in-chief Werner von Fritsch, simply ignored the portion which called for specific preparations for a German initiative called “Otto,” which involved an invasion of Austria if there were an attempt to restore the

Habsburgs there. The possibility of restoring Otto von Habsburg to the throne was much discussed at the time,>2 but Beck believed that under the circumstances of 1937 a

German invasion of Austria would lead to a general war. Since von Blomberg and his staff had not consulted the army on the basic issue of the risks involved, Beck just disregarded the order.°> Von Fritsch, moreover, went to the Armed Forces Office in person

and complained.** He criticized the whole manner in which the Armed Forces Office operated and the way it was issuing orders such as the annual directives for the conduct of war, of which the one for 1937—38 had just come

out, without prior consultation

between the minister of war and the commander-in-chief of the army.°> Since there appeared to be little inclination to accept this view, von Fritsch further suggested that the minister of war himself take over the command of the army, thereby emphasizing the key role of the army in Germany’s military posture, clarifying the command relationships, and—though he did not point this out—bringing von Blomberg into direct contact with the advice he would receive from Beck and the army general staff, not just the drafting 50. See above, p. 176. The interpretation of the directive of 1935 given (ibid.) has now been further substantiated in Diilffer, pp. 318-19, and all efforts to pretend that it was of a routine and precautionary rather than aggressive nature can be dismissed. 51. The “Weisung 1937/38” of 24 June 1937 is in TMWC, 23:733-45, and Walter Gorlitz (ed.), Generalfeldmarschall Keitel, Verbrecher order Offizier? (Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1961) (hereafter cited as Keztel Papers), pp. 115~23. It had been discussed in Hitler’s presence as early as 27 January 1937 (Jod/ Diary, TMWC, 28:249-50). A British estimate of German army strength at about this time in C 5456/136/18, FO 371/20731.

52. The subject of a possible Habsburg restoration is covered in chap. 23. 53. Wolfgang Foerster, Ein General kdmpft gegen den Krieg: Aus den nachgelassenen Papieren des Generalstabschefs Ludnig in Beck (Munich: Minchener-Dom Verlag, 1949), p. 63. This does not mean that Beck opposed the Axschluss, it believed Beck which in circumstances under order the gave Hitler when preparations staff 1938 he made the was safe for Germany to move. TMWC, 54. The date of this meeting between von Fritsch and Keitel was probably 15 July 1937 (see Jod! Diary, Ausserungen des 27:355). The record, from Jodl’s papers and initialed by Keitel, is entitled “Ansichten und 1937),” Nuremberg Ob.d.H. gegeniiber Chef WA (niedergeschrieben unmittelbar nach der Aussprache Juli document 1781-PS, National Archives.

.

“00

the military district 55. Von Fritsch also complained about the Armed Forces Office scheme to replace but later applied to dropped was plan This 231-32). pp. (Miiller, commanders forces armed with commanders to secure in Africa hoped Germany colonies the for intended and II War World some of the occupied areas in Geschichte und Gegenwartsbemusstsein: (Gerhard L. Weinberg, “German Colonial Plans and Policies, 1938-1942,” 487). This was clearly the direction Festschrift fiir Hans Rothfels (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1963], p. Hitler’s perception of the internal of framework the in belongs properly issue the but take, to Hitler intended structure of his future empire.

312

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

assistance of Keitel and Jodl. The arguments continued through the summer and fall of 1937, at this tune focused more on the respective roles of the headquarters of the army and of the Armed Forces Office than on broader policy issues. Although he made a friendly visit to Paris in June 1937, Beck thought of France as Germany’s most likely and most dangerous enemy.°° He was, however, opposed to the risk of any war which was likely to become general, and this meant in effect, though not in theory, practically any war started by Germany at all. The problem of those risks and the probability of incurring them was, of course, in the background of the controversy as Keitel and Jodl argued for their position of unquestioning implementation of whatever inspiration the leader of Germany might pass on to his soldiers. While the argument among the latter over command structure was still in progress—and precluded any really united front among them—Hitler summoned the highest figures in the Reich to a conference at which he voiced the inspirations he wanted implemented. As the foreign exchange and materials allocation crisis of 1936 had precipitated Hitler’s decision to establish the Four-Year Plan in accordance with a detailed exposition of his views on the subject, so problems in the rearmament program led him to expound his views on the tasks immediately ahead to his chief military and foreign policy advisers in November 1937. The immediate occasion was the critical problem of steel allocation: the navy had pointed out to von Blomberg on October 25 that there was no prospect of completing its existing construction program unless there were substantial additional allocations both to firms directly engaged in naval contracts and to new Krupp steel works.*’ Hitler, of course, always saw such economic problems as aspects of Germany’s need for Lebensraum, and his repeated references to that subject in his speeches in October and November 1937, as well as at the famous conference of 5 November, must be

seen in this light.>® Hitler’s self-confidence had grown; the recent visit of Benito Mussolini, which will

‘be discussed later, surely contributed to this. One of the results of that visit had been the dismissal of Hans Steinacher as head of the Association for Germandom Abroad (Volksbund fiir das Deutschtum im Ausland, VDA), and the assignment of full and open control over the organizations for those of German descent abroad to the SS. Steinacher had been dropped at Mussolini’s request because of his continued support of the German element in South Tyrol in disregard of German promises to Italy; but as General Karl Haushofer explained to Rudolf Hess, the replacement of Steinacher by an SS officer with

the obvious implication of total and direct German government control was a step that could be taken only if Germany felt strong enough to take gambles. After almost five years of National Socialist rule Berlin was prepared to run such a risk.5? The open control 56. On Beck’s visit to Paris, see Miiller, pp. 634-35; Foerster, pp. 47-49; Hans Speidel (ed.), Ludwig Beck, Studien (Stuttgart: K. F. Koehler, 1955), pp. 295-302; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 94, 152. French General Maurice Gamelin

was favorably impressed; and when Sir Orme Sargent in the British Foreign Office commented how the French appeared to get along better with the German general than the Polish colonel [Foreign Minister Josef Beck], Anthony Eden noted that this was not so curious for those who knew the colonel (C 4888/822/17, FO 371/20696). 57. Differ, pp. 446-47. 58. Note the reference to Lebensraum and the need to solve the problem soon while he himself was still alive in Hitler’s talk to propaganda officials in late October 1937 (Max Domatus [ed.], Hitler, Reden und Proklamationen, 1932-1945 [Neustadt a.d. Aisch: Verlagsdruckerei Schmidt, 1962], 1:745); the discussion of Lebensraum in his Augsburg speech of 21 November (ibid., 760); and the secret speech of 23 November (Henry Picker, Hitlers Tischgespriche im Ftibrerhauptquartier 1941-42 [Bonn: Athenaum, 1951], pp. 443-50). _ 59. Hans-Adolf Jacobsen (ed.), Hans Steinacher Bundesleiter des VDA 1933-1937 (Boppard: Harald Boldt, 1970), pp. 380-81, 403-9, 413, 415-16, 469-73; G.D., C, 6, No. 576. Steinacher asserted that if Germany gave up the

minority in South Tyrol, no one would take her interest in the Sudeten Getmans seriously (Jacobsen, Steinacher, pp. 451-53;

Derringer,

“Informationsbericht

Nr. 147,” 23 October

1937, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer,

Z.S¢g.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

312

of those of German ancestry, in addition to those of German citizenship, living in other countries, which was firmly established in 1937 represents a dropping of pretense as to future policy that can be compared with the open announcement of rearmament in 1935. It shows how secure the German government by then felt its position to be. When Hitler met with the minister of war, foreign minister, and the chiefs of the three branches of the armed forces, with his military adjutant, Friedrich Hossbach, taking the notes on which to base the record he wrote five days later, the man who controlled Germany gave his own assessment of the current situation and his future plans as far as he cared to reveal them.*! He described what he was telling them as his considered views, to be looked upon as his last testament if he died—a personal element that Hitler repeatedly brought into policy discussions.°* Germany, he asserted, needed space for her population which could not be fed from her present space, even if some of her raw materials needs could be covered. Dependence on world trade would not do; it limited independence and was in any case dubious in a world in which all countries were industrializing.°> Germany would have to expand by seizing agriculturally useful land. This would involve war, and Germany had to decide where to seize the most with the least risk. Britain and France would always oppose Germany and would yield no colonies unless they were faced by the threat of superior force. But they were both weaker than ever, Britain because of the process of dissolution of her empire and France because of her internal political troubles.“* Force alone could solve Germany’s problems, and the only questions to be answered were where and how. In his discussion of the possible answers to these questions, Hitler threw together

two types of considerations, the short-term one of “improving our military-political situation” which required the conquest of Austria and Czechoslovakia, and the long-term one of “solving the German space problem.” Many have assumed that the two were identical, though it is clear that Hitler did not. He saw the short-term task as preliminary 101/31, ££.341—43). 60. See Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik 1933-1938 1968), pp. 234ff., 495ff.; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 141, 504. 61. The

memorandum

of Hossbach

is printed in G.D.,

D, 1, No.

(Frankfurt/M: Alfred Metzner,

19, and in TMWC,

25:403-13;

a

supplementary statement by Hossbach is in TMWC, 42:222-30. An important source is Hossbach’s memoirs, Zwischen Wehrmacht und Hitler (Wolfenbittel: Wolfenbiitteler Verlagsanstalt, 1949). Jodl’s references to the meeting are in his diary, TMWC,

28:355, 356, 376. For detailed analyses, see Miiller, pp. 243-45; Walter

Bussmann, “Zur Entstehung und Uberlieferung der ‘Hossbach Niederschrift,”” Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 16, No. 4 (October 1968), 373-84; Hermann Gackenholz, “Reichskanzlei, 5. November

1937,” Forschungen xu

Staat und Verfassung: Festgabe fir Fritz Hartung (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1958), pp. 59-84; Peter Kielmansegg, “Die militarisch-politische Tragweite det Hossbach-Besprechung,” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 8, No. 3 (july 1960), 268-74. The account in Deutsch, chap. 3, relies too heavily on the self-serving testimony and memoirs of Admiral Raeder. The silly speculations about postwar alterations of the text in Goran Henrikson,

“Das Nirnberger Dokument

386-PS

(das ‘Hossbach-Protokoll’),” Probleme deutscher Zeitgeschichte,

Lund Studies in International History, 2 (1970), 151-94, have been refuted in Bradley F. Smith, Reaching Judgement at Nuremberg (New York: Basic Books, 1977), pp. 140-42. to 62. See, e.g., the comment recorded on 31 October 1937 that “he probably did not have very much longer at the live; in his family the people did not live to an old age” (Domartus, 1:745) as well as his reference

comments November meeting to the attitude of Italy depending on whether Mussolini were still alive. Hitler’s

about the in May and August 1939 were similarly focused on his own and the Duce’s lifespan; Hitler’s worry

by his fiftieth possibility that he might die before he could start the first of his wars was apparently accentuated in early May 1938 birthday in April of that year. For Hitler’s decision to move more rapidly on Czechoslovakia at the time he thought he was suffering from cancer, see p. 581 below. 1. 63. This was an old theme of Hitler’s; see Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 60 and n.

not about to come apart 64. Note Hitler’s expression of doubt at Frangois-Poncet’s assurance that France was

and Beck’s perception of (D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 250). In a way, Hitler’s view of France was similar to Goerdeler’s weaknesses of the two basic the saw correctly but difficulties immediate the d overestimate all Germany:

countries.

314

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

to the other; it would provide added food supply for “5—6 million” —assuming the expulsion of several million Czechs and Austrians—as contrasted with the long-term need to solve the space problem for “about 1-3 generations.”®° The short-term task would help with the bigger one by creating “a shorter better boundary, by freeing troops” and by making possible the recruitment of additional troop units “to the extent of about 12 divisions.” The long-term goal of solving Germany’s space problem would thus be aided by the prior seizure of Austria and Czechoslovakia; the troops freed by better borders and the additional divisions recruited in the annexed territory as well as the economic resoutces of the seized lands would strengthen Germany for its next wat. Hitler argued that the effort to reach the long-term goal would have to be launched by 1943-45;

thereafter the odds would

shift against Germany

as her own

stock of

weapons became obsolete and her potential enemies rearmed, caught up with Germany, and would then be able to pick /heir time to act.°° Germany’s military forces would a// have to be ready by 1943-45, therefore, and the decision made in the second portion of this meeting to allocate to the navy the steel it would need reflects Hitler’s clear understanding that the long construction time of warships made such a decision necessary at this time if there were to be a substantial fleet ready when he planned to use it.*’ But the short-term goal might be reached much earlier, and Hitler gave a great deal of attention to the prospects and circumstances for that. Hitler thought it possible that the British had already written off Czechoslovakia and would be restrained by the difficulties within their empire and reluctance to become involved in a long European war. His assessment of pacifist sentiment in England and the leakage of information from the Imperial Conference could easily lead to this conclusion.®* He deduced further that in the absence of British support, France would be unlikely to move in defense of Czechoslovakia. Italy would have no objection to the disappearance of Czechoslovakia; only her attitude in regard to the Austrian question was still uncertain. Poland would not move if Germany succeeded quickly; and the Soviet Union, unlikely to move because of the attitude of Japan, would be precluded from intervening by the speed of Germany’s action. If the internal problems of France degefierated into civil war, Germany would move against Czechoslovakia immediately. The other potential opportunity for a sudden move might be created by a war in the Mediterranean between Italy and France or Italy with England and France arising out of the struggle for control of that area or out of the Spanish Civil War. A possible clash of Italy and France in the Mediterranean was an idea that Hitler had long contemplated.® 65. The population of Germany was growing at an annual rate of four to five hundred thousand at this time. 66. Any analysis of the incipient rearmament programs of England and France as well as the likelihood of some

eventual American effort would suggest that from the perspective of 1937 this was a by no means unreasonable prediction. If Germany could not afford to scrap the stocks of planes and tanks on which her early rearmament program was based, replacing them with newer models even better than those on which Britain and France standardized their late efforts, there was indeed an element of time pressure.

67. Differ, pp. 447-51, gives the decisions and cites the appropriate sources. The fact that raw materials were discussed and that new allocations to the navy were decided upon wete the only specifics of the meeting that the French ambassador in Berlin learned about at the time (D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 196). 68. As United States Assistant Secretary of State George S. Messersmith had written on 11 October 1937: “It is the fears of war and the horrors of wat which persist in the democratic states, and understandably so, which ate paralyzing our action. It is exactly this which the fascist states are deliberately capitalizing ... This fear of war in the democracies which has been accompanied by an extraordinary patience which does them credit may if cartied beyond a certain point lead to their ruin . . The dictators hope and are playing their hand on the hope that the patience of the democracies will be carried beyond the point of safety.” Messersmith went on to the aspect which led Hitler to set a date for war beyond which he would not wait: “The democracies hope that by the exercise of patience they will wear out the dictatorships and in the meantime are increasing their own strength through rearmament” (U.S. 1937, 1:143—-44). 69. Hitlers zweites Buch, p. 178 and n. 1.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

315

As for a war arising out of the Spanish Civil War, this was a possibility on which Hitler had speculated for some time, and which was in part responsible for his decision in December 1936 to limit German aid to Franco in the hope of prolonging the Civil War.” He had reaffirmed that position—helping Franco a little to make sure he did not lose but not sending enough for a quick and big victory—at the end of Match 1937.7! The possibility that Germany was egging Italy on to a greater role in Spain in the hope of precipitating a war between her and the Western Powets of which Germany could then take advantage by action in Central and Eastern Europe had wottied the British government all during 1937.” In his talk on 5 November, Hitler’s cynical attitude was most explicit: Germany wanted a long war in Spain, not a quick victory for Franco. To accentuate tension in the Mediterranean which might precipitate a war between Italy and the Western Powers, Italy should be urged to stay in the Balearic Islands, an action that could be justified only by the need for Italian assistance to Franco in a continuing civil war, but that France and England could not tolerate indefinitely. In fact, when in Rome

ten days before, Joachim von Ribbentrop had told the Italians that Hitler wanted them to keep the island of Majorca in the Balearics; an assertion that surely reflects instructions to this effect that von Ribbentrop had received from Hitler before this trip and that followed the same line as the comments of Hitler to those gathered on 5 November.’73 In the discussion which followed, von Blomberg and von Fritsch argued strongly that Britain and France might not stay out of a war Germany started in Central Europe, and that Germany was not ready to face them. Von Neurath expressed doubts about the imminence of a war between Italy and the Western Powers in the Mediterranean. Hitler maintained his own position; but when von Fritsch suggested that in view of what had been said he ought not to go through with his intended leave, Hitler responded that the

probability of war was not quite that close. In any analysis of this famous meeting several points must be stressed. The general line of argument with which Hitler justified his intention to go to war was the same as the one he had used in public before 1933 and repeatedly afterwards in meetings with his political associates and his military advisers. No one argued at the meeting with his longterm aims. With his short-term aims, no one argued either; all the objections raised dealt with his calculations as to the risks involved. All assumed that the annexation of Austria was a correct aim of German policy.” The destruction of Czechoslovakia was similarly considered appropriate. Géring had been preaching it for years. Von Neurath had 70. See above, pp. 231-33. 71. See the entry inJodl’s diary for 30 March 1937, TMWC, 28:353. 72. Note that material on this possibility relayed by Norman Ebbutt, the Times correspondent in Berlin, was taken seriously in the Foreign Office in April (C 2845/3/18, FO 371/20710) and that in May the Foreign Office sent to the British embassies in Rome and Berlin information—to be burned after reading—that Hitler and other National Socialist leaders were speculating on a British-Italian war to enable them to seize what they wished in Central and Eastern Europe without a war (C 3525/3/18, FO 371/20710). 32. 73. Galeazzo Ciano, Tagebiicher 1937/38 (Hamburg: Wolfgang Kriger Verlag, 1949), 24 October 1937, p. not reduce the Cf. G.D., D, 1, No. 86. The fact that a war in the Mediterranean did not take place does

for opporimportance of Hitler’s speculations as evidence for his views and procedures. Clearly he was looking up. The turn did expected not had he others while came, never anticipated he that tunities to move; some suitable for critical issue, surely, is Hitlet’s intent to take advantage of whatever opportunities he considered Soe ; specific actions he planned to take. the inside, some time not outside, the from over taken be would Austria that policy the set had Hitler 74, D, 1, No. 216). The Getman before; and this was generally understood in the German government (see G.D.,

in May that both ella and minister to Vienna, Franz von Papen, had told the Hungarian minister there Kerekes [ed.], Akten Czechoslovakia would disappear (Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 260, German text in Lajos Aca Historica, 7, Osterreichs,” Annexion der Vorgeschichte zur Ausseren des Ministeriums des Ungarischen

Nos. 3—4 [1960], 378-79). 75. See above, p. 248.

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assured an old friend in Match 1937 that Czechoslovakia would have to be destroyed.”° Von Fritsch explained at the meeting that he was having exercises conducted to explore ways of attacking Czechoslovakia, while von Blomberg and Géring parroted large parts of Hitler’s views two weeks later, von Blomberg to Lord Halifax and Goring to William Bullitt. On 20 November, von Blomberg told the British lord president of the council: “The vital questions for Germany with her expanding population and set as she was in the middle of Europe, were those which concerned her Central and Eastern European

position. If everybody tried to sit on every safety value, there was bound to be an explosion.” The colonial question was secondary, and the Czechs were a bad lot.”” A few days before, Goring had told the American ambassador to Paris, who was visiting Berlin, that Austria would be annexed as would the Sudeten Germans (without referring to the fate of the Czechs),’”* though a few days later he referred to the destruction of the Czechoslovak state as a whole in his conversations with the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister.”? Even the German army chief of staff, Ludwig Beck, in his critique of Hitler’s views expressed in a memorandum that comments point by point on the record of the November conference, did not disagree with the aim of annexing Austria

and destroying Czechoslovakia.®° What Beck as well as von Fritsch, von Blomberg and von Neurath criticized was the assessment by Hitler that Britain and France would stay out of a war that Germany might start in Central Europe. They doubted that this was correct and were afraid that Germany would run the risk of a general war. Beck, furthermore, was appalled at the whole line of reasoning which led Hitler to conclude that war was necessary; but Beck’s view was not shared by any of those present. Von Neurath had his doubts, which he apparently expressed to Hitler again inJanuary 1938, but no vigorous argument could be expected from him.®! As he explained to Lord Halifax shortly after the conference, “the Nazi system was the only thing to save Germany.”®? Raeder said nothing in the first part of the November meeting. Since his testimony 76. C 2337/3/18, FO 371/20710 (the friend was Ernst Jaeckh). Von Neurath’s violent comments to the Austrian minister to Yugoslavia during his visit to Belgrade in June 1937 also alerted the British Foreign Office to his attitude (R 4087/493/3, FO 371/21118). I am inclined to give greater credence to the views von Neurath expressed in 1937 than to his protestations at the Nuremberg trial as evidence of his opinions at the time. 77. Lotd Halifax’s record in C 8161/270/18, FO 371/20736, £.341. Note that von Blomberg told Sir Ivone

Kirkpatrick, the first secretary of the British embassy in Berlin, that he was afraid he might not have made himself sufficiently clear to Lord Halifax and wanted to repeat that “Germany had an expanding population and her expansion was inevitable. This was a fact. It would remain a fact even if Hitler died or disappeared. England could still sit on all the safety valves, but-an explosion would eventually occur and no-one in Germany could prevent it” (ibid., £.345). 78. U.S. 1937, 1:171-72. 79. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 313 (German text in Kerekes, pp. 379-82); Laszlé Zsigmond, “Ungarn und das

Miunchener Abkommen,” Ada Historica, 6, Nos. 3-4 (1959), 261-62. 80. Beck was shown the memorandum by Hossbach himself since he was acting in von Fritsch’s place during the latter’s leave. Beck’s memorandum of 12 November 1937 is in the Bundesarchiv, H 08-28/ 4, item 52. See

the comments in Miiller, pp. 249-51, and Deutsch, pp. 72-74. An important aspect of Beck’s memorandum from the historiographic point of view is that it confirms the accuracy of the transmitted text of the Hossbach memorandum. Hossbach himself told the three military adjutants about the meeting and read his memorandum to them (see the summary by David Irving of Oberst Nicolaus von Below, “Aufzeichnung aus dem Winter 1948/49; Zwischen Aufstieg und Absturz: Hitler und die Luftwaffe,” p. 3, Munich, IfZ).

As early as the beginning of March 1937 a German officer told the Lithuanian military attaché in Berlin that

Germany would build up her forces until the fall of 1938 and then go after Czechoslovakia (D.D.F., 2d, 5, No.

58). The general thrust of German plans was widely undetstood. 81. Deutsch, pp. 71-72, argues for a firmer stand on von Neurath’s part. In April 1937 von Neurath had told the departing British ambassador, Sir Eric Phipps, that his own position was secure, and that Hitler had promised to keep him beyond his 65th birthday (2 February 1938), but whether he was really that sure as the

date approached is another matter (C 2841/165/18, FO 371/20732). See also TMWC, 40:447.

82. C 8161/270/18, FO 371/20736, £.338.

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at Nuremberg and his memoirs ate unreliable, one can only assume that he was—as usual—in general agreement with Hitler. On those occasions when he disagreed or wished to arouse Hitlet’s interest in policies and possibilities differing from those already contemplated, Raeder never hesitated to express himself. The second part of the meeting which was to deal with the immediate question of raw materials allocation was the critical one for him, and he could be confident that Hitlet’s preference for war would bring the decisions the navy wanted—as indeed happened. Hitler did, however, have a plan to deal with the danger that some of his advisers

warned about. In this conference, as in all German internal planning on the Czech question, emphasis was always on the destruction of Czechoslovakia as a state, not on the

presence of the Sudeten Germans and their fate. On the contrary, as Hitler explained his views at the November meeting, the nationality problem of Czechoslovakia was the presence of Czechs who would have to be expelled (zwangsweise Emigration), not Germans who needed help.®* In the propaganda campaign leading up to what Hitler hoped and expected to be a war only against Czechoslovakia, however, all the stress was on the

terrible persecution to which her German and other minorities were allegedly subjected. Such propaganda would assist in the moral and hence diplomatic isolating of Czechoslovakia from that assistance by the Western Powers which Hitler believed unlikely but his advisers claimed to be probable. This campaign will be examined subsequently, but its role as a method of shielding very different aims is certainly clarified by Hitler’s comments on 5 November 1937. There have been efforts since the record of those comments came to light to interpret them away or to pretend that they were unimportant or meaningless. Such efforts ate solely of interest for an understanding of the methodology or politics of their authors.*4 They are irrelevant for an understanding of German foreign policy or military planning since none of those present at the meeting or immediately informed of Hitler’s wishes could possibly know that there ever would be such a literature; they were much too busy ttying to carry out what they took to be the dictator’s orders. Raeder was pleased to have been assured the steel allocations he needed and could now have the naval construction program move forward, especially the building of the larger warships, with the anticipation of added supplies in the future from new steel works for the even more enormous superbattleships planned for later.*> Just in case the British needed further discouragement from supporting Austria or Czechoslovakia in the immediate future—or did in fact go to war—an immediate speeding up of submarine building was ordered on the very day of the meeting.5° The new general construction plan for the navy that would reflect the November decisions would take a few weeks to prepare; it was issued on 21 December.®”

Géring also immediately gave some new directives to the general staff of the air force. Both to assure a uniform approach by all branches of the armed forces—when each was working out its own implementing procedures—and in accordance with their concept of the military as being purely an instrument and never an adviser of the political leader, Keitel and Jodl now prepared a supplement to the general war directive of 24

a plan for precisely 83. After von Neurath was appointed Reichsprotector of Bohemia and Moravia, he proposed wey 33:252-59). such expulsions (IMWG, 84. Such works ate listed in notes 3 and 4 of Bussmann’s study cited in n. 61, above. ; nea 85. Dulffer, p. 447. could be ordered for sersubmarines time: construction of that again is point critical The 451-53. pp. 86. Ibid., tabulation, ibid., pp. Rohwer’s (see years five to four took battleships and cruisers vice about two years later;

570-79). 87. Ibid., p. 455.

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June.88 Von Blomberg’s agreement to this approach, in spite of his reservations at the November meeting, may well have been caused by his eagerness to utilize an expression of Hitler’s will to override all objections in the high command of the army to the issuance of such general directives. He had run into objections when he had issued these directives on his own authority; once the revision of his own prior order had been personally approved by Hitler, it could hardly be resisted without an open break with the Fuhrer himself.8? The revision was accordingly prepared in the Armed Forces Office by 7 December, approved by Hitler on the 13th, and issued like the navy’s new program on 2isDecembert937. The directive of the previous June had left open the possibility of “military exploitation of politically favorable opportunities”; the new formulation called for an “aggressive wat against Czechoslovakia.” The timing of such a move Hitler had not yet decided, as his response to von Fritsch’s question about going on leave reveals. The words, the

orders, and the procedures of this whole episode illuminate the combination of predetermined planning and opportunistic execution in Hitler’s approach to foreign policy; he had picked his goal and alerted his generals to get ready, but he would move forward as opportunity offered. While Germany awaited the opportunity, her military forces proceeded with the planning for aggressive action. The military concepts were fairly simple. As and when the time was ripe, Austria would be occupied; and it was not thought likely that this operation would require major military action. Czechoslovakia, however, was in an entirely different category. The bulk of Germany’s army and air force would be directed against her with the aim of a quick conquest of Bohemia and Moravia (Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine being left to presumptive allies, either Hungary or Poland or both). While that conquest was in process, minimal German forces would stand on the defensive in the west. If there were any prospect of surprise, the German ait force would attack the Western

Powers’

air forces at their bases, but otherwise

just support the

holding action in the west. More important in supporting that holding action would be fortifications constructed in the* remilitarized Rhineland along Germany’s western frontier. Such fortifications would assist the smaller German forces there and delay any attacking force until the main German army could come to the western front after the crushing of Czechoslovakia. Quite possibly the very existence of the fortifications would reinforce French disinclination to attack Germany in the west at all, and thus leave

France’s eastern allies to their fate—a speculation that would prove largely sound.”! In a summary report on the German army in the fall of 1937, the British military attaché in Berlin, Elliot Hotblack, suggested, in agreement with the ambassador, that the

German army was strong enough for Germany to be immune to attack herself and that it could be ready to attack others by 1940 or possibly earlier. Only shortages of raw materials or an overthrow of the regime could avert this danger.°? There were no signs of the latter, although the summer of 1937 did see the first serious contacts between British officials and Carl Goerdeler, who was becoming something of a leader of the opposition to Hitler inside Germany.’’ As for the former possibility, it confronted Britain with the 88. Millet, pp. 246-47. Note Jodl’s subsequent reference to “Weisungen y. 24.6, 5.11.37. 7.12.37. 30.5.38” in his diary, TMWC, 28:376. 89. ps probably explains the absence of a reaction by Beck; he was not yet psychologically ready for an open break. 90. TMWG, 28:356; 34:745-47; G.D., D, 7:547-51. 91. The details of German military preparations for the attack on Czechoslovakia will not be reviewed here. Only the broader policy aspects of the military plans will be taken up at appropriate points. 92. See n. 94, below. 93. On Goerdelet’s conversations in London, where he met with Sir Robert Vansittart, in June 1937, see C

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tisk of war with Germany when she was lean and angry or fat and ready. As the British pondered this dilemma, the German preparations went forward. If Hitler was willing to seize such Opportunities as might arise to facilitate the annex-

ation of Austria and Czechoslovakia, and to nudge the not come soon enough,” the occasion to make drastic diplomatic advisers arose, with at least some help from of 1938. On 12 January the German minister of war

process if the opportunities did changes among his military and Hitler himself, at the beginning and commander-in-chief of the

armed forces, Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg, married a young woman who turned

out to have a police record of morals offenses. While Goring, who had had an important

role in facilitating the marriage, hoped to utilize the opportunity he had helped create in order to become minister of wat himself, Hitler seized the occasion to tid himself of a whole series of generals and diplomats, take over the position of commander-in-chief of

the armed forces himself, and appoint his own special diplomatic sage, Joachim von

Ribbentrop, to the post as the Fritsch-Blomberg an important bearing on Almost as soon as

of foreign minister. The details of what has come to be known crisis need not be recounted here, but certain aspects of it have the development of German foreign policy.% von Blomberg’s “fault” was called to Hitler’s attention, and

before anyone had had an opportunity to discuss the matter with him, he decided to dismiss von Blomberg and also to use trumped up charges of homosexuality, that he knew to be false, to dismiss von Fritsch as commandet-in-chief of the army. What has often been ignored in the literature on this crisis is that Hitler was perfectly willing to tolerate in his associates and officials all sorts of moral defects of a far more serious kind than the teal or imagined ones of the two general officers. The notorious homosexual proclivities of Ernst Rohm had not bothered Hitler; they merely provided a handy additional expla-

nation to give the German public for murdering him after he had for years led the Brown Shirts and had been made a cabinet minister. There can have been few morals charges of which Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels was not guilty, as Hitler well knew; but this

did not keep Hitler from maintaining Goebbels in office until the end of the Third Reich.®” If Hitler, therefore, acted so quickly in the cases of von Blomberg and von Fritsch, it makes no sense to attribute that haste to the Fuhrer’s disappointment in von Blomberg

ot his initial belief in the charges against von

Fritsch.

Quite the contrary.

Hitler

immediately took advantage of what looked like wonderful excuses to get rid of these 4714, C 4882/165/18, FO 371/20733; Colvin, pp. 149-55. Goerdeler hinted that in a year or so there might be

an atmy-supported government in Germany that would be friendly to Britain, but that Germany’s border with Czechoslovakia should be changed and something done about the Polish Corridor. Goerdeler was in the United States in September, and the president was prepared to see him, but there is no record of any meeting in the president’s appointment calendar (Dodd letter of 6 September 1937 and related documents in Hyde Park, OF 198-A).

94. C 6212/136/18, FO 371/20731. Eden and Vansittart both preferred the former. It should be noted that

General Ironside noted in his diary on 11 October 1937 that his trip to the German maneuvers that fall had convinced him that Hitler would start a wat (Roderick Maclead and Denis Kelly [eds.], Time Unguarded: The Ironside Diaries, 1937-1940 [New York: David McKay, 1962], pp. 31-32). 95. The extent to which Hitler hastened the pace first in the case of Austria and subsequently of Czechoslovakia will be reviewed in chaps. 23-25.

without 96. Miiller, chap. 6, is useful, but the author has been misled by too narrow a focus on the details

His proper regard for the general pattern of Hitler’s conduct. The account of Harold C. Deutsch, Hitler and in Generals: The Hidden Crisis, January-June 1938 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1974), is challenged (Munich: 1938 rise Blomberg-Fritsch-K die und Hitler Generale: der Sturx Der Tobias, Fritz and Karl-Heinz Janssen Beck, 1994). von Blomberg or 97. Concern over the repercussions of knowledge about the allegations concerning Mrs. willing to risk similar perfectly was who Hitler a for seriously advanced be hardly can Fritsch von General successor as well tepercussions—of whatever character they might be—in the cases of the wife of von Fritsch’s as in regard to the newly appointed minister of economics, Walther Funk.

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two under circumstances almost guaranteed to weaken any independence left to the military and to strengthen his own position. This was why he was so reluctant to allow the investigation which eventually showed that the charge against von Fritsch was a carefully planned frame-up, and why he could not allow the general’s rehabilitation. The peculiar advantage of the supposed faults of the two generals, from Hitlet’s point of view, was that a strong reaction from the army leadership was practically precluded as long as the sordid circumstances of the whole operation could be kept concealed. Von Blomberg’s matriage left him without support from his colleagues; he had enjoyed little enough before because he was seen as an advocate of National Socialist influence in the army. In any case, as a devoted admirer of Hitler, he could be depended upon to go quietly. Von Fritsch, though not uncritical, was equally unwilling to do anything himself ot to encourage those among the military who were inclined to act forcefully in behalf of a leader they admired and in whose downfall they sensed, even before they fully understood, a foul maneuver. In October 1926, when General Hans von Seeckt had been removed quite legally from a position equivalent to the one von Fritsch held now, the

latter, then a lieutenant colonel, had urged von Seeckt to use force against the government of the Weimar Republic in order to maintain himself in office.°* Now that von Fritsch himself was removed by Hitler in a filthy plot that involved a confrontation with a professional blackmailer in Hitler’s presence, he submitted meekly to the indignity of Gestapo interrogation and discouraged those appalled by the political as well as personal implications of the incident from doing anything that went beyond purely legalistic steps to clear his name. In a way, von Fritsch continued to believe in Hitler as he had never been willing to support the Republic. Given this loyalty to Hitler of the men removed, why did he drop them? It is too often forgotten that von Blomberg, like von Neurath, was not originally simply chosen by Hitler himself, but had been selected by President Paul von Hindenburg.” Although the appointment had been acceptable to Hitler—as had that of von Neurath—and though von Blomberg, again like von Neurath, had proved himself a capable and willing instrument of Hitler’s will, he retained some independence, a quality both had shown in

the conference of 5 November. Von Fritsch was even more obviously a man out of tune with Hitler’s preferences. Like von Blomberg, he had been the choice of von Hindenburg when Hitler and von Blomberg himself would have preferred von Reichenau as commander-in-chief of the army.! Unlike von Blomberg, he had demonstrated considerable rigidity in resisting accommodation to the regime, and this had been recalled to Hitler not only on 5 November but also at a subsequent meeting of von Fritsch with Hitler on 9 November.'°! Now that Hitler felt ready to begin implementation of the agetessive policies he intended to pursue, he wanted not just willing instruments but totally dependent and pliant tools. Insight into this consideration of Hitler’s can be gained not only from the military succession which will be examined later but also from the nature of the persons Hitler thought about in the diplomatic reshuffling that accompanied the military changes.!" The Italians had asked some time before for the removal of Ulrich von Hassell from the German embassy in Rome; the person whom Hitler asked to take that position on 31 98. Friedrich von Rabenau, Seeckt: Aus seinem Leben, 1918-1936 (Leipzig: Hase & Koehler, 1940), p. 536. The discussion of von Fritsch’s character by Deutsch does not come to grips with this important event for understanding von Fritsch’s attitude toward governmental authority. 99. Summaries of the evidence in Miiller, pp. 49-50; Deutsch, pp. 8-10. 100. Deutsch, pp. 11-13. 101. On von Fritsch and Hitler, see ibid., pp. 29-30; on the 9 November meeting, see ibid., pp. 71, 74-75.

102. The existing literature generally ignores the fact that the same individual, namely Hitler, was making both sets of changes simultaneously.

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

$21

January was Hans Frank, his legal adviser from the time when Hitler was struggling for power in Germany; and it is worth noting that it was when asking Frank to go back to Rome, where he had previously represented Hitler on special missions, that Hitler also explained to Frank his ideas of making the army more National Socialist, settling the Austrian, Czechoslovak, Danzig, and Corridor questions, and making von Ribbentrop

foreign minister.!°> Although the Rome embassy was eventually used as a consolation

ptize for moving von Neurath’s

son-in-law, Hans Georg von Mackensen, out of the

position of state secretary in the Foreign Ministry, it is Hitler’s perception of the relationship between policy and personnel that is informative. The same kind of thinking was involved in the planned change at Vienna. Hitler had sent Franz von Papen there to get rid of him when von Papen had escaped being shot on 30 June 1934 and the Vienna post had become vacant because the German minister there had allowed himself to be publicly implicated in the abortive National Socialist coup of 24 July 1934.1 Hitler was planning a more active policy in Austria and therefore intended to replace von Papen, though the speed of developments in this instance would

leave the latter at his post even after his recall had been publicly announced.!% Again the replacement was to have been an associate of Hitler’s political struggles. At one point,

Hitler considered Hermann Kriebel; later he promised the position to Albert Forster. The former had worked with Hitler in postwat Bavaria, was in Hitler’s focus of attention at this time because of his post as consul general in Shanghai while Germany was trying to mediate in the Sino-Japanese war, and would receive an appointment as chief of the

personnel and administrative section of the Foreign Ministry in 1939.!0° The latter, who was then Hitler’s personal representative in Danzig, was told by Hitler that he would be sent to Vienna to arrange a coup in June or July, but had to content himself with taking more radical steps in the Free City of Danzig when Hitler was able to move mote rapidly on the Austrian question than he had anticipated when he explained his hopes to Forster on 5 Februaty.!°’ While Herbert von Dirksen’s real, not diplomatic, illness in Tokyo! and von Ribbentrop’s removal from London to the position of foreign minister naturally touched off other changes in diplomatic personnel, the key point is that in those changes in which Hitler himself took some initiative, his first inclination was invariably to the appointment of men who wete long-time political cronies and could be depended upon to be completely subservient instruments of his will. Frank, Kriebel, Forster, and von

Ribbentrop a// fit this description; von Blomberg, von Fritsch, and von Neurath could 103. Hans Frank, Im” Angesicht des Galgens (Munich: Friedrich Alfred Beck, 1953), pp. 280-82. Note that on 4 February the Reich press chief, Otto Dietrich, still included Frank’s appointment to Rome among the changes to be made (Dr. Kausch, “Wichtige Bestellung fiir die Aufmachung und Behandlung der grossen petsonellen Veranderungen,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.83), and that the German ambassador to Poland still

expected this change on 15 February (Szembek Diary, 15 February 1938, p. 272), although Frank (p. 282) claims that Hitler told him he would not be sent on 9 February. On Frank’s earlier trips to Italy, see above, pp. 208,

260-61. 104. See above, pp. 85-86. 105. See chap. 23, below. the 106. On Kriebel’s pre-1938 career, see above, pp. 266-67; on his proposed appointment to Vienna, see report by Dr. Kausch cited in n. 103, above, and Dertinger’s “Privater Sonderbericht,” 7 February 1938,

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, £.75.

have taken 107. On the meeting between Hitler and Forster and Arthur Greiser in Berlin, which appears to Carl J. place on 5 February before or after the cabinet meeting, see C 4100, C 4359/197/55, FO 371/21801; 474, Burckhardt, Meine Danziger Mission, 1938-1939 (Munich: Callwey, 1960), p. 133; Gallman (Danzig) dispatch ; 9 May 1938, State 860K.00/323. on 4 February 108. Von Dirksen was most upset at being grouped with all the others relieved of their posts London: 1938, and he expected—and received—a new appointment. See Herbert von Dirksen, Moskau-Tokio1950), pp. Erinnerungen und B etrachtungen xu 20 Jahren deutscher Aussenpolitik, 1919-1939 (Stuttgart; Kohlhammer, RAM, Akte 60964, 194-95; Memoran dum by von Mackensen, 20 December 1937, DZA Potsdam, AA, Biro

Elio

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

not be considered in the same category. Who was to succeed them? The next ranking officer in the German armed forces was Goring, who very much wanted von Blomberg’s spot and had played a major role in dumping von Blomberg and von Fritsch, the latter a possible appointee to the former’s post. Hitler would not appoint Géring and decided to take over the position himself. The reasons why Goring was not appointed are only partly known; Foertsch’s assertion that Hitler referred to Géring’s laziness may well be based on Goring’s notorious apathy of later years.!°° More plausible is the possibility that Hitler did not wish to give too much power to any single individual. Goring had been placed in charge of the Four-Year Plan in addition to control of the air force and multifarious lesser posts;!!° if he were also

placed in control of the armed forces as a whole, his position would have become extraordinarily strong.!"! Hitler decided to take direct control of the armed forces himself and to use the staff which Keitel had been building up as his own.!!2 There is some evidence that he had intended to do this eventually in any case,'!3 and the moment was certainly opportune. Hitler’s daily contacts with Keitel during the whole crisis convinced him that here was a man he could work with and depend on the way he could depend on Frank, Kriebel, and Forster, a judgment that correctly assessed an officer who would remain in

the same position until 1945. In this case, as in so many others, Hitler displayed an almost uncanny ability to sense the presence (or absence) of absolute devotion to himself. As a replacement for von Fritsch, Hitler wanted to appoint his favorite among the generals, Walther von Reichenau, Keitel’s predecessorin the Armed Forces Office and at

the time in charge of the Military District VII with headquarters at Munich. Keitel managed to dissuade Hitler by pointing to von Reichenau’s failings in the one field where Keitel could detect mortal sin: von Reichenau was neither hard-working nor thorough. Furthermore, Keitel—whose objections to von Reichenau were supported for entirely different reasons by others—had a candidate who was likely to meet Hitler’s needs even if Hitler did not know him well as yet. Walther von Brauchitsch was technically competent, had enough seniority to calm the army leadership, and was politically pliable. Before recetving the appointment—which a man of minimal decency would have refused except on an acting basis at a time when the charges against von Fritsch remained unproved—von Brauchitsch had to promise to bring the army “closer to the state and its ideology”; to make a string of key personnel changes including one in the position of chief of army personnel; to change his chief of staff, though that was postponed a while; and to agree to the centralized armed forces command structure Keitel had been pushing, though this also would be postponed a bit.!"4 Hitler was quickly, and correctly, convinced that in von Brauchitsch he had found

109. Hermann Foertsch, Scbuld und Verhangnis: Die Fritschkrise im Februar 1938 (Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1951), p. 88. 110. Wiedemann (pp. 112-13) cites Goring as offering to give up the Four-Year Plan if he was placed in command of the armed forces. 111, Deutsch (pp. 118-19) comes to a similar conclusion. As a consolation prize, Goring was promoted to field marshal.

112. There is agreement that von Blomberg had made this suggestion to Hitler and had also recommended the use of Keitel as head of Hitler’s staff in this new capacity (ibid., p. 119). What is easily overlooked now, but may well have occurred quite independently to both Hitler and von Blomberg at the time, is that Hitler’s immediate predecessor as chancellor, Kurt von Schleicher, had retained his prior position as minister of war. If a minister of war could also be chancellor, why could a chancellor not also be minister of wat? 113. See Miller, document 31, p. 636.

114, Miller, pp. 263-64. For an example of how this was done, see Georg Meyer (ed.), Generalfeldtmarschall Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb: Tagebuchaufzeichnungen und Lagebetrachtungen aus zwei Weltkriegen (Stuttgart: Deutsche

Verlags-Anstalt, 1976), pp. 41-42.

Hittler’s Preparations, 1937-38

323

the man he needed without the disadvantages that von Reichenau’s appointment might have brought with it. About to resign from the atmy because of marital problems when the big prize dangled before his eyes, von Brauchitsch needed and received the assurance of financial assistance from Hitler to enable him to get out of his first and into a second martiage.'!’ If the dependence on Hitler created by this secret subvention was not enough, the new commander-in-chief of the army turned out to be an anatomical marvel,

a man totally without backbone, who would be the despait of all who hoped for some sign of strength and leadership from him in the crises ahead. Whether by permanent inclination or because he knew himself to be personally and hopelessly compromised, and certainly in accord with the energetic preference of his new wife, a wildly enthusiastic

wotshipper of Hitler, von Brauchitsch would be a willing tool of Hitler from the day of

his appointment until his final service when he was the scapegoat for the German atmy’s defeat in Russia in December 1941 and Hitler took over the position of commander-inchief of the army himself. The circumstances surrounding the dismissal of von Fritsch opened the eyes of more among the military to the nature of the National Socialist system; but with no one to give a lead to action, the only significance of the incident for the opposition to Hitler lay in its bringing together of skeptics about the regime from both civilian and military spheres for the first time.'!° The man who would provide something of a rallying point later, the army chief-of-staff, General Ludwig Beck, felt restrained from playing any major part in pressuting von Brauchitsch into an active role in the spring of 1938, not only because his own position was clearly weak, but because he was worried about the efforts Keitel immediately made to follow up on the change in the command personnel with a change in the command structure along the lines he had long pushed.""” With Hitler now taking von Blomberg’s place as commander-in-chief of the armed forces, those who argued for a more centralized command structure were, naturally, in a

stronger position with Hitler. It was his immediate military staff whose prerogatives were at stake, and since Beck knew Keitel and Jodl to be slavish adherents of whatever brainstorms emanated from the Fuhrer, it is not surprising that he should try, with a little success, to persuade von Brauchitsch to argue for a structure that allowed the high

command of the army to retain a role in the decision-making process. It is also not surprising that Hitler should decide in favor of the direction Keitel urged, so that Beck

could only comment at the end of July 1938 on suggested ways of coping with this problem as “too late.”!!8 The military apparatus was fully under Hitler’s control as he moved to realize the first stages of his program of expansion. The questions raised by von Blomberg and von Fritsch at the November 1937 conference were symptomatic of their mental independence rather than direct causes for their dismissal; both were now gone from the scene.!!2 Gone too was Hitler’s chief armed forces adjutant, Colonel Friedrich Hossbach, who had prepared the record of that famous mecting. Because he had been

too loyal to von Fritsch and too independent in his attitude, he was replaced by the more

by conver115. Miller, p. 268, n. 65, leaves the issue open; Deutsch, chap. 7, has a full account, supplemented

sations and correspondence with the author. Perhaps it was precisely the combination of financial difficulties that made that Hitler could solve and marriage to a woman for whose past Hitler could provide dispensation Roschmann Hans letter, the also See eyes. Hitlet’s in Reichenau von to alternative attractive an von Brauchitsch to Hildegard von Kotze, 25 May 1975, Bundesarchiv/Militararchiv, M.Sg. 1/620.

,

L. Weinberg 116. Well-presented in Miiller, pp. 273-89. This is the thesis of the piece by Deutsch in Gerhard (ed.), Transformation ofaContinent: Europe in the Twentieth Century (Minneapolis: Burgess, 1975). 117. Deutsch stresses other factors; Miillet’s interpretation is closer to mine. , H 08-28/4; Miiller, p. 665. 118. Draft letter (not sent) of Beck to von Manstein, 31 July 1938, Bundesarchiv

purged in part because 119. On 18 February Goring told Nevile Henderson that the military leaders had been

be noted that Erich Raeder, like of opposition to Hitler’s policy (C 1161/42/18, FO 371/21655). It will

Géring, was kept at his post.

324

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

complaisant Rudolf Schmundt, who would stay until killed by the bomb of 20 July 1944. The shift in diplomatic appointments carried out at the same time as the military changes has already been alluded to. The most important of these was undoubtedly the replacement of von Neurath by von Ribbentrop. Although Hitler had reassured von Neurath about continuing him in office beyond retirement age, reached with von Neurath’s sixty-fifth birthday on 2 February 1938, he dismissed him two days later, sugat-coating the action by placing him in charge of a special advisory group—that never met. The decision to combine this change with the other military and diplomatic ones (the evidence suggests that the replacement of von Hassell and von Papen had been decided earlier) was apparently taken only just before it was announced. The reasons for this timing must remain speculative. Hitler may have thought that if he were going to make the military and some of the diplomatic changes at one time, it would be just as well to change foreign ministers too, especially because the appointment of von Ribbentrop would open up the embassy in London.!”° Another, and perhaps more important, consideration affecting the timing of Hitler’s action may very well have been an important turning point in German foreign policy. Just as the shifts at the Rome and Vienna posts were associated with the policy of Germany toward Italy and Austria in the winter of 1937-38, so the replacement of von Neurath at this particular time was surely related to developments in German policy toward the nations of East Asia. The details of those developments will be reviewed in a subsequent chapter; but it must be noted here that von Neurath and von Ribbentrop had long been on opposite sides of the argument over German policy toward China and Japan, with the former favoring a continuation of Germany’s strong ties to China and the latter enthusiastic about an alignment with Japan. While Germany was acting as mediator in the Sino-Japanese war, Hitler temporarily deferred public announcement of an option for Japan; but in mid-January 1938 the mediation attempt broke down when Japan decided not to deal with the Chinese Nationalists any more. This opened the way for Hitler to adopt the policy von Ribbentrop had been advocating, first symbolized by the recognition of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo, announced in Hitler’s speech of 20 February in which he also talked about the personnel changes made earlier that month. The coincidence of the ending of the German mediation effort with the FritschBlomberg crisis may well have influenced Hitler in his decision to appoint the advocate of close relations with Japan as foreign minister at just the time when it seemed feasible to adopt his recommendations.'*! There can be little doubt, however, that the change in foreign ministers would have been made in any case; and the two members of the

cabinet selected by von Hindenburg were thus replaced on the same day.!22 The military and diplomatic changes of February 1938 can be seen as a whole as consolidating Hitler’s power and surrounding him by more pliant tools in positions of 120. Note the evidence on plans to transfer von Papen to Spain and Eberhard von Stohrer, the German ambassador

to Franco, to London

(Dettinger, “Privater Sonderbericht,”

7 February

1938, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, £75; Manfred Merkes, Die deutsche Politik im spanischen Biirgerkrieg 1936-1939, 2d ed. [Bonn: Ludwig Rohrscheid, 1969], p. 342). With von Papen held over in Vienna, von Stohrer remained in Spain, and the London embassy went to von Dirksen, whose recall (unlike von Stohrer’s) had been publicly announced. 121. When von Neurath told the new American ambassador, Hugh Wilson, about his dismissal on 19 February

1938, he said that Hitler had told him in January that he was to stay on, that he was then asked to resign, and that he had made no secret of his disapproval of German policy with respect to Japan (enclosure 2 to Gilbert dispatch 3889, 23 February 1938, State 762.00/185). 122. The appointment of von Ribbentrop very much upset Alfred Rosenberg, who had expected cabinet rank as well (Rosenberg to Hitler, 6 February 1938, in Theodor R. Emessen [ed.], Aus Gérings Schreibtisch [Berlin: Allgemeiner Deutscher Verlag, 1947], pp. 68-70).

Hitler’s Preparations, 1937-38

325

influence. This was certainly the way the situation was interpreted by foreign observers who assumed that a more radical course would now be followed by Germany.!?3 But this was, and would be, due not to the advice Hitler received from so-called radicals; it was

because Hitler wanted such a course and picked advisers who would enthusiastically agree with him. Far from being driven by others, he was making certain that those in charge of oiling the machine he drove shared an unquestioning elation over wherever he wanted to go. As a shrewd contemporary German observer concluded: “By way of summary one may therefore assert objectively that the process of totalitarianization has once again moved to absolute effectiveness and that all the events proceed logically out of the concepts of the Fuhrer. There has been no change of course, but rather the con-

tinuity of developments has been stabilized.”!*4

AS

mery U .S. minister Budapest) report ay Lies 123. See Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 349; John F. Montgo No. try, chiefs of the Czechoslovak Foreign

to the section 19-38, State 862.00/3753; Krofta’s comments

t in T-120, ey 5/38 of 10 February 1938, Czechoslovak documen

Cae:

Ce.

y 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, 124. Dertinger, “Privater Sonderbericht,” 7 Februar

Z.5¢.

bos

Chapter 17

Britain and France

Face the German Threat

Ihe increasingly troubled European situation resulting from developments in Germany confronted the governments of Britain and France with grave problems. Several closely related problems loomed ahead, for the rearmament of Germany posed both military and economic issues. In an era when the debate over the origins of the World War stressed the role of the pre-1914 arms race in bringing on that conflict, the public in democratic countries was inclined to see in any return to competitive rearmament a step toward war. Especially in Britain, the pressure of public opinion retarded any idea of rebuilding the country’s military strength.! {Neville Chamberlain, then chancellor of the exchequer, had provided most of what push there was for rearmament in the British government. This personal identification had both advantages and disadvantages. The advantages wete threefold.(The chancellor of the exchequer was the person who from the point of view of costs was always in an excellent position to hold back or assist the budget requests of the armed services; from

that position, Winston Churchill had done as mugh to disarm Britain in the mid-1920s as Chamberlain did to rearm her in the mid-1930s.? [t is quite true that there were limits to what Chamberlain thought feasible, but for some time he would push forward. Second, as an extremely energetic and well-organized person, Chamberlain could be expected to give great force to any policy he urged in a cabinet led by the retiring Stanley Baldwin. Finally, the fact that Chamberlain was the heir apparent who was expected to succeed Baldwin, originally in 1936 and then because of the constitutional erisis over the proposed marriage of Edward VIII, in the spring of 1937, gave to his views an added strength in government circles. 1. It is instructive to see how an article written to destroy the “myth” of the role of rearmament as an issue swinging the East Fulham by-election of October 1933 on close reading supports the basic accuracy of the old interpretation. Richard Heller, “Hast Fulham Revisited,” Journal of Contemporary History, 6, No. 3 (1971), 172-96. See also the relevant materials from the papers of one of Baldwin’s closest associates, in Robert Rhodes James (ed.), Memoirs of a Conservative: J. C. C. Davidson's Memoirs and Papers, 1910-1937 (New York: Macmillan, 1970) (hereafter cited as Davidson Papers), pp. 397-99. The general issue is best treated in Reinhard Meyers, Britische icherheitspolitik. 1934-1938 (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1976), pp. 425ff.

2. A detailed and detached study of Churchill’s role as chancellor of the exchequer remains to be written. The account in Robert Rhodes James, Churchill: A Study in Failure, 1900-1939 (New York: World, 1970), Part IV, és a useful introduction; the material on Churchill’s role in disarming Britain is on pp. 181-86. On the “10-year , rule” of keying arms budgets to the assumption of no major war being anticipated for ten years, and Churchill’s role in its adoption and maintenance, see Meyers, pp. 388-97; Norman H. Gibbs, Grand Snap J 1, Rearmament Policy (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1976), chap. 2.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

327

There was, however, a negative side to Chamberlain’s identification with the rearmament program. As a combative politician who could be and often was mean in debate, supetcilious in attitude, and self-righteous in his approach to problems, Chamberlain assuted hostility to rearmament from those in the Opposition parties who might otherwise have rallied to it in the face of a Germany of which they were most critical. If there were those on the French right who in fact remarked, as alleged, that they preferred Hitler to Léon Blum, they were matched by an attitude on the British left which preferred to trust Hitler rather than Neville Chamberlain.{Labor members of Parliament voted against all funds for the military services in the years 1933-36. The realism of some like Hugh Dalton, and the too obvious inner contradiction between the call of Labor’s left wing to send arms to the Spanish Republicans from a Britain that was not to have any arms itself, began to have an impact on Labor’s parliamentary position in 1936-37. In March 1937 the Labor and Liberal members were still opposing Chamberlain’s rearmament proposals,’ but in July the parliamentary Labor party decided to abstain rather than vote against the estimates for the armed services. On the issue of conscription, however, they would still be unanimously opposed after Chamberlain and his associates had taken the plunge in the spring of 1939.4 ‘| A telated aspect of opposition to rearmament, which was often voiced by Chamberlain

himself as well as by his critics, was the diversion from other possible

expenditures that rearmament was thought to imply. While Hitler saw rearmament as good in itself and even better for having the side effect of reviving a stricken economy, Chamberlain and others saw it as competing for a place in the budget with outlays for health, housing, schools, and other public improvements. The key to Britain’s economic

revival in peacetime and her strength in war if it came was seen precisely in not spending her treasure on the wasteful and nonproductive costs of arms.° An important factor in the debate over rearmament, both within the government at

the time and in the literature on the subject as the British records have become available, was that of financial limitations on proposals for accelerating the rearmament program, particularly during 1937 and 1938.° Though possibly correct in some matters of detail, much of the post-World War II discussion has an unreal aspect because of its disregard of an issue central at the time. England had fought her earlier wars against great continental powers as a member of coalitions and alliances in which she provided financial assistance to her associates. Though there had been some change in this pattern in 1917— 18, that change seemed to be more apparent than real.(England had actually extended greater credits to her allies than she had herself obtained from the United States: Furtherrinefle American Johnson Act which prohibited the extension of credit to countries like England which had defaulted on their war debts to the United States appeared to show that in any future war England would have to depend entirely on her own financial . resources for herself as well as any support her allies might reef those in the British government in 1937-38 did not stake the country’s survival on Arferican aid—on which England came to be dependent by the winter of 1940—41—there was certainly little at 3. See Stephen Roskill, Hankey, Man ofSecrets, 3, 1931-1963 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1974), 289. & Nicolson, 4. John F. Naylor, Labour's International Policy. The Labour Party in the 1930's (London: Weidenfeld distaste for 1969), pp. 191-96. A sample of the problem posed by the contradiction between pacifism and M. Dent, (London:.J. Memory from Pages Griffiths, James in seen be may party Labor the in National Socialism Dennis, Decision 1969), chap. 5, “The Pacifist Dilemma.” A good survey is in Meyers, pp. 458-66. See also Peter Press, 1972). by Default: Peacetime Conscription and British Defence, 1919-1939 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University adie 5. Meyers, pp. 334 ff. University Press, 6. Gibbs, chap. 8; Robert P. Shay, Jr., British Rearmament in the Thirties (Princeton: Princeton Houghton Mifflin, 1977), 1977); Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, 5, 1922-1939: The Prophet of Truth (Boston:

chaps. 42, 43.

328

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the time to indicate that this could be a safe course. The level of military effort Britain actually maintained in her next war with Germany was possible only because of the reversal of England’s role into becoming a net recipient rather than granter of assistance; in the years of American isolationism(the London government not surprisingly decided

to limit its expenditures on arms to wHat it thought could be supported by her own economy. What’Tearmament program there was in England was also slowed by confusions and hesitations about the question of a land army and the related inclination to do whatever seemed unavoidable in the least expensive manner. Nothing terrified both public and government more than the prospect of a land war on the model of 1914~18, a point of view which one can easily understand and which was certainly constantly reinforced by the flood of books about the war on the one hand and the gaping holes in the circle of every person’s family and friends on the other. Yet there was a lurking uneasiness that such a thing might recur, if not in precisely the same form, at least in a form again tequiting a substantial British land army. The beginnings of an agitated debate in British government circles over the role of the British army in any future war can be understood only as a reflection of this conflict between hope and insight.’ As the problem was discussed within government circles, culminating in a cabinet decision on 3 February 1937, the need to plan an expeditionary force to the continent as a last and least desirable resort had to be faced. Although the force sent would be small and take time both to equip with modern weapons and expand to more than nominal size, only the prospect of an expeditionary force could sustain Britain’s diplomatic position in peace and offer any hope of safety in war. Without it there would be no credibility to her concerns in Europe and no substance to her alignment with France.§ Chamberlain’s appointment of the vigorous and imaginative Leslie Hore-Belisha as secretary of state for war infused energy and new ideas into a torpid army leadership, but there was a long way to go.? An invasion of England itself was thought an unlikely danger, though only on the assumption that the Germans would have only their own North Sea ports from which to launch such a move.!° The conclusion drawn, however, was not that no army would be needed, but that the slight danger of sea or airborne landing should not be allowed to tie down British troops in the home islands.'! Such thinking reflects both the assumption that a war started by Germany was the one European contingency to be taken seriously by Britain and the flow of reports from British diplomats in Germany that before long— 1938-40 are the years most commonly mentioned—Germany would launch the first ageression in an attempt to dominate Europe.'? These worries about Germany, however, 7. C 205/205/62, FO 371/20701; Gibbs, chap. 12; Michael Howard,

The Continental Commitment (London:

Temple Smith, 1972).

8. Key documents ate C 563/1/18, FO 371/20705; C 928, C 1050, C 1175/928/18, FO 371/20746. Cf. Roderick Macleod and Denis Kelly (eds.), Time Unguarded: The Ironside Diaries, 1937-1940 (New York: David McKay, 1962) (hereafter cited as Ironside Diaries), p. 37. For a French review of arms production in major European powers, see D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 317.

9. On Hore-Belisha, see R. J. Minney (ed.), The Private Papers of Hore-Belisha (London: Collins, 1960); and the references to their cooperation in the Memoirs of Basil H. Liddell Hart (London: Cassell, 1965). For a French appreciation of Hore-Belisha’s effect on the British army, see D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 174. The army leaders would

get their revenge on the man who had woken them up by securing his dismissal in January 1940.

10. Joint Planning Sub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence, “Sea-Borne and Air-Borne Land

Attack on the British Isles,” 7 January 1937, C 1479/205/62, FO 371/20701. 11. Ibid.

12. See the report of the British military attaché in Berlin of 12 January 1937 that was circulated to the cabinet,

C 496/136/18, FO 371/20731; and the impressions of the chief of the imperial general staff of the German

maneuvers of September 1937 in C 7546/136/18, FO 371/20732. For British concern that the resignation of

Ludwig Beck and his replacement by Walther von Reichenau, rumored in April 1937, meant a more aggressive

Britain and France Face the German Threat

329

were compounded almost to the point of imposing a certain immobility on British strategic thought by the simultaneous danger in the Far East from Japan and to a lesser extent, from Italy in the Mediterranean where disturbances in Palestine complicated the defense of Egypt against Italian forces in Libya. Risks run in one part of the globe threatened to | create even greater risks in others; the dilemma of reconciling a continental defense against Germany with the need to defend a vast world empire, and to do so on the basis of inadequate strength against a multitude of challenges, seemed to defy resolution.!3 In the naval field the London government felt more confident; a new program of construction was approved, but this was one area where the situation was thought to be more favorable to England than before the last war.'t The greatest danger was seen as being in the air. British concern over this subject has already been alluded to;!5 it con-

tinued and even grew in 1937 as the threat of German bombing of England as well as the possible use of the German air force in offensives against other countries loomed ever larger in British calculations. The Foreign Office, conscious of risks at home and the dangerous loss of prestige abroad, pushed for greater expansion of the Royal Air Force, and new programs to accomplish this were approved in February and October 1937.16 In the absence of the radar installations that would play such a key role in 1940, the London government’s alarm is understandable, especially when it is seen against a background of an island state with a strong fleet whose near immunity from attack had been threatened only by the bombs of German dirigibles and planes in the very war which now threatened to repeat itself. Such themes run through all the analyses of the military situation and its import for international affairs that were submitted by the British chiefs of staff to the cabinet in 1937. Britain was weak and would need years to rearm. Even the expanded programs for the air force would leave Britain behind in the race to catch up with a Germany that was continuing to build up its air force at an accelerating pace. The situation in regard to the formation of properly equipped land forces was even worse. Italy could attack Britain or parts of her empire only if assured of German support, while Japan could become dangerous by herself, especially if tempted by trouble for Britain in Europe. As for the prospects of the United Kingdom in a war with all three, that was so dire a matter that all

possible attempts must be made that Germany was not yet ready armament program, including an show results but that offered the

to avoid it. The only bright spots in the picture were herself, and that Britain was finally starting a major reexpansion of plant capacity,!’ that would take time to advantage of standardization on later and more modern

Ee Seen eet) ee een German policy, see C 2967/6/18, FO 371/20710.

OS

13. This is in large part the theme of Meyers’s fine book; it is applied in detail to one area in Lawrence R. Pratt, East of Malta, West of Suez; Britain’s Mediterranean Crisis 1936-1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

OTS): 14. :1516/205/62, FO 371/20701; Br. Cabinet 8 (37) of 17 February 1937, CAB 23/87, £236; A 5459/6/45,

Pratt has pointed out, FO 371/20649. The French were not so sure of this, D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 508; and as

in 1937— especially on the basis of the Chatfield papers, the reduced number of capital ships available for action older ones 38 imposed severe restrictions on British naval strategy until the new ships could be ready and the

modernized. 15. See above, p. 290. in C 409, C 676/185/18, FO 16. The course of the arguments and the conclusions reached can be traced FO 371/20734; Br. Cabinet 9 , 8124/185/18 C 7817, C 7385, C 5102, C 371 /20733; C 930, C 1585, C 1637, 371/20694. Key worties were the (37) of 24 February 1937, CAB 23/87, ££.269, 276-77; C 8434/122/17, FO need to escape the government's weakness of British air defenses (C 3821/205/62, FO 371/20701) and the

January 1937, C 919/185/18, FO public pledge of air parity with Germany (Br. Cabinet 4 [37] of 27 371/20733). with Germany, see Meyers, p. 419, 17. On this issue, which deserves a separate study, especially in comparison a: 173:

330

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

weapons. (Theprospects for the immediate future, however, were extremely grim.'® As General und Ironside, then in charge of the Eastern Command, put it in his diary, Britain was so weak she could not bluff. The strong line that Winston Churchill was calling for was impossible. “We have nothing with which to fight—literally nothing— and will not have anything for two years.”!” The hope that the effort Britain was making to remedy these deficiencies would in itself serve to help by its demonstration of serious purpose could not be relied upon; there was a general recognition that however great these efforts, it would be years before the results would be apparent, and in modern war these years just might not be available.

eg problem as posed by the military advisers of the government was how to postpone e danger of war and reduce the number of potential enemies, for the situation of Great

Britain in the immediate future looked truly desperate.2° And as the former chancellor of the exchequer who, since 1931, had rebuilt the confidence of Britain in its ability to sur-

vive the great depression as a world power, Neville Chamberlain was most unwilling to risk shaking that confidence by. pointing out in public just how desperate the situation had become. Compoufiding the problem faced by policymakers in London was their concern about France. The days-~when there were fears in Whitehall about French hegemony in Europe and belief in a need to moderate her supposedly harsh policies toward Germany must have seemed like a happy piece of ancient history as the British worried not only about the French air force but the French army as well. There was concern about the antiquated matériel—largely left over from the earlier’ wat—and the unresolved riddle of what, if anything, France would and could do in the West if her allies in Central and

Eastern Europe were attacked.?! The comparison drawn by British military observers between the vigorous new German army, however disorganized by the process of rapid expansion, and the tired and poorly equipped French army was hardly reassuring to a country that had taken for granted a superior French army as a guarantor of its own defense and an excuse for dispensing with a substantial army itself.22 It is, therefore, not surprising that the recommendations made by the British chiefs of staff from the beginning to the end of 1937 were that every effort be made to reduce the number of potential enemies and increase the possible friends and neutrals, a viewpoint approved by both Chamberlain and Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden. Both also came to the conclusion that it would be useless and dangerous to attemptto buy off Germany, Italy, or Japan. It would be useless because the demands of the one bribed would only increase and the others would be the more tempted to move forward by such signs of weakness; it would be dangerous because such a policy might open the floodgates of drastic change—with an inherent danger of war—and because it would alienate 18. The foregoing summarizes C 1406, C 1586/205/62, FO 371/20701; C 7851, C 8331/205/62, FO 371/ 20702; R 4963/78/22, FO 371/21160; J4999/244/16, FO 371/20912; C 8124/185/18, FO 371/20734. Note the comments of Sir Thomas Inskip, minister for the coordination of defense, to members of Parliament that it

could take until 1940 to complete the deficiency program, and that Britain was weak but would benefit from standardization

on new

weapons

(Harold Nicolson,

Diaries and Letters,

1930-1939

[New York:

Atheneum,

1966], 5 July 1937, p. 303). 19. Ironside Diaries, 24 Jane 1937, p. 25. .C 1760, C 2620/205/62, FO 371/20701; C 5697/205/62, FO 371/20702; R 2320/989/3, FO 371/21119. 21. See especially the comparison of the French and German 1937 maneuvers in C 7703/136/18, FO 371 /20732; Ironside Diaries, pp. 28-29; and Chamberlain’s comments at the Committee of Imperial Defence on

5 July 1937, R 4963/78/22, FO 371/21160, p. 3. 22. The British dependence on the French army in the interwar yeats bears a certain resemblance to U.S. dependence on the British fleet in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In both Britain and the USS., the possibility of the “shield’s” defeat played a key role in alerting policymakers to dangers ahead—though only in the U.S. did this lead to any literature reinterpreting the past in terms of this new insight.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

3S

France, the United States, and any other potential os Sl seemed to lie in delay and the hope that specific current difficulties could be resolved by negotiations.23 How was this to be done? One possibility that was left from the preceding year but looked less and less likely to lead to any useful conclusion was the effort to find a replacement for the Locarno system destroyed by Germany in March 1936. Unless a new pact served Hitlet’s concept of a complaisant England standing still while he conquered Central and Eastern Europe, there was nothing to be gained in his eyes by making what looked to him like retroactive concessions to obtain something he had already secured by the passive acquiescence of the Western Powers in the remilitarization of the Rhineland. The negotiations for what was by now generally referred to as a Western Pact had accordingly been continuing for many months and, especially at English urging, were still in progress; but it was clear that nothing would come of the scheme. While Britain and France were interested in a security system to take the place of the one that had been torn up, Germany was willing to continue talks on the subject solely to please the British government, but would sign an agreement only if it would provide legal insulation from western hostility for a German attack in Central or Eastern Europe. As neither the French nor the British had any interest in such a scheme, there was no prospect of agreement, and by the summer of 1937, if not sooner, this was readily apparent to all.”4 The evaporation of hopes for a new Locarno had effects that in the long run were precisely the opposite of those the Germans might have hoped for, and that would be fatal to Hitler’s dreams of conquest. He had once hoped, and some historians argue that

he long continued to hope, that he could detach England from France and bring her to his side. This conception, grounded in Hitler’s view of the origins of the prewar AngloGerman rivalry and the postwar British concerns about France’s supposed hegemony in Europe, could have some validity only as long as Germany was relatively weak and was not following an aggressive policy in Europe. The moment Germany destroyed the Locarno system and, by ending the demilitarization of the Rhineland, removed the most important bar to German aggression, she in fact riveted England to the side of France. But such a position for Britain did not mean that there would be no need or desire in England for an accommodation with Germany. On the contrary, while rearming and aligning Great Britain more closely with France, the government in London still hoped

that the outstanding problems of Europe could be solved peacefully and by negotiation rather than by force. Given a failure to conceive, let alone credit, the idea that anyone ia

23. The chiefs of staff appreciation, with Committee

of Imperial Defence,

cabinet, and Foreign Office i

comments, of 9 February is in C 1406/205/62, FO 371/20701. See also C 6124/185/18, FO 371 /20734; “ 4963/1/22, FO 371/21160. A survey of the issues may be found in Anthony Eden, The Memoirs ofAnthon Eden: Facing the Dictators (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962), chap. 9, which overstates the differences between Eden and Chamberlain. For an explanation by Admiral Chatfield of how this perception of Britain’s dangers led to an effort at agreement with Italy, see his letter to Admiral Pound of 23 November 1937, quoted in Pratt, . 114. in 24 No useful purpose would be served by recounting these tedious and abortive negotiations. The summary the supports 53-56, pp. 1973), Boldt, (Boppard: 1935-1939 Kalkiil politischem Hitlers in England Josef Henke, 47-49, 69, 79, 103, interpretation given here. Relevant documents in G.D., C, 6, Nos. 1, 6, 9, 24, 26, 33, 34,

Nos. 163, 107, 199, 201, 217, 223, 232, 241, 258, 263, 285, 287, 296, 420, 430, 474, 497, 505, 577; D.D.B., 4, 27, 44, 49, 85, 169, 202, 204; D.D.F.,, 2d, 5, Nos. 51, 72, 98, 105, 112, 118, 123, 126, 137, 169, 372, 471; 6, Nos.

(ed.), Diplomat in Paris, 88, 94, 168, 207, 218, 243, 248, 379; U.S. 1936, 1:374-75; 2:60-64; Wactew Jedrzejewicz

Press, 1970), pp. 38-52; 1936-1939: Papers and Memoirs ofJulius, Lukasiewicz (New York: Columbia University

Affairs, No. 7 /37, 18 March Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the Czechoslovak Ministry of Foreign der Pressekonferenz vom 17. aus “Bestellung /414049-50; 1809/1041 T-120, in document Czechoslovak 1937, 101/10, ff.37, 63. For an account Juli 1937,” and “. . «am 29. Juli 1937,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

, Die po/nisch-deutschen stressing the effort to extend the proposed new pact to Poland, see Marian Wojciechowski Beziehungen 1933-1938 (Leyden: Brill, 1971), pp. 343ff.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

might deliberately start another war, a basic preference for negotiated settlements, a horror of war based on the experience of 1914-18, a recognition of military weakness in the face of overextended commitments around the world, and a sense that at least some

of Germany’s grievances were real, all combined to push the London government into renewed efforts toward some accommodation with Germany. One step that was designed to bring England and Germany mote closely together, but would have the effect of creating even more misunderstanding, was the appointment of a new British ambassador to Berlin. Though frequently associated with Neville Chamberlain in the public eye, Sir Nevile Henderson was actually appointed to the Berlin post by Stanley Baldwin on the recommendation of Anthony Eden and Permanent Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Sir Robert Vansittart. Given the highly critical attitude of Sir Eric Phipps, who had been in Berlin since 1933, a new look by a new man might make for better contact; and since Vansittart had refused the Paris embassy, Sir Eric was

shifted there to make way for the new appointee.”° Given the unpopularity of Joachim von Ribbentrop in London, where he spent little time in any case, the views of Sir Nevile Henderson were of special importance. In a memorandum of 10 May 1937 he set forth his views at the beginning of his mission to Germany as calling for British agreement to German expansion in Central and Eastern Europe provided that such expansion were carried out peacefully, in accord with the will of the people affected, and with proper regard for the independence of the non-German peoples of the area.2° Apart from the inherent incompatibility of these conditions with each other in the Europe of the 1930s, what worried ‘those in the Foreign Office most about these views was that without providing any assurance that Germany would in fact be satisfied with such concessions—certainly Mein Kampf indicated the contrary—any intimation by Great Britain that she approved such a policy could, as the commentators cited Chamberlain, be the word that would bring down the avalanche. It could be given in any case only if England were prepared to fight if the conditions were violated, and this she was in no position to do. Only delay, negotiations on specific issues, and rearmament could help. In the meantime, however, there was the danger that Henderson would voice his ideas: in fact, by the time he sent the memorandum to the Foreign Office, he

had already done so on several occasions. In May and June 1937, Henderson expressed himself along the lines of his memorandum to the Austrian minister and the United States ambassador to Berlin as well as to Franz von Papen and George S. Messersmith, the German and American ministers to Vienna.?7 When such comments came back to London, and it turned out that in one case 25. On the appointment of Henderson, see Thomas Jones, A Diary with Letters, 1931-1950 (London: Oxford University Press, 1954), 15 February 1937, p. 315; Colvin, None So Blind, p. 146; Eden to Baldwin, 27 January 1937, Baldwin Papers, vol. 124; and the useful, but not very penetrating work of Rudi Strauch, Sir Nevile

Henderson, Britischer Botschafter in Berlin von 1937 bis 1939 (Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1959). Note the comment of Eden’s private secretary: “There really is not anybody else obvious to send.” John Harvey (ed.), The Diplomatic Diaries of Oliver Harvey, 1937-1940 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1970) (hereafter cited as Harvey Diaries), p. 41. Henderson presented his ctedentials on 11 May 1937; see Nevile Henderson, Failure of a Mission, Berlin 1937-1939 (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1940), pp. 41-42; Domarus, 1:691-93.

26. The full text together with a covering letter of 20 July 1937 to Sir Orme Sargent and comments by Foreign Office officials, is in C 5316/270/18, FO 371/20736, ££.77—-108. See also Henderson to Lord Lothian, 25 May 1937 (expressing agreement with the lattet’s views), Lord Lothian Papers, GD 40/17/204/351-2; and D.D.F., 2d,

6, No. 6. 27. On Henderson’s comments to Tauschitz, see Der Hochverratsprozess gegen Dr. Guido Schmidt vor dem Wiener Volksgericht (Vienna: Osterreichische Staatsdruckerei, 1947) (hereafter cited as Guido Schmidt Trial), pp. 493-94,

495-96, and D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 124; to Dodd, see Dodd Diary, 23 June 1937, p. 421, U.S. 1937, 1:341, and Dodd to Phipps, 1 July 1937, C 5541/3/18, FO 371/20711; to von Papen, see G.D., D, 1, No. 228; to Messersmith,

see Dodd Diary, 12 July 1937, p. 422, and memorandum by Messersmith on his trip from Vienna to the U.S. via

Berlin and London, pp. 7-10, Messersmith Papers. See also Henderson, pp. 29ff.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

333

Henderson had even put them in writing, there was a considerable uproar, and the ambassador was recalled to be reprimanded.?8 The evidence suggests that he nevertheless continued talking about the inevitability of German expansion and the need for con-

cessions to her to all he met, except for the Germans, though the latter could not long

remain ignorant of his views.?? Henderson believed that the sensible course fot Gteat Britain to follow was to allow Germany to expand to the limits of her nationality

border—i.e., to annex Austria, Danzig, Memel, the Sudeten area, and the portion of Silesia that had been awarded to Poland; that it would be appropriate for Germany to

become a colonial power again, presumably in West Africa; and that she should be allowed to exercise some sort of peaceful hegemony in Central and Eastetn Europe. He believed that British interests would not be threatened if this were allowed and even encouraged, and there was in any case no prospect of uniting the British public to fight a wat against Germany, with all the costs and dangers a war would entail, unless Germany

either went beyond such concessions to launch a war herself or directly threatened Great Britain. (As will be shown, all this was really not so far in substance from what both Chamberlain

and Eden themselves

believed, but there was a significant difference in

emphasis: Henderson thought that Britain should openly take the initiative to approach Germany with such a program in exchange for a return to a changed League of Nations and a commitment to renounce force in international relations, while Chamberlain and Eden were unwilling to make an agreement at the expense of others, feared a slide to dis-

aster if Great Britain declared itself disinterested in Central and Eastern Europe, and thought it wiser to delay rather than to hurry—and most certainly not,to approve— changes in Europe which England might not like but could not oo it would take shocks in Berlin rather than admonitions from London to correct Henderson’s approach. Eden wrote him a personal note just before Lord Halifax went to Germany saying: “I regard it of the greatest importance at the present time that no encouragement whatsoever should be given the German government for believing that His Majesty’s Government would contemplate any settlement at the expense of the political independence of the nations of Eastern and Central Europe. I am confident that I can rely upon you to bear this constantly in mind.”*° Henderson replied with long explications about the wisdom of his own approach.°! What makes these views of Sir Nevile so important in spite of their being disagreed with sharply in London was that they became known in Berlin, partly through those to whom Henderson talked so freely, and partly because the Germans had access to a large

portion familiar reports reaction

of the British diplomatic correspondence and were therefore naturally more with the ambassador’s opinions than with the objections noted on his letters and within the Foreign Office? When the Getman assessment of probable British to their own possible moves is examined, this aspect of the situation as it

28. Dodd to Phipps, 1 July 1937, C 5541/3/18, FO 371/20711; C 5377/270/18, FO 371/20736. “I wish 29. When Hugh Dalton recounted Henderson’s explication of his views to Eden, the latter commented:

Papers. See also C he would not go on like this to everybody he meets.” Dalton Diary, 28 Octobet 1937, Dalton

5080/270/18, FO 371/20736; C 4975/270/18, FO 371/20735; R 7812/188/12, FO B7TAy/21132s 30. C 7725/270/18, FO 371/20736. 31. C 8293, C 8294/270/18, FO 371/20737. tidbits to the Germans 32. The Italians were reading British diplomatic traffic and at times passed on choice

and apparently secured copies of (see above, pp. 163-64). The Germans also decoded some British telegrams,

344, 484, 487 (the last item may have been some of the Berlin embassy correspondence; see G.D., C, 6, Nos.

to London conclusive circumprovided by the Italians). In March 1937 the Yugoslav government transmitted but although one official, Owen stantial evidence of the ability of the Italians to read British telegrams; possibility (R 1687, R 1688/224/92, FO O'Malley, had his doubts, the Foreign Office eventually denied the

371/21198).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

appeared to them must be recalled.* The replacement of Sir Eric Phipps was not the only personnel change anticipated with pleasure in Berlin. For some time at least a few within the German government had been looking forward to the retirement of Baldwin after the coronation of George VI in May 1937. Neville Chamberlain was thought to be less hostile to Germany than his predecessor, and there were hopes in Berlin that Anthony Eden might be dropped as foreign secretaty when the new ptime minister took over.*4 More important in the long run was Hitler’s complete misconception of most aspects of the British constitutional crisis itself. Edward VIII had in fact shown himself more favorably disposed toward Germany than his father, George V. There was also some evidence that the woman over whose

two prior marriages Edward would lose his throne was also rather pro-German and was known to have such views in the London society which included the German ambassador, Joachim von Ribbentrop.*° There were, however, two related misconceptions

in

Hitler’s appreciation of the events of December 1936 which culminated in the abdication of Edward VIII. In the first place, Hitler, like many other Germans, exaggerated the

importance of the king’s role in determining British policy. Perhaps the debate over the origins of the World War played a part in this misunderstanding; it was often held, especially in Germany, that Edward VII’s anti-German attitudes and policies had contributed significantly to the forging of the Triple Entente, which had proved so fateful for the Second Reich. Even if there was some substance to that view, it had little bearing on the realities of power and influence in the world of the 1930s. More astonishing is that von Ribbentrop was so totally ignorant of the currents of opinion in the country to which he was accredited that he believed and assured Hitler— who needed little convincing—that the whole marriage question was a false front that Baldwin had utilized to get rid of the king because of the latter’s pro-German views.* Once Hitler was certain of the truth of this fairy tale, it developed in his mind, especially after the Duke of Windsor made a favorable impression on the Fuhrer at a visit in October 1937, to a point where he imagined that Winston Churchill was responsible for the removal of England’s pro-German ruler.>” Given the erroneous impression that the duke had lost his throne because of his views on Germany, the even more preposterous idea that Churchill had arranged the clever use of the marriage issue to have him pushed out can be seen as a perfect example of how the imposition of preconceptions on reality

33. Henke, pp. 56-65, discusses what he considers Hitler’s slow turning away from a desire for an alliance with England to shield an offensive eastward in the face of England’s unwillingness to accept the role this scheme allotted to her. The picture Henke presents appeats to me to be overdrawn, and also flawed by heavy dependence on the hopelessly unreliable work of Dietrich Aigner, Das Ringen um England (Munich: Bechtle, 1969). 34, D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 430; 5, No. 39. On a final approach from Germany for a Baldwin-Hitler meeting, see

Jones, 3 January 1937, p. 299 (on the prior approaches, see above, pp. 212-13; Henke, p. 34). Having now had the opportunity to examine the Baldwin papers at Clare College, Cambridge, I am still incapable of imagining a conversation between the two men. 35. The fairest account is Frances Donaldson, Edward VIII (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1974), chap. 15. 36. See D.D.F., 2d, 4, Nos. 108, 140, and the very important record of a conversation between Sir Orme

Sargent and Ernst Jaeckh, who had been shown von Ribbentrop’s report to Hitler by Ernst Woermann, the second man in the German embassy in London, and who had been told by the latter that von Ribbentrop was

unshakable in his views, in C 448/270/18, FO 371/20734. See also Henke, pp. 65-69; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 53,” 12 December 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/29, f£.529-31; G.D., C, 6, No. 84; Albert Speer, Erinnerungen (Berlin: Propylaen, 1969), p. 86. On 11 December 1936, the day the Abdication Act was passed, von Ribbentrop expected shooting in the streets of London, believed that Edward VIII

would be restored to the throne, and discussed the matter with Hitler by telephone (Davidson Papers, p. 417)!

37. Wiedemann, pp. 153-56; Donaldson, chap. 27; Paul Schmidt, Statist auf diplomatischer Biihne 1923-1945 (Bonn: Athendum, 1950), pp. 373-76; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 529, 553; Dr. Kausch, “Die Deutschlandreise des Herzogs von Windsor,” 8 October 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, f£.257-59.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

335

can lead to total self-delusion. Such delusions, of course, have theit own subsequent

impact, regardless of objective reality. The further deduction that Hitler drew was that the British, like the French, were permanent and implacable “hate opponents” (Hassgegner) of Germany as he told his leading advisers at the Hossbach conference of 5 November, a few days after he had entertained the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in Berchtesgaden. ‘These views were avidly shared by Joachim von Ribbentrop. Just before he became foreign minister, he wrote a lengthy memorandum for Hitler explaining his belief in the unrelenting hostility of Britain and in the need to concentrate Germany’s diplomatic as well as military energies on the preparations for the inevitable war with England.3* He alluded to having still had some slight hope of agreement with England when he went there as ambassador in 1936 in view of Edward VIII’s opinions; once that monarch had

been deposed by Baldwin lest he decline to go along with a policy hostile to Germany, all hope of a real German-English rapprochement was gone. (Every future day in which our political considerations are not basically determined by the thought of England as our most dangerous enemy—tegardless of any tactical intermezzo of an understanding with us which might be attempted—would be a gain for our enemies.” In the face of such beliefs and attitudes, the efforts of the,Chamberlain

government

to reach an

accommodation with Germany could only fail. Ironically, in view of Hitler’s opinions, the circumstances of the constitutional crisis

in England helped open rather than close the way to a British approach to Berlin. The beginnings of discontent within the ruling Conservative party about what was seen as an excessively complaisant policy toward Germany was severely undermined when the first ~ major manifestations of this unease lost their impact because of Churchill’s support of Edward sea of the key figures in the Conservative party who urged rearmament and a strong policy toward Germany, Churchill was just recovering some prestige in , British public life from the isolation into which he had thrust himself in his long and ° bitter rearguard action in Parliament against the greater degree of self-government for India embodied in the Government of India Act of 1935. Barely emerging from that fiasco, he now threw himself into the lost cause_of defending Edward VIII in the face of

a practically unanimous House of Commons.*!\The very event which Hitler imagined was proof of a hopeless anti-German policy in“Londen in reality undermined for a long time the position of the most eloquent advocate of such a policy, and thereby helped open the way for Neville Chamberlain and Anthony Eden to try to formulate and implement a policy of accommodation with the Third Reich. In the summer of 1936 Phillig Kerr, Lord Lothian, had sent to Chamberlain and Eden a letter outlining his own proposals for British policy toward Germany, a policy why 38. Historians who argue that Hitler always wanted some agreement with England have never explained it be that in Hitler appointed von Ribbentrop right after receiving this explication of the latter’s views. Could his mastet’s this, as in so many other areas, von Ribbentrop was voicing what he correctly sensed were

The French and British governments were, therefore, both very much interested in

the closest possible ties with Belgium and did their utmost to persuade the Belgians not to take a completely neutral position.°° While the Belgians thought that since Britain and

2d, 5, No. 275. It is 92. This point is aptly made in a French strategic appreciation of 14 April 1937, D.D.F., 1975). r, Davis-Poynte (London: 1939-1940 Belgium, and France Bond, Brian of also a main lesson ‘ 93. C 4888/822/17, FO 371/20696.

Though the subject of interest and 94. The question of Luxembourg’s neutrality will not be discussed here. ie., if a war involved Belgium, it question; Belgian the to subordinate always was it time, the at s negotiation a contingency in which only ed contemplat seriously one no but well, as g would involve Luxembour

Luxembourg might 95. On this subject, 96, See D.D:F., 2d, compate Kieft, pp.

be involved. see C 3727/1/18, FO 371 /20708; C 7378/1/18, FO 371/20709. FO 371/20678; but 4, No. 2, Harvey Diaries, pp. 15-18, 21-22, 24, 31, 41-43; C 181/181/4, 15154.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

France would in their own interest help them if Germany attacked, there was no need to ptovoke the Germans,” the British Foreign Office hoped that signs of concrete support for Belgium might arrest the drift to neutrality; accordingly on 13 January 1937, British cabinet approval was secured for a discussion of munitions supply and other matters with Belgium in case of war.°’ The German government, on the other hand, had an

exactly opposite hope. It was Hitler’s view that every attempt should be made to complete the shift Belgium had started in October 1936 to the point where she was completely neutral like Switzerland. Not linked to France by military obligations and divested of whatever was left of her obligation under the covenant of the League of Nations to permit the transit of troops aiding an attacked League member, Belgium would serve as a barrier protecting Germany in the west.°? Such a barrier would render French support of any countries Germany might attack in Central or Eastern Europe less likely and much more difficult if France did move. From his reference to Belgium in his 30 January speech,!" to the German declaration of 13 October 1937,!9! Hitler did what he could to reassure the Bel-

gians about German intentions in the hope of facilitating a complete detaching of Belgium from any ties to Britain and France. If in this process of making verbal and written promises to Belgium Hitler went further than von Neurath and others in the German Foreign Ministry thought wise,!°

the reason was the same as the one which had led him to make concessions to Poland and the Vatican in negotiations with them in the first years of his rule that also went beyond the foreign minister’s preferences. While the latter thought that the arrangements atrived at might actually last, so that their terms were of real, long-term significance,

Hitler never intended to keep them once they had served their original purpose. Since he did not have the slightest intention of keeping the promise to respect Belgium’s independence and neutrality, any more than he intended to keep the treaties with Poland or the Vatican, it did not make much difference precisely what was promised as long as the key goal of the moment, in this case the neutrality of Belgium until Hitler was ready to attack in the west, was secured. When the moment for that attack came, some excuse would be

found; and the barrier to western interference with his Central and East European adventures would become a corridor through which France could more easily be attacked. The tug-of-war over Belgian policy continued through much of 1937. There were internal divisions in the Belgian government over the proper course to follow. The fear of provoking Germany, the belief that Britain would not have a land army to send to the continent,'® the fear that the treaty obligations of France might involve Belgium in a war, and the pressure of the Flemish element, all combined to give an edge to the 97. D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 301; D.D.B., 4, No. 188; C 1658/181/4, FO 371/20679. 98. C 212, C 318, C 1055/181/4, FO 371/20678; C 1142, C 2937, C 2938, C 6941/271/18, FO 371/20738. Kieft, pp. 161-66, stresses British responsibility for the decisions made by Belgium. 99, See D.D.B., 4, Nos. 209, 217, 219, 221. 100. On the circumstances surrounding the reference to Belgium in Hitler’s speech of 30 January 1937, and prior soundings, see ibid., Nos. 143, 154, 177, 185, 186, 189-92, 195, 200, 203; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 39, 89, 166, 172, 174, 177, 196, 258, 266; Jacques Davignon, Berlin 1936-1940, souvenirs d’une mission (Brussels: Editions

universitaires, 1951), pp. 47-53; C 1081, C 1126/181/4, FO 371/20678; C 1330/181/4, FO 371/20679.

101. For the negotiations leading to the October declaration, see D.D.B., 4, Nos. 232, 235-37, 239, 240, 250;

Davignon, pp. 59-60; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 343, 363, 374, 384, 405, 454, 483, 506, 510, 528, 554, 555, 558, 560;

D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 20, 29, 40, 46, 51, 63, 64, 66, 75, 78, 79, 83; U.S. 1937, 1:116—-17; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 13. Oktober 1937,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.269.

102. D.D.B., 4, Nos. 196, 198, 226, 103. Ibid., No. 228; General Robert von Overstraeten, Albert I-Leopold III: Vingt oms de politique militaire belge 1920-1940 (Bruges: Desclée de Brouwer, 1949), 20 February and 5 March 1937, pp. 256, 257.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

351

advocates of neutrality. It is true that when the British and French governments accompanied their public declaration releasing Belgium from any obligation to themselves while promising to assist her in defending herself with a private communication that the effectiveness of this assistance would be greatly affected by the extent of prior concerted planning, the Belgian government agreed to unofficial staff contacts.! It is also true that Belgium never formally renounced her obligations under the covenant of the League. As a practical matter, however, Belgian policy was obviously oriented toward neutrality in any conflict other than one in which Belgium was invaded herself; and German policy, therefore, was successful in substance even if it fell slightly short in regard to form.1% In this case, as in the scheme to convert the ties of the Little Entente powers with each other and with France into a system of mutual assistance, the weakness of the participants to the discussion was self-reinforcing. The weakness of Britain and France contributed to the reluctance of Belgium; the fearful attitude of Belgium in turn threatened

to immobilize the French. If French troops could not move through Belgium, how were they to come to the aid of Czechoslovakia or Poland? As Germany built fortifications along the Franco-German border, the prospects grew dimmer and dimmer.'% As General Maurice Gamelin, the French chief of staff, put it to American Ambassador

William Bullitt on 20 May 1937: ... the ability of France to come to the assistance of Czechoslovakia or any other state of Eastern and Central Europe has been gravely diminished. France could no longer plan to march her troops through Belgium or base her planes on Belgian territory for attack on the Ruhr. Furthermore, as talks between the French and Belgian General Staffs had ceased thete could be no certitude in making preparations for French support of Belgium in case Belgium should be attacked by Germany.!”

When Bullitt asked Gamelin “if he did not believe that as soon as the French people began to realize the new position of Belgium, that the French soldiers would have to attack heavily fortified German lines on a short front, public opinion would begin to turn against such a horrible sacrifice of French lives,” the latter replied that “public opinion rarely understood military questions.” Bullitt had also received from Blum an emphatic expression of determination to go to war if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia, but the conclusion he drew was a shrewd one: “There is no doubt about the determination of the French Government at the present time to support Czechoslovakia in case of a German attack on Czechoslovakia but it is entirely conceivable that this determination will weaken during the coming months.” It was the recognition of the decreasing effectiveness of any deterrent to German and the adventures eastward resulting from the remilitarization of the Rhineland to situation nal internatio the of observers all led effective neutralization of Belgium that such undertake to planning was Germany t know—tha now assume—correctly as we

supplementary warning and staff talks, see 104, On the joint British-French declaration of 24 April and the 439, 446, 459; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 3295395; 400, 371, 370, 350, 349, Kieft, pp. 167-72; D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 336, . 342: D.D.B., 4, Nos. 226, 228, 231, 233; C 3530/1/18, FO 371/20708 G.D., C, 6, Nos. 248, 268, 289, 446; D, 5, 105. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 246, 255, 289, 367, 426, 463; 7, No. 289: 0 (Frankfurt/M:

(ed.), Die Weizsacker-Papiere, 1933-195 Nos. 473-79; D.D.B., 4, Nos. 206, 214; Leonidas E. Hill p. 118; C 1896/181/4, C 1923, C 2165, (HKG Propylaen, 1974) (hereafter cited as Weizsacker-Papiere), A 10 March 1937, CAB 27/622. 2373/181/4, FO 371/20679; British cabinet meeting of April 1937, pp. 227-28. 9 (Paris: Plon, 1952), 26 106. See U.S. 1937, 1:77-78; Jean Szembek, Journal 1933-193

107. U.S. 1937, 1:96, 97; see also ibid., 3:326.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IL

adventures in the near future.!°8 But could there be an alternative deterrent in the east, if

not from the Little Entente, perhaps from the Soviet Union, a country also potentially menaced by German expansion? Russia was, in fact, tied to France by the 1935 Franco-Soviet agreement as well as by

an alliance with Czechoslovakia that was dependent upon the Franco-Czechoslovak treaty of alliance. There were, however, very serious questions about the practical significance of these commitments. The reluctance of the Western Powers to place much faith in them is often attributed to ideological opposition to the Soviet regime, but there were far more practical obstacles to Soviet assistance to Czechoslovakia. The details of this issue will be examined in greater detail in the account of the crisis over Czechoslovakia, but some general aspects of the situation must be discussed in this broader review of French policy. If France was at least partially blocked from Germany by neutralized Belgium

and a short, defended

Franco-German

border,

the Soviet

Union

had no

common border with Germany at all. Neither had she a common border with Czechoslovakia.!°° Poland and Romania separated Czechoslovak from Russian territory, and neither was willing to allow Russian troops to cross for fear they would never leave.!!° There was, in fact, the real possibility that Poland would join Germany if France tried to pressure her into allowing Russian troops into the country.!!! Even had Poland and Romania been willing, the transportation system in the area as well as in the adjacent parts of the U.S.S.R. was very poor—to say nothing of the different railway gauges.!!? Massive land help was thus unlikely even in the remote contingency that it would be permitted. The French, moreover, were not only dubious about Soviet ability to provide military help to Czechoslovakia by land forces; they also doubted that there could be effective assistance by air.!!3 The French knew as well as the Germans that Czechoslovakia did not have the facilities to accommodate any substantial number of Russian planes.''4 If, however, the Czechs began to develop such facilities in peacetime—on the reasonable assumption that there would not be enough time to do so once Germany attacked—then the Germans would certainly find out and most likely launch a preventive attack. Thus work on the essential precondition for effective Soviet help would precipitate the very thing it was designed to avoid: a quick German invasion of Czechoslovakia.!!5 There were two further elements reducing in French eyes the prospects of effective support from the Soviet Union to restrain Germany. The reluctance of Britain, which itself was founded on doubts very similar to those of France, was one;!!6 the internal tur108. This was, of course, the reason for the British and French attempts to secure German restraint by economic and colonial concessions discussed elsewhere in this chapter. 109. It should also be noted that as soon as the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia became contiguous at the end of World War II, the Soviet Union lost interest in Czechoslovakia’s territorial integrity.

110. Dreifort, pp. 110-14, 119. 111. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 35. 112. In World War I, the communications difficulties in this area showed up repeatedly; the need to improve

them was a major factor in Hitler’s decision to attack the Soviet Union in the spring of 1941 rather than the fall of 1940; again, in 194445, there were serious transportation difficulties in this region, and it was in this regard

that the trucks and other vehicles provided by the U.S. under Lend-Lease were especially helpful to the Red Army. 113. For comments on the unlikely prospects of Soviet assistance to Czechoslovakia, see U.S. 1937, 1:79, 97; Szembek, 26 April 1937, pp. 227-28; Bullitt tel. 192 of 11 February 1937, State 751.6111/185.

114. D.D.F,, 2d, 9, No. 199. 115. Ibid., 5, No. 275. The same analysis showed how feeble the hope of Polish assistance for Czechoslovakia really was: the Poles would have to help in the TéSin area, precisely the portion of Czechoslovakia they coveted for themselves! 116. This point is heavily stressed by Dreifort, pp. 116-17, but without regard to the fact that the British

Britain and France Face the German Threat

33)

moil of the Soviet Union was another. The great purge had begun to tear apart the Communist party of the Soviet Union in 1936; in 1937 it was destroying the command structure and effectiveness of the Red Army.'!’ Hardly had Soviet Foreign Commissat Maxim Litvinov’s Paris visit of May 1937 moved the French to technical military conae sath the Soviet Union when the purge moved into the Red Army hierarchy in une. These events not only dominated the newspaper headlines of the world but also came close to British and French leaders in a personal way. Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, one of Russia’s most prominent soldiers, headed the Soviet delegation at the funeral of George V and returned to the Soviet Union after conversations in Paris; he was shot

in June 1937. Admiral Orlov was chief of the Soviet naval mission at the coronation naval review for George VI at Spithead; he was called out of the official dinner to go

home to dismissal and execution.'!? In the face of the terrible weakening the Soviet regime was inflicting on its own armed might, the lack of confidence in that powet’s

effectiveness in anything other than self-defense should not surprise anyone.!?° The doubts and hesitations are reflected in the diplomatic discussion of possible Franco-Soviet military cooperation. When Blum asked Vladimir Potemkin, the Soviet ambassador in Paris, on 17 February what aid Russia would provide in case of war, the latter answered that there would be troops if Poland and Romania allowed it, and other-

wise a little assistance by air and by ship. He stressed that in any case military protocols supplementing the Franco-Soviet treaty were needed to cover the various possible contingencies.!2! In the subsequent months, the French considered this idea. On the one hand, there were their own doubts, growing out of the knowledge of internal French opposition to closer ties with the Soviet Union. Furthermore, they encountered

resistance to the idea from the British government; both Eden and Vansittart repeatedly warned of the dangerous political implications in Europe of any such military agreements.!22 On the other hand, there were the possible advantages in regard to the defense of Czechoslovakia. Even more important in French eyes as an argument in favor of maintaining Soviet goodwill by some concessions on this point was the need to keep the Soviet Union from aligning herself with Germany. This was the constant worry of the

French and one of the main arguments they used with the British.!”°

attitude was conditioned by the same practical considerations that affected the French also, D.D.F., 2d, 9, No.

347; Pratt, p. 92.

117. On the purge, see John A. Armstrong, The Politics of Totalitarianism (New York: Random House, 1961),

chaps. 4 and 5. 118. Dreifort, pp. 115, 119. Nine Troubled 119. On this incident, see the memoirs of Sir Samuel Hoare, then First Lord of the Admiralty, spent time in Russia, and, as Years (London: Collins, 1964), pp. 342-43. Hoare, later Lord Templewood, had the Soviet Union in the with alliance an of advocate strongest the was the cabinet minutes for 1939 reveal,

27 July 1937, N Chamberlain government. See also Collier’s note of 10 August 1937 on Chilston to Collier, 3934/250/38, FO 371/21101.

Simon and Schuster, 1941), 120. D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 326, 343; Joseph E. Davies, Mission to Moscow (New York:

of Poland to France, pp. 16768. On Soviet awareness of this situation, and the resulting greater importance ily vain—attempts to see G.D., D, 1, No. 73; for French reports on the military purges and the—necessar

see D.D.F.,, 2d, 6, Nos. 54, 65, impress on the Soviet government their devastating impact on French opinion, help, see ibid 7, No. 263. Soviet possible of views k Czechoslova on impact the for 73, 144, 162; 7, No. 170; The Soviet government attributed, or 121. Ibid., 4, No. 457. This whole issue is in need of further study.

arrangements with allies in 193i and claimed to attribute, great importance to detailed and specific military the Soviet government in practice however, II, War World during Germany fighting actually 1939; while possible. extent greatest the to procedures such followed a policy of avoiding any 122. Ibid., 5, No. 299; C 3620, C 3685/532/62, FO 371/20702. 17, FO 371/20696. For Soviet hints of this 123. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 229, 299; Dreifort, p. 121; C 4888/822/ 492. See 2d, 7, Nos. 390, 436; for a threat in 1938, see ibid., 9, No. December 1937, see D.D.F.,

possibility in iet Pact, 1936-37,” Journal of Contemporary also John A. Dreifort, “The French Popular Front and the Franco-Sov

354

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II The French government, in view of these considerations, decided to respond at least

partially to Soviet wishes by authorizing the French general staff to explore the possibilities of military assistance with the Soviet general staff through the military attachés.'™ Little is known about the results of any such contacts, but there is nothing to suggest that they amounted to much. The French were understandably reluctant to make detailed military arrangements with Red Army officers who were likely to be shot soon after for collaboration with Germany;!25 as has already been mentioned, the purges began to reach into the military sphere right after the French decision in favor of contacts at the military attaché level. The practical obstacles in the way of Franco-Soviet cooperation were enormous, and they were not surmounted in 1937, or later.!¢ If the prospects of effective resistance to German expansion in Central and Eastern Europe were so dim, what might be the possibility of a Franco-German agreement? Any such agreement would have the effect of stabilizing the situation in Europe. Pierre Laval had made the effort and failed in the face of Germany’s persistent refusal to make the slightest concession.!2” It seemed inherently unlikely that what Laval had not accomplished could be attained by the Jewish prime minister of a Popular Front government, but Léon Blum was as determined to work for peace if there were any possibility of securing it as Chamberlain and Eden. The French left had been persistently critical of the Treaty of Versailles; though hostile to Hitler and all he stood for, there was a strong belief in the genuineness of German grievances and a predisposition, as would be expected from men who considered themselves Marxists, to look at both the problems of Germany and possible solutions for them in economic terms. That these should be discussed with a man like Schacht, therefore, seemed to make a good deal of sense.

The contacts Blum had had with Schacht in the summer of 1936 had not led anywhere, partly because there was no real prospect of German concessions in return for

colonial cessions by France, but partly also because of other circumstances of the time. Germany had recently violated the Locarno agreements—not an auspicious moment for making a new agreement—and the hostility between a France sympathetic to the Spanish Loyalists and a Germany supporting,Franco in the Spanish Civil War created a bad atmosphere. Although the passions aroused all over the world by that conflict lasted longer even than that protracted war, they were especially heated in those very months of 1936, August to November, when the first contacts with Schacht took place. At the end of 1936, a new phase in the Spanish Civil War appeared to offer an opportunity for reversing the situation; that is, for making that war an opportunity for a rapprochement instead of a source of friction.!78 After the failure of Franco’s forces to seize Madrid, evident by late November 1936,

the apparent development of a stalemate between the two contesting sides suggested the possibility of ending the war by mediation. The course and failure of the mediation efforts in the winter of 1936-37 cannot be traced here. The aspect relevant to FrancoHistory, 11 (1976): 217-36. 124. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 285, 480; cf. C 3620/532/62, FO 371/20702; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 360, 377; Anthony Adamthwaite, France and the Coming of the Second World War, 1936-1939 (London: Frank Cass, 1977), pp. 48-50. 125. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 35. In his thoughtful piece, “Léon Blum et l’Allemagne, 1930-1939,” Jacques Bariéty

argues that Blum did not want a military convention with the Soviet Union because of his worry that such agreements would bring on war as he and many others believed they had done before 1914 (Les relations francoallemandes, 1933-1939 [Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1976], pp. 45, 50-51). 126. There was, nevertheless, no good reason for French Foreign Minister Delbos to snub Moscow during his East European trip in December 1937 (Dreifort, Yvon Delbos, pp. 148-49; D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 237). 127. See above, pp. 172-73. For Laval’s subsequent regrets over this failure, see ‘Reséabes to Goring, 22 May

1937, T-120, 5482/2621/E 382093104. 128. The policy of Germany toward the Spanish Civil War has been touched on briefly in chap. 16; it will be examined in more detail in chap. 19.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

355

German relations is the idea put forward by the French government in December 1936 to have France and Getmany cooperate (in concert with other powers) in settling the conflict in Spain, each in contact and sympathy with one party, and then to use that cooperation as a basis for wider discussion of economic and colonial questions.!2 In December 1936 the French government put out a series of cautious feelers to see whether the German government was at all interested in a program that would start with a mediated settlement in Spain and then, whether or not that were secured, would utilize

the Franco-German contacts developed in that effort to go on to a settlement of various outstanding issues. Economic topics to be worked on would include the Franco-German trade agreement which was in any case due for renegotiation, a reduction in trade barriers

and other steps that would ease Germany’s transition from a wat economy to a peacetime economy participating more actively in normal world trade, and colonial concessions to Germany within the framework of a general political as well as economic settlement.!*° It became evident in the course of these soundings that von Neurath and the other officials in the German Foreign Ministry were not interested but that Schacht was, partly because it might help his own position in Germany, partly because he still hoped to divert Hitler from eastern conquests to international economic cooperation and colonial

development

in Africa. The

German

ambassador

to France, Johannes

von

Welczek was also very strongly in favor of taking up the French offers.'! It is entirely in keeping with other evidence about his views that von Welczek was later quoted as commenting in March 1937 that the French were now willing to negotiate; but that Germany was likely to miss the boat as she had done in the spring of 1918 when she had launched her great offensive in the west instead of negotiating for peace.!*? The only result of the French soundings was that Schacht was to go to Paris again in January 1937, but even this trip was canceled because of a flare-up in German-French relations growing out of alarmist rumors of German troop landings in Spanish Morocco early in January.'33 The unresponsiveness of Hitler’s 30 January speech to the overtures contained in Eden’s speech of 19 January and Blum’s of 24 January seemed to suggest that there would be no further talks at all.134 In the meantime, however, the conversation

between Schacht and Leith-Ross previously reviewed had been scheduled for 2 February, and the various problems as viewed by the French and British were examined in detail.!%° on these 129. The French archives for this period are quite fragmentary, and only a few French documents

German material, and negotiations have survived and will be cited. There is, however, extensive British and informasince U.S. Ambassador Bullitt was in close touch with the French government, there is considerable

tion in American archives. 46, 56, 70-72, 130. D.D.F,, 2d, 4, Nos. 174, 187, 193, 211, 230; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 85, 93, 99, 123, 184; D, 1, Nos. 382-83; 1937, 1:46—54; 91; D, 3, Nos. 150, 160, 162, 164, 167, 169, 173, 174, 179, 193; U.S. 1936, 1:380-81, Harvard University Press, Edgar B. Nixon (ed.), Franklin D. Roosevelt and Foreign Affairs (Cambridge, Mass.:

Hyde Park, Moore Papers, Bullitt 1969), 3:528-30; Dodd Diary, pp. 380, 381; Dodd to Moore, 19 December 1936,

1937, State 751.62/386, 387, tels. 45 of 12 January, 50 of 13 January, 58 of 14 January, and 69 of 16 January L. W. Goring, “Vermerk,” 28 December 391, 392; Dodd tel. 12 of 14 January 1937, State 751.62/388; Herbert

1936, T-120, 5482/2621/E 382111. that the French had reason to feel 131. See especially his letter to von Neurath of 26 December 1936, stating the German government to accept the that they were now negotiating from a strong position, and urging World War, 2, Dirksen Papers (1938 invitation, published in Documents and Materials Relating to the Eve of the Second Appendix II, No. 1, also to be published in G.D., 1939) (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1948),

C, 6, No. 110. 132. C 2337/3/18, FO 371/20710, £.224. 1937,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, 133. Cf. “Bestellungen auf der Pressekonferenz am 13. Januar the brief Hitler-Fran¢ois-Poncet conversawith d terminate been have to d considere be £29, The flare-up may 394). tion of 3February (D.D.F., 2d, 4, No.

D.D.F., 2d, 4, Nos. 346, 347, 351, 386, 389. 134,.G.Ds G, 6, Noss 155, 156, 169).1715 185, 188, 200; A role in attanging German-French contacts that 29-31. 1:27-28, 1937, U.S. 325; 311, Nos. 4, 2d, 135. D.D.F.; (see the documents

time by Kurt Freiherr yon Lersnet is not very clear from the evidence, was played at this

356

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The British-French exchanges of February to. May 1937 have already been reviewed. While the Western Powers were trying to clear their own minds on the prospects and possible terms of a settlement, Schacht went to Brussels to discuss world economic problems with Belgian Prime Minister Paul van Zeeland, who was trying to develop a program to improve world trade.'*6 In his conversations in Brussels, and subsequently in Berlin with Maurice Frére, an assistant of van Zeeland, Schacht once more developed his

projects for world trade and colonial concessions, throwing in a demand for the return of Eupen and Malmédy, Schleswig and Danzig, while asserting that Germany did not want Austria or Czechoslovakia.!37 Because Goring took an entirely different line with Frere, the French were left with the puzzle of who spoke for Germany. By that time, it had been decided that Schacht would make a trip to Paris at the end of May, so there was some hope that the question could be clarified. Certainly the French were highly skeptical; Francois-Poncet was sure that Schacht had no real influence any more and that the Germans were simply letting the talks with him go forward as a cover for their designs against Austria and Czechoslovakia, that Hitler would just accept whatever concessions he might get but make none in return.!3° Blum was not much more optimistic, but he was determined to give the attempt to start conversation another try.!% Just before Schacht left Berlin, about the middle of May 1937, he changed his tune completely. There is no direct evidence as to what happened. There is, however, good indirect evidence to suggest that Schacht saw Hitler and was given clear-cut instructions to stay away from political subjects.'4° In conversations with Frangois-Poncet in Berlin a few days before leaving for Paris, Schacht announced that he would follow an entirely different approach from that of his earlier talks in Paris and from that of his recent conversations in Brussels and with Frére in Berlin. He had no offers to make; he would not

talk about political subjects; he would merely listen on what would be in effect a courtesy visit. Given Schacht’s earlier loquacity to all and sundry on the very subjects he now considered unmentionable, one can only assume that he had been restrained by his master’s voice; the deprecating comments with which von Neurath regaled Francois-Poncet would have an impact in Paris and London, but they could never have restrained the selfassertive Schacht.4! In view of these preliminaries, little could be and was expected from Schacht’s Paris visit of 25-29 May. Much of his time was devoted to negotiations about debts, and in his from Hyde Park cited in n. 130; Bullitt tel. 152 of 3 February 1937, State 751.62/398; G.D., C, 6, No. 178; cf.

above, p. 137, n. 78). 136. The van Zeeland project cannot be reviewed here. There are documents on it in the Belgian, French, and

United States publications of diplomatic correspondence for 1937. 137. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 307, 316, 328, 346, 352; D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 416, 432; U.S. 1937, 1:823-24, 836-37; Kieft, p. 174. 138. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 311, 317, 325, 344; U.S. 1937, 1:92. 139. U.S. 1937, 1:93-95; see also Gteiser to Géring, 5 April 1937, T-120, 5482/2621/E 3821056.

140. Note that just before the trip to Brussels, Schacht had seen Hitler and received some instructions (Kieft, p. 174, n. 2; and U.S. 1937, 1:832-34). The detailed account of the colonial negotiations and discussions in the winter 1936-37 in Hildebrand, pp. 497-511, contains all manner of speculation, but is silent on the reversal in

Schacht’s attitude. The reference to a new directive from Hitler to the effect that there was no prospect of agreement with Britain and that in view of England’s unwillingness to support German space policy in Southeast Europe or German colonial policy, the propaganda and diplomacy of Getmany should be carried out accordingly, in Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 92,” of 27 May 1937, may reflect knowledge of the instructions behind Schacht’s new approach (Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, ff.447—49). It is also possible that Schacht’s

raising the Eupen-Malmédy question in Brussels after having been told not to do so by Hitler, who was anxious to nail down a neutral stance on Belgium’s part, angered the Fuhrer and produced an unmistakable order to stay out of all political matters on Schacht’s next trip.

141. D.D.F,, 2d, 5, Nos. 436, 442, 447; G.D., C, 6, No. 381; C 3736/3/18, FO 371/20710; C 3730/37/18, FO 371/20721; C 3666/78/18, FO 371/20727.

Britain and France Face the German Threat

357

conversation with Blum—the only really political one of his stay—Schacht merely listened to Blum, whose presentation followed essentially the lines that the French and British had previously agreed upon, but to which Schacht had uncharacteristically little to say./42 He would carry back to Germany the expression of French and British willingness to negotiate a general settlement, in the latter stages of which colonial concessions to Germany would play a part if Germany were willing to meet the political precondition of abstention from aggression in Europe. The worry of some in Paris and London that a response Schacht might bring back from Hitler would leave the process of negotiations in unofficial as opposed to regular diplomatic channels was entirely unnecessary; if Hitler had not told Schacht to forget about any ideas of a general settlement before he went to Paris, he assuredly never authorized a reply to the suggestions Blum had put forward on behalf of the Western Powers.!# On various occasions later in 1937 there would be references back to these informal contacts.'44 Three themes dominate in these allusions. One was the continued interest of the French in negotiations that might lead to some settlement along the lines they and the British had suggested. The second was the absolute rejection by those in the German Foreign Ministry of any German interest in any such settlement; they clearly understood and for the most part shared Hitler’s unwillingness to have his hands tied in Central and Eastern Europe. Finally, there is a current of anxiety on both sides, but especiaily the German

one, that the records of the talks not show either one responsible for their

breakdown—an anxiety obviously tied to concern over some future “war guilt” debate in which those records would be made public. The whole thrust of Hitler’s policy ran so directly counter to that of the concepts developed by France and Britain in connection with the Schacht soundings that there could be no prospect of agreement along the lines serious negotiations would necessarily have required. The very factor which made the British and French eager to have any negotiations transferred to regular diplomatic channels in the hope of teaching an agreement that, whatever the details, would have to conform in outline to the type of arrangement they wanted, was the reason that Hitler would under no circumstances allow such

formal negotiations to take place. We shall see how he thwarted subsequent efforts to make him specify his demands in a negotiating position where what was propagandistically defensible might set the limits of what he could actually demand. The one and only time he was maneuvered into such a situation—the negotiations of September 1938 culminating in the Munich agreement—he would regret to his last days alive; and in 1939 he would promise himself and his associates that no “Schweinehund,” no S.O.B. to use an appropriate equivalent, would ever do that to him again.

Whatever precise instructions Hitler actually gave Schacht before or after the latter’s

142. Documents

on the Schacht visit are in C 3751, C 4135/37/18,

FO

371/20721;

C 3861/3/18,

FO

G.D., C, 6, No. 449; D, 1, 371/20710; C 3870, C 3886/237/18, FO 371/20734; D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 462, 470; (this is the portion of 852.00/5567 State 1937, May 31 of 705 tel. Bullitt 109; Nos. 72, 83; U.S. 1937, 1:106-7, ¥ 173-74. the telegram omitted from U.S. 1937, 1:308). Cf. Dreifort, Yvon Delbos, pp. on 26 November 1937 for the visit of 143. The summary of the negotiations prepared in the Foreign Office with the French about the Discussion the in nts “Developme later, days few a London to French ministers to any meeting ot reference no contains 1937,” April 27th the of Paris to Colonial Question since the Despatch

FO 371/ 20723, ff. 116-20). The available exchange after the Schacht Blum meeting of 28 May (C 8265/37/18, a considerable period of time after returning for Hitler see to get even not did Schacht that suggests evidence , FO 371/20727, ff.243-48; D.D.F., 2d, 6, from Paris (C 4068/1/18, FO 371/20708); see also C 4475/78/18 No. 94. 7, 22, 35, 56, 63, 70, 513; G.D., C, 6, No. 430; D, 1, Nos. 144, Hemmen note of 13 July 1937, Hildebrand, p. 1:150, 158-59, 169. Some minor German-French agree1937, U.S. 380; No. 3, D, 91; 90, 88, 1, n. 71, 83 and see H. Merle

were worked out in December 1937; mucnis on radio, newspaper, and foreign correspondents State 751.62/432. Cochran (for Bullitt) dispatch 1452 of 30 December 1937,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

trip to Paris in May 1937, he was not going to risk being detoured from his immediate ageressive designs, and most assuredly not in talks inaugurated by a man whose advice he no longer followed and whom he would soon drop entirely. Schacht could trumpet German colonial demands and economic needs in a general way; that might help soften public resistance abroad and build up enthusiasm for aggression at home, but there must be no bargaining in which Germany would have to become specific in her demands and in her offers. Such a procedure threatened to tie her down to what others considered reasonable to concede to her and to what she herself promised in return. Beyond showing once more German determination not to allow a negotiated settlement of alleged grievances, the Schacht talks must be placed in still another context from Hitler’s perspective. Like the other efforts of the Western Powers to come to an agreement with him, they were interpreted by him—and by no means incorrectly—as signs both of opposition to German continental expansion and of a desperate reluctance to go to wat to prevent it.'45 His comments to this effect of November 1937 have already been cited. In regard to colonies, he would get those for nothing when the continental expansion he intended had made Germany strong enough to demand them at the point of a gun. Ironically, the very attempts Britain and France made and were still to make to divert him from aggtession in Europe by offering colonial and economic concessions encouraged him to take greater risks in a course of continental expansion which would, among other things, pave the way for what Hitler expected would become a later and even greater German colonial empire.

145. Hitler’s view of a possibly imminent internal collapse of France played a role in the development of this attitude.

Chapter 18

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits Pat collapse of the effort to develop the basis for a general settlement through the Schacht soundings of early 1937 did not put an end to such attempts. Two factors may be seen as primarily responsible for this continuation. In the first place, from the perspective of both London and Paris, but especially the former, the disadvantages of dealing with Schacht—unclear authority and unclear demands—were increasingly seen as outweighing the advantage of strengthening what was still considered a moderating influence on Hitler. The second element was peculiar to the political and personal situation in London as opposed to Paris. In both capitals the desire for the maintenance of peace and the willingness to make some sacrifices for it were present to an equivalent degree, but the political situation in the two capitals was different. The end of the Schacht talks almost coincided with the end of Baldwin’s service as prime minister. The new administration of Neville Chamberlain had behind it a solid majority in the House of Commons, an economy that had recovered considerable ground from the depression,! and the knowledge that the big rearmament program launched earlier in the year would eventually greatly strengthen the international position of England. While the British government could devote attention and energy to a new effort for an agreement with Germany, domestic problems kept the French government preoccupied. The Popular Front was in serious trouble throughout the summer of 1937,

and Blum resigned in September. The new government of Camille Chautemps, in which Yvon Delbos remained as foreign minister, did not follow a foreign policy substantially different from its predecessor’s; but there could be and were no French initiatives in the atea of broader European policy in the summer and fall of 1937. Even in the continued troubles aroused by the Spanish Civil War, the diplomatic role of France was generally less active than that of England in those months. Closely related to this political factor was a personal one. The new prime minister of England was determined to try for peace again and again.? As he became prime minister 1. Wendt, Economic Appeasement, pp. 426-36, stresses the role of the 1937 recession as a factor leading the Chamberlain government to the new attempt at appeasement. This is incorrect, at least in the form Wendt puts it, because the evidence clearly shows the British determination to go forward with the policy in May and June, several months before the new recession. Had von Neurath come to London as proposed, talks would have been under way long before the September stock market break and the October-November tise in unemployment. If these economic factors had any influence at all along the lines Wendt discusses, it would have been in the strengthening the British in their purpose and going forward with the previously adopted course even after . cancellation of von Neurath’s visit. for 2. Keith Feiling, The Life ofNeville Chamberlain (London: Macmillan, 1946) is still extremely useful, especially 1962), Atheneum, York: (New Chamberlain Neville Macleod, Iain papers. Chamberlain the its quotations from

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

in name as well as in fact, his concern for foreign affairs was, as previously mentioned, well established.2 Two months before, he had summarized his views in a special communication for the United States government, that had previously been reviewed with Baldwin and Eden and was formally addressed to Henry Morgenthau, the secretary of the treasury and hence Chamberlain’s official counterpart.4 Like the American government, the British was most interested in “preventing the outbreak of another war.” That raised two questions: What were the causes and where was the menace? As to the causes, they were “both political and economic” and sometimes difficult to disentangle from one another. The source and nature of the menace seemed obvious to Chamberlain: The main source of the feats of Europe is to be found in Germany. No other countty, not Italy ... not Russia . . . certainly not France, England or any of the smaller Powers, is for a moment credited with any aggressive designs. But the fierce propaganda against other nations . . . the intensity and persistence of German military preparations, together with the many acts of the German Government in violation of treaties, cynically justified on the ground that unilateral action was the quickest way of getting what they wanted, have inspired all her neighbours with a profound uneasiness. Even these islands which could be reached in less than an hour from German territory by an air force equipped with hundreds of tons of bombs cannot be exempt from anxiety. The motive for this aggressiveness on the part of Germany appears to arise from her desire to make herself so strong that no one will venture to withstand whatever demands she may make whether for European or colonial territory. With this intention in her heart she is not likely to agree to any disarmament which would defeat her purpose. The only consideration which would influence her to a contrary decision would be the conviction that her efforts to secure superiority of force were doomed to failure by reason of the superior force which would meet het if she attempted aggression.

This was why Britain was reafming, wished that the United States neutrality laws would be amended so that a victim of aggression could purchase weapons, and hoped that American-British cooperation in the Far East would restrain Japan and thus facilitate a firmer British position in Europe. But, as Neville Chamberlain saw it, there was also

another path. Although

Chamberlain

believed “it to be true that the political ambitions

of

Germany lie at the root of the economic difficulties in Europe,” he was “by no means

blind to the advisability of trying by allpracticable means to ease the economic situation.” He listed the various directions the British government was exploring to reach this goal. Included were the hoped for British-American trade agreement, the joint efforts with the French to explore a lowering of restrictions on international trade, and support of attempts made by Belgian Prime Minister van Zeeland at a project for improving worldwide economic activities. Finally there was, as Chamberlain put it, “a further matter contains some additional excerpts. David Dilks is prepating a major work based on full access to the papers. 3, Jones, 30 May 1937, p. 350, says that Chamberlain means to be his own foreign minister; see also Colvin,

chap. 8; Samuel Hoare (Lord Templewood), Nine Troubled Years (London: Collins, 1954), pp. 258-59. There is an excellent discussion of Chamberlain’s position in Donald C. Watt, “British Domestic Politics and the Onset of War,” Les relations franco-britanniques de 1935 a 1939 (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique,

1975), pp. 243-61. 4. Text in U.S. 1937, 1:98-102. All the evidence this writer has seen supports the view that Chamberlain was expressing his own convictions as well as those of Eden, who in fact drafted some of the key passages (Eden,

pp. 597-98). Baldwin agreed to the message, but it is difficult to know whether he would have expressed his own views in quite the same way.

Another Attempt at as: ettlement: The von Neurath and Hahfax Visits

361

that should be mentioned.” He then referred to the talk Schacht had had with Blum the preceding year and with Leith-Ross the preceding month. Stressing the secrecy of these soundings, Chamberlain added that although complicated and difficult political and economic problems were involved, “it is possible that these conversations may lead to more formal contacts with the German Government through the normal channels.” Chamberlain was a determined and persistent, even stubborn, man, and he was not

to be deterred by the fruitlessness of the contacts with Schacht in May from attempting to transfer the effort to “the normal channels.” In this he was strongly supported by Eden. If the latter was more pessimistic about the chances of success, it was because of

greater experience and familiarity with the difficulties rather than any divergence in basic approach.° At the conclusion of a series of internal Foreign Office minutes on the proper course for Britain to follow in the dangerous European situation, where both the moderates in Germany—here identified with the army—and the radicals around Hitler were seen as aiming for expansion in Europe leading to a new war, the only difference apparently being the greater caution and inclination to delay of the former as opposed to the latter, Eden agreed with the view of Sir Alexander Cadogan that delay was most important for England. The situation in Germany might change in some way, and British rearmament could make progress. Eden thought that only a policy which accepted all Opportunities to remove grievances and search for solutions gave any “scope for diplomatic effort by ourselves. The Leith-Ross-Schacht conversations, Mr. Van Zeeland’s efforts are all on right lines for they at least gain time, and they might gain peace.’ Within the Foreign Office as a whole, views were crystallizing in the same direction. In April and May of 1937, the information from Germany which pointed to a German

insistence that Britain take no interest'in Central and Eastern Europe and suggested that an Anglo-German agreement would be possible only on that basis provoked the conclusion that Britain could never agree to such an arrafgement. If any legitimate grievances of Germany could be identified—and the Germans were always conveniently hazy on this—then efforts should be made to meet them; but it would be dangerous for Britain

to accept the sort of bargain Germany appeared to be offering (and Hitler might indeed have been interested in). It would divide the British public, alienate all actual or potential

friends, mean writing off any prospect of future collaboration with the United States, and

thus eventually leave an internally divided and internationally isolated Britain facing an immensely strengthened Germany. The preferable course was to negotiate such specific world issues as could be identified, continue rearming, and show both the British and Germany’s was came, it if war, that peace, public, by making every effort for

responsibility. The British government should attempt to find out just what the Germans the wanted, if they were ever willing to specify what that was, but any scheme to divide world between Germany and Britain was out.’ in May The conversations Lord Lothian had with Hitler, Goring, and Schacht early with a forward come not would Germans only confirmed the position of London. The and Eastern Europe; specific program, unless it were one of British disinterest in Central

Lothian himself, and that no one in the London government would agree to. Even Lord Eden’s views with Chamberlain’s. 5. Wendt, pp. 437-38, properly stresses the basic congruence of , FO 371/20710, on a Minute by Rex Leeper of 14 April 1937, C 2967/3/18 6. Eden’s comment of 3 May 1937 stressed the need for time and for careful examination ££.269-77. In his first comments on 15 April, Eden had wanted von must clearly make much of Blomberg at the coronation” and

of British tactics. He added that “we On von Blombetg’s talks at the coronation— Ribbentrop kept as well informed and entettained as possible. 4 June 1937, Nuremberg 6, Nos. 371, 380; Gerl to Hess, much pleasantry but little substance—see G.D., C, C 3555/270/18, FO 371/ 20735: 84; p. Henke, Archives; National 3752-PS, document

C 3825/3/18, FO 371/20710; C 2840/78/18, FO 7. This is a summary based on C 2857, C 3317, C 3438, 436. No. 5, 2d, D.D.F.,, 5; 371 /20726; C 3793/270/18, FO 371/2073

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though he thought there were prospects of progress, insisted with the Germans on respect for the national identity of the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe. His circulation of the record of his talks to President Roosevelt as well as the Dominion prime ministers might shake the Foreign Office into paying more attention to these talks than it would have otherwise, but there was no substance to any of it. As one reads the records,

it is obvious that the parties to the conversation were talking past each other, a fact that would only become obvious when Lord Lothian was awakened by the German action of 15 March 1939, and Philip Conwell-Evans, who had acted as interpreter, was shocked by

German policy into advocacy of resistance rather than concessions to German demands. Lord Lothian’s argument for a special German economic position vis-a-vis the countries to the south and east of Germany might have made sense within a framework of the kind that the British and French governments were themselves considering, but his constant coupling of this with an insistence on the national independence of the countries in that area was directly opposed to German aims, even if he did not realize it at the time.® The opportunity for Chamberlain and Eden to put the attempted negotiations with Germany into “normal channels” came more quickly after Schacht’s Paris trip than might have been anticipated. The bombing of the German pocket battleship Deutschland by Spanish Loyalist airplanes on the evening of 29 May 1937 led Hitler to decide on 30 May, a Sunday, to withdraw temporarily from the Non-Intervention Committee and have the German navy bombard the Spanish port town of Almeria.? The attendant international uproar was the occasion for Eden to instruct Henderson to invite von Neurath for the beginning of the week of 7 June to discuss in London what might be needed for Germany’s return to the Non-Intervention Committee and also for a general review of the international situation.!° The fact that this invitation was sent on 1 June and contained a reference to the fact that “this occasion appears to provide useful opportunity for meeting without raising undue expectations and suspicions,” suggests that the foreign secretary may have been thinking of such an invitation even before the Deutschland incident, which thus provided the opportunity rather than the cause; but on this Eden’s memoirs ate as silent as the archives. If the British were eager to have von Neurath come to London, the Germans were reluctant. Hitler, Goring, von Neurath, and some historians have often stressed the

German interest in an agreement with England during the National Socialist period without ever facing up to the fact that whenever the British government offered the opportunity or even tried to start negotiations, Berlin refused.'! The proposed trip of von 8. On Lord Lothian’s trip, see C 3621/270/18, FO 371/20735; DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964, ff. 133-37; Lord Lothian to Norman Davis, 7 May 1937, enclosing reports of his Berlin interviews, Hydé Park, PSF Germany; Colvin, pp. 139-45; Henke, pp. 81-84; Butler, pp. 217-19, 337-53.

9. The account of Manfred Merkes, Die deutsche Politik im spanischen Biirgerkrieg 1936-1939, 2d ed. (Bonn:

Rohrscheid, 1969), pp. 276-82, must be supplemented by the contemporary evidence in the diary of Alfred Jodl for 29-31 May 1937, “Angriff auf Panzerschiff Deutschland durch rotspanische Flieger,” Nuremberg document 1955-PS, National Archives. (The identity of this as part of Jodl’s diary is evident from his handwriting in the title and its inclusion in the “Verzeichnis der von Chef WFst abgegebenen Akten” in 1781-PS.) The French documents on the Deutschland incident have been published since the 2d edition of Merkes’s book

was prepared; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 2, 5, 7, 12, 17, 18, 21, 23, 24, 29, 30, 32, 39, 40, 42, 43, 49. The German naval

records were used by Werner Rahn, “Ibiza und Almeria: Eine Dokumentation der Ereignisse vom 29. bis 31.

Mai 1937,” Marine-Rundschau, 68, No. 7 (July 1973), 389-406. See also Pratt, pp. 72-74; Henke, pp. 56-58.

10. Eden to Henderson, tel. 86 of 1 June 1937, C 4056/3976/18, FO 371/20748, ff.202~3. Most of the

drafting of this document is in Eden’s handwriting, 11. Note the comment of von Ribbentrop’s successor as ambassador in London, Herbert von Dirksen, in his memoirs: “During my term of office in London, Hitler never once took the trouble of following up on British

offers of negotiations, even if only as a pretence. He never even answered” (Moskau, Tokyo, London (Stuttgart:

Kohlhammer, 1950], p. 255). Henke’s book is one of the few which shows an understanding of the incompatibility of Hitler’s views with any and all British approaches (see esp. pp. 85-88).

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Neutath was a casebook example illustrating Hitler’s desire for British acquiescence in whatever he planned to do in Europe until he was ready to do it to England, as opposed to negotiations with the British government. For several weeks, von Neurath backed and

filled, evaded answering, postponed a reply, and invented new conditions. In view of Sir John Simon’s 1935 trip to Berlin, von Neurath owed a return visit; and finally, having

apparently persuaded Hitler that because of British insistence on a visit, relations would suffer if he declined, von Neurath most reluctantly agreed to go. The Germans so informed the Italians while the British notified the French.!2 Hardly had Eden written an effusive letter to Henderson thanking him for his efforts to arrange the visit than the Germans found an excuse to call it off.!3 As the undoubtedly real bombing of the Deutschland had provided the occasion for asking von Neurath to come to London, so an alleged torpedo attack on the German cruiser Leipzig on 19 June provided Hitler with an excuse to call the visit off. Whatever may be said about the concomitant German decisions to refuse any international investigation of this most questionable incident, and to withdraw from the international naval

patrol scheme entirely, it is quite obvious that the incident was seized upon as a heavensent pretext to call off von Neurath’s trip. This was evident to everyone both inside and outside Germany at the time: if von Neurath could go to London after a real attack on the Deutschland, why not go after an imaginary attack on the Leipzig? Henderson pleaded with Hitler as well as with von Neurath, but Hitler remained obdurate. The London government learned that their distinguished guest was not coming a couple of days before hearing that Admiral von Fischel, the commander of the pocket battleships, had said that

no torpedo tracks had been seen by the Lepzig.'4 In both London and Paris there was a combination of astonishment, regret, and annoyance; no National Socialist German foreign minister was invited to London again." The impression of a fundamental German distaste for negotiations with Britain 12. On

this curious,

but instructive,

charade,

see

C 4068/1/18,

FO

371/20708,;

C 4185/270/18,

FO

371 /20735; C 4057, C 4058, C 4059, C 4070, C 4076, C 4096, C 4196, C 4213/3976/18, FO 371/20748; C 4047, C 4082/4047/18, FO 371/20749; G.D., D, 3, Nos. 281, 284, 287, 288, 290-93, 298, 300, 303, 307-9, 311-15, 318-20, 323, 327-30, 334; Henderson, pp. 62-64; Henke, pp. 91-93; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 122— 23; “Informationsbericht Nr. 99,” 18 June 1937, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101 /30, ££.491-95; Philips

Diary, 30 June 1937, Houghton Library, Phillips Papers, vol. 13, pp. 2115-18. 13. Eden to Hendetson, 18 June 1937, Henderson Papers, FO 800/268, £233. The text of Eden’s letter is of

interest. “Thank you very much indeed for your letter of June 17th in regard to Neurath’s visit to London. “I am very glad that the visit has now finally been arranged and I hope that it will lead to useful results. I have always thought that a frank talk would be extremely useful for clearing up any misconceptions which may exist in the German mind, whilst to us it should constitute a valuable opportunity of testing what German intentions really are. “I am most grateful for your efforts in facilitating this visit.” 339-44, 346, 347, 14, On the Lempzig incident and Hitler’s decisions in connection with it, see G.D., D, 3, Nos. Committee on Foreign 349-51, 354; C 4458, C 4463/3976/18, FO 371/20749; 14th meeting of the cabinet

99; 101-3, 105, Policy, 21 June 1937, CAB 27/622; U.S. 1937, 1:336-37, 341, 343; DDE. 2d, 6, Nos. 92, 95; an attack on the Leipzig, he 107-13, 120, 171; Wiedemann, p. 157. Merkes, pp. 287-95, believes there really was

with von Neurath going fails to explain what the firing of torpedos which missed, even if it occurred, had to do of Merkes’s account. basis the on mainly but annoyance, real Hitler’s to London. Henke, pp. 93-94, believes in (Paderborn: Ferdinand The account of the incident in Hans-Henning Abendroth, Hitler in der spanischen Arena British knowledge that there was Schéningh, 1973), pp. 170-73, ignores the proposed von Neurath visit. The that the Leipzig did run into something, no torpedo attack is in W 12285/7/41, FO 371/21338; their evidence the evidence that the Italians did not 371/21339; FO 12635/7/41, though obviously no torpedo, is in W

believe in the incident is in R 4547/438/3, FO 371/21117.

When Chamberlain was asked about a renewed 15. C 4458, C 4463/3976/18, FO 371/20749; U.S. 1937, 1:333.

“did not consider the present moment invitation to von Neurath, he responded on 19 July that the government te” moment never came? Von “appropia the that e appropriate” (5 Hansard 326, c. 1783). Is it a coincidenc as foreign minister, but this was to say his Ribbentrop went to London in March 1938 after his appointment farewells as ambassador.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cteated by the abortive visit is reinforced by what is now known about the preparations of both sides for that visit during the days when it still appeared as if it would take place. On the German

side, the Balkan travels of von Neurath that had been one cause for

postponing a trip to London, gave him a chance to speak to Prince Paul of Yugoslavia, who had just been in London himself. The Yugoslav regent assured von Neurath that Chamberlain and his government were sincere in their desire for peace with Germany, and watned him about the horrendous impression von Ribbentrop was making in London.'¢ If the latter comment fitted in with von Neurath’s predilections, the former left him unmoved; he told the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister when in

Budapest a few days later that there was little prospect of an agreement with England.’’ As it became more definite that von Neurath would go to London, materials were prepared for his conversations with British leaders.'* These documents deal in some detail with the Spanish question and, in addition, cover a wide range of topics very briefly and without the slightest indication of substantive proposals. At only one point did Ernst von Weizsacker, head of the political department of the German Foreign Ministry, touch on the basic issue: “If England would let us do what-

evet we want where there are predominantly German interests and English [interests] are not touched, [and] if the British would take our raw materials situation seriously and help [us] improve it, then German-English cooperation for the purpose of maintaining peace would be assuted.’”!? Had von Neurath made this proposal, which elegantly combined Hitler’s desire for a free hand on the continent with Schacht’s hopes for trade and colonial concessions, he would have been quickly turned down. This scheme implied not an agreement between Germany and Britain but total British approval of whatever Germany wanted. As will be shown, Goring put this concept to Henderson later in the year, but in the summer of 1937 Hitler thought it best not to risk its exploration.”° The British government in its preparations for von Neurath’s visit could draw upon the presentations of English policy that had been drafted for the imperial conference which overlapped with the efforts to bring the reluctant German foreign minister to London. In his briefing of the Dominion prime ministers at their first meeting on 19 May, Eden had indicated that the greatest risk of war in Europe was not in the east as both Poland and Romania favored a policy of equilibrium and would not allow either neighbor the passage of troops for use against the other. “The danger of war was much greater in Central Europe in connection. with countries such as Czechoslovakia and Austria. The countries of the Danube Basin afforded a natural field for Germany’s economic development, but it was very doubtful whether Germany would be satisfied with such economic advantages.” Eden pointed out that Italy had given up her interest in Austrian independence and that the situation in Central Europe was now like that in the Balkans just before the war. There were thtee courses open to England. She could disinterest herself in Central Europe altogether. “Such a policy would be unwise and would most certainly invite aggression.” A second possibility would be to declare readiness to fight for Czechoslovakia or Austria if either became the victim of aggression. The British public would not be behind such a declaration, and it would be most dangerous for the 16. RM 423 of 8 June 1937, T-77, 884/5632521—23. 17. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 264.

18. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 317, 333, 337. 19. “Wiirde England uns da gewahren lassen, wo iiberwiegend deutsche Interessen vorliegen und englische unbertihrt sind, wirde England unsete Rohstofflage ernst nehmen und férdern helfen, so wire die deutsch-

englische Zusammenarbeit zum Zweck der Friedensbewahrung gesichert.” 20. Note Dertinget’s “Informationsbeticht Nr. 100,” of 26 June 1937, reporting that those still hoping for an understanding with England wete going against the policy of Hitler and citing Propaganda Ministry directives supporting his interpretation (Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, f£.505—9).

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government to announce a policy that did not have general support at home. “There remained the third possibility, namely, that without undertaking any military commitment we should make it clear that we were interested in events in Central Europe.””! At the twelfth meeting, Eden reiterated a similar view, reaffirming that Britain could

not disinterest herself in Central Europe. “The United Kingdom Government desired a world settlement because they were conscious that a spark in some distant area might ignite a general conflagration but they were only prepared to undertake military commitments in definite and limited areas.” At the same meeting, Eden expressed the view that

the majority of Austrians were not in favor of annexation to Germany. If that really changed, Britain would not oppose an Anschluss, but she would not encourage it—which

would be the practical effect of a public declaration of British disinterest in Central Europe. The knowledge by foreign governments of this attitude on the part of England would have the same effect; and this statement was, therefore, neither distributed for

possible use in conversations with foreign diplomats nor included in what was to be said to von Neurath.?? Although one of Eden’s comments in the archives states that he was “not entirely convinced of the truth” of the view held by Sir Orme Sargent and Sir Robert Vansittart that the Axsch/uss would change the whole situation in Central Europe to an extent that would be “inimical to peace and therefore to British interests,” the decision on what pre-

cisely to say on this subject had not been made when the visit was canceled.** On other topics an agreed position had been developed. If there was the hope that better AngloGerman relations might have a salutary effect on the behavior of Italy, the main emphasis was on the issues between Germany and the United Kingdom. There would be a chance to review the latest developments in regard to Spain. Britain very much wanted good relations with Germany and hoped that the present talks would help. In regard to Central Europe, Eden would take the line he had just expounded to the Dominion prime

ministers. The memory of the dispute over Serbia that had started the last war hung overt British policy, and von Neurath was to be reminded of this: “The Great War took its rise

from Central and S.E. Europe. Any violent disturbance would certainly lead to another war .... A war that began in Central Europe could not possibly be limited, and would inevitably spread.” Britain, therefore, could not disinterest herself in the independence of the countries of that area, but this did not mean that as part of a general European settle-

ment Britain might not make commetcial concessions in Germany’s favor there. Von Neurath might be asked whether any of Hitler’s promises and offers of March 1936 about nonagetession pacts, a Western Pact, return to the League of Nations and

other matters still held, and if so, on what terms. He should be told of British pressure in

Prague in favor of better treatment of the German minority in Czechoslovakia but was to be contradicted if he repeated the German fairy tales of Soviet influence in that country. As for relations with the Soviet Union itself, von Neurath would be told that R 3903/770/67, FO 21. Extract from Draft Minutes of the First Meeting of Principal Delegates, 10 May 1937, 50-54. pp. Pratt, also see discussions, strategic the On 371/21139, f£.196—-99. June 1937, R 4048/ 770/67, FO 22. Extract from Draft Minutes of the 12th Meeting of Principal Delegates, 3

who had complained about 371 /21139, ff.217—-24. At this time, Henderson was instructed to try to ask Géring,

the Germans thought that Britain British interference with German policy, for a clearer explanation of where not take place until October ¢ did talk oring Henderson-G the reasons, various For way. stood in Germany’s Office was also trying to Foreign the visit, the for preparations 4185/270/18, FO 371/20735). As part of the correspondence (C 4240/237/18, FO clear up all remaining confusion about the 1936 Schacht-Blum

371/20733. 371 /20734; C 4700/37/18, FO 371/20721). See also C 4367/165/18, FO Neurath to London” are filed under Cc 23. The relevant papers, “Preparations for a visit of Baron von at the an open door policy in the British colonies 5200/3976/18, FO 371/20749, f£.341-54, The discussion of

1937 also belongs in this context (CAB 13th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy on 16 June

27/622).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Britain “cannot join or countenance in any way the ‘Anti-Communist front,” and that she deplored the evidence of Russo-German friction. If von Neurath brought up the Danzig issue, he would be told that England wanted a peaceful evolution of events there, but that British public opinion would be sensitive to violent and unconstitutional acts in the Free City. Should the occasion arise, von Neurath could be asked about the various conversa-

tions with Schacht to see whether the political aspects of those talks could now take place through diplomatic channels. On the colonial question, the German foreign minister would be given the same view both the British and the French had given Schacht, namely, that a general political settlement was the prerequisite of any consideration of colonial concessions. As in the talks with Schacht the possibility of concessions in the fields of trade and finance would be mentioned. Furthermore, if Germany were interested, the British would be pleased to discuss having them join the British-French-

United States currency stabilization agreement of September 1936. While this policy statement would be made to von Neurath, the technical discussions required for any implementation of the latter step would be held with Schacht; and in this way it was hoped in London that Schacht could be kept favorably disposed to the idea of a general settlement though excluded from the political discussions.”4 The cancellation of von Neurath’s visit made all these points academic, but the British policy reflected in them remained essentially unchanged until the outbreak of war in 1939. If war broke out in Central or Eastern Europe, it would surely spread. If, on the other hand, specific problems were discussed, a comprehensive settlement might be worked out. Since this was the last thing Hitler wanted, it is not surprising that he evaded talks on the possibility; orders were even given in Berlin that references to the invitation to von Neurath must be stricken from German press reports.25 There was a further divergence of great importance that is implied rather than stated openly at this time. Hitler, as previously shown, thought that he could move step by step indefinitely and make war at times and against victims of his choosing. The British belief that any war would spread meant that a war once started would almost certainly involve them. This discrepancy in petception contributed equally to Hitler’s unwillingness and England’s eagerness for negotiations between them, Hitler operating on the hope and assumption of a series of isolated wars, while the British drew from 1914 the sad and fearful conclusion that they would be unable to remain outside any European war once it had started. Subsequent months would see the pattern of matched unwillingness and eagerness repeated. Before the next major episode in the attempts at a British-German settlement—the visit of Lord Halifax to Germany in November—can be reviewed, the relationship of the United States to British and French policy toward Germany must be examined. The Amertican aspect of the European diplomatic situation became important in the spring and summer of 1937 through the publicly well-advertised debate over the new neutrality legislation of the United States and the behind-the-scenes discussion of some American role in assisting a European settlement. The spring of 1937 saw a culmination of Ametican efforts to legislate the danger of war away from the United States. As military leaders so often prepare to fight the last war, civilian leaders work to avoid it. This inherently tather questionable venture—it is, after all, impossible to keep out of a war you have already been in—was high on the priority list of isolationists and pacifists in the United 24. On this aspect, see C 4475/78/18, FO 371/20727. See also the report on the Schacht-Henderson talk of 29

August 1937, in C 6206/270/18, FO 371/20736.

25. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 9. Juli 1937” (reference to “allerhéchste Anweisung”), Bundes-

archiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, f.19. See also Hess to Gerl, 31 August 1937, Nuremberg document 3752-PS, National Archives.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and H alifax Visits

367

States. In the congressional debate over the 1937 neutrality law, the assumpti on that the

United States had been tricked, or had tricked herself, into war in 1917 was translated

into proposals additional to those already on the books which were designed to keep the United States from being involved in a European conflict, it being assumed that any such involvement might come in the same way again.26 Allusion has already been made to Neville Chamberlain’s letter calling attention to the dangerous implications of the neutrality law. If a potential ageressor knew that his victim could not buy weapons from the United States, the advantage his own armament gave him was doubled. The potential victim was not only unprepared but could not quickly remedy the deficiency. In fact, the general knowledge that this was so would encourage the aggressor to threaten or to strike, while discouraging the victim. Knowing that Germany had a head start in rearmament, Britain and France watched anxiously as proposals designed to keep war from coming to America seemed to make more likely the outbreak of war in Europe—and then engulf America anyway.2’ The Western Powers hoped that the legislation would at least leave some discretion to the president, but the final form of the law of 1 May 1937 left very little. The prospect that, once war had broken out, the law might be changed provided little consolation if the Germans exploited their armaments advantage in a quick offensive. The old controversy over the Allied debts left over from the World War did nothing to make Americans more sympathetic to Britain and France, but it is unlikely that this was a very significant factor. The more dangerous the situation in Europe appeared, the more public pressures mounted in the United States in favor of building a legislative Maginot Line against any danger of involvement. Ironically, in the United States (as in England), those most in favor of taking a strong line with Germany and Italy were among those equally fervent in demanding that anyone who took a strong line should be left in the lurch if that led him into trouble. In the face of these pressures,

President Roosevelt, who was himself hopeful of keeping America out of any war, fought a rearguard action against only the more outlandish isolationist proposals, and the law eventually enacted offered little solace to British and French statesmen. As in the examples mentioned in the preceding chapter, there was here another selfreinforcing process of undermining resolution in the face of danger. The British and French were necessarily more cautious in their attitude toward taking any risks in Europe in the knowledge that any deficiency in their armament could not be remedied by wartime purchases in the United States.28 The more complaisant the attitude Britain and France adopted toward the dictators and the less their concern for the ideologically antiAxis proclivities of an American public that wanted its own government’s hands tied anyway, the more the isolationist tendencies in the American public and leadership grew. This does not mean that London and Paris became uninterested in the development of American opinion and policy, but it did lead to a kind of petulance that was precisely the opposite of what was needed. Instead of looking for opportunities to assist the process of informing the American public about the dangers in Europe, the British government seemed to go out of its way to avoid that. It is true that in response to Roosevelt’s and Morgenthau’s indications of a willingness to exchange information,””? London 26. See Manfred Jonas, Isolationism in America, 1935-1941 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1966); William L. Langer and S. Everett Gleason, The Challenge to Isolation, 1937-1940 (New York: Harper, 1952), chap. 1.

A 27. For French observation, see D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 304; 5, Nos. 21, 54, 373, 399. For British observation,

1895/448/45, FO 371/20666; Colvin, pp. 139-45. 28. An assessment of the dangers of the U.S. neutrality laws for Britain by the Chiefs of Staff Sub-Committee A 4581 of the Committee of Imperial Defence of 13 May 1937 is in A 3587/448/45, FO 371/20666. See also and A 4631/448/45, FO 371/20666. 29. A 665/38/45, FO 371/20651.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

became far more forthcoming in keeping Washington informed about current problems and negotiations. There was also the beginning of the negotiations that eventually led to the Anglo-American Trade Treaty, certainly the most important sign of a closer relationship between the two powers, and seen as such by the two countries.” On anything more elaborate, however, the British government tended to discourage rather than encourage feelers from Already in 1936 step to assist a new soundings made on

Washington. President Roosevelt had considered the possibility of some broader European settlement, perhaps by calling a world conference.*! The his behalf with the London government early in 1937 were turned

down there with a rather reasonable argument: having just alerted the British public to the need for a rearmament program, the British government would find itself having to start all over again if the heady prospect of disarmament were once again dangled before the people in circumstances where there was not the slightest chance of German cooperation. Furthermore, British agreement in or joint sponsorship of a conference at that point would look like a total retreat to the Germans.*? If that made sense, the British handling of the alternative to which Roosevelt turned did not. As he cast about for some approach to the threatening danger of war,** the president decided to invite one of the

British leaders to Washington. When the idea of a visit was first broached, Baldwin was still prime minister, and

either he, Chamberlain, or Eden was thought of as a possible guest. Over the following months, various ideas were put forth from Washington; and there was a considerable crossing of wires between the United States ambassador in London and Norman Davis, who was also there to represent the United States in naval negotiations. The outcome, however, is certainly clear. No one went, neither Baldwin nor Chamberlain nor Eden.34

There is no reason to believe that great results would have come from such a visit, but there would surely have been effects in three areas of some importance: a closer cootdination between the deplorably divergent American and British policies in the Far East, an exchange of ideas and information that would have made it easier for the two governments to understand each other, and a clearer recognition of the problems facing both on the part of the American public. Of those British officials whose views about the project can be determined from the 30. On the Anglo-American trade negotiations, including the Foreign Office pressure for concessions to the US. because of the political importance of the negotiations, see A 1059/93/45, FO 371/20656; A 7450, A 7765/228/45, FO 371/20663; 12th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 11 June 1937, CAB 27/622; U.S. 1937, 1:72-74; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 19 November 1937, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.367. There is a somewhat exaggerated account in Schréder, pp. 190-99. 31. See above, p. 123. The most sophisticated analysis of the Roosevelt plan as well as of its fate in reality and in historical writing, is Francis L. Loewenheim, “An Illusion That Shaped History: New Light on the History and Historiography of American Peace Efforts before Munich,” in Some Pathways in Twentieth Century History: Essays in Honor of Reginald Charles McGrane, ed. Daniel R. Beaver (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1969), pp. 177-220, 286-95. Though perhaps neglecting the “public relations” aspect of the president’s project, Loewenheim has catefully assessed all the evidence available through 1967. Offner, chaps. 7 and 8, is far less

satisfactory. 32. C 2614/3/18, FO 371/20710; W 4604/4604/98, FO 371/21254; U.S. 1937, 1:640-41, 641-48, 72-74;

Eden, pp. 599-600; Dodd Diary, 4 March 1937, pp. 388-89; G.D., C, 6, No. 245; Bingham to Roosevelt, 24 March 1937, Library of Congress, Hul/ Papers, folder 98; Bingham tel. 135 of 12 March 1937, State 500.A

19/60. 33. See D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 270.

34, On this episode, in addition to the evidence in Loewenheim and Offner, see Jones, pp. 327, 330, 337-38;

Dorothy Borg, The United States and the Far Eastern Crisis of 1933-1938 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1964), pp. 375-77; Janet Adam Smith, John Buchan:A Biography (Boston: Little Brown, 1966), pp. 444-47, 473-75; Bingham to Roosevelt, 1 July 1937, Roosevelt to Bingham, 16 July 1937, draft of letter, Norman Davis

to Chamberlain, June 1937, all in Hyde Park, PSF Great Britain 1937; A 4412/228/45, FO 371/20661; A 6550, A 6869/228/45, FO 371/20663.

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record, Vansittart—who had been in charge of the American section of the Foreign Office during much of the 1920s—was most strongly in favor, and Neville Chamberlain

was both most dubious and opposed. He thought nothing would come of it all anyway, failed to see the publicistic aspect of the whole problem, and was probably still influenced by his resentment over Roosevelt’s actions toward the London Economic Conference of 1933 in which Chamberlain had, of course, played a major role on the British side. Eden’s attitude is unclear. He had a vivid appreciation of the need for encouraging any American initiative, and was generally in agreement with Vansittart on the key importance

of British-American

cooperation.25 He seems, however, not to have

pushed very hard, and his memoirs sound rather apologetic on this point.%6 It appears likely that Eden’s reluctance to insist on working out something leading to an American visit at that time contributed to the dispute between him and Chamberlain over Roosevelt’s January 1938 initiative in two ways. The lack of personal contacts made it more difficult for both Americans and British to clarify a proposal that was very nebulous in Roosevelt’s own thinking originally—but might have been more specific and would certainly have been less of a surprise to London had there been some prior face-to-face discussions in which either Chamberlain or Eden would have had an opportunity to ask some pointed questions. In the second place, while Eden learned Chamberlain’s views in the course of the British consideration of the invitation, the evi-

dence suggests that Eden’s own passive behavior kept Chamberlain from finding out how strongly the foreign secretary felt about not discouraging Roosevelt’s initiatives. It is, of course, doubtful that much could have been accomplished. The inability or unwillingness of Britain and the United States to cooperate effectively in the crisis in East Asia in the months following the outbreak of open hostilities between Japan and China in July 1937 certainly raises doubts about any possible cooperation in regard to European problems. At the Brussels Conference as in the diplomatic contacts between the two powers—other than China—whose interests were most threatened by Japanese agetession, the hesitations of each reinforced the timidity of the other.*’ Roosevelt’s “quarantine the aggressors” speech, made on 5 October 1937 at the dedication of Chicago’s Outer Drive bridge in the shadow of the Tribune Tower did little more than stit a temporaty excitement.*8 Roosevelt himself saw the speech as designed “to educate American opinion and to show the world in which direction that opinion is running,” but did not feel that the “very difficult and restive American public opinion” would let

35. See the various Foreign Office comments on Sir Eric Phipps Berlin tel. 331 (Saving) of 6 November 1936

on his conversation with Dodd about a possible world conference, in A 8860/103/45, FO 371/19827, f£.314-

21. Cf. A 5459/6/45, FO 371/20649. 36. Eden, p. 601.

37. The point is well made by Loewenheim. See also Borg, chap. 14; Bradford A. Lee, Britain and the SinoChina—British Japanese War (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1973); Nicholas Clifford, Retreat from Policy in the Far East, 1937-1941 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1967). Quarterly, ue 38. On the speech, see Dorothy Borg, “Notes on Roosevelt's ‘Quarantine’ Speech,” Political Science Beal Jacobs, “Roosevelt s (Sept. 1957), 405-33; Borg, United States and the Far Eastern Crisis, chap. 13; Travis in Robert A. Divine, evaluation general good a and 489-99; 1962), (Aug. 24 Historian, The ‘Quarantine Speech,”

British reaction in A Roosevelt and World War II (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1969), pp. 16-19. 2d, 7, Nos. 33, 42, 53; German 7186/448/45, FO 371/20667; French reaction in U.S. 1937, 1:132-33; D.D.F.,

reaction

in G.D., D, 1, Nos.

412, 413, 416; “‘Bestellungen

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.253.

aus

det Pressekonferenz,”

6 October

1937,

of a financial blockade of For evidence that Roosevelt discussed the quarantine idea, phrased in terms as 16 May 1934, see the British Foreign Germany, with former Belgian Prime Minister Emile Francqui as early and C 4982/ 635/18, FO 371 /18871, Office correspondence under C 3720/635/18, FO 371/18870, f£.388-93, rd talk with Francqui following a off-the-reco an had president the that me f£.66-68. (The FDR Library informs and Francqui.) Roosevelt between nce luncheon, but has no account of the meeting or corresponde

370

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

him move ahead quickly.* At the turn of the year, the president did, however, decide to move, if not quickly,

certainly substantially. He authorized confidential discussions of naval contingencies in the Far East and sent Captain Ralph Ingersoll of the American navy on a special mission to London so that the United States and Britain could exchange information on their dispositions in case of war in the Pacific.4? (Chamberlain and Eden cooperated in responding blandly and without enthusiasm to this overture, but they took differing positions on Roosevelt’s next initiative. He wanted to summon an international conference to discuss a new program for a conference of all governments at the White House to discuss the principles of international conduct and devise ways of assuring a reduction of armaments and equality of economic opportunity. When he sounded the British government—with a very short deadline for a response—Eden was .on a holiday; and Sit Alexander Cadogan, who had replaced Vansittart as permanent undersecretary but shared the latter’s view of British-United States relations, was unable to persuade a Chamberlain to give a positive response.*# Chamberlain disregarded the publicity aspects of the issue, looked at the rather vague and woolly scheme, and ‘asked the president to

_ defer action on his plan for a short time while he pursued his own plans for better rela\ tions with Germany and Italy. Although Eden subsequently tried to reduce the negative tone of the first reply, the delay requested by Chamberlain became a permanent one as Roosevelt never brought this proposal forward again.*? At a time when the British gov/ernment was reviewing the results of Lord Halifax’s visit to Germany and was about to

embark on a major new approach to Germany itself—the same meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy considered the American overture and the planned proposal of colonial appeasement—Chamberlain did not want to become involved in a scheme he saw as running at cross-purposes with his own.“ There is little to suggest that much would have com Roosevelt’s scheme had it

been tried. The only discernible effect of the episode was on the internal situation in London. Eden was most upset by Chamberlain’s action. He wanted to resign but could not because of the secrecy Roosevelt had imposed on the existence of his project; never-

theless, Eden’s two strong letters of criticism and concern to the prime minister probably matk the real breach between the two men.# The strong opposition expressed by Washington to the possibility of British recognition of the Italian conquest of Ethiopia, a 39. Wickham Steed to Vansittart, in Mallet (Washington), tel. 344 of 13 October 1937, A 7441/228/45, FO 371/20663, ff. 108-11. Wickham Steed had met Roosevelt and Hull on 12 October. Cf. A 7748/228/45, FO

371/20663. 40. On this episode, see Eden, pp. 617-20; Borg, United States and the Far Eastern Crisis, pp. 497-99; Pratt, pp. 57-61; Roskill, Hankey, 3:274~75, 309-10; Cadogan Diary, pp. 31-34, 37, 46, 49; F 11201, F 1748/9/10, FO

371/20961; F 95/84/10, FO 371/22106. The study by Lawrence R. Pratt, “The Anglo-American Naval Conversations on the Far East of January 1938,” International Affairs, 47, No. 4 (Oct. 1971), 745-63, shows on the basis of the British records that the London government was exceedingly reticent about Roosevelt’s approach. 41. Evidence on this proposal cited by Loewenheim will not be cited here. The origins and history of the project can now be determined more precisely from the diaries of Adolf A. Berle, Navigating the Rapids, 19181971, ed. Beatrice Bishop Berle and Travis Beal Jacobs (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1973), 13 October 1937-7 Februaty 1938, pp. 140-63 passim.

42, Cadogan to Chamberlain forwarding Lindsay’s telegrams on the Roosevelt plan, 13 January 1938, FO

371/21526, ff. 113-14; Cadogan to Eden, 13 January 1938, ibid., ff. HOA-112. Lindsay himself urged “a very

quick and very cordial acceptance.” (Most secret telegram 42 of 12 January 1938, Premier 1/259, ff. 73-74). Other documents on the original plan in Premier 1/259; further details in Cadogan Diary, pp. 35-41, who insists, however, that Vansittart opposed a favorable reply to Roosevelt. 43. Telegrams in Premier 1/259, ff.45—9, 59-60, 65-66; Harvey Diary, pp. 67—79, 88, 117.

44. The minutes of the 19th, 20th, and 21st meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy are in CAB 27/622, 623.

45. Eden to Chamberlain, 17 January 1938, Premier 1/259, £f.55-58; Eden to Chamberlain, 18 January 1938,

FO 371/21526, ff.86A-88. Cf. Cadogan’s entry in his Diary, 21 January 1938, p. 40.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

ByAll

subject that was to be included in British negotiations with Italy, touched on the general problem of how to conduct those negotiations over which the final break would come a few weeks later. [The evidence is clear that Chamberlain did want good relations with the United States, but in his approach he showed the same unbending attitude that so antagonized his domestic political opponents. JNot even the hopes for a ministerial visit for the signing of the Anglo-American Trade Agreement of 17 November 1938 materialized.‘ In spite of the fact that as prime minister Chamberlain was mainly responsible for the concessions to the United States that were needed to bring about that agreement,4” he could not look beyond the immediate diplomatic issues of the moment to the broader problem of allowing America to educate itself on the realities of a world that did not conform to the fantasies of those who feared that the United States might again be involved by its munitions makers in a wat against the Kaiser. Jf President Roosevelt’s leadership in foreign affairs in 1937-38 was faltering and vague as he was torn between a genuine hatred of war and a distaste for the aggression of Germany, Italy, and Japan, his casting about for ways and means of averting the drift to war testifies to a concern for the dangers ahead and a desire to move public opinion to a point where it might be led to a clearer appreciation of the new situation developing in Europe. He would receive no help in this endeavor from Chamberlain, who saw the dangers and problems cleariy but) had a stubborn confidence in his own ability to devise the means for coping with them and no confidence whatever in any American oes This determination was maintained after the refGsal of von Neurath to visit London and took the form of a continued belief in personal contact with the dictators. Chamberlain’s efforts at an arrangement with Mussolini will be mentioned later in this chapter but has to be seen as part of his general approach. The British prime minister believed that differences could be settled by negotiations—or at least might well be—and that great differences required longer negotiations and greater patience. The possibility that anyone might in fact not want to negotiate at all but would prefer the arbitrament of war did not occur to him. Since he himself continued to believe that a war would spread, it did not seem possible to him either that anyone would run the risk of war voluntarily or that the very signs of eagerness to negotiate might encourage the willingness to run that risk. (He was, therefore, pleased by Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie

King’s

report on his meeting with Hitler and other German leaders at the end of June 1937 and and persistence, our present endeavor assured him that “we shall continue, with patience

to bring peace and order to a disturbed Europe.”

"

Difficulties in the Non-Intervention Committee and the sinking of ships by Italian

submarines in the Mediterranean, which provoked the Nyon Conference, dominated the

European, and the outbreak of war between China and Japan the Far Eastern diplomatic

vis-ascene in July and August 1937, but London continued to examine the possibilities

vis Germany. The reports coming in from that country were anything but encouraging, long but the cabinet thought that further exploration of the situation was desirable.*° A 46.A 556/1/45, FO 371/21490. Chamberlain’s desire for a closet 47. The letter of Lord Runciman to Roosevelt of 18 February 1938 stressing have been inspired by Chamberlain understanding with the U.S. and his support for a trade agreement may well

Park, PPF 4322. See also U.S. 1938, 2:41, 44— himself. The letter, with Roosevelt’s reply of 13 May, is in Hyde

45, 51-53.

Dibwee 2d, 7Nowi la. 1 48, There is no trace of this episode in the surviving French archives, FO 371/20750, £.342. Material on the 49. Chamberlain to Mackenzie King, 29 July 1937, C 5187/5187/18,

ff.348—54. Cf. Dettinger’s “Informationsberic visit, ibid., ff.318—42; and C 6349/5187/18, FO 371/20750, ff.5—7. 101/31, Z.Sg. Brammet, Nr. 103,” 1 July 1937, Bundesarchiv, ; Br. Cabinet 29 (37) of 8 July 1937, C 50. C 5150/3/18, FO 371/20711; C 5138/165/18, FO 371/20733 scare in the summer of 1937 is in R 5224/770/17, 4966/270/18, FO 371/20735. Material summarizing a war

372

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

conversation between Henderson and Géring on 20 July certainly offered no encouragement. Géring talked about the Slavs as Germany’s enemies, assured Henderson that Austtia would have to join Germany and that Czechoslovakia would yield only to force, while the ultimate objectives of German policy could not be revealed.5! Nothing the British learned through their embassy in Berlin about von Ribbentrop’s views offered better hopes. Everything pointed to the German leaders having given up on an agreement with England and being engaged in planning for ageressive actions of their choice. As for Chamberlain’s effort for a settlement, this was seen as temporizing until British rearmament was completed, an interpretation that was partially correct—but also partially mistaken.*? As the firm line taken by the British government at the Nyon Conference of September 1937 against acts of piracy by Italian submarines showed, there were indeed prospects of a firmer posture once the British felt militarily capable of assuming it.5> This did not mean, however, that Chamberlain was only playing for time; if settlements could be reached, he was all in favor. The reports of Nevile Henderson in September and October of 1937 did not suggest that there was any greater prospect of agreement. His accounts of conversations with Hitler, Goring, and von Neurath made clear that Germany planned to move on Austria next, Czechoslovakia soon after, and subsequently to further expansion eastward. Britain could acquiesce in all this, in which case Germany would promise to leave her alone, at least for the time being. What was proposed, in effect, was the exact opposite of

what the London and Paris governments had suggested in the Schacht talks. Instead of considering a return of colonies in exchange for German restraint in Europe, Goring —

who alone put forth the idea in specific terms—wanted to have Britain (and France) agree to German expansion in Central and Eastern Europe in exchange for German restraint in colonial demands.*4 This suggestion, and Hitler’s anti-British diatribes to the League high commissioner in Danzig, Carl J. Burckhardt, on 20 September hardly augured well for any formal negotiations along the lines developed in London and Paris, but the British government was not to be deterred.°° On 4 October Henderson had another lengthy conversation with Géring in which the latter declined to specify German demands and grievances. He repeated that the only workable proposal was a free hand for Germany in Europe and German respect for the security of the British Empire.°° Two strains of development issued from this meeting. Within the British government, it was suggested that the impact of their rejecting this offer of an alliance might be softened by a unilateral British declaration that she would not attack Germany if the latter were attacked in Eastern Europe. Since there was not the slightest prospect of this contingency—everyone, including Goring, knew that the only probable source of attacks in Eastern Europe was Germany herself—this would have eliminated a fictitious German grievance while removing at the same time any danger of subsequent German complaints that no response had been made to any of her offers. After initial enthusiasm for this idea in London, Chamberlain and Eden agreed on

FO 371/21140.

51. C 5314/270/18, FO 371/20736; the report of Henderson was stolen by the Italians from the British embassy in Rome and transmitted to the Germans, see G6ring’s Stabsamt, T-120, 5482/E 38202233. 52. C 5957, C 6083/270/18, FO 371/20736; C 6301/3/18, FO 371/20711.

53. The British cabinet agreed on the line to be taken—sink submarines as needed—at the meeting of 8 September 1937, Cabinet 34 (37), W 17044/16618/41, FO 371/21405. 54. Henderson-Hitler, 10 September 1937, C 6494/4222/18, FO 371/20749, f£.157-58; Henderson, ps 74s Henderson-Goring and Henderson-Neurath, 10-11 September 1937, Henderson, pp. 74-75; C 6494/4222, FO 371/20749, ff. 159-64, 135-38, 55. C 7394/5/55, FO 371/20758; Burckhardt, pp. 97-103. 56. C 7027/270/18, FO 371/20736; R 6983/303/3, FO 371/21116.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

373

11 November that the scheme should be dropped.5? The reasons ate not fully evident from the record; concern for the reaction in France and the danger of misunderstanding in Germany and Eastern Europe appear to have been the main considerations. The other result of the Henderson-Goring talk in the end accomplished no more, but because in this instance, public action was taken, international interest of a very high degree was aroused, Almost certainly it was the discussion between the two men in Goring’s hunting lodge at Rominten that produced the invitation to Lord Halifax to visit the international hunting expedition scheduled for Berlin in November 1937. There had been discussion of a possible visit by Lord Halifax to Germany in 1936.58 Lord Halifax, who in May 1937 had shifted from the post of lord privy seal to the equally unencumbered position of lord president of the council, had periodically taken over Eden’s responsibilities in the latter’s absence. He was kept informed of significant developments in the diplomatic sphere by his membership on the Foreign Policy Committee of the cabinet and by the transmittal of important documents from the Foreign Office. He was personally close to Chamberlain—who had exceedingly few such associations—and also to Eden.*? Though not always in agreement, Halifax and Eden worked together extremely well; their friendship survived the replacement of the latter by the former at the Foreign Office in February 1938 and the reversal of this succession in December 1940. Their differences reflected not so much a differing appreciation of the dangers in Europe as a great divergence in previous experience. Eden’s formative experience in international affairs was in a Europe where the failure of disarmament, the

collapse of collective security, and the rising threat of Germany left little room for optimism. He did not allow his personal distaste for Hitler and Mussolini to color his approach to them as much as Chamberlain feared, but it did make Eden exceedingly skeptical that any agreement worth the paper it was written on was likely to be secured. His strong advocacy of a policy of appeasement was, therefore, always tempered by doubts about the likelihood of success. Halifax, on the other hand, had acquired his perspective on international affairs as viceroy of India. There he had applied his curiosity, energy, and political courage to a world as variegated as Europe but with one most important exception. Mohandas K. Gandhi was the recognized leader of the opposition to British rule, but Halifax had him released from jail, met him face to face, and worked out a settlement that did not eventually hold but that did show what could be accomplished if the protagonists sincerely tried to negotiate—even over the greatest imaginable gulf. As Halifax himself was to discover, however, there was a fatal flaw in the view that the viceroy who could talk usefully

with Gandhi was surely the man who might talk usefully with Hitler. Though the German leader was seen by the mass of his followers in a way not unlike the regard millions of Indians had for Gandhi, the German leader was not interested in negotiations for an adjustment of differences and was most certainly no believer in nonviolence or civil disobedience. But it would take some hard experiences to bring this point home to Churchill, Neville Chamberlain and Lord Halifax. In the meantime, the fact that Winston

the most opposed plausible. races in

vocal ctitic in British political life of talks with Gandhi, was almost as strongly to conversations with Hitler only setved to make a false analogy look more Lord Halifax fully understood that given the tensions between religions and the India, Gandhi’s agitation could lead to communal violence in spite of

8, FO 371/20736, folio following £.157; 57. Minute by William Strang of 11 November 1937, in C 7027/270/1

see also R 7931/1/22, FO 371/21162. 58. See above, p. 212.

.

Bi

The Life of Lord Halifax (Boston: 59. The most perceptive work on him is the Earl of Birkenhead’s Halifax: York: Dodd Mead, 1957), are (New Days of Fullness memoirs, own Halifax’s Houghton Mifflin, 1966). Lord helpful but very reticent.

374

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

nationalist leader’s professions and preferences; it took him, like many others, a long time to realize that what was called communal violence in India was precisely what Hitler was determined to bring to Europe. Like Chamberlain, Halifax was able to see how a man’s single-minded pursuit of cherished goals could lead him to ignore or underestimate the danger of touching off a bloodbath; it was inconceivable to them that the bloodbath itself could be anyone’s goal.°° When the opportunity for Lord Halifax to visit Berlin arose in October 1937, therefore, there was initially agreement that this might provide a fine opportunity for a frank conversation with high-ranking Germans, including possibly Hitler.*! In anticipation of the visit, there was again, as when von Neurath had been expected in London, anxious

preparation in London and Berlin. The British studied both Burckhardt’s report on his September talk with Hitler, which boded no good, and the Aga Khan’s record of his conversation with the German leader on 20 October. Since Hitler had sounded a trifle more accommodating in the latter meeting, Eden thought that it might be used as a point of

departure for Lord Halifax’s talk.°? Hitler had expressed an interest in the return of Germany’s African colonies and suggested compensation in West Africa for former German East Africa, talked about a peaceful cultural and economic union with Austria

and autonomy—whatever that meant—for the Germans of Czechoslovakia, and also indicated a willingness to return to the League. As the time for the visit actually approached, the generally negative attitude of von Ribbentrop and von Neurath reinforced the doubts in the Foreign Office that much of anything could be accomplished. In particular, there was concern that Lord Halifax be most careful to warn the Germans about precipitate action, and that he elicit as specific as possible an elaboration

of what Germany meant by her demands on Czechoslovakia, for example.® Similarly, the agitation in Germany on the colonial question suggested that the various aspects of this problem had better be examined further in London, while Halifax would have to make clear that no colonial concessions could be made except within the framework of a general settlement. In spite of an uproar over a leak about the planned visit, the British wanted to go ahead. There is substantial evidence that the Germans tried to use this leak to call off 60. For a shrewd observer’s analysis of 4 October 1937 that the whole German colonial propaganda campaign of the fall of 1937 was solely a cover for planned expansion of German Lebensraum in Europe, see Dertinget’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 141: Die Osterreichische Frage,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ff.301-3;

large part published in Hildebrand, p. 517. 61. C 7324/7324/18, FO 371/20751. The argument in the literature over the attitudes of Chamberlain, Eden, and Vansittart toward the idea of the visit is largely a product of confusion and hindsight. The contemporary evidence shows that all were originally in favor, that subsequently the prospect of a meeting of Eden with von Neurath at the Brussels Conference on the Sino-Japanese conflict (see G.D., D, 1, No. 13) made Eden dubious about Lord Halifax’s going, but that by then Halifax was committed and von Neurath did not go to Brussels. Eden, pp. 576-81; Harvey Diary, pp. 59-60; Feiling, p. 332; Birkenhead, pp. 365-66. 62. C 74/3/18, FO 371/20712; R 7303/770/67, FO 371/21140; Paul Schmidt, Statist auf diplomatischer Biihne,

1923-45 (Bonn: Athenaum, 1950), p. 382; Aga Khan III, The Memoirs ofAga Khan (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954), pp. 276-77; cf. C 7232/3/18, FO 371/20712. 63. C 7506/37/18, FO 371/20722; C 7550/270/18, FO 371/20736; C 8293/270/18, FO 371/20737, £.62; C

7549/7324/18, C 7666/7324/18, FO 371/20751. On French information and reaction, see D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 229, 230, 232, 234, 238, 240, 246, 251; the French thought of this episode as analogous to Lord Haldane’s trip

to Berlin in 1912, and like Sir Robert Vansittart they hoped that it would prove as educational for Lord Halifax as the 1935 trip had been for Sir John Simon (ibid., No. 246). 64. R 7303/770/67, FO 371/21140; R 7574/188/12, FO 371/21131.

65. C 7582, C 7595/37/18, FO 371/20722; D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 35, 37, 43; Dr. Kausch, “Mitteilung fiir die Redaktion,” 5 November 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.331. 66. There are no solid clues in the archives on the source of the leak; hints point to the Italian embassy in

London or the Italian Foreign Ministry in Rome (see Eden’s postscript to Vansittart to Hendetson, tel. 198 of 15 November 1937, C 7732/7324/18, FO 371/20751, £.117; and G.D., D, 1, No. 29).

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifaxc Visits

O75

the visit, as they had used the Leipzig incident, but the combined efforts of Sir George Ogilvie-Porbes, the British chargé in Berlin, Henderson, and Chamberlain kept the project alive in spite of a deliberately provocative communiqué Hitler atranged to have published in the party’s news service, the Nationalsozialistische Partei-Korrespondenz.’ This incident suggests that the Germans, knowing the general type of approach Halifax would take, were as uninterested as ever in negotiations along those lines; but it did not keep the key figures in London ftom arguing over detailed preparations for the talks. Henderson urged a conciliatory attitude and concessions on the Austrian and Czech issues; Lord Halifax was inclined in that direction; and the permanent officials of the

Foreign Office thought that a less complaisant attitude should be shown. But these differences revolved more around emphasis than substance. The basic question was whether there was any prospect of working out an agreement on the basis of German restraint in Europe if Britain and France would make concessions in the colonial sphere and whether such agreements might then lead to a general system of European security in which concessions to Germany might be made but would be limited by the national rights and independence of others.®* Britain’s French ally was reassured in several conversations; invitations to the French prime minister and foreign minister for a subsequent trip to London would provide the opportunity for providing them full information. At the same time, Chamberlain’s press secretary, obviously on orders from his chief, gave the Germans

through the German

News

Agency, Deutsche

Nachrichten

Buro (DNB), representative in London a detailed reassurance of the British government’s unified determination to try to come to an agreement with Berlin. The authorities there should disregard both the press leaks and all rumors of differences between Chamberlain and Eden; the conversation between Hitler and Lord Halifax was a good way to get things started, though all must realize that the development of a British-

German rapprochement would be a slow process, taking years.” This circumvention of regular channels was due not only to Chamberlain’s great interest in having the process of talks started but also to a correct assessment of the opposition of the German ambassador to London, Joachim von Ribbentrop. In the days when the government to which he was accredited was preparing for the Halifax visit which was seen as the preliminary to serious Anglo-German negotiations, von Ribbentrop, who would later protest that all he ever wanted was Anglo-German friendship, was doing his best, or worst, to alienate the two countries from each other. Continuing his

habit of spending much of his time away from his post, von Ribbentrop was devoting his 26; Dertinger, 67. See the material filed under C 7732/7324/18, FO 371/20751, f£.97-116; G.D., D, 1, No. 25, The “Informationsbericht Nr. 163,” 15 November 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, f£415-17.

suggests that latter document makes the analogy to the “welcome opportunity” of the Leipzig incident. It also Rome and the communiqué, aside from trying to discourage the visit altogether, was designed to reassure it would “whether of question the in culminating communique, the of text full The policy. Tokyo on German Folge 266, issued not be more helpful in the interests of a detente to postpone the visit” may be found in NSK, analysis of this incident by on 13 November but appearing under the release date of 16 November 1937. The agrees that Hitler wanted to the French ambassador in Berlin is in D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 277. Henke, pp. 109-13, Ministry in the visit. avoid meeting Lord Halifax altogether, but exaggerates the interest of the German Foreign with Hitler are not in the Foreign 68. The notes Lord Halifax prepared for himself to take along to the meeting which he wanted Vansittart present Office files; he sent them to Chamberlain with a request for a meeting at The Foreign Office comments on (see Halifax to Chamberlain, 8 November 1937, Premier 1/330, ff.174-87). Eden, and Vansittart on 14 Halifax, Chamberlain, between meeting a at these notes, which were discussed meeting, see also Harvey November 14 the On ££.137-44. November, are in C 7866/7324/18, FO 371/20751, ff.261—-62. On the London preparations for to Hendricks, 15 November 1937, C 7932/270/18, FO 371/20736,

the 371 69. 70.

visit, see further, R 7574, R 7653/188/12, FO 37420134; C0746, /20736; C 7834/226/18, FO 371/20734, f£.92-99. See C 7785/3/18, FO 371/20712; C 7852/7324/18, FO Sry/2075ir G.D., D, 1, No. 29.

GC 7799, C 7932/270/18,

FO

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

efforts to bringing Italy into the Anti-Comintern Pact with Germany and Japan.”' The details of those negotiations do not belong in this context, but von Ribbentrop’s explanation to the Italians that he had failed to get along with the British and that this new scheme, seen by all participants and onlookers as directed against England, was the preliminary to a military alliance for the inevitable war against the Western Powers, suggests how fat his perspectives were from those of the hosts of his infrequent stays in London.” The fact that the proposed pact was, as Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano put it, “ostensibly anti-Communist but in reality anti-British’’? was understood in England. It did nothing to enhance von Ribbentrop’s popularity in London, where, between his ttips to Berlin, Munich, and Rome, he preached about the dangers of communism

to

Eden.”4 While von Ribbentrop merely listened to the general views of Lord Halifax on his forthcoming trip,”> the British government circularized its missions abroad instructing them to voice discreet British opposition to all ideological blocks if any government were solicited to join von Ribbentrop’s Anti-Comintern Pact.” Unable to block the Halifax visit, von Ribbentrop then tried to persuade Hitler to have him participate in the meeting, but here the opposition of Henderson fitted in with the personal preferences of von Neurath, who was quite happy to exclude his rival from the spotlight.” There is little evidence of detailed preparations in Germany for Lord Halifax’s visit. The suggestions of the head of the political section of the German Foreign Ministry, Ernst von Weizsacker, combine the demand for colonies with a free hand in Eastern

Europe (“Kolonien und Aktionsfahigkeit im Osten”) ‘as in his plan when von Neurath was expected to go to London. The only new point is the caution that with Britain’s rearmament program, time was running in England’s favor, and Germany, therefore,

should not delay negotiations indefinitely if she really wanted an agreement.’ The key problem of negotiations, namely, that the British would consider colonial concessions only in the context of a general settlement which would limit Germany’s freedom of action in Europe, was not grasped by von Weizsacker, who imagined, in spite of the evidence brought back by Schacht, that the British might settle for German restraint in Western Europe. His superior, State Secretary von Mackensen, on the other hand, saw the

point very clearly.” Hitler certainly understood it also; his comments in the Hossbach Conference of 5 November show that he understood that he could not have both volun71, For a list of von Ribbentrop’s travels in 1937 and early 1938, see T-120, 778/1562/378075-76. 72. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 139-41; Ciano, Tagebiich, 24 October 1937, p. 32; Henke, pp. 95-96. 73. Ciano, Tagebiich, 2 November 1937, p. 37.

74, The latter suggested that “His Excellency would perhaps not be offended at the knowledge that we much desired that he would spend the greatest possible measure of time in his work with us in London. Hert von Ribbentrop appeared gratified at this aspect of the matter, which had not previously occurred to him and left assuring me once again of his satisfaction at the better relations between England and Germany. I refrained from telling His Excellency my view of the contribution which he had made to this alleged improvement.” Eden to Henderson, No. 1288 of 27 October 1937, C 7451/270/18, FO 371/20736, ff. 187-91; cf. Eden, pp-

571-72, 607. 75. G.D., D, 1, No. 24. 76. F 9369/26/23, FO 371/21028. Note the decision vot to hold up this instruction because of the Halifax trip. 77. Henderson tel. 290 of 16 November 1937, C 7853/7324/18, FO 371/20751, ff. 129-31. 78. G.D., D, 1, No. 21. Von Weizsicker was here looking at the same issue from which Hitler drew the conclu-

sion that a major war could not be postponed beyond a certain point (1943-45 was the time mentioned at the Hossbach

conference

five days before

von

Weizsicker

wrote

his memorandum).

After

several

years,

Germany’s armaments headstart would vanish; without the economic resources to scrap the existing stocks of weapons and to mass-produce newer models, Germany could go to war or try to negotiate before the diplomatic initiative passed out of her hands. Von Weizsacker recommended negotiation; Hitler was determined on

wat.

79. See his directive on colonial policy to the German minister in Pretoria of 31 October 1937, G.D., D, 1, No. 15, and his circular instruction on the colonial question on 11 November 1937, ibid., 7:518-21.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

are

tary colonial concessions and a free hand in Europe; and that he had decided to go ahead with the latter while postponing the former.®° The fact that von Papen in a conversation with him three days later not only reported an attitude in France similar to that of the British but urged that it made sense for Germany to agree to such a policy of gradual and peaceful change in Europe in the expectation of colonial concessions probably had some influence on Hitler’s decision to replace his minister in Austria at a time when a more active policy there was to be implemented, and the general policy line von Papen urged tan in a directly contrary direction.*! It is in this context that one must see the instructions to the German press to play down the Halifax visit and also the German attempt to spike the whole idea of conversations by the violent communiqué.®? Hitler’s subsequent comments to the Hungarian minister of foreign affairs on the visit placed the issue and his own perception of it in cleat focus: “Halifax had suggested something might be done on colonies conditional on Germany binding itself to keep peace with Austria and Czechoslovakia and Hitler replied that there was no connection between the two subjects and he would not bargain on either.”®? Lord Halifax was in Germany from 17 to 21 November, seeing Hitler and a number of other German leaders. In the long talk he had with Hitler, the fact that an agreement

was most unlikely became evident. Hitler explained that he would get what he wanted by negotiated agreement or by war—the free play of forces as he called it—but that he had no interest in the kind of comprehensive settlement that the British government hoped to secure. Hitler wanted colonies, but he would not make any concessions whatever in return for them. Those who had taken Germany’s colonies could return them of their own free will now, and in that case he would accept suitable areas elsewhere in exchange for any they wished to keep. If Britain and France were disinclined to return them, then he would wait a few years and later take what he thought proper. As for the European situation, Hitler did not even put to Lord Halifax the demand for a free hand that Géring had placed before Henderson. He simply pretended that all would work out all right and refused to be drawn out by any of the hints Lord Halifax put forward. Two months earlier Lord Lothian had written to Henderson his view that the real issue was whether Germany or Russia or France were to be predominant in East Central Europe, “and if Germany is willing to accept the independence of nationality I think we ought to encourage her to assume that position, as it is the only way of preventing an explosion.”85 Though neither Chamberlain nor Halifax believed that Germany should be encouraged, there is good reason to believe that in other respects they agreed with this

view, and that Hitler recognized this fact. Since it was precisely the “independence of nationality” that Hitler was not prepared to accept, however, there would be no

advantage and actually great danger for Hitler’s plans if he allowed any precise specification of delimitation of his ambitions in Europe.®* The only hint that Lord Halifax was 80. See above, pp. 313-14. 81. G.D., D, 1, No. 22.

Redaktion,” 12 November 1937, 82. See above, pp. 374-75, and Dr. Kausch, “Vertrauliche Bestellung an die

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £349. 83. Montgomery (U.S. minister to Hungary) tel. 10, 26 January 1938, State 740.00/283. records: C 8094/270/18, FO 84. The account of the visit is based primarily on the British and German

33, 38. See also Birkenhead, chap. 20; 371/20736; C 8279/270/18, FO 371/20737; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 31, Diary, PP: pi Sea Releakes pp- 113-17; Haney 93-96; pp. Henderson, 582-85; pp. Eden, Halifax, pp. 185-89; et tribulation d'un diplomate autrichien Expériences Wimmer, F. C. Lothar Colvin, pp. 156-60; TMWC, 40:252-53;

1946), pp. 206-8; Memorandum of entre deux guerres, 1929-38, trans. Charles Reichard (Neuchatel: Baconniére, in U.S., presumably because it was kept published (not /2 741.62/206' State 1937, November 29 Welles, Sumner until 1948). out of the central files of the State Department and not inserted into them GD 40/ 17/347/331. 85. Lothian to Henderson, 13 September 1937, Lord Lothian Papers, 86. Henke takes a similar view.

378

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

given about the new world Hitler hoped to create came not in response to suggestions of topics for a settlement, all of which Hitler waved off, but in an aside on the subject of India. Hitler told the former viceroy that the way to take care of problems there was to shoot Gandhi and a substantial number of his associates. No wonder Halifax thought that he and Hitler had a different sense of values, lived in different worlds, and spoke different languages.

Looking ahead, what conclusions were drawn from the talks? A side issue, of which a good deal was made but which in perspective does not appear nearly so important as it did at the time, would receive considerable further attention on both sides. This was the

attitude of the press and of newspaper correspondents. The German minister of propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, promised to try for a better atmosphere. This was a promise he kept for a very short time indeed. There was also to be some restraint in the reciprocal expelling of newsmen, something the Germans could promise easily since they had already expelled the British newsman they most wanted to get rid of: Norman Ebbutt of The Times of London, a brilliant reporter whose accurate accounts of German developments had long annoyed Berlin and were often cut or entirely suppressed in London by Geoffrey Dawson, the editor of The Times, in agreement with Lord Astor, its owner.®’ In

response to repeated German urging, Lord Halifax promised to take up with the British government the possibility of pleading for restraint with the English press, especially in tegard to personal attacks on Hitler. Chamberlain did in fact touch on the problem in the House of Commons on 21 December and subsequently reminded British newspaper editors of their responsibility not to exacerbate an already delicate international situation.** Because of a leak—apparently from the German side—from the talk between Lord Halifax and Schacht, in which the latter had proposed that a future German colonial sphere in West Africa be augmented by pieces of the Belgian Congo and Portuguese Angola, with Portugal compensated out of the southern part of Tanganyika, there was a great uproar in Portugal which the British government had to calm down as best it could. Since Portugal’s colonies had in fact been discussed, and since Schacht’s territorial concepts were not very far from some considered in London, this was no easy task; it was further complicated by Portuguese sensitivity in view of the prewar Anglo-German discussions about a possible partition of the Portuguese colonial empire and the postwar cession of a small sliver of German East Africa, the Kionga triangle, to the Portuguese colony of Mozambique.®® The main point, however, was whether there were to be any attempts at further negotiations. Goring had indicated interest in Anglo-German talks, but Hitler was not encouraging. On the other hand, he had.tried in his own way to be a polite and charming 87. On

the expulsion

of Ebbutt,

see

C 5830,

C 6045,

C 6120/305/18,

FO

371/20740;

Dertinger,

“Informationsbericht Nr. 118,” 19 August 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ff.155-57. On the attitude of Dawson and Lord Astor, see The History of the Times, vol. 4, pt. 2 (1952, Nendeln/Lichtenstein: Kraus

Reprint, 1971), chap. 23; Evelyn Wrench, Geoffrey Dawson and Our Times (London: Hutchinson, 1955); Messersmith Notes on Conversations with Lord Astor and Geoffrey Dawson in 1937, Messersmith Papers. The often quoted letter of Dawson to his correspondent in Geneva of 23 May 1937 about how he could not undetstand German objections to The Times (Wrench, p. 361), has a close parallel in a letter to Lord Lothian of the

same date: “. . . but I should like to get going with the Germans. I simply cannot understand why they should apparently be so much annoyed with The Times at this moment. I spend my nights in taking out anything which I think may hurt their susceptibilities and in dropping in little things which ate intended to soothe them.” Lord Lothian Papers, CD 40/17/337/340. It is typical of the tendentious character of Dietrich Aigner, Das Ringen um England (Munich: Bechtle, 1969), that he tries to discredit the self-description of Dawson (pp. 112-14, and esp. n. 43).

88. On this subject, see C 8311/270/18, FO 371/20737. 89. W 20797, W 21667, W 21790, W 21794/1966/36, FO 371/21278; C 8375, C 8377/37/18, FO 371/20723; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 52, 60, 61; von Neurath to von Ribbentrop, 8 December 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biito RAM,

Akte 60964, £.174.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

on)

host and had, therefore, not said a flat no. Lord Halifax thought that the political value

of his talk with Hitler was not very high, that it had been valuable to make the contact,

but that Hitler felt that time was on his side regarding European problems. The question to be answered by the British government was whether under these circumstances they should try to use colonial concessions as a lever for securing reassurance in Europe, to try once again for a bargain with colonies in order to make Hitler into a “good European,” the assumption being that real as opposed to hypothetical offers might tempt the Fuhrer. Lord Halifax was skeptical, but he believed that the attempt should be made.

The comments within the Foreign Office on the accounts of his conversations were along the same lines. Extreme skepticism was coupled with a belief in the necessity of trying anyway and combined, in the case of both Eden and Vansittart, with highly favorable comments on the way Lord Halifax had handled himself. The discussion within the British government shows that there was general agreement on how to proceed; the only disagreement was on the prospects for success. Chamberlain’s summary at the cabinet meeting of 24 November fairly states a position that had the support of both the cabinet members and the permanent officials in Whitehall: “For his part he would not make any offer in the colonial field except as a factor in a general settlement. The difficulty was to find what contribution the Germans could make. That would depend on the degree of conviction we felt as to their good faith. We should have to obtain some satisfactory assurance that they did not mean to use force in Eastern Europe.’?! Chamberlain’s anticipation that there was some chance of agreement was not, however, shared by Eden or high officials in the Foreign Office; but since there

was a basic agreement on how to proceed, this difference was of little practical importance.°? The next steps were clearly first to inform the French and attempt to concert British and French views on the general prospects of agreement, and then to make a

more definite approach to Germany. As will be shown subsequently, the very weeks after Lord Halifax was in Germany during which the British government was working out its plans for negotiations with Berlin were a time when the German government was moving forwatd with its own designs against Austria. The fact that in its final stages that project moved slightly more rapidly than Berlin had anticipated must not be allowed to obscure the chronological realities. The soundings from London were taken in Germany not as the opening of a round of negotiations for a German agreement with England but as a confirmation of Hitlet’s view that Britain would not fight for Austria or Czechoslovakia, and that it was

therefore safe for him to move. He had expressed his determination to do so at the Hossbach Conference a few days before seeing Lord Halifax, and nothing he heard in that conversation deterred him in the slightest. On the contrary, the visit was used to fur-

on 23 90. In view of subsequent controversies, theit contemporary expressions are worth quoting. Vansittart handled November: “Lord Halifax’s paper [on his German trip] seems to me shrewd, and he appears to have the interview

well and to have

drawn

some

realistic conclusions”

(FO 371/20736,

£312). Eden

on 24

each point in his conNovember “expressed great satisfaction with the way the Lord President had dealt with versation with the Chancellor” (Br. Cabinet 43 [37] in CAB 23/90). the League and an 91. Br. Cabinet 43 (37), CAB 23/90, ff. 165-70. Chamberlain also assumed that a return to British disinternal on information other For settlement. any in included be agteement on atmaments would interested in German cussions at this time, see the Foreign Office materials on whether Hitler was setiously

in N 5764, N 5795/ 125/ Se), minorities abroad or metely wished to use some of them as excuses for expansion,

the continuation of the talks, in C FO 371/21058; material on a possible visit of Goring to England in

Hitler-Halifax conversation in FO 8067/3/18, FO 371/20712; and the discussions of the record of the of 19 November, Hungarian Documents, 1, 371 /20736, f£.310-16. Cf. the Hungarian minister in London’s report

Schmidt Trial, pp. 526-27; the No. 312; the Austrian minister in London’s report of 22 November in Guido chargé in London’s American the 499-501; pp. ibid., November, 26, of report Berlin’s Austrian minister in report of 24 November, (OES CWE, NEMA

tho

,

é

by Feiling, pp. 332-33. 92. Chamberlain’s optimistic assessment is quoted at length from his papers

380

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ther the interpretation that Britain would acquiesce in German designs; and this interpretation was then used to overawe the smaller states of Central and Eastern Europe.®? If that calculation did not work out, Hitler would fight rather than change his plans: as he explained to an assemblage of National Socialist party officials on 23 November, Germany might well have to fight England to obtain the vast territories she needed.* The Germans had to inform the Italians about the nature of the conversations, but

the anxiety in Rome over the possibility of an Anglo-German rapprochement would vanish as it became evident that nothing of the sort was happening.”® Italy’s intention of leaving the League, communicated to the Germans at the same time, would provide an additional excuse for Germany to evade any British approaches on that subject. There was no need to be impolite, but nothing suggests that anyone in the German government seriously expected or desired progress toward an Anglo-German agreement along the lines of the general settlement the British appeared to them to want. Germany would go its own way without regard to any proposals from London; as agreement on terms dictated by Hitler was not possible, there was no point to even discussing whatever projects might emanate from London.” Contrary views have occasionally been expressed in postwat memoirs and other writings; they have no basis in contemporary evidence. The French prime minister and foreign minister, invited to London to hear Lord Halifax report on his trip and to discuss possible future moves with their British colleagues, came to the meeting skeptical but hopeful. Like the permanent officials of the

British Foreign Office, Chautemps and Delbos had little expectation that a general settlement with Germany could be realized but continued to hope for the best.?’ They believed, correctly, that direct exposure to Hitler would have proved a useful educational experience for Halifax and his British associates and that if there were any prospects for a settlement, these should certainly be explored. Furthermore, the French minister was about to go on a trip to the countries of East and Southeast Europe, and it was both important and useful for the two Western Powers to clarify and coordinate their own views before Delbos made his tour.” The London talks of 28-30 November 1937 produced a wider range of understanding and agreement than might have been expected.” Lord Halifax gave a full account of his trip to Germany, and it is indicative of the extent of the frankness with which the French were treated that this was the account used to inform other departments of the British government as well as most British diplomatic missions abroad. Chamberlain expressed the opinion that he thought there was a possibility of agreement, that it could not be a purely Anglo-German one but would have to include France. It would be necessary to work out an approach and then see through diplomatic channels whether Britain and France could secure a general settlement, arrived at in good faith, in which colonial concessions would be exchanged for German good conduct in Europe. 93. See Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 314, and compare Vaclav Kral (ed.), Das Abkommen von Miinchen (Prague: Akademia, 1968) (hereafter cited as Kral, Miinchen), No. 2.

94. Speech of 23 November 1937 in Henry Picker, Hitlers Tischgespriche im Fiibrerhauptquartier, 1941-42 (Bonn: Athenaum, 1951), pp. 443-50; cf. Domarus, 1:761—63; Speer, Erinnerungen, pi539; n-15: 95. Ciano, Tagebuch, 23 November 1937, p. 50; G.D., D, 1, No. 39.

96. Dertinger’s “Informationsbeticht Nr. 168,” 22 November

1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/37,

f£.437-39; U.S. 1937, 1:167-69; Henke, pp. 118-19; Henderson’s report on a conversation with von Neurath

on 30 November 1937, C 8315/270/18, FO 371/20737. 97. French preparations for this meeting ate in D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 264, 274, 275, 282. 98. Kral, Miinchen, No. 2; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 37, 46; N 6024/5587/59, FO 371/21062. 99. The British record is in C 8234/270/18, FO 371/20736; the French record, given to the British on 20 December, is in C 8714/270/18, FO 371/20737, and published in D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 287, 291. A full report given by the French to the Czechoslovak minister in Paris, Osusky, is in Kral, Miinchen, No. 6; American reports in U.S. 1937, 1:180—88, 196-202. Cf. Eden, pp. 585-87; Dreifort, pp. 94-99.

Another Attempt ae a Settlement: The von Neurath and Halifax Visits

381

Delbos indicated that the information the French had of German aims was similar to that brought back by Lord Halifax, namely, that Germany was likely to move on Austria and Czechoslovakia next. To Chamberlain’s question whether Germany could be stopped without resort to force, Delbos replied that if all really worked for a general settlement, there was some hope, but otherwise he feared that Europe would slide into another war. Chamberlain warned the French leaders about the reluctance of the British public to go to war over the issue of Czechoslovakia, especially because of the impression that the Sudeten Germans had legitimate grievances. The French, who had hitherto been reluctant to do so, now agreed to urge concessiéns on the government of Czechoslovakia when Delbos visited Prague, but wanted the British to issue warnings in Berlin as well as in the Bohemian capital.!° In prior internal British consideration of this question, the

problem of granting autonomy to the Sudeten Germans had been canvassed, especially in view of the difficulties with public opinion in both the United Kingdom and the Dominions. Eden had reluctantly concluded that only British acceptance of a commitment in Central Europe in the form of a joint guarantee with France and Germany could lead to a settlement of this question;!! but in the Anglo-French talks, the discussion was

confined to the need to pressure Czechoslovakia, with Eden suggesting that any promises Czechoslovak President Eduard Benes could be persuaded to make be used to secure assurances from Germany. In any case, the further the Czechoslovak government went, the better its international position would be; a point which will be further examined in the general discussion of the Czechoslovak crisis. There was agreement that an effort should be made to secure a German promise not to use force in her relations with Austria and also to make some commitment in regard to disarmament and a possibly reformed League of Nations. Chamberlain summarized these matters as follows: “Whatever Germany’s ultimate object—and we might assume that this was to gain territory—our policy ought to be to make this more

difficult, or even to postpone it until it might become untrealizable.”

Here Chamberlain reflected on the terrible dilemma London. The French could not and the British would but even if they did, could they win? And even if enforce a return to the status quo on Germany? But

in Central Europe as not fight for the status they won, would and if Germany did secure

seen from quo there; could they control of

Central Europe, would this not endanger the rest of Europe, including England? Would

postponement combined with rearmament not ease the situation? In the face of these

puzzles, should British policy be directed to letting developments take their course, to halting them, or to helping them?!02 Henderson and Lothian wanted the last-named

course; Chamberlain opted for something midway between the first two; and the French,

though reluctant to face the options, took a similar course. On the colonial question, there was still agreement thaf

concessions could be made

only in the framework of a general settlement and that Britain as well as France would have to make a substantial contribution.!°3 A number of schemes to cope with various aspects of this issue were touched on. Perhaps the use of chartered companies could circumvent the problem of transferring to the Germans authority over an indigenous popucaused lation that might object to and suffer from such a transfer. Perhaps the difficulties Tanganyika of for the British government by the dangers seen as inherent in any transfer FO 371/21132. 100. For Foreign Office preparations on this subject, see R 8249 /188/12, 101. R 8248/188/12, FO 371/21132.

sa eS, : 102. C 4757/3/18, FO 371/20711. visit, C ministerial French the before prepared was question colonial 103. A summary of the status of the 8265/37/18, FO 371/2723.

382

Hitler's Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

to Germany could be obviated by monetary compensation to Germany, or by territorial compensation in East Africa to powers other than Germany—presumably Belgium or Portugal, or both—in exchange for colonial concessions to Germany in West Africa by those countries. In any case, the British government would have to be clear in its own mind as to what it could and would do, and would then have to agree with the French on the conditions to be set before the Germans. The Spanish problem and relations with Italy were among the other issues discussed; the public communiqué agreed upon at the end of the meeting, however, was noteworthy primarily because it indicated for the first time that the colonial issue was under review, a novelty hardly reduced by the reiteration of the position that colonies would be discussed only within the framework of a general settlement and not in isolation.!°4 Privately the British and French leaders had agreed to interpret the term “general settlement” as including a Western Pact that did not give Germany a free hand in Eastern Europe, a German commitment to England and France to abide by the July 1936 agreement affirming the independence of Austria, and German respect for the integrity of Czechoslovakia in exchange for concessions to the Sudeten Germans. Equal sacrifices would be made by England and France in the colonial portion of a settlement, but there would be no statement on any recognition of Germany’s “right” to colonies.!°° The highest officials of the British government could have saved themselves a great deal of time had they paid more attention to von Ribbentrop’s negative reaction to all this; it was precisely the theoretical recognition of Germany’s right to colonies and the total separation of the colonial from all other issues: that he insisted on to Eden when briefed by the latter on the talks.!° The British, however, did not deduce from von

Ribbentrop’s frequent absences in Germany that perhaps he was being kept continuously abreast of Hitler’s thinking; instead they told both von Ribbentrop and von Neurath that the next step in the negotiations arising out of the Halifax visit would come through diplomatic channels and would take some time to prepare.'” Von Ribbentrop recommended that the German government reject the expected British approach by refusing to relate the colonial question to any other issue, a position fully in accord with Hitler’s and von Neurath’s views at the time.!°* Nevile Henderson was apparently inclined to deprecate the idea of demanding a general settlement in the face of obvious German reluctance, but he was reprimanded repeatedly orally and in writing.!° The London authorities were determined both to make an offer in the colonial field and to insist that Germany make a substantial political contribution in Europe. As the British cabinet on 1 December 1937 began consideration of the offer to be made, it was apparent that the difficult problem of what to do about the reluctance to

104. FO 371/20736, f£.356, 422. It was at the end of the discussion that the British again pushed the French on the subject of air rearmament. 105. Foreign Office memorandum of 30 November 1937, C 8274/270/18, FO 371/20737, ff.16-23. On French pleasure with the results of the meeting, see C 8281/270/18, FO 371/20737; G.D., D, 1, No. 49. A

thoughtful and very positive evaluation by the French ambassador in London is in D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 299. 106, C 8280/270/18, FO 371/20737; Eden, pp. 587—88; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 47, 49, 50.

107. G.D., D, 1, No. 48; C 8280/270/18, FO 371/20737. Cf. N 6024/5587/59, FO. 371/21062, reverse of £402. The effort of Hildebrand to postulate a difference between Hitler and von Ribbentrop on the colonial

issue is not convincing. The evidence suggests, on the contrary, that the views of the two men were essentially identical in the winter of 1937-38, a factor relevant to Hitler’s appointment of von Ribbentrop to the position of foreign minister in February 1938. Given the importance of Anglo-German relations and colonial propa-

ganda in those months, it is difficult to believe that Hitler would have taken this step if he had reason to believe

there was any serious divergence of opinion. 108. G.D., D, 1, No.

51, Dertinger’s

“Informationsbericht

Nr.

1747’ 2 December

1937, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ff.473-75 (Hildebrand, pp. 540-41); D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 296; cf. ibid., No. 321. 109. See C 8466, C 8634, C 8661/270/18, FO 371/20737.

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and H. alifax Visits

383

return the most important English mandate, Tanganyika, would have to be faced.!!0 With most of the rest of the German colonies that had been turned over to the British Empire under the mandatory authority of various Dominions, London would have to face squarely the question of a British contribution, a question that had been left in merciful obscurity by the failure of the Schacht talks. Furthermore, it would be necessaty to specify precisely what would be asked of Germany in return. Both the territorial issue and the broader political one were simpler for the French: for them the colonies involved were obviously Togo and the Cameroons, and the political demands were ptedetermined by the French treaty of alliance with Czechoslovakia. The cabinet agreed that the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy would have to examine the whole question, develop an approach to Germany, and include in it possible economic concessions along with the colonial ones to be offered in exchange for the precise political concessions from Germany that would secure peace in Europe and justify to the British public the transfer of territory contemplated."!! Those involved in this whole project saw it as a serious undertaking that offered a slight—and perhaps the only—hope of an agreement with Germany that would avoid another war. Dominated by the experience of 1914-18, they seem to have thought of Lord Halifax playing a role not unlike Lord Haldane in 1912. The broader intentions of Germany would be tested, so to speak, by an attempt to settle what appeared to be the most difficult of the outstanding issues between the two powers, with the colonial ques-

tion taking the place of the naval rivalry of an earlier day. The vehement colonial agitation in Germany, heavily augmented in 1937,!!2 could be seen as whipping up German Opinion in somewhat the same way that the propaganda of the Flottenverein, the Naval Society, had aroused German navalism in the early years of the century; and it remained to be seen whether the growth in the antagonism between Britain and Germany could be arrested and turned around by a general settlement. There was no expectation that an agreement would be reached easily or quickly. What Joseph Chamberlain had tried but failed to accomplish in his efforts for an English-German rapprochement at the turn of the century, what the British had subsequently worked out in long negotiations with the French, they would now try to work out with Germany: a negotiated resolution of outstanding differences that it was hoped would lead to a new relationship. The London government approached the prospect of a detente with Germany in a frame of mind that included the expectation of drawn out and difficult, but it hoped successful, months of negotiations, and they so intimated to the Germans.'!° The British leaders were urged along the thorny path of prolonged negotiations by the harsh facts of the situation placed before them by their military advisers. Early in December, the Committee of Imperial Defence and the cabinet discussed the report of the chiefs of staffs summarizing the dangerous situation Britain would face in 1938.14 The grim concluding sentence of the chiefs of staffs had been that “we cannot, there371/20737. 110. Br. Cabinet 45 (37) of 1December 1937, CAB 23/90, ff.215-23; C 8278/270/18, FO PMS 111. On economic aspects, see C 8263/87/18, FO 371/20731; cf. R 4476/770/67, FO SL

tiber das Stidsee112. Hildebrand, pp. 390ff.; Gerhard L. Weinberg, “Deutsch-japanische Verhandlungen Weinberg, “Stidseemandat,” Vierteliahrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 4, No. 4 (October 1956) (hereafter cited as mandat”), p. 390. 113. C 8411/270/18, FO 371/20737; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 74, 75, 81. 114. The CID

meeting of 2 December

1937 in C 8704/205/62,

FO 371/20702;

the Cabinet 46 (37) of 8

report of 12 November with the December 1937 in C 8477, ibid. The text of the chiefs of staff sub-committee ff.195—213; it had been disibid., 7851, C in is memoranda, covering and relevant Foreign Office comments ff. 214-16. A further discussion took cussed in a preliminary way at the CID on 18 November, C 8331, ibid., ff. 356-77, with Foreign Office comments place in the cabinet on 22 December, Cabinet 49 (37), CAB 23/90,

in 1938, that of oil supplies, was not in C 42/42/18, FO 371/21654, £448. A critical weakness of Germany

be remedied by the Soviet Union. called to the attention of the cabinet (Roskill, 3:387); in 1939 it would

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fore, exaggerate the importance, from the point of view of Imperial defense, of any political or international action that can be taken to reduce the number of out potential enemies and to gain the support of potential lis" (BorChamberlain and Eden believed that under the circumstances the right policy was-one of delay, rearmament, and negotiations. Delay would be accompanied by the hope that rearmament would strengthen ase that in any case, as Eden put it, “for periods in the past, Europe has managed to exist, under armed truce, without a general settlement, but without war.”

Rearmament, furthermore, would rally the smaller states of Europe to England’s side and restrain Germany.{Negotiations might alleviate tensions as long as no unilateral concessions were made. As Chamberlain phrased it: “He could see no prospect of success by methods which would shame us in the eyes of the world, alienate the good opinion of France and the United States of America and ultimately land us in worse difficulties than those which confront us at the present time.\He preferred the policy that was at present being pursued by the Foreign Office, whickwas not one of doing nothing but of active diplomacy.” They would try for better relations with Germany and with Italy; they would hope to resume the efforts at agreement with Japan that had been interrupted by Japanese aggression against China. They would hope to improve their relations with the smaller countries of Europe while expecting little help from a Soviet Union in internal upheaval but potentially capable of assistance _to possible victims of Germany and also potentially a great menace if allied with Berlin. =e = As the government in London developed ffs approach, an important change of personnel was made. Sir Alexander Cadogan replaced Sir Robert Vansittart as permanent undetsecretary of state for foreign affairs with the latter appointed to the new position of chief diplomatic adviser. Though still involved in key policy matters as the foreign secretary's representative on the Committee on Imperial Defence—and much involved in other diplomatic matters as the archives show—Vansittart’s influence was substantially reduced. It is a double irony that this should be done at a time when the British government was pursuing an approach to Germany along lines he had himself originally proposed two years earlier and when the failure of that approach would see him play a most important role in the immediately ensuing Czechoslovak crisis. But he had warned too often, too vehemently, and too indiscriminately; and having earlier declined the Paris embassy, was now waved to the sidelines.!!5 Certainly Eden’s agreement with Chamberlain in this step shows the determination of both to move forward with the new project; and at his meeting with the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Commons on 9 December 1937, Eden at least claimed to be more optimistic about the chances of success in attaining what was still referred to as European appeasement.!!6 In December 1937 and January 1938 the British government considered the terms of an approach to Germany. The details of these internal deliberations are, for the most part, of no great importance in view of the fate of the approach; what is important is the earnestness with which the authorities in London examined the problem and the light shed on British policy by the final result.” If the Germans objected so strongly to the 115. Eden, pp. 590-91; Colvin, pp. 169-74; Harvey Diary, pp. 22, 44, 63-64, 101; Dalton Diary, 12 April and 4

November 1937; A. J. Sylvester to Lloyd George, 3 January 1938, Lloyd George Papers, G/22/4. Cf. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 89, 95, 101. 116. Nicolson, pp, 314-15. On Chamberlain’s determination to try, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 75, 81; on Eden’s, see U.S. 1938, 1:135—36.

117. On these discussions, see 20737; C 74, C 484/42/18, FO 21132; W 22354/1966/36, FO 3775/184/18, FO 371/21680;

C 8682/148/62, FO 371/20700; C 8352, C 8406, C 8661/270/18, FO 371/ 371/21654; C 800, C 995/42/18, FO 371/21655; R 8128/188/12, FO 371/ 371/21278; C 157/85/18, FO 371/21672; C 1305/184/18, FO 371/21679; C C 13430, C 13657/184/18, FO 371/21682; C 508, C 515/184/18, FO

371/21678; C 448/448/18, FO 371/21700 (on possible GOring visit); Henderson to Halifax, 10 January 1938, and Halifax to Henderson, 14 January 1938, Henderson Papers, FO 800/269, ff.3—5; 21st meeting of the cabinet

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term “general settlement,” perhaps the way to phrase things would be to describe the Process as “the contributions towards appeasement which, as the bases of a possible agreement, each country might be able to make in Europe and elsewher e.”!!8 That there could be no agreement without all making contributions was, however , agreed to by everyone, even Henderson, who was repeatedly in London for conferen ces during the discussion of the approach.!!9 The contribution expected from Germany was primarily in terms of a nonaggressive German policy toward Austria and Czechoslovakia. Because of the acceleration of German pressure on Austria, symbolized by Hitler’s threats to Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg at their meeting of 12 February, during the weeks immediately preceding the British offer to Germany, the phraseology on this point was made even mote explicit by Lord Halifax, Eden’s successor. He instructed Henderson, over the ambassador’s objections: “You should say that in our view appeasement would be dependent, among other things, on measures taken to inspire confidence in Austria and Czechoslovakia, and to establish better relations between those countrie s

and Germany.”!20 A contribution seen as being made by all and being as beneficial for Germany as for Britain and France would be a beginning of arms limitation by the restriction or elimination of bombing and bombing places. This was a subject to which Hitler had alluded on a number of occasions in diplomatic conversations, and where it was thought—quite incorrectly as we now know—Hitler might be expected to consider British and German interests as coinciding. On the colonial question, the discussions in London produced a new concept on which Henderson would be instructed to sound out the German government. Previous discussion had revealed the great difficulties Britain would face in making a contribution equivalent to that of France if the mandate of Tanganyika were not returned to Germany for fear of leaving Kenya between German and Italian territory. There was, moreover, the exceedingly difficult political and moral question posed by the rights of the population of any areas transferred. Would the public allow such transfers—to the National Socialists of all people—and what would be local reaction, and reactions elsewhere in the

Committee on Foreign Policy, 24 January 1938, CAB 27/623; Cadogan to Horace Wilson, 22 January 1938, Premier 1/330, ff.83-110, 113; Feiling, pp. 322-24; Henderson, p. 113; Cadogan Diary, pp. 40-45; Harvey Diary, pp. 62-63, 78, 80, 81, 85; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 78, 98, 99, 112; Earl R. Beck, Verdict on Schacht (Tallahassee: Florida

State University, 1955), p. 111; Gilbert (U.S. chargé Berlin) tels. 16 of 17 January, 56 of 14 February, 70 of 21 February 1938, State 741.62/221, 225, 233; U.S. 1938, 1:403; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 318, 319. The detailed examination of Chamberlain’s African scheme in FO 371/21679, ff£.154ff., was not printed until

months later, but a copy was in Chamberlain’s hands at the time, see Premier 1/247. Vansittart warned about the active role of Sir Horace Wilson in these matters; see C 484/42/18, FO 371/21654, ff.480-81.

The subject of possible limitations on air warfare in general, and bombing in particular, is reviewed in Uri Bialer, ““Humanization’ of Air Warfare in British Foreign Policy on the Eve of the Second World War,” Journal ofContemporary History, 13, No. 1 (Jan. 1978), 79-96. 118. Eden’s instruction to Henderson, No. 164 of 12 February 1938, C 995/42/18, FO 371/21655, £.108. This

is the official text on the basis of which Henderson saw Hitler on 3 March 1938; the supplements that Halifax sent him on 27 February and 2 March reinforced the warning about Austria and provided information about the steps being taken in London to try to restrain the British press and to coordinate British publicity abroad ibid.). Ne se also Francois-Poncet on Hendertson’s optimism just before leaving Berlin for discussions in London at the end ofJanuary, D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 55. 120. This addition came in response to French and Austrian requests for a British demarche in Berlin on the Austrian crisis, see C 1095/42/18, FO 371/21655; R 1442/137/3, FO 371/22311; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 185, 189, 190, 231, 258, 274, 276, 278, 301, 304, 403. It should be noted that the texts of the relevant documents

directly contradict the assertion often found even in scholarly works (¢.g., Hildebrand, P- 551), that England did not expect Germany to respect the independence of Austria as well as Czechoslovakia as part of an AngloGerman agreement.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

British Empire? The restrictions that might be imposed in protection of native rights— against forced labor and land alienation, for example—wete the vety ones that would hamper the economic exploitation for which Germany allegedly needed and wanted colonies. How could any such restrictions be enforced on a Germany that might at first agree to them and subsequently quietly violate or publicly renounce them like the demilitarization of the Rhineland? Moreover, was it not likely that the Germans would reject out of hand any special restrictions imposed on them by disinterring their ancient arguments about “equality of rights” (Géeichberechtigung) that had loomed large before German armaments had surpassed those of her neighbors? In the recess of Parliament after Christmas, Chamberlain pondered these complexities and came up with an idea that looked to him, and to at least some other members of the government, like a possible solution to a substantial proportion of these puzzles. As he originally proposed it to the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, and as it came to be embodied in the scheme Henderson was to put before Hitler, Chamberlain envisaged a new colonial regime for all of Central Africa. The region south of the Sahara and north of the Zambezi River would be placed under a system in which all the powers holding territory there would be required to subscribe to certain principles for the wellbeing of the indigenous population; these would include demilitarization, provisions for the welfare of the inhabitants, and freedom of trade and communications. Germany would be allocated territory within this area, would be subject to the identical restrictions as all the other powers with lands there, and would be represented along with these others on a new international commission to observe the area. Thus Germany would hold colonies on the same basis as Britain, France, Belgium, and Portugal, and possibly

Italy; there would be a new body to take the place of the Permanent Mandates Commission of the League of Nations; and, perhaps most important, both the area to be in-

cluded and the restrictions to be imposed were essentially similar to the area and restrictions covered by the Congo Basin Treaties signed in Berlin in 1883. Just which territory within the total area Germany would receive was not spelled out; Henderson was first to elicit a German reaction to the whole concept, with the

details left to subsequent negotiations. The evidence as to what Chamberlain had in mind on the territorial question is not conclusive, but there are indications that he thought pri-

matily of a German colonial empire in West Africa, based on the original German colonies of Togo and the Cameroons,-enlarged by parts of Nigeria, French Equatorial Africa, and adjacent portions of the Belgian Congo and Portuguese Angola. Belgium

would be giving up this territory in exchange for keeping Ruanda-Urundi, her portion of former German East Africa; while Portugal would be compensated by the southern portion of Tanganyika, and France by other British colonial concessions, with the New Hebrides, islands in the West Indies, the northern portion of the Gold Coast, Gambia,

and the remainder of Tanganyika figuring as possible candidates for transfer. Some thought was also given to an alternative by which the area included in the new international system would extend only to the western border of Nigeria, in which case Togo would come under German sovereignty without any restrictions whatever. The idea was that this prospect would make the whole proposal mote attractive to Germany, which, like Britain and France, would then have colonial territory both inside and outside the area subject to the new colonial regime. While none of these details was ever ptesented to the German government, such considerations do show how fat the British

Another Attempt at a Settlement: The von Neurath and H. alifax Visits

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wete prepared to go in the attempt to make Hitler into a “good European.” oe the British worked out the preliminary details of an offer to Germany, they had to notify their French allies, fit the offer into a general policy dealing with Italy as well as Germany, and modify as well as delay their offer to Germany because of the course of events in Europe. The French had agreed at the London meeting at the end of November that the British should take the lead in carrying forward the talks with Germany growing out of the Halifax visit. They were themselves in favor of an approach to Germany, and Delbos so explained to von Neurath when the latter met him briefly in Berlin as Delbos was passing through on his way to Warsaw and Southeast Europe.!?! On his trip, Delbos gave the Czechoslovak government the advice to make concessions to the Sudeten Germans that he had promised to make when in London;!2? after his return to Paris, he continued to hope for agreement with Germany, but like Prime Minister Chautemps was increasingly doubtful of the prospects of success.!23 The French began to urge the British to shift the nature of the approach to Germany; instead of attempting a comprehensive settlement, Britain and France should first try to get some smaller problems worked out and then use the better atmosphere created by such successes to move on to larger problems.'*4 While the British rejected this idea, they were far more sympathetic to the French request that detailed staff conversations were now needed for the contingencies of joint military operations should all peace projects fail. In spite of the great reluctance of the British military leaders, the Foreign Office recommended and the cabinet approved staff talks; although there would be no new formal commitments, Britain and France were drawing more closely together in the face of anticipated common dangers.'*° At the same time, the French sent a secret mission to the United States to remedy French deficiencies in air power by building up the American aitcraft industry with a view toward the future purchase of planes on the assumption that if war in Europe once broke out, the American neutrality law would be amended.'”° On the issue of an approach to Germany, however, the French deferred to the British

desire to go ahead, though with considerable reluctance.'?’ Fearing a leak of their scheme, the British gave the French only the vaguest hint of the proposal they planned to place before the Germans. If the Germans agreed in principle, the British would go into more detail with their allies; but if Berlin rejected the whole concept, there was little sense in risking a big ruckus over the proposed scheme.!?8

The other colonial powers potentially affected, Portugal and Belgium, were left officially uninformed, though there is evidence that the Belgian government, or at least the Belgian 121. G.D., D, 1, No. 55; C 8406/270/18, FO 371/20737; C 8730/7888/17, FO 371/20698; R 8546/26/67, FO 371/21137; D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 307, 319, 323, 324, 327, 340, 349; Dreifort, pp. 141-50. 122. D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 365. 123. U.S. 1938, 1:2; Bullitt tels. 56 of 12 January and 136 of 25 January 1938, State 740.00/264, 277. On French consideration of publishing the correspondence on the Schacht talks, see C 157/85/18, FO 371/21672.

the 124. C 631/42/18, FO 371/21654; U.S. 1938, 1:15-16; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 35, pp. 68-69, No. 53, Note Civil similarity to the French concept of December 1936, when they hoped that joint mediation of the Spanish vile War would open the way for a general settlement (see above, p. 355). franco-britanniques, 125. GC 8674/3285/17, FO 371/20698; C 841, C 1206/37/18, FO 371/21653; Les relations

on this critical 1935-1939, p. 95; cf. Ironside Diary, pp. 46-48. The agreement between Chamberlain and Eden cabinet members at issue at the cabinet meeting of 16 February no doubt contributed to the surprise of many : the split between the two a week later. See also Gibbs, pp. 624-36. Aid to France, 1938-1940 (New 126. U.S. 1938, 2:297-309; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 447; John M. Haight, Jr., American

York: Atheneum, 1970), pp. 1-12. 127. C 1287/42/18, FO 371/21655. to Henderson of 12 128. The text of the information to be given Paris was included in Eden’s instruction February (n. 118, above).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

king, was in fact aware of at least some of the specific ideas being considered.'”” The weeks during which the approach to Germany was being worked out in London was also the time of decision for negotiations between England and Italy. Though still entertaining some hope that the Rome-Berlin Axis might yet be broken, the British government, and especially Chamberlain himself, wanted to improve relations with Italy as well as Germany.'%° This aspect of the effort to secure peace by better telations with both Hitler and Mussolini—described at the time by Lord Halifax as “the broad question of getting onto closer terms with the gangsters”!>!—was being pushed by Chamberlain with the somewhat doubtful agreement of the French. Like the AngloItalian negotiations

of a year before, these new

talks would

lead only to dubious

agreements immediately violated by the Italians. The tedious details need not be tecounted here; they show Chamberlain eager for some agreement and Mussolini quite unwilling to make any significant concession. There was really no way to bring the two powers together in the face of Mussolini’s ambitions, his continued large-scale intervention in the Spanish Civil War, and his unwillingness to confront Hitler firmly over Austria.!32 The negotiations led to an agreement signed in April and put into effect in November

1938, but of little long-term significance; the talks did, however, have two

exceedingly important immediate by-productslThe prospect of negotiations with Italy as well as Germany was a major factor in Chamberlain’s decision to ask Roosevelt to delay his planned call for a world peace conference. difference between Chamberlain and Eden on that specific issue was greatly increased by Eden’s unwillingness to agree to formal negotiations with Rome until the Italians gave ‘some small sign of complying with their earlier agreement with England. Over this essentially procedural issue, though it had some substantive overtones, the two men came to a break, with Eden resigning rather than going along with the procedure Chamberlain wanted.'*4 Lord Cranborne, the

parliamentary undersecretary, resigned with Eden and was replaced by R. A. B. Butler. Since Eden’s successor, Lord Halifax, was in the House of Lords, Butler would play a

mote prominent role than his predecessor; but of greater significance was the fact that as a tesult of this situation, Chamberlain himself came to speak more frequently in the House of Commons on foreign affairs and thus became personally embroiled in controversy on a wider variety of subjects than might otherwise have been the case. Eden’s resignation delighted the Italians and Germans; Henderson wrote Lord Halifax that “coming from the Germans that is naturally a compliment to Eden. At the same time it must be admitted that it was unlikely that any understanding with Germany 129. D.D.B., 5, No. 3. See the comment by the secretary of state for the colonies, William Ormsby-Gore, at the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy on 24 January 1938, that “the King of Belgium, who had given considerable thought to the matter, had told him that while Belgium could not possibly contemplate the return to Germany of Ruanda-Urundi, she might be prepated to make some contribution in West Africa” (CAB 27/623, f.17), which appears to reflect discussions going into considerable detail. 130. As previously noted, Eden had originally urged the idea of negotiations with Italy on Chamberlain. The strategic factor—Britain’s need to be able to send a fleet to the Far East without excessive risks in the Mediterranean—was more important than ever (see Roskill, 3:282-84). 131. See Lord Halifax’s handwritten comment of 18 February 1938 on C 1324/42/18, FO 371/21656, £.264. See also G.D., D, 1, No. 130; Gerl to Hess, 6 March and 15 April 1938, Nuremberg document 3752-PS,

National Archives.

132. A brief account in Siebert, pp. 62-67. See G.D., D, 1, No. 116; 2, No. 33; Eden; pp. 646ff.

|183. See above, p. 370. Cf. U.S. 1938, 1:122-24.

134, Eden’s account is in his memoits, chap. 13. See also U.S. 1938, 1:136-39, 158-59; Cadogan Diary, pp. 44—

55 passim; Nicolson, pp. 326-27; Feiling, pp. 337-38; Harvey Diary, pp. 91-97; Duff Cooper, pp. 211-13; Roskill, 3:298-305; Pratt, pp. 103-4; Nancy H. Hooker (ed.), The Moffat Papers, 1919-1943 (Cambridge, Mass.:

Harvard University Press, 1956), pp. 189-91; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 111, 119, 120, 123, 126-28; Masaryk report No. 1 of 24 February 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/412935-38 (excerpts in Berber, pp. 88— 89); Douglas, pp. 105-14; Australian Documents, No. 127.

Another Attempt Aba Settlement: The von Neurath and Hakifax Visits

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was possible as long as Eden was Secretary of State... Eden and Hitler could never have agreed. I cannot therefore, since I regard an understanding with Germany as indispensable if we are not slowly or even rapidly to drift into wat again, regard either Eden’s tesignation or your own appointment with anything but the utmost relief.!35 He would soon have the opportunity to discover whether an understanding with Germany would now be any easier to secure. The situation in Germany itself had also changed during the winter months while the British offer was being prepared. The internal changes announced by Hitler on 4 February 1938 have already been discussed.13° Beyond strengthening Hitler’s position in Germany, these changes directly affected Anglo-German relations through the appointment of von Ribbentrop as German foreign minister. Von Ribbentrop’s memorandum for Hitler summarizing his impressions as ambassador to the effect that war with England was inevitable has already been quoted.'*” In regard to the question immediately confronting Hitler, von Ribbentrop’s assessment was in some ways quite shrewd, but it

was fatal for any Anglo-German agreement both immediately along the lines London was then considering and, by implication, for any future agreement as well. “A clear

English concession to [a settlement of] the Austrian and Czech questions as we see fit could have the effect of clearing the air in Europe. From my experiences here, I consider such a development unlikely and believe that at the most England might by circumstances be forced some day to tolerate such a solution. I am confirmed in the belief that this problem cannot be solved by official negotiations with England by the fact that in internal political as well as foreign affairs Chamberlain stands in a system (with France) which makes great decisions incredibly difficult to take.”!58 In view of this attitude, it is not surprising that von Ribbentrop’s replacement in London, Herbert von Dirksen, was

a man of ability but without even the slightest influence in Germany.!*° The other major change in Germany’s situation, that in German-Austrian relations,

was closely tied to the Fritsch-Blomberg crisis of early February 1938. Hitler decided to increase the pressure on Austria; as Alfred Jodl noted in his diary on 31 January: “The Fuhrer wants to divert the searchlight from the armed forces, keep Europe in suspense...

Schuschnigg is not to be allowed to gain courage, but [shall] tremble.”4° The Austrian chancellor was to do his trembling when Hitler, surrounded by the most fierce-looking of his generals, browbeat him into concessions at Berchtesgaden two weeks later, and

then refused to acknowledge these concessions in a threatening speech on 20 February. In these weeks the Germans were simultaneously telling everyone except the British that both Eden and Lord Halifax had agreed to whatever Germany wanted to do with Austria, while they complained

to the British about just the opposite, namely, that

London was stiffening Vienna’s resistance to Germany and encouraging von Schuschnigg to go back on his agreement with Hitler.'4! This form of duplicity was, of course, quickly registered in London; it hardly augured well for the forthcoming negotiations. 135. Henderson to Halifax, 27 February 1938, Henderson Papers, FO 800/269, £35. 136. The

internal

German

crisis, right after Chamberlain’s

request

for postponement,

Roosevelt’s further delaying his world peace project, U.S. 1938, 1:124—25.

was

a factor in

;

accurate view of von 137. See above, p. 335. The U.S. chargé a.i. in London, Hershel Johnson, had a very

the existence Ribbentrop’s experiences in London as well as knowledge that was generally accurate about both 1938, State and contents of von Ribbentrop’s concluding report (Johnson’s dispatch 3879 of 8 February 862.00/3745). 138..G.D.,.D, 1:135. 139. See von Ribbenttop’s

371/21706.

own

postwar comments

in TMWC,

35:145-46;

see also C 2514/812/18,

FO

140. TMWC, 28:362. Miller (p. 269, n. 71) doubts the connection. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 397. 141. R 1372/137/3, FO 371/22311; C 1237, C 1324/42/18, FO 371/21656;

800

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

As the Germans considered the possibility of negotiations with Britain, how did they assess the prospects? In particular, how did the question of colonies and the idea of paying a price for them look to Berlin? On the colonial issue, the winter of 1937-38 saw the continued public demands for colonial restitution accompanied by examination of the issue within the German government. It was in the context of dealing with the two powers most favorable toward Germany among those who had acquired portions of her former colonial empire—the Union of South Africa and Japan—that the issue took a concrete as opposed to a theoretical form. The Union of South Africa held the mandate for former German Southwest Africa;

her government under Prime Minister James B. M. Hertzog was most kindly disposed towatd Germany but simultaneously determined to hold on to Southwest Africa. There wete apparently soundings about a possible South African purchase of German claims to the former German colony; nothing came of this as Berlin insisted that Germany would not give up her position calling for the return of her African empire.'4? As for the Japanese, they approached the Germans in December 1937 and January 1938 with schemes for a public Japanese acknowledgment of the right of Germany to her former colonies accompanied by an agreement on Germany’s part to sell her former Pacific islands mandated to Japan to the latter power. Although the Germans were in principle prepared to agree to such an arrangement, Berlin feared that its whole colonial case would be weakened if any such agreement were made public and, therefore, allowed the subject to drop. The Japanese tried to keep the negotiations going; in fact they were more interested

than the Germans. The explanation for this curious reversal of roles, with Tokyo trying to lure back to Eastern Asia a Germany that, as Hitler proclaimed on 20 February had “no territorial interests whatever in East Asia,” lies in the Japanese interest in the former German colonial empite in the Pacific that had come under Australian, New Zealand,

and British mandate. Thinking that in any reopening of the colonial question Germany might recover these areas, Japan hoped to pave the way for acquiring them from Germany as well. In 1938 Berlin had no interest in such prospects; what colonial ambitions there were had a focus on Africa, not New Guinea, the Solomons, or Nauru. The

relationship between Germany’s “right” to the return of those territories and Japan’s plans for expansion in the Pacific was left open until the negotiations for the Tripartite Pact of 1940.1 If the German government in the winter of 1937-38 looked to the recovery of a colonial empire in Africa, was there any willingness to consider making concessions for their return in the framework of some sort of general settlement? Although some technical preparations that looked to a continuation of the Halifax conversations were made in the German Foreign Ministry,’ the general impression given by the German government at the end of 1937 was that there was no interest in a comprehensive settlement.!45 In view of the postwar emphasis on disagreements with Hitler by many of the professional diplomats, it should be noted that for this critical juncture, such disagreement is

restricted to imaginative memoirs and apologias. At the time, the views of Hitlet’s key diplomatic advisers were extraordinarily similar to his. Ernst von Weizsacker wrote von Papen that he doubted there would be a settlement because Germany would not allow 142. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 15, 77, 79; 7:518-21; Weinberg, “Stidseemandat,” Deol

Zane:

143. The whole subject is covered in Weinberg, “Stidseemandat.” Hildebrand found no space in his volume on Hitler’s colonial policy for the only serious colonial discussions in which the German government engaged

before World War 1; there is merely an indirect reference (p. 533). See also Australian Documents, Nos. 3, 16, 37; German naval documents Case 3/2, PG 48901, ff.138—45, in Bundesarchiv/Militararchiy.

144. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 86, 100, 102. 145. Ibid., No. 87; C 8830/3/18, FO 371/22712; C 8719/270/18, FO 371/20737.

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any testriction on her freedom of action in Central Europe, the price Britain and France would require for colonial concessions. In terms similar to those Hitler had used with Lord Halifax, von Weizsacker explained that Germany would take what she wanted peacefully or by force.'#6 He was at least willing to have the question of arms limitations explored; but Foreign Minister von Neurath would have none of that.!47 When Hender-

son saw von Neurath before going to London for consultations about the planned British offer, von Neurath was emphatic that there would be no German contribution of any sort.'48 Hans Georg von Mackensen, von Neurath’s son-in-law, who would soon be replaced as state secretary by von Weizsacker, evidently held views essentially similar to those of both other men.'#?

It is difficult to understand

how, in the face of such

unanimity, Henderson could write to Lord Halifax on 27 February: “Will Germany coopetate? Since you left here last November I have spoken to many Germans on the subject of co-operation. All appear to agree that she must, from Goering downwards, but I do not yet know the views of the only one who matters, namely Hitlet.’”5° Having asked for an appointment to see Hitler, Henderson would find out on 3 March.15!

On 3 March 1938 Sir Nevile Henderson had his opportunity to present the British plan to Hitler in the presence of the newly appointed foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop.'** The British had given a brief prior notice to France and to the United States;!°? a fuller preview had been provided to the British cabinet.!*4 An effort was also

begun to try to restrain the British press and radio from excessive criticism, especially of Hitler personally, so that the latter could be informed of this by Henderson as a sign of British responsiveness on a subject that Hitler had often complained about.'>° The accounts of the conversation between Hitler and the English ambassador show very clearly that there was an unbridgeable gulf and not the slightest prospect of agreement.!5¢ Hitler rejected the whole concept of a new regime for Central Africa. He would move forward in Central and Eastern Europe as he saw fit and at the risk of war; and he would continue to ask for the return of Germany’s colonies, hoping—or threatening— that the day would come some years hence when they would be returned without any concessions on Germany’s part.'5’7 He not only dismissed the British offer but reiterated 146. G.D., D, 1, No. 96. 147. Ibid., Nos. 103, 105, 148. Ibid., No. 108. Cf. Tauschitz report of 27 January 1938, Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 507-8. 149. See his brief for von Ribbentrop’s first meeting with Frangois-Poncet, in G.D., D, 1, No. 115; cf. ibid., No.

308. If von Mackensen ever had any original views when minister to Hungary, state secretary, or ambassador to Italy, they have escaped both contemporary observets and historical researchers. 150. Henderson Papers, FO 800/269, £.36. 151. G.D., D, 1, No. 310. When Henderson saw von Ribbentrop on 1 March to set a date for the meeting on the colonial offer and to ask for a German contribution, the latter replied that there would be none (ibid., No.

131), ae The notes Henderson prepared for himself to use at this meeting are in his papers, FO 800/270, ££.303—4. 153, US. 1938, 1:31—32. 154. Br. Cabinet 10 (38) of 2March 1938, C 1616/42/18, FO 371/21656.

FO 371/21709; circular to Dominion prime ministers, 10 Match 1938, P 1259/4/150, 155. C 1431/1261/18,

FO 395/561; G.D., D, 1, No. 148; Australian Documents, Nos. 133, 135; 1945, National 156. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 135-39, 141, 142, 144; interrogation of von Dirksen, 8-13 December C 1474, C 1475, C 207-10; pp. Dirksen, (Poole); Mission Interrogation Special Department State Archives,

of Henderson’s 1495, C 1502, C 1657/42/18, FO 371/21656; Henderson, pp. 113-18 (note that this portion Henderson Papers, memoirs was cut at the request of the Foreign Office, Cadogan to Henderson, 4 June 1940, (1937-1939) FO 800/270, f£.323-24); Harvey Diary, pp. 108-9, 110-11; Massimo Magistrati, LItalia a Berlino 741.62/242; Henke, pp. 130-34. (Verona: Mondadoni, 1956), pp. 136-37; Wilson tel. 99 of 9 Match 1938, State

'

For information given to the French, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 310, 407.

letter written by Lord Hitler may conceivably have been influenced in his attitude by knowledge of a that there were no recognized now who relations, an Anglo-Germ good of advocate an once , Londonderry limits to German ambition (G.D., D, 1, No. 104).

;

that he would certainly pursue the 157. Hitler had told Polish Foreign Minister Josef Beck on 14 January

au2

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

earlier complaints about England’s opposition to German aims in Vienna and Prague. He was urged on by a variety of nasty and misleading comments from von Ribbentrop, and only on Henderson’s repeated insistence promised to give a written reply—which he never sent. As Henderson concluded: Hitler’s whole attitude clearly shows how unpromising is the policy of those who think he may be deflected from his aims in Central Europe by French and British expressions of disapproval. If offer of British friendship and prospect of a colonial settlement ate not sufficient to deter him or to secure even a temporary halt, how much less effective is likely to be an ambiguous warning which is not backed by a show of force.!58 Since von Ribbentrop was coming to London to make his official farewell, there was an opportunity to show him how disappointed the British government was over the German rejection of the proposal, but this in no way altered the situation.!°? On the contrary, von Ribbentrop took the sincerity of British interest in a settlement as proof that it was safe for Germany to move rapidly against Austria and urged Hitler on to the annexation of Austria and, in effect, a rupture of negotiations with England.

In the British cabinet on 9 March the failure of the attempt to initiate serious negotiations for a general settlement was reported. While no one wanted to give the impression that it was “now or never,” the import of the meeting was essentially to that effect. Lord Halifax recalled that “conditions were: now comparatively favorable and might not return”; Chamberlain said that this was not the last opportunity, “but that it was a more favorable opportunity than might occur again.” The danger of war was ever greater, and Germany would have to be warned that “if once war should start in Central Europe it was impossible to say where it might not end or who might not become involved.’’'®! Lord Halifax informed the American government “that one of the twin efforts which His Majesty’s Government were anxious to make to prepare the way for an appeasement, and on account of which we asked the President to postpone his initiative, has failed.”!°* Henderson would not have an opportunity to refer back to his fateful conversation of 3 March in a meeting with Hitler until the eve of war—29 August 1939.16 The uproar over the annexation of Austria a week after the Hitler-Henderson meeting of 3 March assured that the negotiations would not be resumed for a long time; and in the event, they never were.!©4 As Henderson wrote Lord Halifax on 16 March, “all

the work of the past 11 months has crashed to the ground!”!® Lord Halifax responded on the nineteenth that “our constructive efforts have suffered a pretty severe setback.”!° colonial question. “If the English were not yet ready to carry out a far-sighted policy, they would perhaps be forced into it in a little while” (G.D., D, 5, No. 29; cf. Lipski Papers, No. 77).

158. Henderson tel. 71, 4 March 1938, C 1475/42/18, FO 371/21656, f£.328—33. 159. C 1524/42/18, FO 371/21656, ££.342-54; Cadogan Diary, pp. 58-59; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 145, 147. 160. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 146, 150, 151. 161. Br. Cabinet 11 (38), C 1766/42/18, FO 371/21656, ff.497—504. Note that this was the formulation used

subsequently to warn Germany of the possibility of a war between England and Germany. 162. U.S. 1938, 1:132. Roosevelt, who had been doubtful about the whole scheme (D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 380),

showed himself very accurately informed when reviewing it on 21 March (ibid., 9, No. 58, p. 113). 163. B.D., 3d, 7, p. 387. 164. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 381, 386, 400; C 2776/42/18, FO 371/21657; R 2659/137/3, FO 371/22316. A German Foreign Ministry circular of 31 March 1938 reaffirmed German opposition to a comprehensive settlement. 165. Henderson Papers, FO 800/269, £.50.

166. Ibid., £56. One of the most prominent of the advocates of concessions to Germany, Lord Lothian, wrote

to Lord Allen of Hurtwood on 8 March 1938: “We have now got so much nearer to a position of collective justice for Germany that the problem of preventing Germany going beyond what is legitimate may soon

become urgent” (Lord Lothian Papers, GD 40/17/352/28).

Another Attempt a a Settlement: The von Neurath and Hahfax Visits

393

But it was more than a setback. When urged by Viscount Astor to renew negotiations in June 1938, Lord Halifax could only reply that “the Germans never seem to be able to grasp the dire effect of their action on public opinion here. The Ayschluss, or rather the methods by which it was brought about, shocked this country profoundly . . . Such methods will always have such an effect here and will always be likely to block attempts to bring the two countries together.’”!67 In February 1938 Hitler had a conversation with the German military attaché in Yugoslavia, Moriz von Faber du Faur. He told the latter: “In the immediate future I shall initiate an operation against Austria. It will go smoothly; I have come to agreement with [Yugoslav Prime Minister] Stojadinovi¢. He prefers the Avsch/uss to the Habsburgs. Mussolini will put on a good face to a bad situation; he does not have much choice since

he alienated England and France in his Abyssinian venture. It will be more difficult when I start on Czechoslovakia; but because Stojadinovié has only a smile left for the Little Entente, that too will work. Only when I attack Poland will everyone jump on me.” Asked why not then avoid an attack on Poland and let time work for Germany, Hitler responded that he could not afford to do that.'® In none of this was there any room for an accommodation with the Western Powers on terms they could be expected to accept. Hitler would continue on his course, risking war where and when it seemed appropriate,

and taking British and French expressions of interest in a rapprochement as signs of weakness to be exploited rather than as opportunities for a peaceful settlement. If in the short run the effort of the British, supported by the French, was thus in a way counterproductive, in that it encouraged Hitler to think he could move

forward

without English opposition even if also without English approval, there was a long-range aspect to these abortive negotiations that ought not to be disregarded. Those who had spent many hours on these fruitless endeavors were hardly unaffected by having made them. Those who in 1939 made the decision to challenge Germany in war, a decision which would cost Britain its empire and them the world they knew and loved—something they sensed or knew as they made the decision—were the very same men who had tried so long and so patiently to devise ways to avoid it. When they faced that decision, they felt they had done their best and now had no choice, something no one else mustered up the courage to do in the face of Hitler either before or after them.

167. Halifax to Viscount Waldorf Astor, 23 June 1938, Halifax Papers, FO 800/309.

®

Hans E. Gunther, 168. Moriz von Faber du Faur, Macht und Ohnmacht: Erinnerungen eines alten Offiziers (Stuttgart: 1938, in US 938; 1953), pp. 204-5. Note the astonishingly similar prediction of Chautemps on 21 February 2H,

Chapter 19

Germany and the Civil War in Spain 1937-39

he military uprising in Spain in July 1936 had not led to a quick change of the regime. Instead, the mixed success and failure of the plotters had forced them to ask for and depend on assistance from Italy and Germany to launch an effective military campaign against the government of the Spanish Republic. In a series of decisions in the summer of 1936 Hitler chose to aid the Spanish rebels, led by General Francisco Franco. The Germans had provided planes to airlift Franco’s army from Morocco to the Iberian peninsula; had dispatched German armored, air force, and anti-aircraft units to Spain;

wete providing a steady stream of military supplies to the rebels; and publicly extended diplomatic recognition to the insurgents, thus fastening their own prestige to the eventual triumph of Franco’s forces.! The purposes that Hitler hoped to achieve by this support of Franco were several. The prospect of weakening the position of France by assuring that Spain was friendly rather than hostile to Germany was a welcome one to Hitler, who expected French interference with his plans for conquering living space in the East.? The cooperation with Italy in Spain would assure a continued alignment of Germany and Italy; any return of Italy to friendship with Britain and France after the rupture of that friendship in the Abyssinian crisis was made impossible by the joint intervention in Spain and the resulting friction with the Western Powers. Every effort made, especially from London, to heal the breach with Italy and thus possibly isolate Germany again was thwarted by Italy’s involvement in the Spanish Civil War. A further possible advantage for the Germans was in the field of her armaments. Spain provided important raw materials, especially copper from the southern and iron from the northern part of the country. If these could be diverted from Britain—Spain’s traditional customer for these ores—to Germany in exchange for aid in the civil war, both the raw materials and the foreign exchange situation of Germany would be helped. 1. See above, pp. 221-30. 2. This point is especially stressed in the study of Hans-Henning Abendroth, Hitler in der spanischen Arena (Paderborn: Schéningh, 1973), esp. pp. 35-36, 319. 3. Because so many other products that Spain traditionally exported, such as olive oil and oranges, were similar to those Italy produced, there was little danger that Germany would be outstripped by Italy in competition in the peninsula.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

B95

Finally, Germany’s unhindered pursuit of her own ambitions in Central and Eastern Europe could only be assisted by the focus on Spain of governmental anxiety and public attention in the Western Powers. As the civil war developed into a massive conflict engaging worldwide sympathy for one side or the other, this could be the most valuable factor of all from the vantage point of Berlin, though this as well as the trying out of German weapons in a long war wete the results of the unanticipated duration of a conflict that Hitler, like Franco and Mussolini, thought likely to end in a few weeks at most. As the forces of Franco were stalled in the outskirts of Madrid in the last weeks of 1936, the issue facing the Germans and Italians was whether to add to their earlier assistance such substantial forces, including divisions of soldiers, as to enable him to win out quickly over the defenders of the Republic, now augmented by the International Brigades. Early in December Mussolini decided that Italy would respond to Franco’s need by sending large land forces to Spain.4 Hitler, however, did not follow this course. It is possible that he had already decided on his policy by the time he met von Blomberg on 3 December 1936, but the evidence on this meeting is indirect and inconclusive. Certainly at the conference in the Berlin chancellery on 21 December Hitler announced the lines to which he would adhere in the more than two years that the war continued in Spain. Against the recommendation of the German ambassador in Spain, General Wilhelm Faupel but in agreement with all his other military and diplomatic advisers, Hitler decided to send no divisional units of ground forces to Spain. Not only were the risks too great, not only would such action interfere excessively with Germany’s own rearmament

program, but massive aid was not in accord with Hitler’s main objective,

which was to focus European attention on Spain for a long time. A prolonged war, not a quick victory by Franco, was what German interests—as Hitler defined them—called for. This could best be accomplished by sending assistance not in a flood but in driblets.° Almost a year after the meeting of 21 December, Hitler reiterated essentially the same view at the famous meeting of 5 November 1937, recorded in the Hossbach Memorandum. “According to the experience up to now in the course of military operations in Spain, the Fithrer did not expect their conclusion soon. If one takes into account

the length of time Franco has used in his offensives up to now, the war could possibly last about another three years. On the other hand, from Germany’s point of view a 100% [meaning immediate] victory of Franco is really not’desirable; we are more interested in a continuation of the war and the maintenance of tensions in the Mediterranean.”° The comment on Franco’s military procedure of slow offensives must be read as partly ironic; both the Germans and the Italians were periodically exasperated by the measured pace of the military operations of the Nationalist armies.’ There is no reason to examine here the reasons which led Franco to adhere to this approach from the beginning to the end of the long and bitter conflict in Spain; the aspects of this procedure which are relevant to an understanding of German policy after the summer and fall of 1936 are that, first, it was seen as in accord with German interest in a drawn-out Italy’s rather than a rapidly concluded war and, second, that it was mo¢ in accord with

NJJ.: Princeton University Press, 4. John F. Coverdale, Italian Intervention in the Spanish Civil War (Princeton,

1975), pp. 156ff.

n

ahs

162), then German military attache in 5. See above, pp. 231-33. The statement of Faber du Faur (pp. 160,

German troops in Spain but Belgrade, that in the winter of 1937-38 von Fritsch told him that he wanted no in this context. The belongs probably Yugoslavia in émigrés Russian White suggested recruitment among into the Russische Schutzkorps Serbien. émigrés in Yugoslavia had to wait until World War II to be recruited differently but metely concludes Coverdale, p. 164, argues that the evidence on Hitler’s policy should be read a far cry from deliberately prois that but war, the shorten to have might he everything do not that “Hitler did

to 22 December 1936. longing it.” Merkes, pp. 201-8, dates Hitler’s meeting in the chancellery

6,G.D:, D431: 7. Cf. Coverdale, pp. 172-73.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

hopes for a quick victory by Franco. The various recommendations by Faupel in December 1936 and the spring of 1937 must be seen as reflecting his personal belief that a quick victory by Franco was to be desired; this was why he so often urged on his government advice similar to or identical with that of Italy’s representative in Spain; this was why he believed in interference in the internal affairs of Franco Spain for what he saw as the requirements of speedy victory; and this discrepancy between his approach and that of Berlin would be the basic cause of Faupel’s recall in August 1937.8 The decision of Mussolini to send large contingents of Italian land forces to Spain placed Italy in the forefront of international concern.? The fact that major troop shipments took place immediately after the Anglo-Italian agreement of 2 January 1937, thereby violating it the day after it was signed, symbolizes the advantage for Germany in the continued estrangement of Italy from the Western Powers assured by a drawn out conflict in Spain.!° The almost simultaneous war scate in France about alleged German troop concentrations in Spanish Morocco grew out of the suspicion and expectation in France that the two Axis powers were following identical policies in Spain. Since Italy was known to be sending army contingents in early January, it was thought likely that Germany was doing the same thing. The uproar died down quickly—once it became obvious that Germany was in fact not dispatching land forces—but as an outgrowth of fears of German intentions in a tense international situation, the war scare over Spanish Morocco of January 1937 was the first of a series in which the May Crisis of 1938 and the January crisis of 1939 must be grouped. If the German government invariably reacted with outraged protestations of innocence against the allegations made in those war scares, and used them as evidence of the unscrupulous warmongering of the press in other countries, it must be recalled that the atmosphere of sudden coups, lightning moves, and unheralded treaty violations had been created and was maintained by German policies. In November 1937 Hitler complained to Lord Halifax about the wild rumors in the press; why, they went so far as to have German troops suddenly appearing in Vienna or Prague . . .!! The real assistance of Germany to Franco, in accordance with Hitlet’s basic policy, was designed to assist the Nationalists in waging war, to keep them from losing to the Loyalists, but not to give them such great superiority as might produce a speedy victory. In practice, this meant an essentially even level of support, maintained at about the volume reached at the end of 1936. The Condor Legion, the German air force organization in Spain, was kept at approximately the same size from its arrival in the fall of 1936 until Franco’s final victory in the spring of 1939.!2 In addition, Germany provided specialists, training officers, and military equipment. A useful index of the volume of German assistance is provided by the German record of the costs involved. The secret accounting for internal purposes shows a rather 8. The comment by Manfred Merkes, Die deutsche Politik im spanischen Biirgerkrieg 1936-1939, 2d ed. (Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1969), p. 102, that the proposals of the German commanders in Spain with the object of bringing speedy victory to Franco “dissolve” the argument that Germany wanted a long war is similarly based on a confusion between the tactical proposals of men on the spot—who had no interest in seeing their soldiers killed in a drawn-out combat—and the broader policy objectives of Hitler. 9. When Italian Ambassador Bernardo Attolico urged the dispatch of German troops to Spain on von Neurath on 13 January 1937, the latter again declined (G.D., D, 3, No. 200). 10. See Eden, pp. 484-87; Coverdale, pp. 200-202; D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 242; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 77-78, 78-80. 11. On the Morocco war scare of January 1937, see G.D., D, 3, Nos. 192, 195; D.D.F., 2d, 4, Nos. 248, 261,

265, 273, 274, 276-78, 282, 288; 5, No. 37; Merkes, pp. 209-13; Abendroth, pp. 145—49; Jodl Diary, 12 January 1937, TMWC, 28:348. 12. A good history of the Condor Legion remains to be written. There is a considerable amount of material in

Merkes, but his interpretation of that evidence is often unconvincing.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

BOT

steep tise in total outlay early in 1937, primarily because of substantial deliveries of equipment to Franco, but otherwise presents an almost straight line graph from the fall of 1936 to the end of May 1939.13 Even if such a financial record necessarily obscures vatiations in the types of deliveries and has a built-in tendency toward stability because of

the practically constant personnel costs of the Condor Legion, it nevertheless does pro-

vide a useful general indication of the trends in total German support of Franco.!4 The one major spurt in German aid, that of the spring of 1937, is faithfully reflected in the accounts. The Nationalists needed large shipments of German supplies, and Franco appealed directly to Hitler. In accord with his general policy, Hitler decided at the end of March to accede to Franco’s wishes to a considerable extent, but not enough to assute a big victory.'> Thereafter, the accounts reflect with equal faithfulness continued assistance

without substantial variations for the next two years. The support provided Franco was to provide Germany tangible returns beyond the political and diplomatic ones of drawing public attention away from German plans and actions. One of the factors in the German decision to intervene in Spain and a continuing element in her support of the Nationalists was the possibility of drawing on Spain’s mineral riches for raw materials needed by Germany’s rearmament program, and doing so without expending precious foreign exchange. The copper, iron, and pyrites of Spain might be diverted to German use either through some close economic association if Franco won quickly, or in repayment for German support if victory was delayed. From the first days of German intervention, the machinery for supplying Franco and the mechanism for drawing on the Spanish economy for Germany’s armaments program were in the same hands, both subordinated to the same German agency. Johannes Bernhardt!® operated Hisma (Compafiia Hispano-Marroqui de Transportes) in Spain and Rowak (Rohstoffe- und Waren-Einkaufsgesellschaft) in Germany for getting supplies to Franco and making purchases in Spain; all under the authority of Géring as plenipotentiary for the Four-Year Plan. Simultaneously, a World War associate of Goring, Josef Veltjens, was operating a semiofficial gun-running business, shipping tifles and

ammunition to Spain for much-needed foreign exchange that the German government’s Four-Year Plan could use to purchase raw materials in other markets.'” This concentration of economic, military, and by implication diplomatic power in 13. Sonderstab Wiilberg], “Nr. 6789/39 IVa g. Kdos., Betr.: Ubung Riigen,” 12 June 1939, Bundesarchiv,

Reichsfinanzministerium, R 2/23, £.214. This is the latest—and hence the most complete—of a series of

periodic reports showing in graph form the total German expenditures, expenditures on deliveries to Franco,

expenditures on the German forces in Spain, Spanish repayment, and the proportion of the latter in foreign exchange. Merkes, pp. 399-400, summarizes the financial statistics. 14, The figure of Merkes, p. 76, showing a total of about 18,000 German military men in Spain during the civil war with about one-third that number present at any given time is probably correct. March 1937, TMWCG, 15. On this, see G.D., D, 3, Nos. 204, 214-16, 222; Jod/ Diary, 14 January, 27 March, 30 Non-Intervention the in policy German that noted be should It 219-21. pp. 28:349, 352-53; Merkes,

(G.D., D, 3, No. Committee toward controls or shipments to Spain was keyed to the timing of these shipments

212). , War II as well. 16. study of Bernhardt’s careet would be most useful. He was important during World

; which accounts those clear, wholly nature—not vety its of is—because business 17. Although the Veltjens In August 1937 the show up in the Ministry of Finance files provide considerable insight into the operation.

v, R 2/20, f£.73, 100); recotds tefer to 30,000 rifles and 20 million rounds of infantry ammunition (Bundesarchi

(R DAYPES\, si3)3)) in February in January 1939 there is reference to a further shipment of rifles and ammunition tetrospective discussion of a and f.9); 2/26, (R rifles carbine 50,000 of return 1941 there is a reference to the delivery of 87 million rounds of the financing of the Veltjens operation of October 1941 refers to a total also show that the Veltjens deliveries infantry ammunition (R 2/26, ff.222-23). The Finance Ministry records

1939 (R 2/26, ff. 148-50, 223). See were paid for in foreign exchange, with the last payment made in December Veltjens Merkes, pp. 49, 220, discusses also G.D., D, 3, No. 213; Jod/ Diary, 27 March 1937, TMWC, 28:252-53. On Veltjens, see above, pp. 222-23, 224, n. as a purely private arms merchant, an utterly ridiculous description.

by Abendroth, p. 181. 106. His role in supplying defective weapons to the Loyalists is confirmed

398

- Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

organizations and agencies combined under direct government control was a peculiar feature of German-Spanish relations. Marion Einhorn, the East German historian of the economic aspects of German intervention, was so blinded by catch-phrases about monopoly capitalism that the extraordinarily close analogy to the Soviet foreign trade monopoly conveniently eluded her.'® Both from the side of German private economic interests and from the side of Spanish Nationalist government and private interests, efforts were made to break into the German state monopoly of trade between Germany and Spain. All these attempts were warded off, though a minor amount of trade on private accounts was authorized by the state agencies. The Spaniards wanted to use their foreign exchange to purchase weapons and raw materials where available from countries other than Germany. Furthermore, there are indications that they preferred to deal with private German firms in order to play them off against Bernhardt, and in any case to weaken the latter’s exceedingly strong position in demanding compliance with German economic requirements. This, of course, was the very reason why the German government decided to maintain the existing arrangement. Against the arguments of the Spaniards and those German firms interested in entering or returning to the field of German-Spanish trade, the arguments in favor of maintaining

the Hisma-Rowak monopoly were overwhelming. As an official of the trade policy section of the German Foreign Ministry summarized them: A. The undoubted success of Rowak/Hisma which has succeeded because of

its good relations with Franco in having Germany preferred over all other countries in [Spain’s] trade and in securing for Germany the bulk of the raw materials available in Spain. B. In order to assure the delivery of Spanish raw materials to Germany, steady pressure must be exerted on the Franco government, which would prefer to sell these raw materials to other countries for foreign exchange. Rowak/Hisma has the

needed means of pressure because of the special [arms] deliveries which it can provide to the Franco government. C. Because of the special German deliveries to Spain, Germany has acquired such a large credit balance that its repayment by Spanish deliveries or by German [purchases of] shares in Spanish concerns will be possible only over a long petiod of time. From this perspective there is no great interest in having this credit balance further increased by any additional other German exports.!°

Under these circumstances, Goring secured the agreement of the Foreign Ministry and even of Schacht to the full support of Bernhardt’s system.?° Just as the monopoly of Hisma-Rowak was confirmed in Berlin, the German embassy in Salamanca was instructed to urge Franco to agree to the continuation of the existing system and to reverse the efforts of a Spanish economic delegation that was demanding a clearing system in which others could participate.2! Franco agreed to the German request on 20 May 1937 and thus paved the way for a series of new GermanSpanish economic and trade agreements in the summer of 1937.22 18. Marion Einhorn, Die dkonomischen Hintergriinde der faschistischen deutschen Intervention in Spanien 1936-1939 (Berlin-East: Akademie-Verlag, 1962), see esp. p. 140. 19. G.D., D, 3, No. 223; cf. Einhorn, p. 137. 20. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 213, 223, 231, 256; Merkes, pp. 233-37; Abendroth, pp. 128-34. See also Wolfgang

Schieder, “Spanischer Biirgerktieg und Vierjahresplan,” in Wolfgang Schieder (ed.), Der Spaniche Biingerkrieg (Munich: Nymphenburg, 1976), pp. 162-90.

21. G.D., D, 3, No. 256. 22 Ibid., No. 263. On the economic agreements, see Merkes, pp. 234-40; Abendroth, pp. 135-36.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

399

Two aspects of the economic relationship were of ptimary significance to Germany. In the first place, there was the actual current supply of raw materials and food from Spain. In this regard, the Germans could feel very satisfied with their accomplishments. Hisma was extremely successful in acquiting raw materials from Franco Spain, even including those from the Italian-occupied island of Majorca in the Balearics.23 Very extensive quantities of ores wete shipped to Germany in 1937, and this pattern largely continued. In the first stages of the revolt in Spain, the area containing the Rio Tinto copper mines had come under the control of Franco, and the available ores from there had been confiscated for the Germans with subsequent production also sent mainly to Germany. Since the mines were British-owned and the copper had previously been supplied to England, this raised difficulties with London. These difficulties would con-

tinue for years and constituted one facet of the German concern over the competition with England in Spain that will be taken up subsequently.25 The twin issues of raw materials for Germany and competition with Britain were present also in the area to which Spanish Nationalist military operations turned in the spring and summer of 1937. The initial stalemate near Madrid in November 1936 had been followed by a succession of local Nationalist offensives in the vicinity of Madrid, each of which had

been halted by the Loyalists after small advances.”° The last of these offensives, one launched on Madrid from the north, came to be called the Battle of Guadalajara after the

provincial capital north of which the attacking Italian units were defeated and pushed back a part of the distance to their starting position. Coming right after the prominent Italian role in the Nationalist victory at Malaga, this spectacular setback attracted inter-

national attention.?’ If the army of the Spanish Republic was the victor of Guadalajara, Germany was the beneficiary. In the first place, Italian prestige in Spain dropped hopelessly below Germany’s. In the second place, Mussolini now felt that Italy’s very status as a world power and his own status as its leader wete so deeply involved in the Spanish Civil War that there could be absolutely no turning back from that deeper and continued involvement in it which guaranteed the persistence of friction with England and France. If Germany’s breach of Locarno had riveted Britain and France to each other, Italy’s inability to extricate herself from Spain assured the maintenance of the Rome-Berlin Axis. In the third place, having so spectacularly failed to take Madrid either by frontal assault or by flanking attacks, Franco was obliged to shift his offensive capabilities from that section of the front to another, and this meant the northern section of Loyalist Spain, the Basque area around Bilbao. This, in turn, was of great interest to the Germans because the area to be conquered contained the other major Spanish mineral resource Germany wanted: the rich iron mines that had hitherto supplied ores to United Kingdom smelters.”” If the offensive to conquer the northern portion of Republican Spain took longer than anticipated—a characteristic feature of the war—this was in no way due to the absence of German aid. On the contrary, it was in support of this Nationalist offensive

23. See Merkes, p. 233, n. 530.

24. See G.D., D, 3, No. 507.

pp. 117-18, 145, 147, 198. 25. On the Rio Tinto ores, see ibid., Nos. 208, 218, 245, 381, 401; Einhorn,

War (New York: Harper & 26. Brief accounts of these battles may be found in Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Cwil secs. 28 and 34.

Nr. 75,” 24 March 1937, 3, Nos. 220, 227; 229,230, 236-38, 240, 246; “Informationsbericht aes 224; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 254. For Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, ££.285-95; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No.

see ibid., pp. 212-60. the Malaga campaign, see Coverdale, pp. 206-12; on the Guadalajara offensive,

28. See Coverdale, pp. 277-84.

29. Abendroth, p. 237.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

that the Condor Legion perfected the technique of destroying towns from the air, first applied by them to Durango and Guernica for subsequent application to Warsaw, Rotterdam, Coventry, and Belgrade—with an eventual return to the cities of Germany herself. The fall of Bilbao did not come until 19 June 1937; and the capture of the remaining portions of the Republic in the north, Santander and Asturias with its coal mines, was delayed until October by local resistance and a Republican offensive near Madrid. The Germans, however, had staked a claim to the Basque iron ores immediately, at least for a

while diverting all the available ore to Germany.*! The coal mines were of little interest to Germany, which itself exported coal to Spain, but the Basque iron mines added greatly to Germany’s economic strength. Although iron ore could be shipped to Germany from Bilbao only during the last quarter of 1937, the volume was even then higher than the total annual German iron ore imports from all of Spain in the prewar period.*? The Spanish campaign in the north, therefore, was of great benefit to the Germans and easily offset the troublesome affairs of the Non-Intervention Committee. The Deutschland and Leipzig incidents of May and June 1937 might attract great attention and arouse Hitler to frenzied denunciation of the Loyalists, but for Germany’s long-term aims the vastly increased economic resources of Franco Spain were more important even if less spectacular.* If substantial ore deliveries from Spain constituted one major concern of the German government, the other was the difficulties anticipated by Berlin in competing against Great Britain for future advantage in the Spanish economy. It was not only that Germany was taking copper and iron ores that had in large part previously gone to England and often originated in English-owned mines. As important, perhaps more important, was German recognition of her own lack of capital and England’s ability to provide capital for the reconstruction that would be needed in Spain once the civil war was over. Hitler had told Faupel as early as November 1936 that Germany should use her present aid to Franco to establish firm trade relations; this would prevent England from

subsequently using her strength in,capital to take Germany’s place.*4 A key element in all German

economic

negotiations with the Spaniards, therefore, became

a determined

effort so to anchor German economic interests in Spain as to preclude a subsequent return of Spain to that close economic relationship with Britain which had long characterized both Spanish mining and trade. While the Germans wanted to take advantage of Franco’s desperate need for military supplies to establish a permanent hold on the Spanish economy, the Spanish leader had every interest in resisting such a development. Both because of the importance of the British market and of British investors to the Spanish economy, and because he wanted to maintain the independence of Spain, Franco preferred to play Britain and Germany off against each other rather than allow the Spanish economy to come under German control. Through various channels, Franco assured the British and French governments that he had no intention of allowing Spain’s independence or terri30. Of interest on the bombing offensive is the report by Martin Wronsky of Lufthansa, the German government-owned airline, cited by Einhorn, p. 131. See also G.D., D, 3, Nos. 241, 247, 249, 251, 253, 258, 265; Merkes, pp. 397-98; Abendroth, pp. 158-60; Thomas, pp. 986-88; Klaus A. Maier, Guernica, 26.4.1937

(Freiburg/Br.: Rombach, 1975). 31. See G.D., D, 3, Nos. 390, 391. 32. Deutsche Revisions- und Treuhandaktiengesellschaft, “Bericht nebst Anlage uber die bei der Rowak Handelsgesellschaft m.b.H., Berlin, vorgenommenen Priifung des Jahresabschlusses zum 31. Dezember 1937,” pp. 3, 5 (Bundesarchiv, Reichsfinanzministerium, R 2/27, ff.41, 43). See also Abendroth, p. 240.

33. On the Deutschland and Leipzig incidents, see pp. 362-63 above.

34, G.D., D, 3, No. 132.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

401

torial integrity to be infringed by Germany or Italy. He further encouraged the maintenance of some trade with both Western Powers, but especially with England. To the alarm of the Germans,

there were

frequent rumors

of Spanish-English

negotiations,

especially about economic subjects; and the Germans immediately suspected that economic issues were behind the British de facto recognition of Franco in November 1937, which was accompanied by an exchange of diplomatic agents between the London and Nationalist governments.°¢ In the face of a possibility of Britain’s return to a key role in the Spanish economy, the Germans were determined to use the economic leverage they had acquired and were continuing to acquire because of their aid to Franco’s war effort. The strength of the German position was derived from two categories of aid. The value of the war materials supplied to Franco was credited to Hisma, which used the balances it was building up in

Spain to pay for the ores and other materials Germany imported. Because the volume of deliveries to Spain exceeded those to Germany, Hisma had enormous excess funds which might be used to purchase shares of Spanish mining and other firms, so that in effect Germany would compete with Britain’s export of capital by exporting war materials and using the Spanish payments for this aid to invest in the Spanish economy. This would become the major focus of German-Spanish friction. The other significant category of aid to Spain was the services of the Condor Legion. The equipment, minus materials returned to Germany, was charged to Franco and included in the German official claims for repayment by Nationalist Spain; but the personnel costs were treated differently. The pay of the usually slightly over five thousand members of the Legion, together with the danger supplement added to it, was so high that the Germans thought it best not even to tell the Spaniards about it—as they would have had to if they had wanted to claim its inclusion in the accounts.*’ The German government did, however, secure a secret fund inside Spain through an aspect of the Condor Legion’s pay. Half the danger pay supplement of the Legion members was made available to them individually for purchases in Spain in pesetas by the Franco regime in accounts with Hisma; but since the Germans serving in Spain did not use up all these funds, they received the equivalent of their unspent balances in marks in Germany.*8 This arrangement left the German government with the pesetas in Spain. These so-called “savings pesetas”(Sparpeseten) came to over 90 million by 1939;°° their existence was not known to the Spanish government; and they were kept in cash, first by Hisma, then by Bernhardt personally, and finally by the German embassy in Spain. A small portion of these funds was used during World War II to cover embassy expenses, but far larger sums were expended for German intelligence operations and for the activities of the German navy in supplying submarines from Spanish ports. Some amounts were in fact used for purchases in the Spanish economy and to provide Getman firms with Spanish currency, but the major use of this secret fund was for military purposes. Thus Germany could derive greater benefits from Franco’s “benevolent neutrality” in World War II than the Spanish leader had imagined when financing the visits 35. D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 287; 5, No. 403; 6, No. 272.

1937, DZA Potsdam, 36. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 221, 244, 383, 389, 440, 454, 473; von Neurath to Faupel, 21 April

Hodgson was Biro RAM, Akte 60964, £.105; Coverdale, pp. 324-26; Abendroth, pp. 181-202. Sir Robert appointed British agent in Spain; the Duke of Alba became Franco’s representative in London.

of 3 and 8 November 37. Reichsfinanzministerium, “Vermerke Wi 3735-449” and “450, g. Rs.,” M Bundesarchiy, Reichsfinanzministerium, R 2/22, ££.156—-57.

Sparpeseten,” 38. Sonderstab W (Schweickhard) to Ministry of Finance, “2207/38 IVa g. Rs., Betr.: 1938, Bundesarchiv, R 2/22, f.54.

1938,

2 June ,

1937, Bundesarchiv, 39. Stohrer, “Bericht Nr. 1007g., Sparpesetenguthaben der Legion Condor,” 29 November

R 2/24, f£.294-98.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

of Condor Legion membets to Spanish brothels during the civil war.*° Most of the funds available to the German government for investment in Spain came from the deliveries of Hisma, and in its chief figure, Bernhardt, the Germans had a

man determined to use these funds to establish German domination of Spain’s economy. Starting in the summer of 1937, and almost certainly with Goring’s prior approval, Hisma used parts of its balances to purchase mining rights and shares in mining firms or to establish firms of its own all over Nationalist Spain and Spanish Morocco.*! Bernhardt moved more rapidly than the German diplomatic representatives in Spain realized and more extensively than the Spaniards were prepared to tolerate. The German-Spanish sectet protocol on economic cooperation of 16 July 1937 was presumably seen by Bernhardt as the appropriate cover for these operations. Its concluding section had provided, among other topics, that “the Spanish Nationalist Government will facilitate as far as possible the establishment of Spanish companies for the development and economic exploitation of minerals and other raw materials and for generally useful economic purposes with the participation of German citizens or German firms in accordance with the general Spanish legal regulations.’’4 In his characteristically cavalier manner, Bernhardt had neglected to look up the “general Spanish legal regulations” concerning mines; even by December 1937 the German embassy had not adequately studied the relevant texts.4* Had they done so, they would have discovered, months before the Spaniards called it to their attention, that the Spanish regulations could be read to limit foreign ownership of mining claims and firms to 25 percent since the early 1930s. Because the qualifying phraseology in the GermanSpanish protocol was not limited to the Spanish laws in effect at the time of its signing, there was the further possibility that the Spaniards might change the law whenever it suited them. In the fall of 1937 they decided to do so, and on 9 October by a new mining law suspended all changes in the control of Spanish mines since 18 July 1936, the date of the uprising against the Republic. This law would assure Franco a useful tool against any unwelcome changes in the area controlled by the Republican forces once he had conquered all of Spain, but it also threatened to destroy the whole German scheme for longterm control and exploitation of Spain’s mineral resources—which was doubtless one of its main purposes. The October decree alerted the Germans to their threatened position, though it was only during the subsequent agitated discussions with Spanish officials that they finally began to realize just how tenuous their legal standing really was. There is no need to review in detail the conferences among the interested agencies in Berlin and with the Spanish representatives. Repeatedly the.Germans approached Franco personally; in their eyes, Spanish acceptance of the position Hisma had already secured through its holding companies for Spanish exploitation and mining was the key to future German-Spanish relations.* Goring—whose agencies in Spain were directly involved and whose respon40. Documents on the usage of the “Savings Pesetas” during World War II may be found in the Bundesatchiy, R 2/24-26, passim. The relationship of these funds to the German submarine campaign remains to be

investigated; see Salewski, 1:135.

41. Metkes, p. 229; Abendroth, pp. 241-56. Note that as early as 4 June 1937 the German press was forbidden to report on the purchase of shares of foreign mines, “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz vom 4. Juni 1937,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, £.407. In April 1938 the official in the Foreign Ministry who

handled aid to Spain suggested that Spain’s debt to Germany be used in part for current repayment, in part for investment in Spain, and in part to assure future deliveries (G.D., D, 3, No. Sys

42. Text in G.D., D, 3, No. 397. 43. Von Stohrer’s own record of his 20 December meeting with Franco shows him ignorant of the details of the subject matter about which he was making an urgent demarche! (ibid., No. 491). Abendroth (pp. 245-47) puts the emphasis on confusion in the relevant Spanish regulations. 44, Accounts of these negotiations will be found in the books of Merkes, Einhorn, and Harper; a substantial

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937~39

403

sibilities in the Four-Year Plan were affected by any problems in deliveries of taw materials to Germany—was greatly exercised by the Spanish actions, which he assumed were due to concessions to Britain. In order to enhance the position of Bernhardt in the negotiations, Goring gave him a new and special commission, something he had also done for Franz Neuhausen in Yugoslavia.45 All the titles of Bernhardt and all the urgings of the German ambassador only moved Franco to a promise to review the details of Hisma’s acquisitions. The negotiations over these would drag on for a long time. Only in one subsidiary, though still important, area did Franco make a concession in response to Bernhardt’s pressure. Starting in May 1938, the Franco government began to make monthly payments on a portion of its accumulating obligations to Hisma in foreign exchange.’ On the mining control issue, however, Franco was obviously and deliberately stalling. If the position of the Germans in Spain was not as strong as might have been expected from the enormous value of their assistance to Franco, certainly Franco’s own

attitude in his relations with Germany played a part. He was simply not the sort of person to be pushed around. A shrewd and cautious man, he admired the Germans, appreciated their support, was prepared to accommodate himself to German economic needs, but wanted above all to maintain control of the situation in Spain himself. It was not simply a matter of Franco’s playing off the British and Germans against each other in order to protect Spain’s independence; one cannot tread the relevant records without getting the impression that Franco’s pride and sense of propriety wete offended by Bernhardt’s

grasping

approach.

Shipping

ores

to Germany

was

one

thing; having

Germany take advantage of his need for military aid at the moment to seize control of Spain’s mineral resources for the future was quite another. A second factor operating to weaken the position Germany might have secured was the almost interminable feuding among her own representatives. If there were real policy differences between Wilhelm Faupel, Germany’s ambassador to Franco, Hugo Sperrle, the first commander of the Condor Legion, and Hans von Funck, the commander of the

German army men in Spain as well as German military attaché, they are not apparent from the record. Probably the fact that Faupel himself was a military man increased rather than alleviated the problem. Whatever the real causes of friction, Faupel could not work with Spertle and von Funck, and a great deal of German attention was devoted to their quarrel—which ended with the replacement of both Faupel and Sperrle, the former in August, the latter in October 1937.4’ Differences over military tactics and arguments over the operations of Bernhardt had played some part in what appear to have been primarily personality clashes, but there was one facet of Faupel’s activities in Spain that went beyond these matters and conttibuted to hints from the Spaniards that he be recalled. This was Faupel’s dabbling in the a

ee

ll

ee

ee

eee

selection of documents has been published in G.D., D, 3. 45. Ibid., No. 474, cf. No. 491. On Neuhausen’s commission, see above, p. 253.

His War— 46. The payments in pounds sterling are analyzed in Robert Whealey, “How Franco Financed the basis of Spanish Reconsidered,” Journal of Contemporary History, 12, No. 1 (January 1977), 135-37, mainly on archival material.

355; G.D., D, 3, Nos. 386, 47. See Jod] Diary for 5 January, 24 March, 4 October 1937, TMWC, 28:346, 352, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.38. 399, 411 n. 1; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 121,” 23 August 1937,

Sperrle (referred to as 101/31, ff.167-75. There is a series of documents pertaining to Faupel’s quarrels with the Potsdam archives, in office Neurath’s von from file a in Funck von and ce) “Sanders” in the corresponden

at great length. The draft of a Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964. Merkes, passim, discusses the quarrels

DZA by Jodl but not sent, deals with letter from von Blomberg to Hitler of 10 August 1937, which was prepared and Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma, latter the between difficulties to alludes and Faupel replace to Hitlet’s decision for Spanish officers and nonorganization training the of and unit the head of the German armored

commissioned officers (National Archives, Nuremberg document 1955-PS).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

internal politics of Franco Spain. What has not generally been recognized is that the internal developments in which Faupel was involved immediately preceded Hisma’s attempts to control portions of the Spanish economy, almost certainly increased Spanish resistance to the latter, and may well have made Franco suspicious that his German friends might try their hand—or hands—at running the whole country. The slow pace of Franco’s military operations, the insufficient mobilization of the manpower resources of Nationalist Spain, and the political differences and rivalries within the Nationalist camp had long bothered the Germans.** Those German diplomats with experience in Spain, however, warned against any interference in internal affairs. Faupel’s predecessor, Count Johannes Welczek, then German ambassador to Paris, reminded von Neurath of the dangers of trying to “reform” the Spaniards along German lines and thereby incurring the xenophobic reaction that any such procedure guaranteed.*? He urged that the Germans in Spain be explicitly cautioned against involvement with the Falange, the political movement of Spanish fascism. It was precisely with this group, however, that Faupel and several other German representatives in Spain developed close relations, and so could easily be interpreted as siding with it in the rivalries over policy among the Nationalists. Such rivalries were characteristic of both sides in the civil war. The important difference—a difference that may well have been decisive for the wat’s outcome—was that the divisions among the Republicans erupted repeatedly into what can only be called sub-civil warts and mass purges on their side, with such hostilities carried on about as ferociously as the fight against the Nationalists. The most spectacular of these internal conflicts broke out in Barcelona in April and culminated in the destruction of the POUM, the Spanish Trotskyite movement, in accordance with Soviet orders in June 1937.°° At the very time of this grisly drama, Franco was consolidating his own power by ending—or at least papering over—the divisions on the Nationalist side in a manner characteristic of his political style. The major elements contending for influence in Nationalist Spain were the Carlists and other species of monarchists, the Falange, and miscellaneous clerical and military groups. Unlike the Republicans, Franco generally preferred to apply the death penalty only to those on the ofher side of the civil war; he simply exiled or jailed key figures who might be actual or potential rivals for leadership of the Nationalist cause. With José Antonio Primo de Rivera, the leadet of the Falange, executed by the Republicans, Franco jailed his successor, Manuel Hedilla Larres, and exiled Manuel Fal Conde, the Carlist

leader. Franco then combined all the various elements into one single organization with himself as its leader. This new creation, the Falange Espafiola Tradicionalista y de las Juntas Ofensivas Nacional-Sindicalistas, was as disparate as its name was long, but Franco was the unchallenged leader of whatever it included. Whoever was not included did not count in Nationalist Spain. Though clear in their own minds that Franco was the only possible petson to lead the Nationalist cause, Faupel and several other German representatives in Spain had 48. A good comparison of the situation in Republican and Nationalist Spain by a German diplomat is in G.D., D, 3, No. 128. 49. Von Welczek to von Neurath, 27 December 1936, DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.46—-47 (this is the document cited in Einhorn, p. 128). 50. A good brief account in Thomas, secs. 37 and 39. Alexander Orlov, the NKVD chief in Spain at the time,

conveniently omits his key role in these events in his memoirs, The Secret History of Stalin’s Crimes (New York: Random House, 1953). It is not surprising that at a time when Stalin and the Soviet secret police were pulling imaginary Trotskyites from under almost every bed in the Soviet Union, the very existence of a real Trotskyite movement in “their” part of Spain stimulated Soviet ingenuity to the forgery of POUM documents and the murder of the Trotskyite leader, Andrés Nin.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

405

been working with Hedilla and other Falangist elements, both because they saw in them a spirit akin to German National Socialism and because they believed that only the radical program of the Falange could succeed in mobilizing mass support behind Franco and thereby assure a successful conclusion of the war. The consolidation of Franco’s hold over the Falange, accompanied by considerable friction in April 1937, made Faupel’s association with elements Franco was pushing aside intolerable for the continuation of good German-Spanish relations. The hints from Burgos met with Berlin’s recognition that the situation had become impossible; Hitler decided to recall both Faupel and Sperrle.*! In the face of these developments, it should not be surprising that Franco was most cautious about the German economic demands and allowed the talks concerning Hisma’s control of mining firms to drag on for months. In the early part of 1938, the Germans and Spaniards argued over the mining concessions. While the Nationalists first retreated before the Republican offensive at Teruel and then retook the city, the Germans puzzled over the best ways to cope with Spanish legal and procedural obstruction.>? Franco’s need for more supplies during this phase of the war appeared to give the Germans added leverage, but the situation changed quickly.*> The fighting around Teruel had weakened the Republican forces; and in March and April 1938 the Nationalist armies moved forward rapidly, cutting the Republic in two by reaching the Mediterranean on 15 April. For a moment it looked as if a total Nationalist victory were imminent, and the Spanish position in the mining controversy correspondingly stiffened,4 only to soften again soon after when it became apparent that the Republic would hold in spite of the great setback it had received.°> These shifts reflect the inherent dilemma of both the Germans and the Spanish Nationalists. The Germans wanted Franco to get and keep his military operations moving, but they had a strong negotiating position only when Franco was stalled for lack of German (and Italian) support. Franco wanted both to win and to remain independent, but faced the demand that he mortgage Spain’s independence for the aid he needed to win the civil war. The interaction of military developments in Spain and diplomatic developments in Europe in the seven months of May to November 1938 temporarily resolved these problems. The euphoria of April soon gave way to gloom in the Nationalist camp as the Republic held in the summer. Assisted by a temporary opening of the French border (17 March-13 June), allowing substantial Soviet and French supplies to move through, the Republican forces regrouped and held firm. The continued internal dissension on the Loyalist side was temporarily offset by the exhaustion of the Nationalists. The final halting of the Nationalist offensive before Valencia in mid-July was soon followed by a about Italian 51. On Faupel’s recall and the Hedilla affair, see Merkes, pp. 249-64. There were similar problems

190, 19394). See also, James interference, only in this case Mussolini was himself responsible (Coverdale, pp.

(London: Vallentine, Joll, “Germany and the Spanish Civil War,” in Max Beloff (ed.), On the Track of Tyranny

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, Mitchell, 1960), p. 133; “Tnformationsbericht Nr. 99,” 18 June 1937, Bundesarchiv,

££.491—95. the World Wat and Eberhard von Stohrer was appointed Faupel’s successor. He had been in Spain during wat. Some consideration had been designated for the embassy in Madrid just before the outbreak of the civil minister, but this plan was was given to moving him to London in 1938 when von Ribbentrop became foreign 1942. in late until Spain in dropped and von Stohrer remained Stohrer, No. 44 of 31 January 1938, T-120, 52. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 499, 501-4, 508-10, 515, 516, 526; von cited cover these talks; the latter is the 784/1557/377754. The accounts of Merkes and Abendroth already

more reliable. 53. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 528, 532, 537, 539, 541, 542. 54. Ibid., Nos. 561, 566. 55. Ibid., Nos. 578-81, 584, 586.

406

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Republican offensive from the northern region across the Ebro. The fighting near the Ebro would last from late July to mid-November; in its costs and character it resembled

one of the great attrition battles on the Western Front in the World War. When the bloodbath on the Ebro was over, the northern Republican forces had been to all intents

and purposes destroyed, but the Nationalist armies were so exhausted and weakened that only a complete surrender to German demands would enable Franco to restore his offensive capabilities and avoid a compromise settlement of the civil war. In the summer of 1938, the Franco regime had tried to satisfy the Germans while containing their future role in the Spanish economy by a new mining law which increased permissible foreign participation from 25 to 40 percent and provided for possible exceptions to even this higher limit. The manner in which the new rules were prepared and promulgated annoyed the Germans—who could not understand that precisely because concessions were being made to their point of view the Spanish government was especially careful to use procedures free of outside interference—and friction over the application of the 6 June regulation continued into the fall.°° While the Germans puzzled out ways to get around the new law and the Nationalists became increasingly desperate for more aid, the international situation accentuated the confrontation between Franco

and the Germans.*” The crisis over Czechoslovakia in 1938 threatened to lead to a new world war at the very time when the fighting on the Ebro recalled the horrors of the last. The possibility of wat in Europe was most dangerous to the Spanish Nationalists. Since they had been unable to push on to victory in the spring of 1938, the possible outbreak of war between Germany and the Western Powers threatened all their gains since 1936. Aid from Germany and Italy would surely end, while the Republic could be expected to revive its strength in alliance with Britain and France. The French might, in fact, decide to clear up

any doubts about their security in the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean by sending an army to the aid of the Loyalists; a possibility that could presumably be forestalled, if at all, only by a compromise peace in Spain. As Franco saw this danger looming ahead, the absence of information from Berlin

on the development of the crisis alarmed him all the more.58 He decided to avert what must have looked to him as the greatest danger to his position and prospects—and to the Loyalists as the best hope of recovery—by assuring Britain and France in the most complete way that he would maintain absolute neutrality if a European wat should break out. Although the Germans recognized the difficult situation Franco was in, they found his eagerness to proclaim neutrality in a wat that had not broken out exceedingly offensive; and a considerable residue of resentment remained even after the Munich settle-

ment had removed the fears of Franco and the hopes of the Republic. In the period immediately following Munich, however, Franco faced the new danger of having to agree to a political settlement of the civil war. It was obvious that the Republican forces could not secure a victory, and many of their leaders would have been prepared to make peace; Franco wanted the unconditional surrender of his opponents but lacked the offensive power to break out of the stalemate to final victory. The 56. Ibid., Nos. 588, 591-93, 595, 596, 604, 606, 610, 612, 613, 632. 57. Ibid., Nos. 634, 642, 643, 651, 655, 663. 58. Merkes, p. 321, suggests that a reduction in the size of the Condor Legion in August and eatly September 1938 may have led Franco to believe that Germany was drawing back experienced crews for an imminent war. 59. G.D., D, 2, Nos. 622, 624, 638, 641, 659; 3, Nos. 656-59, 664-66, 669, 670, 704, 705; Metkes, pp. 320-28; Abendroth, pp. 217-24. Franco’s own apologia to Hitler may be found in G.D., D, 7:501—4. Ciano, after expressing his disgust, recognized that Franco had little choice (Diary, 26 September 1938) SGELULS 1938: 1:240-41, 255, 258, 260; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 369, 378. 60. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 660-72, 674, 685.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

407

Germans had always feared that a compromise would be against their interests. A long

war, as has been mentioned, was in accord with their preferences; but not if it led to a

peaceful settlement of the civil war. Any such settlement involved the possibility—however remote—of elections, in which the Germans were sure the supporters of the Republic would win.” On the other hand, the German government was no longer willing to supply aid to Franco without commitments from him on the key issues outstanding in German-Spanish relations, and of these, the mining concessions problem was the most important to them. There was, therefore, agreement for once among the German authorities both in Berlin and in Spain that rigid conditions should be set for any future aid.° As Spanish anxiety increased, Germany postponed a decision until it became obvious to Franco and his associates that only a complete surrender to German demands would enable them to secure the means of enforcing a complete surrender on their own domestic opponents. In mid-November 1938, accordingly, Franco decided to give in to Berlin. The needed exemptions from the restrictions of the mining law were voted by the

cabinet; all other current issues were settled in accordance with German wishes; and the

Germans were also assured that their desires for political agreements with Spain would be met when the military aid of the Axis had assured a speedy victory for Franco.®3 The happy Germans provided the support Franco needed to resume the offensive. As the Germans in December 1938 reviewed the great gains they had made and those that they still expected to make, Franco’s forces crushed the northern portion of the Republic around Barcelona and prepared to complete the conquest of the southern portion around Madrid.%4 One cannot say with absolute certainty why Franco decided to give in to German pressure at precisely this point in the civil war rather than risk a continued stalemate, but the signs of shock and fear at the prospect of a world war in the Czechoslovak crisis may well explain the decision of the Spanish leader. Who could know when Germany—again without the slightest notice to Franco—would run the risk of war? Might not some German move, about which he would learn from the newspapers, wreck all he had attained

in over two yeats of war? Unlike Mussolini, who in May 1939 would sign an alliance with Hitler on the premise that there would be no war for several years, only to learn a few months later that Hitler was about to start one, Franco may have been frightened by the Czechoslovak crisis into taking radical steps to make certain that he would have finished his own war before Hitler started a conflict that was certain to jeopardize the prospects of Nationalist victory in the civil war if that war were not yet finished.® In other words, Franco felt that he had to take whatever measures might be necessary to win his war before the “campaign season” in Europe opened again in the summer of 1939. The concessions to Germany of November 1938 were Franco’s Brest-Litovsk. Like Lenin, he mortgaged a large portion of his country’s future to Germany in order to obtain full control of the rest for himself. Each dictator was to be rescued from the implications of his own concessions by the subsequent victory of other powers over opposition 61. See, e.g., Faupel’s analysis of May 1937, ibid., No. 254. The reasons for Franco’s and Germany’s to a compromise peace are discussed by Merkes, pp. 119-22. 62. G.D., D, 3, Nos. 679-82, 686, 687. pp. 226-29, 256-57. 63. Ibid., Nos. 688, 690-93, 695, 697, 698, 700, 703; Metkes, pp. 329-32; Abendroth, 64. G.D., D, 3, No. 702; cf. Thomas, sec. 48.

political prestige triumph of 65. It should be noted that Abendroth’s interpretation (pp. 228-29) stresses the with the subsequent hesitaMunich as inclining Franco to Germany’s side; an explanation hardly consonant related view (p. 279) that Abendroth’s Pact. tern Anti-Comin the to adhesion Spain’s for tions about publicity does not appear conFrance and Britain of expense the at only realized be Spain’s colonial ambitions could in 1940, they collided with German vincing for this period, and when those ambitions were voiced by Franco Plans,” pp. 472-73). and Italian as well as British and French colonial interests (Weinberg, “Colonial

408

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Germany. In the case of Lenin, the interval was less than a year; Franco would have to wait much longer—but then, he was a patient man. The major aspect of German-Spanish relations other than the economic one in which the Spanish government shifted its position in November 1938 was that of a political alignment with Germany. This question had arisen before. In the spring of 1938 when Franco’s success in splitting the Republic had suggested the possibility of an imminent Nationalist victory, there had been discussions of a possible German-Spanish political treaty and the adherence of Spain to the Anti-Comintern Pact. These discussions had gone hand in hand with consideration of a possible withdrawal of the Condor Legion and the Italian troops, but all such rosy prospects vanished with the restabilization of the front. The Nationalists had been worried about the anticipated British reaction if they adhered to the Anti-Comintern Pact even before the setbacks of mid-May 1938.°° Thereafter, the difficult situation in the war left the Nationalists even more afraid of a public treaty with Germany—especially at a time when the French had opened the border for supplies to the Republic. They therefore told the Germans that a political treaty would have to be either secret until victory had been won or postponed until that time altogether. The German government was interested in the propaganda value of a public alignment of Spain with the Axis and accordingly expressed a preference for postponing the whole question.°’ With the shift in Franco’s policy in November 1938 and the resulting approach of military victory, the German-Spanish negotiations for a political agreement that had been suspended in May were resumed in December 1938. There were details to be settled—as well as a characteristically prolonged final military campaign—but the negotiations culminated in an agreement signed on 31 March 1939.°8 The treaty provided for consultation in international affairs, benevolent neutrality in case one partner were involved in

war, abstention from international agreements hostile to one another, cooperation with the Italian government, and promises to cooperate in political, cultural, and economic

relations. Although the Spaniards eventually also gave way on the subject of adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact, that would be a longer and more difficult problem. It was not merely that the negotiations were complicated by the participation of Italy and Japan; there was a fundamental difference of interest and approach between Germany and Spain. Von Ribbentrop had always looked upon the Anti-Comintern system as his own brainchild, a gift of genius to a skeptical world. The propagandistic aspect of an imposing facade of unity, the appearance of a worldwide association of the rising nations as contrasted with the collapsing League of decaying democracies—these were the great merits of the Anti-Comintern Pact in the eyes of its creator. The early months of 1939 were, as will be examined later, the time when von Ribbentrop was attempting to convert the original association of Germany, Italy, and Japan into a formal military alliance; what better time could there be for a public association with those three wise powers of a Nationalist Spain that was conquering enemies of the new dispensation who had enjoyed such sympathies in the West? Only if seen in this context can the tremendous German pressure on Franco, personally and continually reinforced by von Ribbentrop, be understood. Franco, on the other hand, could see no good reason to take a step, especially to 66. G.D., D, 3, No. 582. For the negotiations up to that point, see ibid., Nos. 529, 544, 557-60, 564, 567, 570,

575, 576. 67. Ibid., Nos. 587, 589, 590. 68. See ibid., Nos. 705-8, 714, 718-20, 725, 729, 733, 734, 741, 769; Merkes, pp. 335-37. 69. German and Spanish text in G.D., D, 3, No. 773.

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

409

take a public step, that was guaranteed to annoy Britain and France at a time when he was securing their formal diplomatic recognition and wanted a number of important concessions from them.’? This was particularly so from his point of view as he could see nothing to be gained from adding such an action to the political treaty with Germany that he was willing to sign. Furthermore, he pointed out with understandable annoyance, he had surely given enough practical evidence of an anti-Communist orientation. In the face of this divergence of views, the talks dragged on from January to the end of March

1939. Only when victory in Spain was certain and German pressure most insistent did

Franco agree to the signing on 27 March, but even then insisted that this action be kept

secret. A leak, possibly arranged by the Germans, finally forced publication of Spain’s adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact on 7 April 1939.7! Ironically, by then the German attempt to convert the German-Italian-Japanese association into a firm military alliance was seen in Berlin as unlikely to succeed so that the German government was beginning to give serious thought to an alignment with the Soviet Union. The publication of Spain’s adhesion to the Anti-Comintern Pact would be the last act of the German government that could be interpreted as overtly anti-Soviet before the Nazi-Soviet NonAggression Pact.” As the end of the civil war in Spain came into view early in 1939, the Germans thus reaped their political harvest. Having won major concessions from Franco in the economic field, they could afford to be generous in the concluding negotiations to secure their economic position in postwar Spain. These talks, it is true, lasted several months,

but the Germans were delayed more by internal feuding of their own than by Spanish teluctance.’> The outbreak of World War II in September 1939 would alter the whole situation, so that the details of these economic talks came to be of little practical importance.’4 German economic benefits from the intervention in Spain had either been already secured or would be completely transformed by the exigencies of war. In a real sense, the same thing was also largely true of the political and military benefits to Germany. Franco had explained to the Italians that the long civil war had so weakened Spain that it would take years to rebuild the country; if a European war came in the near future, Spain would have to remain neutral.’ The German government was

fully aware of this fact and realized that for the time being the waning of the civil war had ended the favorable political effects Germany could draw from that conflict. These had, however, been very great. For years, public attention had been preoccupied with

Spain. The continued estrangement of Italy from France and Britain had been successfully maintained. Every effort of London to rebuild a bridge to Rome had foundered over the problems of the Spanish Civil War.’ Even if Mussolini was ever sincere in his desire for a rapprochement with England—and there is great doubt on that score’/— cf. 70. On British efforts to dissuade Spain from adhering to the pact, see C 2191/421/62, FO 371/22944;

Abendrtoth, pp. 286-87.

734, 738, 741-43, 746, 71. The negotiations can be followed in G.D., D, 3, Nos. 717, 721-24, 726, 728, 733,

748, 751, 752, 758, 760, 761, 767, 768, 770, 772, 775-79, 781, 782; Merkes, pp. 336-37. upon the welcoming 72. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 21-22. On the publicity problems attendant and anticeremonies for the returned Condor Legion in Germany at the end of May when anti-Soviet see Union, Soviet the with t rapprochemen a at effort the of because banned Communist themes had been Merkes, pp. 343-44, 346. See also Sommer, p. 182, n. 36. ; 73. A good summary in Abendroth, chap. 12. 783, 784, 786, 809. On internal German 74. See G.D., D, 3, Nos. 710, 753, 754, 756, 757, 759, 762, 764, 765,

feuds, in which Bernhardt was again a center of controversy, see Abendroth, pp. 294-98. 75. G.D:, D, 3, Nos. 755, 763. the B titish cabinet Committee on 76. This is particularly striking when one reads the discussions on Spain in

avi Foreign Policy during 1937 and 1938, CAB 27/622 and 623. Vittorio Cerruti, expressed the view that 77. Thus at the end of October 1937, the Italian ambassador to Paris, be detached from Hitler, a statement that Mussolini was determined to make war on England and could not

410

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

nothing would come of the endless soundings and negotiations between London and Rome that cost Eden his position and Chamberlain and Halifax a good part of their reputation.’* The Italians were encouraged to ever greater risks,” and the British and French had to worry about their Mediterranean communications, the safety of Egypt, and the possibility of Italy’s becoming permanently entrenched in the Balearic Islands.*° At the same time, German and Italian authorities had accustomed themselves to working together in a wide variety of fields, in spite of occasional friction and rivalry.*! As will be shown in chapter 23, it was this combination of factors that opened the door to Germany’s annexation of Austria, which in turn facilitated the destruction of Czechoslovakia. In this sense, the Germans had already brought in their political harvest from the Spanish conflict long before the Condor Legion staged its triumphal return procession in Berlin. There was a further advantage for the Germans to draw from the turmoil in Spain. The passions aroused by the conflict contributed both to internal divisions in France and Britain and to their estrangement from the Soviet Union. Inside the democracies, the

question of intervention and nonintervention was debated bitterly; a study of the impact of this controversy on the United States is appropriately entitled The Wound in the Heart.8? The bitterness of these divisions was to have no analogy until the American debate over Vietnam in the 1960s—though then the fronts would be reversed with the government ptacticing intervention and the critics urging nonintervention. Not unrelated to these controversies was the impact of the Spanish Civil War on relations between the Western Powers and the Soviet Union. Though fully aware of the limited character of Soviet assistance to the Republic,®

the Germans and Italians never ceased trumpeting their argument that Moscow controlled the Loyalists. The reluctance of Britain and France to aid the Republic had the effect of giving some truth to Axis propaganda by making the Republic dependent on Soviet aid. The Russian government, on the other hand, saw grounds for recognizing in

the policies of London and Paris a complaisance toward Germany and Italy and a willingness to accept Franco’s victory that could easily be made to fit into preconceived notions of a capitalist conspiracy against the U.S.S.R.8+ The firm position temporarily was shown to Chamberlain (R 7531/1/22, FO 371/ 21162; cf. R 7469/1/22, ibid.). 78. R 2261/5/67, FO 371/21136; R 2376/1/22, FO 371/21158; R 4965, R 4976, R 4977, R 5137, R 5161, R 5176, R 5304, R 5186, R 5313/1/22, FO 371/21160; R 6096/1/22, FO 371/21161; R 6700, R 6907, R 7329, R 7776/1/22, FO 371/21162; R 8563/1/22, FO 371/21163 (this deals with Lady Ivy Chamberlain’s visit to

Rome in December 1937); R 6557/23/22, FO 371/22413; R 8513/23/22, FO 371/22414; Feiling, p. 330; Hore-Belisha Papers, pp. 101-2; Eden, pp. 535-37; Ciano, Diary, 10-11 September 1937, p. 13; 5 October 1937, p. 22; U.S. 1938, 1:249-52; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 116, 791; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 209. 79. Ciano, Diary, 14 October 1937, p. 26.

80. W 18182/9549/41, FO 371/20588; Br. Cabinet 75 (1936), 16 December 1936, W 18354/9549/41, FO 371/20589; J 4324, J 4422/244/16, FO 371/20911; J 4995, J 5108/244/16, FO 371/20912; R 3076, R 4964/5/64, FO 371/21136; R 5290/1/22, FO 371/21160; R 6435/1/22, FO 371/21161. 81. Rintelen, p. 17; Merkes, pp. 173-74; G.D., D, 3, Nos. 170, 209, 210, 255, 360-62, 376, 379, 423-25, 427-29, 433, 434, 444, 448, 456, 460, 489, 494, 495, 497, 498, 521, 616, 625, 631; C, 6, No. 350; D, 1, No. 2; Jodl Diary, 9

and 12 January 1937, TMWC, 28:347, 348; “Informationsbericht Nr. 59,” 14 January 1937, “Informationsbericht Nr. 37,” 21 May 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, ££.33-37, 101/32, ££.339— 41; Stohrer, “Bericht 259g,” 17 February 1938, T-120, 784/1557/377841; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 80-91, 115-17, 126-27, 128, 137, 144-46; Mussolini’s instruction of 8 July 1938 to the Italian embassies in Paris, London, and Washington, in Moffat Papers, vol. 13.

82. Allen Guttmann, The Wound in the Heart; America and the Spanish Civil War (New York: Random House, 1962). 83. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 86; cf. W 12727/7/41, FO 371/21339; C 5049/122/17, FO 371/20694. 84. The suggestions of Abendroth (pp. 168-68) that the Deutschland incident was arranged by the Soviet Union in the hope of provoking conflict between the Western Powers and Germany over Spain by drawing Germany mote deeply into the war there is based primarily on the fact that the bombers were piloted by Russians and

Germany and the Civil War in Spain, 1937-39

411

taken by Britain and France in the fall of 1937 at the Nyon Conference had produced an immediate Italian retreat, but that isolated incident only seemed to underline the flabbiness of Western policy the rest of the time.8> The developments in Spain thus served to make a general alignment against Germany less likely by increasing the mistrust among the potential allies in the East and West. The fighting itself was also to have favorable by-products for Germany. The Germans had an excellent opportunity to test their weapons and to train officers and men in their use under combat conditions, something especially useful for the German ait force.*° There was also the special role of Getmany’s air force as a means of bluffing

potential victims into submission, of scaring potential enemies into acquiescence, and of

achieving quick victory if war should come. The course of Operations in Spain served to enhance the position of the Luftwaffe in these respects. The bombings of the Basque towns in 1937 and of Barcelona in 1938 not only horrified the world at the time but also heightened the sense of menace that Germany hoped first to create and then to utilize.87 The belief that another European conflict would probably begin, but certainly end, with the major cities of France and England destroyed from the air was to be a powerful influence on policy in Paris and London; it took much of its intensity from the events in Spain. The Germans, like the Italians, could not impose on Franco the cession of bases

since that would have undermined the position of the Nationalists and was in any case anathema to Franco. Even at the height of German triumphs in Western Europe in the summet of 1940 Franco would refuse German demands of that sort.88 Von Blomberg’s assurance that the German as well as the Italian contingents would leave Spain at the end of the fighting there was both meant sincerely and carried out in practice.’ Nor could the Germans expect the Spaniards to repay their efforts with great affection. The British diplomatic agent in Franco Spain, Sir Robert Hodgson, reported perceptively on the Spanish reaction to Italian and German assistance in late August 1938: There is ... a subtle process at work to the detriment of Nationalist Spain’s allies. So far as Italy is concerned this is of course long standing. The partnership has throughout been an uneasy one .... The general disposition is to refer to Italians with a certain amount of levity, to decry their performance in the field—where it surely would be too much to ask of them that they should display for a cause that is of no kind of interest to them the reckless gallantry that decimates the Spanish army—and to minimize the immense services their aviation and artillery have in fact rendered to “The Cause.” No amount of propaganda or mellifluous phrasing can hide the fact that the two allies are heartily tired of one another and look forward to the day when their partnership in arms will be dissolved. Relations with the Germans have been throughout, and continue to be, of a

different character. The circumstances which were responsible for the Germanophil belonged to a special squadron. It would be difficult to prove or disprove this thesis. 85. On Nyon, see G.D., D, 3, Nos. 407-10, 413-19; “Informationsbericht Nr. 132,” 9 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, f£211-13; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 134-35; Ciano, Diary, 23 August

1937, p. 1; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 338-500 passim, especially the records of the closed meetings of the conference

in Nos. 423, 426, 447, 460; Dreifort, chap. 4; Pratt, pp. 72-74. Coverdale, pp. 306-10, takes a view of the con-

ference somewhat different from that of most scholars. 86. A summary of the evidence is in Merkes, pp. 128-43, an excellent assessment in Homze, pp. 170-74.

87. There is considerable material on the Barcelona attacks in the various documentary collections and in the

literature on the civil war, but a detailed study remains to be written and would be most useful.

88. Weinberg, “Colonial Plans,” p. 481; Donald S. Detwiler, Hitler, Franco und Gibraltar (Wiesbaden: Steiner,

1962), chap. 4. 89. See, e.g., C 7228/3/18, FO 371/20712.

412

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II orientation of Spain at the time of the Great War are, to some extent, operative today. The immense respect which the efficiency of the German war machine then commanded in Spanish military circles made the Spanish army definitely Germanophil, still hypnotizes soldiers . . . Thus the German effort in Spain started under favorable auspices .. . Nowadays a mote critical attitude seems to be supervening. The Spaniards are not so sure as they were on which side the balance of indebtedness stands. Is it not arguable that it is Germany who is in debt to Spain? The fact that Germany—as Italy too—tushed to Spain’s assistance was just as much to their own advantage as it was to hers. The three were fighting on a common front against a common foe...But the land that was ravaged by the struggle was Spanish soil and the blood that was spilt in the course of it was Spanish blood. True, the Italians did a little blood letting too—at Guadalajara for instance—the Germans none, while the latter found in the Spanish battle-fields an extraordinarily convenient arena for trying out their latest military inventions ... No, on the whole the balance of indebtedness seems to be on the side of Germany, not on the side of Spain. And this makes it all the more annoying that the Germans should be advancing continual demands for payments ... , should have swarms of their compatriots burrowing into every little business affair throughout the country and be doing their best to get their fingers into mining and other enterprises where they are not in the least wanted.”

Though written before Franco’s policy switch of November 1938, there is little reason to believe that basic attitudes were greatly altered by those concessions to the needs of the

moment. The returns to Germany for her role in supporting Franco were thus not so much in later support from Spain, but in the immediate effects of the fighting itself. Ores for German rearmament, the diversion of attention from Central Europe, the strengthened alignment with Italy, all were hopes of Hitler and some of his associates in 1936; and all were realized. Like the Italo-Ethiopian war, the conflict in Spain was a disaster for the peoples immediately affected but a great boon for Hitler. He had seen the opportunities and made the most of them; if the Italians were stupid enough to pay the greater price in blood and treasure, that was their own, or rather Mussolini’s, foolishness.2! For almost

three years civil war ravaged Spain; the tides of battle shifted this way and that; but only Berlin could call it all a gain.

90. Hodgson report of 24 August 1938, W 11582/29/41, FO 371/22624.

91. Coverdale, pp. 392-410, concludes that the price paid by Italy in money and materials was not very substantial and that no lessons learned in Spain were ever applied and no deficiencies discoveted there subse-

quently remedied. Though the last two conclusions are undoubtedly correct, the former ignores the significance

of marginal cost in a strained economy. Denis Mack Smith in his Mussolini’s Roman Empire (New York: Penguin

Books, 1976), p. 105, also concludes that “the war can be said to have been a very heavy burden on the fat from flourishing Italian economy.”

Chapter 20 Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripartite Alliance

[i the war that started in Spain in July 1936 was to prove of great advantage to the Third Reich, the hostilities which broke out between China and Japan in July 1937 were damaging to German policies and plans. As described in chapter 15, the relationship of Germany with the Nationalist regime in China as well as with the government of Japan was good. If Germany secured from China both raw materials and foreign exchange needed by Germany’s war industries, she obtained from Japan the political advantage of having a power threaten by expansion in East Asia several of the same major powers whose interests might be affected by German expansion. As long as Sino-Japanese relations were peaceful, Germany’s ties to both presented no problems;

but even before the incident at the Marco Polo bridge near Peking on 7 July 1937, the friction between Nanking and Tokyo had repeatedly strained German ingenuity. The difficulties of maintaining close relations with both China and Japan had been aggravated by policy disputes in Germany herself. Without reviewing the endless arguments,

one

might summarize

the views

of various

contending

elements

inside the

German government as follows: the Ministry of War and the Foreign Ministry were, on the whole, pro-Chinese, with the Ministry of War somewhat more willing to take steps helpful to Chiang Kai-shek. Von Ribbentrop and his special office, the Dienststelle

Ribbentrop,

were

enthusiastically

Rosenberg concentrated

pro-Japanese;

its interests

the foreign policy office

on Afghanistan;

of Alfred

and the foreign section of the

National Socialist party, the A.O., never developed a clear policy line on East Asia. Goring was torn between what appeats to have been great sympathy for Japan and equally great interest in the benefits to his economic projects of the raw materials and foreign exchange furnished by China, with the latter interest reinforced by the transfer in the fall of 1937 of HAPRO (Handelsgesellschaft fiir industrielle Produkte m.b.H.), the semiofficial German agency for trade with Nationalist China, from the supervision of the Ministry of War to control by Géring’s own Four-Year Plan.! Hitler himself inclined more to the Japanese than the Chinese side.” Concentration on more immediate European issues had, however, led him to leave the multiple confusions of German policy in East Asia largely unresolved in the early years of National

1. On Goring’s views in 1936, see above, pp. 264-65.

2. See ibid., pp. 19-20, and chap. 5.

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Hitler’s Foreign Polity, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

Socialist rule. It should be noted, nevertheless, that his basic sympathies would lead him,

when pushed into a decision by events, to follow a policy of alignment with Japan. This proclivity could be seen in his agreement with von Ribbentrop’s Anti-Comintern Pact, which had been opposed by the Foreign Ministry;? and it would reemerge in the winter of 1937~38.

Until he reached

that final decision, however,

the first months

of war

between China and Japan would see German policy shifting from rebuffs to Japan to an attempt at mediation before a clear option for Tokyo. Whether or not the Japanese intended a major expansion of their control of North China in July 1937 is not entirely clear. It has seemed to many that this was another in a series of expansionist moves, with the Japanese army determined to prevent the consolidation of China that appeared likely to follow the temporary cessation of civil war between the Nationalists and the Communists after the Sian incident involving the kidnapping of Chiang in December 1936. Others have pointed to evidence suggesting the unplanned nature of the incident and the very limited aims of the Japanese.* The latter interpretation, however, overlooks one most significant element: evidence of Japanese moderation and intended self-restraint might be unearthed by historians decades later, but it was certain to be invisible to the contemporary leaders of China. Faced by one more in a long series of aggressive and expansionist actions of the Japanese, the Chinese public and government determined to meet this last step as best they could. They would fight the Japanese, not only at places of Japan’s choosing, but also in such locations as might offer greater hopes of success for themselves and support to the Chinese cause by others. If the Japanese, therefore, both in North China and at Shanghai soon found themselves embroiled in a far larger conflict than they had intended, they had no one to blame but themselves. Austria-Hungary “only” wanted to crush Serbia in 1914; Germany “only” wanted to destroy Poland in 1939; and Japan may in 1937 have wanted “only” to protect against the possible resurgence of China her prior loot in Manchuria and her predominant position in North China; but those who deliberately let loose avalanches should not be surprised—though they usually are—by their own burial under the debris. When the incident of 7 July was followed by further clashes in North China, the German government was most concerned about the impact of all this on German interests in East Asia. German diplomats anxiously observed developments.5 Both in Tokyo and Nanking, the German representatives initially saw the dangers of the escalating conflict in a way similar to the perception of the German Foreign Ministry. Germany, having close ties to both sides, would want to stay neutral,° but a prolonged

war between China and Japan was certain to have serious effects for Germany. German economic interests in China would be endangered, whatever happened. Japan would be weakened by what the Germans thought likely to become a long and drawn out wat.’ This weakening of Japan would reduce her value to Germany as a threat to the Western 3. On the negotiations for this pact, see now the supplementary information from the papers of Friedrich Wilhelm Hack in Bernd Martin, “Die deutsch-japanischen Beziehungen wahrend des Dritten Reiches,” in Manfred Funke (ed.), Hitler, Deutschland und die Machte (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1977), pp. 460-62. 4. This view is the main burden of James A. Crowley, Japan’s Quest for Autonomy (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966). Bradford A. Lee, Britain and the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1939 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford

University Press, 1973), chap. 2, takes a midway position. This chapter is especially good for its delineation of Anglo-American differences in facing the situation, with Britain willing and the U.S. quite unwilling to pressure Japan toward a peaceful line of policy.

5. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 456, 457, 459, 460, 464, 466-68, 471, 481, 498; D, 1, Nos. 468, 477; Ernst L. Presseisen, Germany and Japan (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1958), pp. 127-28; Yu-hsi Nieh, “Die Entwicklung des chinesischjapanischen Konfliktes in Nordchina und die deutschen Vermittlungsbemiihungen 1937-38,” Hamburg diss., Institut fiir Asienkunde, 1970, p. 134, n. 420.

6. G.D., C, 6, No. 480; D, 1, No. 463. 7. Ibid., D, 1, Nos. 465, 470, 471.

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripartite Alliance

415

Powers and the Soviet Union, making all these powers freer to move in Europe. The longer the fighting in China, the more Japan would be drained and weakened . Furthermore, just as the Japanese political maneuvers in North China had brought the Chinese Nationalists and Communists closer together politically, so the military aggressio n of Japan could be expected to drive Chiang into the arms of the Soviet Union diplomatically. The longer the war, the more dependent on Russia he would become; the greater the disruption of China, the better the chances of a Communist victory in China afterwards.§ On the other side of the globe, the Germans could see clearly in 1937 that the Japanese attack on China would open the door to Soviet expansion in Asia—just as the Japanese would see in 1939 that a German attack on Poland would open the door to Soviet expansion in Europe. Neither could persuade the other to recognize these realities. In view of the German analysis of the situation in the summer of 1937, it should not be surprising that Berlin rebuffed all Japanese attempts to secure diplomatic support by reference to the Anti-Comintern Pact. German diplomats explained to the Japanese that the conflict in China was helping, not hindering, the spread of communism;

and that

Germany, moreover, could not be expected to withdraw her military advisers to Chiang Kai-shek or suspend the trade which provided weapons to China in return for materials Germany needed.’ On 16 August, Hitler himself at a meeting with von Neurath and von Blomberg confirmed this policy; he would have preferred to side with Japan but decided on a neutral policy with deliveries to China that were paid for in critically needed raw materials

and

foreign

exchange

being continued,

though

camouflaged

as much

as

possible.!? The German press, which had initially been instructed to take a neutral attitude, was lectured by the Propaganda Ministry about its pro-Chinese orientation and told to take a pro-Japanese view—only to be recalled to straight neutrality after Hitler’s decision.!! From the perspective of Tokyo, the obvious alternative European power to which Japan might turn for support was Italy. If not as powerful as Germany, Italy’s role was of interest to Japan for two main reasons. In the first place, Italy had been selling airplanes to China, and her officers were playing an important role in training the Chinese Nationalist air force. If Italy withdrew her training officers and ceased to supply China with planes, this would have both military and morale repercussions on the fighting in East Asia. Second, the location of Italy with her navy and African colonies astride

Britain’s Mediterranean communications would make any Italian alignment with Japan an asset in restraining Great Britain. The Japanese accordingly approached the Italian government with requests that Italy cease all support of China. They also asked Italy to consider aligning herself politically with Japan through an Anti-Comintern agreement similar to that between Germany and Japan, the assumption being that Italy’s taking such action at that moment would serve as a political reinforcement to Japan’s position, especially because Italy was one of the signatories of the Nine-Power Pact guaranteeing the integrity and independence of China. The Italians hastened to agree to the Japanese overtures. When the Chinese com8. Ibid., C, 6, Nos. 470, 473, 478; D, 1, No. 476; U.S. 1937, 3:481-84, 489-90. 9. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 465, 479; D, 1, Nos. 466, 467, 469, 472-74; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 378, 386.

10. GD. D, 1, Nos. 478, 481. For Hitler’s earlier comments on the value of Germany’s trade with China, see ibid., C, "aNo. 429; U.S. 1937, 3:287. For allusions by Hitler to heavy Japanese losses of officers in the fighting

as recounted by Albert Forster to Carl Burckhardt, see the latter’s letter of 1 December 1937 in Burckhardt, p. July, 29 agai D, 1, Nos. 480, 482; Nieh, pp. 126-29; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 21 July, 28 July, 17 August 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, ff.43, 61, 63, 117.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

plained about the halting of airplane shipments, Italian Foreign Minister Ciano reminded them of China’s participation in sanctions against Italy at the time of the Ethiopian war. Though officially neutral, Italy was obviously siding with Japan.!? In fact, Mussolini and

Ciano began to push so hard for a close political alignment with Japan that the Japanese themselves became a bit worried and began to hold back.!’ How can one account for this Italian enthusiasm and the surprising reluctance of the Japanese to move forward with their own original suggestion? The answer is necessarily speculative but appears to lie in the different diplomatic styles and aims of the two powers. If the Japanese had originally sought Italian support as a means of exerting an indirect and subtle naval pressure on England, the Italians were enthusiastic about using the Japanese in the same way. Engaged in a serious and immediate naval controversy in the Mediterranean marked by ship sinkings, the Nyon Conference, and British naval orders to sink “pirate,” Le., Italian, submarines, the authorities in Rome were understandably eager to align themselves with one of the world’s great naval powers that could divert British attention away from Mediterranean waters. This converse of Japan’s interest in a naval diversion from the Pacific was accentuated by both the characteristic flamboyance of Mussolini’s diplomatic style—which stressed loud gestures and dramatic forms—and a significant distinction in ultimate aim. Italy expected to fight Britain at some time and would be enormously assisted by an allied Japan. The Japanese government, on the other hand, preferred low-key diplomacy and still hoped to accomplish its objectives in East Asia without a war with England. Once the Italians had taken their general position on the Sino-Japanese war, therefore, the Japanese had achieved most of what they had hoped for—without having to give anything in return—and were in no hurry to run risks that Mussolini was inviting them to share. It is even possible that the very eagerness of the Italians alarmed the Tokyo government by suggesting a possibly imminent Anglo-Italian war in which Japan certainly did not want to participate at the moment when her navy was preoccupied with supporting the Japanese landing force in and around Shanghai. It was the temporary lull in the Italian-Japanese negotiations which resulted from this divergence of perspective between Rome and Tokyo that provided the opportunity for a new initiative from within the German government. Joachim von Ribbentrop was unhappy with Germany’s attitude toward the conflict in East Asia from the start. As architect of the Anti-Comintern Pact he thought of himself as the advocate of close relations with Japan in Germany. He had originally hoped to convert the bilateral German-Japanese agreement into a broad front including Italy and possibly other countries, and therefore thought of himself with considerable justification

as the originator of the concept of a tripartite German-Japanese-Italian alliance.!4 Neither the failure of von Ribbentrop’s earliest attempts at the beginning of 1937 to broaden the German-Japanese agreement nor the discouraging report from the Far East of Albrecht Haushofer of his own Dienststelle dampened his enthusiasm.'5 When in Berlin between 12. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 129-30, 130-31; Ciano, Diary, 23 August, 26 August, 7 October 1937, pp. 1, 4,

27; G.D., C, 6, No. 508; D, 1, No. 464; Sommer, p. 84. 13. G.D., D, 1, No. 485. 14, See above, pp. 295-96; Sommer, pp. 82-83. Sommer (pp. 99-102) is in my opinion correct in stressing von Ribbentrop’s role in pushing for a tripartite alliance as against the thesis of F. C. Jones and Mario Toscano that Japan took the initiative. Toscano’s book on the Axis pact will be cited here from the English-language version which contains the last revisions he made before his death, The Origins of the Pact of Steel (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1967). Although Sommer’s book appeared between this version and the last Italianlanguage edition, that of 1956, no account was taken of Sommer’s findings. 15. Haushofer to Hess, von Ribbentrop, and von Dirksen, 1 September 1937, TMWC, 33:170-74; cf. G.D., C, 6, No. 493. Hsi-huey Liang, The Sino-German Connection: Alexander von Falkenhausen between China and Germany, 1900-1941 (Amsterdam: Van Gorcum, Assen, 1978), pp. 126-28, 132-33, is based on the von Falkenhausen

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans Jor a Tripartite Alliance

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visits to his London post, von Ribbentrop met with the Japanese ambassador and with his old friend Japanese Military Attaché Oshima Hiroshi to discuss the extension of the Anti-Comintern Pact and the situation in the Sino-Japanese conflict.'6 Oshima persuaded von Ribbentrop—whose inclinations were in any case in that direction—that all was going well for Japan in the fighting and that Germany could look forward to wonderful economic Prospects in a Japanese-controlled China. Von Ribbentrop transmitted these exciting, even if totally misleading, tidbits to Hitler and Goring,

He persuaded these two to revetse Germany’s position toward the conflict and secured Hitler’s approval of an extension of the Anti-Comintetn Pact to include Italy. The Opponents of such policies in Germany, the Foreign Ministry and War Ministry, succeeded in temporarily having the policy toward the Sino-Japanese war restored to its former status, and German deliveries to China were continued even after the flurry caused by Hitler’s and Géring’s actions of 18 October 1937.17 In tegard to the AntiComintern Pact, however, von Ribbentrop would get his way in spite of the conttaty preferences of the German Foreign Ministry.!8 On 18 October, the same day that the order to halt deliveries to China was issued,

von Ribbentrop’s assistant for East Asian affairs in the Dienststelle Rzbbentrop, Hermann von Raumer, flew to Rome to inaugurate new negotiations for the adhesion of Italy to the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact, a proposal that reached Rome from Berlin at the same time as the Japanese finally responded to Italian pressure for an Italian-Japanese political agreement by likewise suggesting a three-cornered Anti-Comintern treaty.!° Oshima had apparently suggested this approach to Tokyo as a fine way out of the dilemma the Japanese had created for themselves by inspiring the Italians to be eager for a treaty with them. With the Italians and the Japanese both willing, and with the genial solution for salving Italy’s pride by making her retroactively an “original” signer of the Anti-Comintern Pact, as opposed to a mete adherent to it, the road to the conclusion of

a tripartite treaty seemed to be open. The only remaining difficulty was that von Ribbentrop had failed to inform the Foreign Ministry about either of the decisions he had secured from Hitler and Goring. The Foreign Ministry and War Ministry had immediately learned of the decision about deliveries to China when Goring ordered them stopped, and they had thereupon obtained a reversal of that action. Hitler’s agreement to a tripartite Anti-Comintern Pact came to the Foreign Ministry’s attention only when von Ribbentrop as well as von Raumer suddenly appeared in Rome to negotiate the new pact. There was a violent uproar in which the Italians to their interest and amusement learned that Hitler was fully behind von Ribbentrop’s scheme—which he claimed as his own—but would have preferred for von Neurath to have been informed. Once that problem had been settled, the negotiations moved forward rapidly with the formal signing taking place in Rome on 6 November.” papets, now in the Bundesarchiv/Militararchiv in Freiburg. “a hb 16. GD., D, 1, Nos. 479 (note that in this document von Ribbentrop and the Japanese military attaché discussed the inclusion of Poland, not Italy, in the Anti-Comintern alignment), 486.

;

17. Ibid., Nos. 499, 500, 504; D, 7:521-22; U.S. 1937, 3:625—26; Sommer, pp. 66-67; Nieh, pp. 136-37. It is possible that the Propaganda Ministry complaints of 16 October 1937 about the pto-Chinese tone of the German press should be seen in this context (“Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, f.281). 18. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 9, 488; Sommer, pp. 86-87. 19. Toscano, pp. 8-9; Sommer, pp. 67, 86; Drechsler, pp. 62-66; it, UN, HEBTE 3:612-14.

20. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 138-46, Ciano, Diary, 20 October-5 November, passim.; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 10; 14, 17; Eden, pp. 571-72, 607; U.S., Japan 1931-1941, 2:160—-61; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 153, 2 November 1937, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ff.347—49; C 7451/270/18, FO 371/20736. In this

case, the British knew all about the Italian-Japanese negotiations, having obviously broken one of the relevant

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The Italians had received some information about the secret protocols to the original German-Japanese agreement but did not become a party to them. Their contribution to the new alignment was instead to take the form of finally officially leaving the League of Nations, as Japan and Germany had done previously.”1 The new association would thereby present, as permanent, a solidarity they had already shown temporarily by all refusing to attend the Brussels Conference that had been called to discuss the SinoJapanese war.22 Whether or not the essentially propagandistic alignment of the AntiComintern Pact could be transformed, as von Ribbentrop hoped, into a tripartite military alliance for the inevitable war against the Western Powers remained to be seen.” Von Ribbentrop would find that the objections of important elements in the Japanese government to an anti-British coalition were not overcome as easily as those of the German diplomats whom Hitler had simply overruled.” But before any thought could be given to more elaborate agreements between the three powers, the situation in the Far East had to be clarified. If even von Ribbentrop with his misplaced confidence in Japan’s ability to conquer China realized that the war was weakening Japan, certainly the regular German diplomats could see how the continuation of hostilities sapped the strength of Japan and harmed German interests in China. In view of Germany’s close ties to both contending powers, as well as her interest in a peaceful settlement between them, she was both the logical power to suggest mediation to Tokyo and Nanking and the country in which the two contestants might be prepared to confide. As the war in East Asia continued into the fall and winter of 1937, there was an

increasing interest in the possibility of a negotiated peace on both sides. Once the Japanese had surmounted the crisis in their military situation near Shanghai in August, Japanese military leaders became more and more concerned about the possibility of a long war; having defeated the Chinese both in the north and near Shanghai, they could contemplate a settlement without loss of prestige. Efforts had been made by Tokyo to secure a cessation of German military supplies to China, but these had failed as had the hopes for the recall of the German military advisers to Chiang Kai-shek. Although Berlin had instructed the advisers to stay away from the front, their activities were of great help to the Chinese who found their work useful not only in the basic training of officers and soldiers but also in drawing tactical lessons from the fighting in progress.2° The German government thought it best to leave the advisers in China for the time being, lest they be replaced by Soviet officers and so that they might at an appropriate moment advise Chiang to make peace, as well as preserve the neutral position of Germany with good ties to both contending parties. By this time the Chinese as well as the Japanese were codes (F 10344, F 10616/26/23, FO 371/21028; U.S. 1937, 1:617; 3:668-70). 21, Ciano, Diary, 25 October 1937, p. 32. The official exit took place subsequently. 22. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 493-96, 503, 507, 13, 14. 23, Ciano, Diary, 24 October 1937, p. 32. 24. Sommer, pp. 86-93.

25. Considerable knowledge of the actual activities of the advisers can be secured from the translations of a series of papers and reports to the Chinese government from the advisers for the period 1937-38 which the United States military attaché Joseph Stilwell obtained early in 1939 and forwarded with his report No. 9766 of 27 April 1939 (National Archives, War Department Records 2009-255). Annotation on one of the documents indicates that Stilwell either translated the documents himself or went over the translations from the original German very carefully. These documents have, to the authot’s knowledge, not been exploited by students of the Sino-Japanese war; they are briefly cited in Charles F. Romanus and Riley Sunderland, St/vell’s Mission to China (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1953), p. 6, n. 2, and they are used in Billie K. Walsh’s “The

German Military Mission in China, 1928-38,” Journal of Modern History, 46, No. 3 (September 1974), 502-13, a useful but inadequately researched account. 26. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 483, 487, 490, 491, 513, 519, 520. The British not only recognized the strength of the

advisers’

position with Chiang but feared

that German

naval advisers

might displace their own

(F

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419

beginning to consider the possibility of a peace settlement. The fighting had not gone well for the Chinese Nationalist forces; Soviet aid was helpful but not nearly as great as the Chinese had been led to expect; and the Brussels Conference had produced much oratory but no concrete assistance to China’s cause.27 In this situation, the possibility of some accommodation between China and Japan appeared to exist, and the Germans strongly urged both sides to make peace.*® Japanese Foreign Minister Hirota Koki gave the first set of Japanese terms to German Ambassador Herbert von Dirksen on 3 November 1937; and with von Neurath ’s transmittal of these

for Chiang to Oskar Trautmann, the German ambassador in China, on the same day, the German mediation attempt may be said to have officially started.2? The details of the negotiations which occupied the rest of 1937 and the first days of 1938 constitu te a critical element in the modern history of both China and Japan but are of only tangenti al concern to the foreign policy of Germany.” From the point of view of Berlin, there were one minor and three major concerns. The minor concern was that of keeping Germany distinct from all other powers as mediators. Berlin was unwilling to be associated in the mediation with Italy—which had already come down openly on the side of Japan.*! The Germans were equally uninterested in using the visit of Lord Halifax to Germany during the mediation effort to associate Great Britain with themselves in this project.22 The first of the major concerns was to be certain for Germany to act only as an intermediary, catrying messages back and forth, but never advancing concrete proposals herself. The record bears out German success in this regard. A second major concern was to urge both sides to a conciliatory position, the Japanese to keep their demands moderate, and the Chinese to go as far as

possible to meet

them.

In this regard also the record

shows

consistent

Getman

adherence to such a line. The third, and most important, of the German interests was that the mediation succeed, i.e., that Japan and China reach an accommedation and end the hostilities. On this score, the Germans were unsuccessful.

During the course of the talks, the new military victories of Japan in China in November and December 1937, culminating in the capture of Nanking in midDecember, were used as an excuse to taise the previously communicated Japanese demands, which Chiang had been willing to accept as a basis for negotiations. In a long and bitter internal struggle in Tokyo, the generally perceived pattern of advocacy was reversed. While the Japanese military wanted peace with China on the 3 November terms, Japanese Prime Minister Konoye Fumimaro did not. In lengthy and devious maneuvers, he succeeded in tying the Japanese government to a new set of more extreme 7911/1079/10, FO 371/21001).

a

27. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 484, 492; U.S. 1937, 3:827—28. An excellent account of the Brussels Conference is in

Dorothy Borg, The United States and the Far Eastern Crisis of 1933-1938 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1964), chap. 14; see also Lee, chap. 3. 28. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 508-12; Joachim Peck, Kolonialismus ohne Kolonien (Betlin-East: Akademie-Verlag, 1961),

No. 15; F 9307/9/10, FO 371/20959.

;

29. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 514 (with an added sentence in Peck, No. 14), 515. On Hirota’s role, see Richard Dean

Burns and Edward H. Bennett (eds.), Diplomats in Crisis: United States-Chinese-Japanese Relations, 1919-1941 (Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-Clio, 1974), pp. 24445. f 30. Accounts in Nieh, pp. 143-76 (with important evidence from Trautmann’s diary); James T. C. Liu, “German Mediation in the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1938,” Far Eastern Quarterly, 8, No. 2 (February 1949), 157-81; Jones, pp. 59-70; Presseisen, pp. 124-47; Sommer, pp. 68-82; Peck, passim; Drechsler, pp. 42-48. In

addition to the sources cited by these authors, the following documents have been used for the account given here: F 9764/9/10, FO 371/20959; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 13, 31. Borg, chap. 13, discusses all the mediation ss efforts of 1937.

31. Ciano, Diary, 15 November, 30 November, 26 December 1937, 1 January 1938, pp. 45, 55, 72-73, 77; U.S. 1937, 3:649—-50, 788-89.

32. Peck, Nos. 25, 27; cf. U.S. 1937, 3:687—88.

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terms—which it was neither expected nor hoped that Chiang would accept—and then committed Japan to a course of total war against the Nationalist regime.°? On 16 January 1938 the government of Japan announced that since the Nationalist regime would not make peace on Japan’s terms—which were so harsh that the Germans had at first been hesitant about passing them on—Japan would fight on and would never deal with Chiang Kai-shek.*4 The one time in the decade between 1931 and 1941 that the civilian authorities in Tokyo mustered the energy, courage, and ingenuity to overrule the military on a major policy issue they did so with fatal results—fatal for Japan, for China, and for Konoye himself. From the point of view of the Germans, the failure of the mediation effort created new problems. The Japanese tactic of changing terms they had previously asked the Germans to recommend to Chiang left a bad taste in the mouths of some German diplomats, but this was of short-term significance. More important was the fact that it left the

Germans little choice but to take sides in the Far Eastern conflict.°> They could try to remain neutral and to protect their interests in China by a gradual withdrawal from an exposed position there, or they could side clearly with either of the two waning powers. Of these three theoretically possible choices, one, namely, siding with China, had been ruled out by Hitler’s personal preference for Japan and was, accordingly, never seriously considered. Adherence to an at least ostensible neutral position was advocated most strongly by Oskar Trautmann, the German ambassador in China, and appears to have been in accord with the preferences of von Neurath and von Mackensen, the two top

figures in the German Foreign Ministry in mid-January 1938, as well as von Blomberg, the minister of war.*° They stressed the maintenance of German interests in China in what was likely to be a lengthy war; in the area controlled by the Chinese the Germans would be dependent on Chinese good will that could be quickly lost by siding with Japan, while in the area controlled by Japan the Germans as well as others would very likely be squeezed out by the conquerors. There was the further hope of countering Russian and British influence in China. Perhaps most important—though rarely expressed so precisely—was a great doubt that Japan could ever win the sort of victory she was now striving for, a victory that would give Japan complete control rather than a limited sphere of influence in China.*’ On the other hand were the influences and arguments urging Germany to side openly and fully with Japan as Italy had already done. Herbert von Dirksen, the German ambassador in Tokyo, had argued that Germany should maintain her ties with Nationalist China only as long as there was some prospect of successful German media33. The best account of this struggle is in Crowley, pp. 358-75. There had been hints of the more moderate view of the military from German sources (see Sommer, p. 73, and the sources cited there, as well as Peck,

Nos. 78, 87, 113), but Crowley has been successful in clarifying the issue from Japanese sources. See also Lee, pp. 98-99. 34, Text in U.S., Japan 1931-1941, 1:437-38. When the Chinese government asked the Germans to reopen the mediation effort in April 1938, the German government replied by alluding to the Japanese decision not to negotiate with Chiang (Peck, Nos. 130, 131). 35. Note that on 17 January 1938 the German press was instructed to be pro-Japanese—but not antiChinese—in the Far Eastern conflict (“Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 17 January 1938, Bundesatchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £35; cf. 26 January, £55). 36. For von Neurath’s views at the time, see his comments to Polish Foreign Minister Beck on 13 Januaty 1938 in Lipski Papers, No. 75, and compare with Hitler’s confidence in a Japanese victory expressed to Beck on the following day (ibid., No. 77). These comments are not included in the German records of the conversations (G.D., D, 5, Nos. 28, 29). 37. Indications of these views may be found in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 519, 539, 546; C 7228/3/18, FO 371/20712

(on von Blomberg’s views); Peck, No. 66. See esp. the detailed—and prophetic—critique by Trautmann of von Dirksen’s advocacy of a pro-Japanese course in G.D., D, 1, No. 573 (cf. Ciano’s comments on Trautmann in his Diary, 1 January 1938, p. 77).

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tion of the hostilities in the Far East. If mediation failed, a clear choice would have to be

made; and shortly after the Japanese declaration on 16 January , he urged the German government in a lengthy dispatch to shift all economic interests in China to the northern area dominated by Japan, to recall the military advisers, to cease all military deliveries to China, and to extend formal diplomatic tecognition to the puppet state of Manchukuo that the Japanese had formed out of the Manchurian provinces of China.*8 Even before this brief for a pro-Japanese line had reached Berlin on 17 February 1938, German policy was shifting in that direction. This shift and the decisions implied by it can be understood in terms of the interaction of three elements: the pro-Japanese inclinations of Hitler, the agreement of Hitler and von Ribbentrop that a policy of German expansion in Europe could not count on permanent British acquiescence and therefore required additional means of threatenin g England, and the coincidence in time of the end of German mediation in East Asia with

the personnel changes in Germany’s military and diplomatic leadership.

The last of these three, the temporal and personnel factor, is the most obvious.

Hardly had the Japanese declared that they would never negotiate with Chiang Kai-shek when von Blomberg was removed as German minister of war. Simultaneous shifts in the German Foreign Ministry would remove both Foreign Minister von Neurath and State Secretary von Mackensen; at least the former believed that differences of opinion on German policy in East Asia contributed to his dismissal at this time.2? There could be no doubt of the pro-Japanese proclivities of von Ribbentrop, the new German foreign minister, whose interest in closer German-Japanese relations went back several years, who was the architect of the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact, and who by all in-

dications approved the appointment of General Eugen Ott, the German military attaché in Tokyo, to the position of German ambassador there primarily in order to pave the way for the promotion of his old friend Oshima Hiroshi in a similar manner from military attaché to ambassador in Berlin.*° Von Ribbentrop had secured Hitlet’s agreement to the tripartite Anti-Comintern Pact as well as a halt in the shipment of military supplies to China as early as October 1937, and only the latter of these decisions had been reversed at the insistence of those who were now relieved of their high positions in the Third Reich. The negotiations on the Anti-Comintern Pact had reopened the question of recognizing Manchukuo, and it was around this symbolic issue that the turn in Germany’s East Asian policy first became publicly apparent.*! On this controversy, also, Hitler favored the Japanese position but had deferred formal action until after the conclusion of Germany’s mediation attempt. If his agreement in principle to the recognition of Manchukuo of October 1937 was translated into a public action in February 1938, a new view of Germany’s policy toward Japan was the basic reason, even if the end of mediation determined the timing of the formal announcement. As described in earlier chapters, the British and French idea of a comprehensive European settlement had contemplated colonial and commercial concessions to Ger38. G.D., D, 1, No. 564; cf. ibid., No. 565. 39. See above, p. 325 and the comments in Ciano’s Diary for 21 and 24 November 1937, PP. 48-49, 51. It is

also noteworthy that von Dirksen alone of those relieved of their posts on 4 February was given a promotion; in his case, ill-health was a genuine reason for removal from Tokyo, and appointment to the embassy in London a real step up in the traditional concept of diplomatic careers. The transfer of von Mackensen to the embassy in Rome, where he remained until 1943, might have been considered a promotion under normal circumstances, but hardly in the Germany of 1938. 40. See Sommer, pp. 107-8. 41. Gerhard L. Weinberg, “German Recognition of Manchoukuo,” World Affairs Quarterly, 28, No. 2 (July 1957), 157-61. Several of the documents cited there from the German Foreign Ministry microfilm have since been published—from the German embassy China copies—by Peck. See also D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 208.

422.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

many in exchange for German abstention from aggression in Central and Eastern Europe. All British and French efforts to push these schemes forward in 1937 had foundered on German unwillingness to contemplate any such concession on their part. The attempts of England and France had had, in a sense, the opposite effect of the intended one by encouraging Hitler to take greater risks in the face of such an obvious desire for peace. Nevertheless, the constant reiteration of a wish for Germany to respect the independence of the Central and East European states had shown Hitler and von Ribbentrop that Germany could not expect a free hand in Central and Eastern Europe from the Western Powers; that those countries might acquiesce in what Germany did for fear of war, because of divisions at home, or because of threats to their interests elsewhere; but that there was no hope of positive agreement to German ambitions. It is in

this context that Hitler’s pro-Japanese views fitted so well with von Ribbentrop’s idea of a German-Japanese-Italian alliance that would scare off Great Britain. Threats to her empire all around the globe might make England less willing to impede German expansion in Europe—or force her to face enormous dangers if she were rash enough to challenge a Germany with a Mediterranean and a Pacific ally.4? A firm German agreement with Japan, therefore, offered the hope that Britain could

be intimidated into noninterference with German expansion on the continent of Europe, it being assumed that France—with her vulnerable Southeast Asian colony of Indochina—would be similarly intimidated, but would in any case not move without firm assurances of British support.*? As both Hitler and von Ribbentrop contemplated these prospects in the first weeks of 1938, and as Hitler, intending to move soon against the very countries that the proposed general settlement was designed to protect, gave every sign that he would reject any steps toward such a settlement—as the English would learn on March 3—the real choice that the German leaders had to make was whether to make a full change in Germany’s East Asian policy and then strive for agreement with Japan or whether to secure a firm commitment from Japan as a condition for the concessions to Japan implied by such a change. Little is known about the reasons for the decision by Hitler and von Ribbentrop to move toward concessions to Japan without setting any conditions. Von Ribbentrop’s specialist on East Asia, von Raumer, claims to have urged the opposite policy and to have broken with von Ribbentrop over this issue.4+ At a discussion within the German Foreign Ministry on 7 February, possible economic or political concessions to be asked of Japan in exchange for the recognition of Manchukuo were canvassed. Economic demands were dismissed as smacking of “horsetrading” (Kubhandel); recognition of Germany’s colonial claims was rejected as “not very useful”; only Japanese recognition of German expansion in Europe at the expense of Austria and Czechoslovakia looked like useful concessions to request as a secutity against any possible Anglo-Japanese tapprochement.* For several days, this view of the German Foreign Ministry appears to have been controlling,#° but no negotiations for this or any other concession preceded Hitler’s announcement of the recognition of Manchukuo and general declaration in favor of Japan in his speech of 20 February 1938.47 In notifying the Japanese officially of this step, the Germans expressed the hope that Japan would reward the German action by 42. As indicated before, the British government was acutely awate of this danger. The subject is explored at length with reference to Japan by Lee and with reference to Italy by Pratt. 43. See above, n. 14.

44. See Sommer, p. 103, n. 3. Note also the contradictory references to this subject in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 523, 526. 45. Weinberg, “Recognition,” pp. 160-61. 46. See ibid, p. 161, n. 48; Peck, No. 126. 47. Domarus, 1:798-99.,

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripart ite Alliance

423

favorable treatment of German economic interests in N orthern China, a hope that would never be realized. Hitler had decided to go ahead without setting any conditions; one can only specu-

late that he and von Ribbentrop wanted a closer alignme nt with Japan, assumed that the

Japanese had similar interests, and expected that once German y had taken the necessary steps to dissociate herself from the League’s policy of nonreco gnition and to end German support of Chiang Kai-shek, the Japanese government would fall in with their wishes for a closer association to be evidenced by some new treaty of alliance as well as preferential treatment for Germany in Japan’s East Asian sphere of influenc e. The extent to which Hitler and von Ribbentrop discussed these questions is not known. What evidence there is suggests that Hitler, who knew von Ribbentrop as an energeti c advocate of the three-power alignment, left to the latter considerable discretion to proceed as seemed best to him. The new East Asian policy was being initiated in the weeks when Hitler was concentrating on the annexation of Austria, and the most far-reaching steps to liquidate Getmany’s position in China were taken in the subsequent months while the attack on Czechoslovakia was under preparation; it is easy to imagine that Hitler was pleased to be relieved of the lengthy bickering over German policy in East Asia that had obtained previously and was now replaced by von Ribbentrop’s single-minded determination to charge ahead. The aura of Getman-Japanese cooperation which might deter Britain from intervening against German action on Austria and Czechoslovakia was in any case secured for the immediate future by a German policy of one-sided concessions to Japan. The repeated interventions of Hitler in the disputes over German policy toward East Asia from July 1937 to February 1938 have no parallel in the subsequent months. Since his method of governing included running the details of subjects in which he was very interested, while allowing his subordinates great leeway in other ateas—involving himself only when their conflicts of jurisdiction and policy became too urgent to ignore—the general subject of East Asian policy had come before him only intermittently in previous years.** Since von Ribbentrop moved forward in the general ditection that Hitler wanted, and since the key figures who held different views either had been or soon would be removed from office, the details of German policy probably did not come before Hitler again for months. Nothing suggests that von Ribbentrop reported to Hitler the embarrassing troubles he would soon encounter, contrary to his own predictions, in securing economic advantages for Germany in Japanese controlled parts of China. The warnings of Oskar Trautmann probably never reached Hitler,” and anyway, Trautmann was recalled in the dispute over the withdrawal of the military advisers in June 1938. On that subject, Hitler’s inclination had in fact been reinforced by the one important member of the German diplomatic corps who agreed with von Ribbentrop’s China policy, Herbert von Dirksen, who saw Hitler in April in connection with his trans-

fer from the Tokyo to the London embassy.*” When the Japanese ambassador in Berlin alluded to von Ribbentrop’s personal role in expressing thanks for the German recognition of Manchukuo, therefore, he was correctly interpreting Hitlet’s decision as one of allowing the new German foreign minister to implement Germany’s new policy toward East Asia in accordance with his own judgment.°!

48. See above, chap. 5. 49. See, e.g., Peck, No. 127; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 566, 567.

50. Interrogation of von Dirksen, 8-13 December National Archives; Dirksen, pp. 209-10.

51. G.D., D, 1, No. 571.

pi

1945, State Department Special Interrogation Mission,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The fact that the recognition of Manchukuo brought no special advantages to German trade with that area would not discourage von Ribbentrop. The first few months of the difficult negotiations for a friendship treaty and a trade agreement with the puppet state, concluded on 12 May and 14 September respectively—with neither document especially advantageous to Germany—were not taken as a clue to the fate of Germany’s future negotiations with Japan.*? On the contrary, von Ribbentrop persuaded G6ring, presumably on the basis of Hitler’s wishes, to have deliveries of German wat supplies to China halted by a seties of directives at the end of April and beginning of May 1938.53 Because of the associated loss of foreign exchange, Goring was not very enthusiastic about this step. He suggested to Oshima that Japan might help make good Germany’s losses, a forlorn hope.>+ More concrete relief for German foreign exchange needs could be expected from the continuation of industrial deliveries to China under HAPRO contracts, though it is doubtful that these could make up for the almost complete termination of arms deliveries.®> In spite of Chiang’s strong protests that even the Italians had completed deliveries under existing contracts, the Germans stuck to their abrupt decision, at least formally.5° Furthermore, von Ribbentrop next proceeded to otder the recall of the German military advisers in China. As long as the German officers who were under various personal contracts with the Nationalist government remained in China, Chiang was careful to restrain press and public reaction to the steps taken by Berlin. In the continuing war with Japan, the advisers were of great help to the Nationalist army, which was, of course, one reason that

the Japanese had long been urging their recall to Germany.>’ In May 1938 von Ribbentrop ordered them home, offered to have the German government defray the costs, and threatened dire reprisals if they did not break their contracts and forfeit their livelihood. Chiang was most disturbed, and even Ott agreed with Trautmann that a recall in stages would be preferable to a dramatic breach. Von Ribbentrop, however, was by no means averse to spectacular steps; the man who was later to explain Germany’s declaring wat on the United States by asserting that it was a mark of great power status for a country to declare war on others*rather than have them declare war on it, was quite willing to threaten a rupture of German diplomatic relations with China if the Chinese government did not immediately release the advisers from their contracts and speed them on their way to Germany. In the event, the German ambassador was recalled but diplomatic relations were maintained; the crude procedure employed, moreover, resulted 52. See Weinberg, “Recognition,” p. 162. The German press was instructed to give the German-Manchukuo agreement of 12 May great publicity (“Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 12 May 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammet, Z.Sg. 101/11, £361). 53. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 576, 579, 581, 594; Sommer, pp. 108-10,

54. Goring to Oshima, 7 May 1938, Emessen, pp. 86-88; Oshima to Goring, ibid., pp. 89-90. 55. GGring’s statements are summarized as follows on 2 May: “China-business: Military equipment deliveries

which have not yet left a German port are to be held up. The industrial installations signed for via HAPRO can continue to be worked on and delivered” (Aktenvermerk tiber die Besprechung am 2. Mai 1938 von 11:05 bis 12:25, London, Imperial War Museum, Misch Papers, folder 65, frame 7463). On 8 May: “Export . . . No equipment is to be delivered any more” (Ergebnis der Besprechungen beim Herrn Generalfeldmarschall am 8.5.38, ibid., frame 7466). The very repetition of orders to stop delivery supports the belief that at least some still continued. The assertion of Goring to Sven Hedin in October 1939 that Germany would “now” stop deliveries as reported in Sven Hedin’s memoirs (Ohne Auftrag in Berlin [Buenos Aires, 1949], p. 49), on which Hartmut Bloss relies in his “Deutsche China-Politik im Dritten Reich” (Funke, p. 423) as evidence that Germany continued to send war

materials until the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939 cannot, however, be accepted as controlling. Sven Hedin was strongly pro-Chinese, and Goring may have been trying to please his guest. 56. G.D., D, 1, No. 582; Drechsler, pp. 50-54.

57. For a report by one of the advisers, explaining why he thought China would win, see Dr. Kausch’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 45,” 16 June 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ff.409-13.

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripartite Alliance

425

not only in the end of the military advisers’ role. Germany’s position in China, carefully, laboriously, and successfully built up over a petiod of two decades, was liquidated by von Ribbentrop in less than six months.38 The German hope and expectation had been that they would secure some compensation for the losses in foreign exchange and wat materials resulting from the sacrifice of their position in China to the ambitions of Japan by obtaining a special position in the trade and economic reconstruction of Manchuria and Japanese-controlled China. These expectations were disappointed, not only in regard to Manchuria and North China but in the broader field of German-Japanese economic relations as a whole? As von Ribbentrop reminded Japanese Ambassador Togo Shigenori in their discussion of the recognition of Manchukuo that Hitler had announced two days earlier, he had not asked for any concessions from Japan in return; but he did expect the Japanese to recognize Germany’s generous action by appropriate conduct on their part. What the Germans wanted was treatment by the Japanese authorities in occupied China that was on a par with the treatment accorded Japanese firms and individuals. As the German ambassador to China had warned and as the German government was quickly informed, there could be no hope that the Japanese government would seriously consider this possibility. On the contrary, the Tokyo government was hesitant about granting any status to the Germans that was superior to that of third countries— who were all being squeezed out—and merely hoped to use German interest in North China to secure German acceptance of Japanese control there by direct GermanJapanese dealings on the specifics of the North China trade.*! On 20 May 1938 Togo gave von Ribbentrop the text of a proposal outlining the situation that would obtain in Japanese-controlled China. He had received instructions on the subject from Tokyo, and the text clearly rejected the German expectation of a status which, if not one of parity with the Japanese, at least assured a distinct preference over third powers.“ When repeated efforts to alter this key factor failed, with Togo refusing to budge in the knowledge of Tokyo’s position, von Ribbentrop tried to circumvent him by appealing to his friend Oshima, who promised to try to have the Japanese general staff intervene.®? This procedure had worked the other way around when Oshima and von Ribbentrop had prepared the Anti-Comintern Pact behind the back of the German Foreign Ministry, but it did not work now. Von Ribbentrop would have done better to pay attention to Togo, who told him and his subordinates what the real position of Tokyo was, rather than to listen to Oshima, who wanted to be pleasant and helpful but

could not bring about the least change in the firm determination of the Japanese government to maintain its position. In a series of increasingly heated conversations in Berlin the negotiations were stalemated over German insistence on a clearly expressed preferential position vis-a-vis third

58. On the recall of the military advisers, see Sommer, pp. 110-15, and the sources cited there; Drechsler, PP: 48-50; Dirksen, p. 210. See also Peck, No.

133; Kausch’s

“Vertraulicher Informationsbericht Nr. 48: Die

zukiinftige diplomatische Vertretung des Reiches in China,” 15 July 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £.37; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 461; 10, No. 105. 59. There is as yet no comprehensive study of this subject for the period 1937-41. Drechsler, pp. 55-60, has

some details; Johanna Menzel Meskill, Hitler and Japan: The Hollow Alliance (New York: Atherton, 1966), chap. 4, covers the war years; Sommer decided to ignore the subject (p. 116, a. 78); Presseisen, pp. 146-47, 156-60, gives an introductory survey. Bloss (Funke, pp. 423-24) asserts that Hitler had already dropped any idea of economic interest in China.

60. G.D., D, 1, No: 571. 61. Ibid., Nos, 573, 575, 581. 62. Ibid., Nos. 587—90.

63. Ibid., Nos. 595, 603.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

powers that the Japanese government equally adamantly declined to allow.°* German eagerness for the preferential position was heightened by reports on the actual situation in the areas controlled by Japan. German firms were being pushed out as ruthlessly as British, American, and other non-Japanese interests. Moreover, in their confiscations in

China, the Japanese authorities were applying the same procedure that the Germans, as will be shown subsequently, had followed in Austria, namely, seizing the assets but refusing to honor attendant debts, including those to German firms. The fact, of course,

was that the Germans had made all the concessions at their disposal to Japan unilaterally and now had no effective way to pressure the Japanese into deviating from their intentions in China. These intentions were obvious to everyone except von Ribbentrop. They aimed at the exclusion of all Western economic interests and activities with the sole exception of importing those items Japan herself needed and exporting those items Japan did not want—with the export-import business conducted by Japanese monopoly organizations. Neither the polite evasions of Togo nor the even more polite pleasantries of Oshima could alter these aims in the slightest. In the face of such developments, the Germans themselves began to wonder whether a preferential position would in fact do them any good. If all except the Japanese were pushed out, the Germans’ own acceptance of the concept that they could not have parity with the Japanese in reality settled the fate of German economic interests in China, and preferences over similarly excluded third powers would have only imaginary significance.® Given this assessment of what was really happening—that if all non-Japanese were excluded the relative legal status of those pushed out would make no difference to Germany’s foreign exchange earnings—why were the Japanese so obdurate about conceding so worthless a gesture? The answer almost certainly lies, as the Germans suspected, in the reluctance of the Tokyo government to preclude the possibility of an agreement with Great Britain. As long as the Japanese were following the policy of driving a// Westerners out of China, they could assure the British of equal treatment and commit themselves to give no third power any preference over British trade. The cheap concession of a largely imaginary preference for Germany could, therefore, be made by

Tokyo only by forgoing the equally cheap concession of promising no preference for third parties to the London government. In the summer of 1938 the Tokyo government was not prepared to do this. As will be seen, the same reasoning was a determining factor in Tokyo’s simultaneous unwillingness to agree to a tripartite military alliance potentially directed against Great Britain that the Germans were also pressing on them. The two sets of negotiations were, in fact, being conducted simultaneously and collapsed temporarily in August 1938 for identical reasons. If the parallel economic and alliance negotiations of February to August 1938 have not generally been seen in a combined and coherent framework it is because most authors have ignored the economic talks in spite of adequate available evidence, while knowledge of the alliance negotiations has been limited by the dearth of relevant documentation. The German evidence is fragmentary, partly because von Ribbentrop was very secretive about his plans—even toward his own immediate assistants—and partly

64. Ibid., Nos. 598, 602, 604-6. Cf. Drechsler, pp. 108-12, for 1939 negotiations. The assertion that the

Japanese army tried to interest Germany in investing in North China, promising preferential treatment in exchange for German recognition of the special Japanese position, in Lincoln Li, The Japanese Army in North China, 1937-1941 (Tokyo: Oxford University Press, 1975), p. 137, is contrary to the bulk of the evidence. 65. See the last paragraph of G.D., D, 1, No. 606.

66. This admittedly runs counter to the views of Sir Robert Craigie, the British ambassador to Tokyo at the time (see B.D., 3d, 8, No. 99), but Craigie appears not to have known of the stalemate in the German-Japanese negotiations.

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripart ite Alliance

427 because some of the relevant files appear to have been destroyed.*’ The Italian archives are still closed, a portion of the record was in any case badly damaged by moisture, and the historian must depend on excerpts and summaries offered by Mario Toscano,%* the late editor of the appropriate seties of Italian Foreign Ministr y documents in which the volumes for 1938 have still to appear. The Japanese diplomatic atchives contain relatively little on this subject because a large portion of the negotiations was cattied on by Oshima, then still military attaché, and by special courier; as a result much of the evi-

dence ftom the Japanese side must be gleaned from the testimony of those involved at the Tokyo war crimes trial and from materials in ptivate Japanese archive s.% If the details of these negotiations are, therefore, still shrouded in some obscuri ty, the available infor-

mation does allow us to ascertain the broad outlines of the policies pursued and to place the episode in the context of both German foreign policy and the interna tional diplomatic situation. The new German foreign minister, in agreement with Hitler, hoped to bring about a closer alignment of Germany with Italy and Japan, but his steps to bring this about vis-avis Japan in his first months in office were necessarily indirect. As has been shown, in February—May 1938 von Ribbentrop took a series of actions designed to remove Japanese grievances over Germany’s ties to Chiang Kai-shek. The evidence suggests that the brusque and abrupt manner in which this was done was due not so much to any special distaste for the Chinese government as to an eagerness to remove the obstacles to an agreement with Japan as quickly and in as conspicuous a manner as possible. In ptior years, from his position as foreign policy adviser to Hitler with his own special staff and as ambassador

to Great Britain with other official duties and responsibilities, von

Ribbentrop had done what he could to further the cause of closer German-Japanese relations. In the process he had been hindered and at times thwarted by others; now that his

triumph was complete he hastened to make up for what must have looked to him like lost time. If von Ribbentrop for several months took no actions aimed directly and explicitly toward the alliance with Japan that he had described in January 1938 to Hitler as of critical importance

for Germany,’ this was

due to his belief that the obvious

obstacles to such an alliance would have to be removed first. The decisions to remove those obstacles had been taken in Berlin by the end of April 1938, though it took two more months to have them fully implemented. It is thus understandable that von Ribbentrop should have turned formally to the question of a closer German-Japanese relationship in May and June, assuming that by this time Germany’s conspicuous teorientation of her East Asian policy would be beginning to have some impact on Tokyo. In the meantime, German actions in Europe had made a prior approach to Italy expedient. Italian acceptance of the annexation of Austria in March 1938 had been welcomed as a sign of true friendship in Germany, where the plans for an attack on Czechoslovakia were maturing and a closer relationship with Italy was seen as one way of forestalling Franco-British intervention against such an attack. The approach made to Italy eatly in May, when Hitler and von Ribbentrop were in Rome, did not produce a formal

67. In addition to the G.D., there are some documents used by Sommer. Useful for the German-Italian aspect of the negotiations is Donald C. Watt, “An Earlier Model for the Pact of Steel: The Draft Treaties Exchanged between Germany and Italy during Hitler’s Visit to Rome in May 1938,” International Affairs (London), 33, No.

2 (April 1957), 185-97. , ; 68. The Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 6-41 (see above, n. 14). Ferdinand Siebert’s, Italiens Weg in den Zweiten Weltkrieg (Bonn: Athenaum, 1962), ignores the negotiations with Japan before October 1938.

69. The former has been done very well by Sommer (esp. pp. 116-39); the latter is the especial merit of Ohata Takushiro’s piece “The Anti-Comintern Pact, 1935-1939,” in James W. Morley (ed.), Deterrent Diplomacy: Japan, Germany, and the USSR, 1935-1940 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976). 70. 'G.D5.D; 1, No. 93.

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agreement. As will be discussed later, the Italians who were upset over the Anschluss and anxious about South Tyrol had just signed a new agreement with England and did not think this the right moment for a formal alliance with Germany.’! Nevertheless, their expression of disinterest in Czechoslovakia encouraged Hitler to move forward.’* The subsequent crystallization of Hitler’s timetable for the attack on Czechoslovakia in midMay 1938 led von Ribbentrop to return to his concept of a tripartite military alliance against Britain and France that might deter or defeat those powers. In this endeavor, launched in June 1938, von Ribbentrop could be confident of

Hitler’s support. When the fate of General Ott had been under consideration, Hitler had expressed a desire to speak to him personally if he were to be appointed to a diplomatic post.73 In view of Ott’s previous association with the murdered General Kurt von Schleicher, Hitler’s wish is easy to understand. When Hitler saw Ott at the end of May, he explained to the latter that because of the expected British opposition to Germany’s conquest of Lebensraum in Eastern Europe, it was important to try to shift Japan from an anti-Russian to an anti-British policy. Hitler brushed aside Ott’s view that Japan could assist Germany only if she were assured of American neutrality with a disquisition on the weakness and unimportance of the United States.”4 As for the general idea of securing a reorientation of Japan’s policy along the lines Hitler desired, Ott reserved judgment. His excellent contacts with Japanese military leaders—a contributory factor to his appointment as ambassador—would presumably prove useful in this project. Soon after this discussion, von Ribbentrop undertook to sound out both the Italians

and the Japanese on a possible three-cornered alliance. On 17 June he touched on the project with Oshima, and on 19 June he discussed it at length with Italian Ambassador Bernardo Attolico.’”> Von Ribbentrop explained his view that only “a plain, open military alliance” would serve to deter England and France from interfering with the ambitions of Germany and Italy; he explained his conviction that Japan would also agree to participate for analogous reasons and informed Attolico that key figures in Japan were being sounded on this possibility. The Italian government was now more favorably disposed to the idea but, having been itself negdtiating with Tokyo for closer ties,”° wanted to know

how far Japan really was willing to commit herself to Germany. At the moment, Oshima could give neither Attolico nor von Ribbentrop any information on that score; he was waiting for instructions from Tokyo himself.”” At the end of June, Oshima received instructions from the Japanese general staff by courier. They included a draft military agreement to be concluded between the Japanese and German armies. The explicit limitation to the respective armies should have tipped off the Germans to expect resistance by the Japanese naval authorities to a Japanese 71. See Watt, “An Earlier Model”; Sommer, pp. 116-19.

72. See pp. 519-21, 543 below. 73. G.D., D, 1, No. 574. 74. Sommer,

pp. 122-23; Erich Kordt,

Wahn und Wirklichkeit: Die Aussenpolitik des Dritten Reiches, 2d ed.

(Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1948), pp. 141-42. Subsequently, Hitler would somewhat revise his view of the interrelationship of German policy with the potential friction between Japan and the United States. In the summer of 1940 he expressed the view that a German attack on the Soviet Union, by freeing Japan from restraints imposed upon her by worry about her rear, would encourage Japanese expansion which in turn would immobilize the United States vis-a-vis Europe (Halder diary for 31 July 1940 quoted in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 115). 75. On the von Ribbentrop-Oshima meeting we have only a brief German record (G.D., D, 1, No. 595); for the

von Ribbentrop-Attolico talk there is some rather misleading information in the German records (ibid., No. 784), but a full report by Attolico quoted and summarized in Toscano, pp. 27-33, with some supplementary details in Massimo Magistrati, L Talia a Berlino (1937-39) (Milan: Mondadori, 1956), pp. 200-203. On the negotiations as a whole, cf. Presseisen, pp. 191-95. 76. The process is easily followed in the Ciano diary, beginning with 26 November 1937. 77. See Attolico’s reports of 25 and 30 June and 2 July 1938, cited in Toscano, pp. 34-35.

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripart ite Alliance

429

commitment to fight Britain alongside Germany, since the burden of such a war would obviously fall on the navy; but this was not of immediate moment because the draft itself was directed solely against the Soviet Union. Similarly, the redrafting that State Secretary von Weizsacker persuaded Oshima to accept when the latter handed him the text on 28 June still maintained an exclusively anti-Soviet orientation.78 Although the Germans used the Japanese proposal to make the Italians think that Japan had already agreed to Germany’s concept,”? von Ribbentrop was in reality dissatisfied with it. The anti-Soviet orientation ran directly counter to his and Hitler’s desite to give the pact an anti-British character, and accordingly von Ribbent rop repeatedly explained to Oshima why a pact directed against a// powers, not just Russia, was essential. As a rejoinder to the Japanese ptoposal, von Ribbentrop prepared and secured Hitler’s approval for a three-power pact.®° For the maintenance of secrecy, this text was sent to

Tokyo by courier, a time-consuming procedure during which von Ribbentrop could ptetend to all and sundry that the negotiations were going well and that Japan could be depended upon to side with Germany if the Czechoslovak crisis led to a world war.8! The reality was quite different, since the new German proposal went beyond an agree-

ment between the two armies and hence had to be submitted to the Japanese government as a whole. When the Tokyo authorities received the German proposal at the beginning of August, debate immediately concentrated on the implications of an anti-British and possibly anti-American war inherent in the German draft. This was the last thing the Tokyo government wanted when the development of the crisis over Czechoslovakia suggested the real possibility that Germany might soon call on Japan to carty out her obligations under such a treaty. The war with China had continued inconclusively, and their proud boasts of January were returning to haunt the Japanese leaders. Even more dramatic in its impact on Japanese consideration of their relations with Germany was the fighting with the Red Army at the border between Korea and the U.S.S.R. at Changkufeng (Lake Khasan).*®? Whatever the outcome of the argument over the causes of that incident, there can be no

disputing the severity of the fighting and the fact that the agreement between Japan and the Soviet Union which produced a cease-fire on 11 August constituted a definite setback to Japan. The contrast between Soviet firmness in 1938 and their earlier appeasement of Japanese ambitions by the sale of Russia’s interest in the Chinese Eastern Railway to the puppet state of Manchukuo was dramatic. Only a year earlier, in June 1937, the Russians had been most conciliatory in an incident involving some islands in the Amur River.* The renewed militancy of the Soviet Union strengthened the desire of all factions in the Japanese government for an agreement with Germany directed against the Soviet Union. Simultaneously, it made the Japanese more cautious about antagonizing Great Britain; there wete obvious dangers in adding to a continuing war in China and a threat of war with the Soviet Union the prospect of being precipitated by events in Europe into a war 78. Both texts in Sommer, pp. 129-30. 79. Ciano, Diary, 11 July 1938, p. 193. , 80. See Sommer, pp. 130-32; Morley, pp. 50-51, where the text is quoted from Japanese archives. 81. G.D., D, 2, No. 332. eae 82. On this conflict, see Max Beloff, The Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia (London: Oxford University Press, 1949), 2:191-94. There is a good account of the diplomatic negotiations centering on the role of Shigemitsu Mamuto in Burns and Bennet, pp. 255-67, with extensive notes citing the relevant evidence; for accounts of the conflict itself, see Morley, pp. 140-57; John Erickson, The Soviet High Command (London: Macmillan, 1962), pp. ehag

Alvin D, Coox, The Anatomy of a Small War: The Soviet-Japanese Struggle for Changkufeng/Khasan, 1938 (Westpott, Conn.: Greenwood, 1977). 83. On this incident, see Beloff, 2:179-80; Morley, pp. 137-40; D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 217.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

with Great Britain, especially since the latter might well secure the backing of the United States. It ought, therefore, to have been no surprise to the Germans that the instructions

sent to Oshima urged a draft so revised as to aim the treaty primarily against the Soviet Union.*+ The Japanese ambassador in Germany, who had found out about the negotiations Oshima was carrying on behind his back with von Ribbentrop, warned against even a limited alliance with Germany and was transferred to Moscow for his pains. Even his replacement by Oshima himself could not, however, alter the basic facts. These were that Japan was most eager for a strengthening of the Anti-Comintern Pact with its vatious secret qualifications into a strong and explicit anti-Russian alliance.*° Such an alliance could serve either to deter the Soviet Union or to strengthen Japan if allout war between the two powers did start.87 On the other hand, the very real likelihood that a Japan already engaged in a bitter conflict in China might at any moment find herself in a war with the Soviet Union, whether on the initiative of either party or developing in unintended but inexorable escalation out of some border incident, made the Japanese government all the more reluctant to run still other risks. This meant that Tokyo would continue to push the British and Americans out of their positions in China, but would try to keep that process from becoming an open confrontation. From the perspective of Tokyo, a clear economic or military alliance with Germany could lead to such a confrontation. Knowing how important the British considered their economic interests in China, the Japanese saw the German demand for a legally formulated preferential position in China primarily neither as a means of helping solve Germany’s raw materials and foreign exchange needs nor as a real obstacle to the expulsion of all Europeans from Japanese-controlled China. The former problem left them cold, and as for the latter, once they had pushed all the Europeans out, it would make

little difference what treaties or promises had been broken in the process.8® What did matter was that formal Japanese agreement to a preferential position for Germany would be taken by the British as a signal of the end of all hopes for any present or future AngloJapanese rapprochement, and this the Japanese did not yet wish to give. If the authorities in Tokyo were unwilling to risk a‘rupture with Britain on this point, they were naturally even less enthusiastic about an open military alliance directed against “all powers.” From the point of view of Hitler and von Ribbentrop, the prospect of war with the Soviet Union was still remote: Germany had no common border with Russia, and neither did Czechoslovakia.

Furthermore,

as von

Weizsacker

discussed

the

situation

with

reference to the purges then going on inside the Soviet Union in a letter at the end of May: “Russia hardly exists in our plans at the moment. As long as Stalin makes himself as useful as he is doing at present, we really need not have any special military worries about him.”® The main interest of the German government was an alliance against England and France; having sacrificed their position in China to Japan, the Germans believed they had done all they could reasonably be expected to do for Tokyo—maybe more—and hardly thought it their business to support the Japanese in their border troubles with the 84. The text of the instructions of 29 August 1938 is in the Saionji-Harada Memoirs under the date of 15 June 1939 (International Military Tribunal for the Far East, pp. 2554-55), 85. Sommer, pp. 133-39.

86. A picture of the complicated manner in which the secret protocols hollowed out the original GermanJapanese Anti-Comintern Pact is in Gerhard L. Weinberg (ed.), “Die geheimen Abkommen zum Antikominternpakt,” Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 2, No. 2 (April 1954), 193-201. 87. There is a useful account of the arguments in Tokyo in Morley, pp. 52-71. 88. Note the German reaction to the public assertion by the Japanese minister of the interior, Admiral Suetsugo Nobumasa, at the beginning of 1938 that all whites would be expelled from China in “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 6 January 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.9; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht

Nr. 5,” 5 January 1938, Z.Sg. 101/32, ff. 17-19. 89. Von Weizsacker to Trautmann, 30 May 1938, G.D., D, 1, No. 586.

Germany, the Sino-Japanese War, and the Plans for a Tripartite Alliance

431

Soviet Union.” The appearance of close relations with Japan as well as Italy, with the threats to Britain’s world position implied thereby, was quite enough for Berlin, though naturally a strong alliance would have been most welcome. The eventual peaceful resolution of the dispute over Czechoslovakia appeared to bear out this calculation in spite of the fact that the actual negotiations between Germany and Japan had reached a stalemate in both the economic and military fields. Von Ribbentrop, in any case, believed that Japan’s interests coincided with those of Germany and that a new world war would inevitably find them on the same side. If he was partially correct, he would still not succeed in working out a successful timing of the German-

Japanese association. Though he resumed his efforts in the fall of 1938, these too, as will be seen, ended in failure. The German leaders wanted to expand Germany in Central and Eastern Europe. When they turned to Italy, the signals were always mixed. In London, they had found the light turned on red; when they looked to Tokyo, all they could see was a hazy yellow. It was not until they squinted toward Moscow that they found a light that was switched to green.

, . Z.Sg. Nr. 55,” of 10 August 1938, in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, 90. See the very perceptive “Tnformationsbericht 101/33, ff.71—75.

Chapter 21

Germany, Eastern Europe,

Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

n the preceding chapters, the international situation has been described in terms of German plans and preparations for expansion as contrasted with the efforts of Britain and France to avert war, and as affected by the two military conflicts of the time, the Spanish Civil War and the Sino-Japanese war. Before the German moves against Austria and Czechoslovakia are examined, the policy of Germany toward other countries not hitherto discussed will be reviewed. Not only is this necessary for a well-rounded picture of the way Germany moved in the world before the plunge into war, but significant aspects of German policy cannot be understood without such a survey. In some cases, German policy gives clues to long-term hopes, but in many instances the policy adopted by Berlin toward these other countries was very much affected by the desire to secure advantages for immediate goals elsewhere. For these reasons, scrutiny of Germany’s relations with such countries as Poland and Yugoslavia allows considerable insight into Hitler’s sense of priorities as well as the way in which German policy tried to take advantage of the ambitions and fears of others. Furthermore, the divergence between Germany’s perception of the international situation and that of other governments—with Hungary providing a particularly good example—will assist our understanding of subsequent developments in the relations between Germany and these European countries. Although in the years before the Second World War Germany’s role in the Near East was essentially a marginal one, and she would fail entirely in that area during the war, some review of her relations with that portion of the globe is surely a necessary part of the whole story. The interrelation of different facets of German foreign policy was especially evident in Germany’s relations with Poland. Since the complete, even if temporary, reversal in German-Polish relations in 1933-34, the Berlin government had pursued a double line of conduct toward its eastern neighbor. On the most important issues—which meant those defined by Poland as being vital to her—the German government had been careful to avoid pushing Warsaw too far.! The cover for new policies at home and abroad which was provided for Hitler by the rapprochement with Poland was too valuable to give up yet. Accordingly, whenever the second political line, the nazification of the Free City of Danzig looking toward its eventual absorption by Germany, involved steps that Poland saw as excessively threatening, the German government pulled back and ordered the 1. See above, pp. 48-61, 145-53, 235-41.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

433

Danzig authorities to make such adjustments in their procedures as would satisfy Poland’s concern for her own interests in the Free City. The long-range thinking of Poland’s leaders about the future of Danzig was not clear either to the Germans at the time or to historians subsequently. The special interest of Polish Marshal Edward Smigly-Rydz in Danzig has been properly stressed by scholars who have examined the issue,? and his key role in post-Pilsudski Poland lent great weight to his views that were known in Berlin.3 There are, on the other hand, various indication s

to suggest that Polish Foreign Minister Josef Beck was not nearly as certain of the importance of Danzig to Poland, hoped that in some way Polish leadership of a group of nations from the Baltic to the Black Sea could compensate for the prestige loss of a change in the status of Danzig, and was prepared to consider at some future time either a German-Polish condominium over Danzig or a partition of the territory of the Free City, with the latter procedure returning the city of Danzig and the bulk of the population to Germany while leaving the western third of the area to Poland.4 The very fact that he was so closely associated personally with the rapprochement with Germany, however, made Beck, who knew how unpopular this policy was in Poland, particularly sensitive to German initiatives in Danzig that could be interpreted within Poland as resulting from his policy. For him, therefore, as well as others in the clique that governed Poland in the name of the deceased Pilsudski, Danzig was the barometer of German-Polish relations,

and the maintenance of Polish rights there a requirement of Polish as well as an indicator of German foreign policy. If Polish rights in Danzig constituted a subject that German initiatives might attempt to limit but could not terminate, the borders of the Corridor and Upper Silesia were obviously untouchable. On this subject all Poles were known to be in agreement, and Berlin would refrain from any questioning of the status quo. Hitler affirmed in public his belief that Poland needed an access to the sea, and he made similar statements to diplomats who might be expected to pass on theit information to Warsaw.® Outstanding issues affecting current direct German-Polish relations, especially those concerning transit traffic across the Corridor and German-Polish

trade, were settled in a

series of successful negotiations in the winter of 1936-37; and although some important concessions wete made in these by Poland, they also marked a further step away from the trade war that had once poisoned relations between the two countries.’ On the basic issue of the German-Polish border, Goring was in Warsaw in February 1937 to reassure 2. Anna M. Cienciala, Poland and the Western Powers, 1938-1939 (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1968); Hans Roos,

Polen

und Europa;

Studien

zur polnischen Aussenpolitik

1931-1939

(Tubingen:

Mohr,

1957);

Marian

Wojciechowski, Die polnisch-deutschen Bexiehungen 1933-1938, trans. Norbert Damerau (Leyden: Brill, 1971). 3. See G.D., C, 6, No. 59; and Hitler’s telling Lipski in November 1937 to be sure to inform the marshal of his

statements on Danzig (Lipski Papers, No. 73; Szembek Diary, 5 November 1937, p. 247). 4. The author summarized the evidence on this issue available at the time in “A Proposed Compromise over Danzig in 1939?” in Journal ofCentral European Affairs, 14, No. 4 (January 1955), 334-38; see now also G.D., D,

7, No. 59; Cienciala, pp. 239-40. Ludwig Denne’s superficial book, Das Danzig-Problem in der deutschen hae Aussenpolitik 1934-39 (Bonn: Réhrscheid, 1959), ignores the subject. 5. A sign of Beck’s own views of Danzig as less critical to Poland in the long run can be seen inhis restraint toward the persistence with which Polish Ambassador Lipski pushed for a new German declaration on Danzig in 1937; Beck could not, of course, afford to appear uninterested in the subject at the time just as he could not reveal his real thoughts on this touchy issue in his memoirs. 6. This was presumably the purpose of Hitler’s comments to the Romanian minister on 20 November 1936 (Lipski Papers, No. 61; cited in Josef Beck, Dermer rapport, politique polonaise, 1926-1939 [Neuchatel: Editions de la : Baconniére, 1951], p. 24, n. 1). 7. On these negotiations, see the memorandum, seen by Goring, “Deutsch-Polnische Wirtschaftsverhand-

Ausschusses lungen,” 2 December 1936, T-120, 2621/5481/E 382280-82; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen December vom 9, Februar 1937,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 0041024; “Bestellungen aus det Pressekonferenz,” 17 6E of 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, £.427; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 106, 147; Kennard dispatches

January 4 and 45E of 27 January 1937, C 169, C 754/30/18, FO 371/20717.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the Polish leaders that Germany had no desire for territorial revision and himself to hear assurances of Poland’s adherence to the policies of Marshal Pilsudski.§ Hitler, furthermore, repeated Goring’s pledges when he received Polish Minister of Justice Witold Grabowski on 11 May 1937.? The maintenance of good relations with Poland, moreover, limited the extent to

which the German government could intervene in the fate of the remaining German minority inside Poland. It is true that the attitude of deference did not go to the same extreme as in the case of first Italy and later the Soviet Union where the German government agreed to the physical transfer of the people of German descent across the boundary. Nevertheless, the nationalistic and revisionist agitation of the pre-1933 period had given way to severe restrictions on the German press internally and cautious complaints to the Polish government externally. During 1937 this attitude of restraint was reinforced not only by broader political considerations which dictated good relations with Poland while Germany was preparing to move against Austria and Czechoslovakia but also by the special danger to a portion of the German minority resulting from the expiration of the Geneva Convention of 1922 that was scheduled to take place in July 1937. This convention had been signed as a part of the settlement of the division of Upper Silesia between Germany and Poland following a plebiscite in the area. For a period of fifteen years it provided for extensive special protection for minorities on both sides of the new border.'° In the period since Hitler came to power, international attention had been drawn to the convention in connection with an appeal to the League of Nations from the Jewish community in German Upper Silesia, an appeal generally referred to as the Bernheim case.'! While the German government was eager to limit the application of the convention on German territory as much as possible, it had been happy to utilize the provisions of the convention to protect the German minority in the portion of Upper Silesia allocated to Poland. The approaching expiration of the convention was, therefore, contemplated in Berlin with a mixture of glee and apprehension—glee over the imminent possibility of subjecting German Upper Silesia’s few hundred Jews to the same indignities already being visited of other German Jews, apprehension for the rights of the many thousands of German-speaking people in what the German documents sometimes refer to as “East Upper Silesia.” Within the German government, discussions on how to protect the German minority began in January 1937,!2 and von Neurath raised the subject with Beck when the latter stopped briefly in Berlin on 20 January 1937.13 The Polish government, which had repudiated the League’s role in the minorities problem earlier, was not in the least eager for a new treaty; and Beck at this meeting indicated a willingness to consider a number of technical questions in regard to the railways and mines of the region but 8. Sxembek Diary, 16 February 1937, pp. 221-23; Lipski Papers, pp. 286-87; G.D., C, 6, No. 227; Slavik reports 2220 of 19 February and 2674 of 2 March 1937, Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1041/1809/413765—66

and 413767—68; Cudahy dispatch 1530 of 1 March 1937, State 760c.62/332; Wojciechowski, pp. 329-31; D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 461; 5, No. 9 (note that a leak from Paris of information the Poles had given the French encouraged the Poles to be even more secretive with their French ally, ibid., 5, No. 44).

9. Szembek Diary, 21 May 1937, pp. 230-31; Lipski Papers, p. 287; Wojciechowski, p. 339; Domatrus, 1:693.

10. Though dated in parts, the best survey of the topic remains Georges Kaeckkenbeek, The International Experiment in Upper Silesia: A Study in the Workings of the Upper Silesian Settlement, 1922-1937 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1942). K. had served as arbitrator under the terms of the convention. The broader issues are handled in Harald von Riekhoff, German-Polish Relations, 1918-1933 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1971). 11. An excellent account may be found in Eliahu ben Elissar, La diplomatie du IIe Reich et les Juifs (1933-1938 ) (Paris: Juilliard, 1969). 12. Material is to be published as G.D., C, 6, No. 134.

13. The Polish record is in Lipski Papers, No. 64; the German record will appear as G.D., C, No. 148; cf. Wojciechowski, pp. 356-57.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast E urope, and the Middle East

435

coupled this with a clear hint that no new treaty about minority rights would be welcomed by Poland. The Germans, however, thought the issue of great importan ce and began to urge the Polish government to agree to such a treaty, simultaneously instructing the German press to maintain a moderate tone on the matter.'4 The Getman soundings met with a firm refusal in Warsaw, and Beck personally declined any bilateral minoritie s agreement.'> In the face of this situation, the German authorities turned to a different approach. If Poland would not agree to a special treaty—presumably limited in its application to the area covered by the Geneva Convention of 1922—there was no means at hand to pressure her into it. On the other hand, desire to avoid a deterioration of telations with Germany and the hope of providing assistance to the large Polish minority in Germany might induce Warsaw to issue a governmental policy declaration to protect the rights of the German minority in Poland, with the German govetnment promising to issue simultaneously an analogous declaration concerning the Polish minority in the Third Reich. If less binding than a treaty, such a declaration would be of broader tettritorial applicability and might serve to restrain local Polish authorities in their actions. After considerable internal discussion, Hitler approved this approach to the problem; and Hans Adolf von Moltke, the German ambassador to Poland, was instructed to ask

Beck in Hitler’s name to agree either to a new bilateral treaty or to separate governmental declarations.'¢

At the beginning of June 1937 the Polish government, after some internal discussion

of the matter, told the Germans that a bilateral treaty was definitely out of the question but that they were prepared to consider favorably parallel policy declarations by the two governments.'’ The Germans thereupon began to transmit proposed texts to Warsaw, but there was no possibility of agreement before the Geneva Convention expired in July.'* Although there is no direct evidence on the point, it would appear that this was not unwelcome to the Polish government since it improved their negotiating position. When the convention expired on 14 July, only minor technical agreements, dealing pri-

marily with railway problems, had been signed; the major issue of the minorities was still open, and the Germans had to be exceedingly careful lest publicity or diplomatic ptessure on their part provoke a reaction from which only the German minority in Poland would suffer.!? Furthermore, the Poles now used their stronger bargaining position to tie the minorities question to another issue: when Beck gave von Moltke the Polish counterdraft of a minorities declaration on 30 July, he also suggested that there be a joint declaration reaffirming the status quo in Danzig.”” The negotiations over this combination of problems would drag on for more than three months, with Hitler eventually overruling the German Foreign Ministry and making a statement on Danzig; but this process cannot be properly analyzed unless the situation in Danzig and the attitudes toward the Free City of Hitler and the German Foreign Ministry are first placed in perspective. 14. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 176, 194, 222, 277; Szembek Diary, 8 April 1937, pp. 224-25; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 19 March, 22 March, 15 April 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101 /9; ff£.219, DIBW2TI ACE D.D.F, 2d, 5, No. 135; Slavik report 31 of 12 April 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/

1809/413777-78. The whole subject is reviewed surprisingly briefly in Wojciechowski, p. 333, n. 3. 15. G.D., C, 6, No. 327. 16. Ibid., Nos. 331, 392-94. 17. Ibid., Nos. 402, 408.

18. Ibid., Nos. 432, 433, 435, 439; Lipski Papers, No. 65. Ginter Wollstein’s reference to a German-Polish minorities agreement of 5 July 1937 (Funke, p. 607, n. 22) is based on a misunderstanding.

19. See Szembek Diary, 2 July 1937, pp. 232-33; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 4 June, 28 July 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, £.407, and 101/10, £.61; but note G.D., C, 6, No. 490.

Moltke’s report will 20. There is a reference to this meeting in G.D., D, 5, No. 1, n. 2; the full text of von appear as G.D., C, 6, No. 501.

436

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

German-Polish relations ought really not to have been troubled by the Danzig problem during 1937-38. The crisis over this in the summer and fall of 1936 had apparently been settled to the satisfaction of both parties. The Poles had succeeded in maintaining their rights in the Free City as well as its special international status, while the Germans could rejoice—though not too conspicuously—about the replacement of Sean Lester by CarlJ.Burckhardt as the League’s high commissioner in Danzig.”! This change was both explicitly and implicitly a German triumph; Lester’s attempts to maintain the constitution of the Free City had cost him the enmity of both the National Socialist leaders and Germany’s diplomats. His removal, accompanied by instructions to his successor to exercise the greatest restraint and to try to mute rather than to hinder the nazification of the Free City should have opened a new eta in Danzig in which the local National Socialist officials could ride roughshod over constitutional niceties as long as they neither made too much noise nor interfered too clearly in Polish rights. Because of Polish concern over a direct confrontation with Germany in Danzig questions, the position of high

commissioner, which the British would as soon have dropped altogether, was maintained, but in a manner calculated to be satisfactory to Germany as well.”? In addition to the settlement of the major double problem of the relationship of Danzig to the League and the appointment of a high commissioner, there had been a successfully completed series of complicated negotiations between Poland and Danzig on a variety of special and technical questions. Although it had looked for a moment as if these might produce setious German-Polish friction, by the end of January 1937 agreement had been reached between Danzig and Polish authorities.” The new high commissioner, moreover, understood that his task was to be a con-

ciliatory one. He would protect the Danzig opposition parties and the Jewish population as much as possible, but this was to be done with a minimum of friction and publicity. In other words, he was to make the inevitable as noiseless and painless as possible; and Burckhardt went about this role to the satisfaction of the Germans as well as the Poles and a special League committee consisting of the foreign ministers of England, France, and Sweden. : If there were problems in Danzig in spite of all these auspicious developments, the explanation lies in the interaction of conflicting personalities in Danzig with contradictory policy impulses from the German government. The nominal head of the Danzig government was Arthur Greiser; the head of the National Socialist party was Albert Forster. The two could not abide each other, and the very fact that both were faithful followers of Hitler only made them rivals for the latter’s affection and support. What one wanted, the other automatically rejected, and vice versa; only the occasional intervention of Hitler himself could bring them temporarily to the same course—until they parted company again on the next issue. Both wanted to return Danzig to the Reich and looked 21. See above, pp. 236—40. The instruction to the German press to restrain its joy over the Burckhardt appointment is in “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 15 February 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9,

f.131. For Poland’s concentration on her own rights to the exclusion of all concern for the League’s guarantee of the constitution, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 29.

22. For a review of the negotiations, see the “Memorandum by U.K. Delegation at Danzig, Consideration of Danzig Affairs by the Council of the League of Nations 1139/5/55, FO 371/20757. See also G.D., C, 6, Nos. 140, 148, 158, 163, 165, 208; Gallman (Danzig) dispatch 324 of 13 January, Gilbert (Geneva) tel. 45 of 27 January,

Geneva: Free City of in January 1937,” C Lipski Papers, No. 64; and Cudahy dispatch

1480 of 29 January 1937, State 860K.00/274, 276, 280; Slavik report 5 of 2 February 1937, Czechoslovak docu-

ment in T-120, 1041/1809/413758-59; C 1756, C 1781, C 1782/5/55, FO 371/20757. 23. On these problems and negotiations, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 28, 30, 63, 77, 100, 112, 117, 125, 140, 148, 158;

Lipski Papers, No. 64; Szembek Diary, 4 December 1936, p. 218; “Anweisungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 8 December 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, £.395.

24..G.D), G6, Nos. 2:73; 303, 320; C 1756, 'C 1781, C 1782/5/55;, FO 371/20757)

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

437

forward to successful careers in the party as a whole, as distinct from any local ambitions for Danzig itself. There was, nevertheless, a difference in temperament and perception between them which tended to determine which coutse each followed in regard to current problems. Forster, probably closer to Hitler persona lly, was a man of extremely violent temperament who did not particularly cate about the day-to-day concerns of the people of Danzig. Greiser, always a trifle insecure about his relatio nship with Hitler, was a more restrained and thoughtful person with some interest in the impact of policy deci-

sions on the life of the Danzig population.25 Thus Forster was inclined to wild speeches, impetuous acts, and political experimentation regardless of the consequences, while

Greiser leaned more to a cautious step-by-step approach to the nazific ation of Danzig. If

Forster was eager to run risks, Greiser was more reluctant; and this difference was pto-

ductive of perpetual turmoil in part because it was nourished rather than attenuated by the German government, which tended to speak to both of them on Danzig questions in

three different tones: those of the Foreign Ministry, those of Hitler, and those of Goring. The German Foreign Ministry officials were interested in a reasonably quiet shortterm policy and, therefore, usually sided with Gteiser in the continuing rivalry over specific actions to be taken in the Free City. In line with their traditional approach calling for a revision of the Versailles settlement as the proper aim of German foreign policy, they

were, however, opposed both to concessions to Polish interests within Danzig and to any German action that might imply a reaffirmation of the legal status of the territory. Hitler’s line was in general quite different. He was willing to have Forster try for short-

term gains in Danzig as long as these did not create any problems for Hitlet’s broader aims. These, in turn, went infinitely beyond the revisionist views of the Foreign Ministry which he had ridiculed in Mein Kampf and in his second book and which looked to enormous additional living space in the east, something that was assuredly not to be found in the minuscule area of the Free City. If necessary, therefore, he was quite willing to give whatever formal reassurances might be needed to keep Poland quiet while he laid the foundations for an expansionist program that dwarfed the limited ambitions of his diplomats—and would require the breach of all reassurances at a time of his choosing. In the day-to-day affairs of the Free City, the Foreign Ministry was accordingly more conciliatory to Polish wishes than Hitler; in the intermediate span of commitments for a year or two, Hitler was more conciliatory than his diplomats; in the long run, however,

Hitler took the most extreme view of all. He knew that he could depend on both Forster and Greiser to carry out his wishes and was content to let them feud with each other along the way. As for Goring, he had made relations with Poland one of his own special

interests. Having visited Poland several times in Hitler’s behalf, and personally well acquainted with Josef Lipski, the Polish ambassador to Berlin, Goring at least for a time

looked on good relations with Poland as a personal policy the way von Ribbentrop identified himself first with a German tie to Japan and later to the Soviet Union.** On several occasions,

therefore,

Goring tried to mend

local fences broken

by Forster,

attempted to move Forster to another assignment where his fence-breaking proclivities could be controlled more easily, and generally took a friendly view of Polish concerns. It was in this confusion of rivalries and differing policy views that Forster wanted to push forward the nazification of Danzig, a process that involved incidents in Danzig and

attracted world attention because of the relationship of the Free City to the League. Of these incidents, the one that received the most attention was the murder in 1937 of the 25. These contrasts ate drawn from the memoirs of Burckhardt and the reports of the vatious diplomats stationed in Danzig. They apply to the period up to the outbreak of war and do not necessarily apply to the tespective wartime careers in occupation administration of the two men. 26. Note Géring’s comments to Bullitt in November 1937, CES OBZ, DAT

438

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

leader of the Danzig Socialist party, Hans Wiechmann, right after he had seen the high commissioner. Although at first denied by the National Socialists, this Danzig equivalent of the Mateotti case—in which Mussolini had let the leader of Italy’s Socialists be murdered a decade earlier—both discouraged any other contacts between the Danzig opposition and the high commissioner and focused public interest in England on the Danzig situation. Other incidents provoked by Forster, including plans to change the Danzig flag and to take various unconstitutional measures against the opposition parties and Jews in the Free City, kept the situation there boiling. Burckhardt attempted to restrain Forster by personal contact; the Polish government became increasingly worried; and Hitler finally intervened in July to restrain his overexuberant follower.”’ Since Hitler and Forster had met in late April, just before the new incidents, Hitler’s orders not to

change the Danzig constitution at this time must have seemed like a very slight tap on the wrist by Forster, who muted his antics but little. Under these circumstances, the Germans had no reason to be surprised, as they claimed to be, when the Polish government took advantage of its strong negotiating position on the minorities question to raise the subject of a German declaration reaffirming the international status of Danzig. The possibility of the complete withdrawal of the League from Danzig was a contributing factor in bringing on this request,?* but even that danger would not have forced a Polish move had not the constant agitation in Danzig suggested the risk of Poland’s being faced by a fait accompli of some sort in the Free City. Ambassador Lipski took an especially active part in the attempt to secure a statement from the German government. He discussed the subject with von Moltke when the latter was temporarily in Berlin, and urged the Polish government to make the minorities declaration conditional on German compliance with this request.” The negotiations on minorities and Danzig thus came to be joined in fact, if not legally. The view of the German Foreign Ministry was as its past position might lead one to expect. They would bargain hard over the text of a minorities declaration, making such concessions on this subject as might be needed to secure agreement; various Polish suggestions as to how the declafations by both sides might be made appropriately solemn and conspicuous were eventually agreed to. On the topic of Danzig, however, von Neurath was absolutely adamant. Von Moltke was instructed to tell Beck that the German government accepted the reality of the Free City and had no intentions of changing its status, but that a public declaration to this effect was out of the question. Such a declaration would be a voluntary reaffirmation of a portion of the Versailles settlement, something that von Neurath—who took such policy statements seriously— tesolutely opposed. When Lipski tried to secure G6ring’s support in the face of the rebuff, the latter’s inclination to agree with Lipski was thwarted by von Neurath’s opposition. As Lipski continued to insist, the German foreign minister told him that the day would come when Danzig would have to be returned to Germany.°° 27. On these events, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 233, 340, 366, 379, 383, 389, 400, 411, 412, 419, 436, 447, 462; Szembek Diary, 8 and 10 May 1937, p. 227; Denne, pp. 77-90; Roos, pp. 295-98; Buckhardt, chaps. 3 and 4;

Gallman dispatch 387 of 21 July 1937, State 860K.00/298; Lane to Roosevelt, 12 July 1937, Hyde Park, PSF Poland; Dr. Kausch, “Informationsbericht

Nr. 90,” 21 May 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101/30,

f£.437-41; C 3893/3/18, FO 371/20711; C 3592, C 3905/5/55, FO 371/20757; C 5151/5/55, FO 371/20758. 28. Beck appears to have worried about the fate of Danzig in connection with the possibility of a new Locarno

agreement. See Wojciechowski, pp. 343-68; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 29, 533; Szembek Diary, 15 November 1936, pp. 216-17; U.S. 7.5., 1937, 1:120-21; C 4382, C 4751/1/18, FO 371/20708.

29. Lipski Papers, Nos. 66, 67. 30. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 513, 515, 530, 535, 537, 540, 541, 548; D, 5, Nos. 1, 2, 6-13; Szembek Diary, 25 August—4 October 1937, pp. 234-43 passim; Lipski Papers, Nos. 68-70; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. ABSOE a2 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, £205; Slavik report 62 of 28 August 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/ 413817-18.

Germany, Eastern Exrope, Southeast E urope, and the Middle East

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Although the evidence suggests that Beck was less interest ed than Lipski in extracting a declaration on Danzig, the very fact that the issue had been pushed for so long now made him argue for it—while demonstrating his desite for continued good telations with Germany by disclaiming any formal connection between it and the minorities declaration. Under these circumstances, Hitler dropped his earlier reluctance, agreed to the inclusion of a reference to Danzig in the communiqué to be published along with the minorities declaration, and thus overruled his foreign minister. In fact, he

would go even further and include in his speech of 20 February 1938 a eulogy to the wonderful state of German-Polish relations, with the marvelous situation of harmony in Danzig being held up by the Fuhrer as an example for all.3! If one seeks the reasons for this willingness of Hitler to make a major concession to Poland, the dates of the two public pronouncements may unwittingly provide a significant clue. The date when Hitler received Lipski and representatives of the Polish minority in Germany for the declarations on minorities rights and Danzig, 5 November 1937, was also the day on which he told his key advisers in the secret conference tecorded in the Hossbach memorandum about his intentions to move in the near future to the annexation of Austria and the destruction of Czechoslovakia. The speech of 20 February 1938, in which Hitler praised the wisdom of Poland’s leaders and the happy situation in Danzig, was also the speech in which he spoke of the millions of Germans in Austria and Czechoslovakia whose fate was of great concern to him. Hitlet’s desire to maintain the benevolent neutrality of Poland toward his Austrian and Czechoslovak policies was presumably the key element in his decision to make the gesture that his foreign policy advisers had rejected.* Whether or not this sort of gesture was worth anything is, of course, another matter entirely. In the short run, all it meant was that Hitler would restrain Forster’s plans for the nazification of Danzig and the persecution of its Jews for a few months, though the leeway given Forster within these restraints was very considerable indeed. At their meeting in September 1937 Hitler had told Burckhardt, after long diatribes against the British and their interest in Danzig, that Forster would be told to hold back; and in the face of Polish protests over incidents in October and November the brakes were again applied from Berlin; but all of this represented not a change of policy but a temporary adjustment of approach.*? Forster was told by Hitler that the Danzig situation had to be kept quiet for a little while longer because the Reich had to concentrate its immediate energies on Austria.*4 Forster himself was to make a goodwill visit to Poland.*° As for the long run, Burckhardt for one was most dubious about the maintenance of the Free City; he felt that the Poles had undermined the League’s role there and that Danzig was 31. On the final stages of the negotiations and the relevant texts, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 13, 16, 18, 19; Lipski Papers, Nos. 70-73; Roos, pp. 298-301; Wojciechowski, p. 334; Richard Breyer, Das Deutsche Reich und Polen

(Wurzburg: Holzner, 1955), pp. 216-19, 297-331; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 5 and 8 November 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.S¢. 101/10, ff. 329, 337; Slavik reports 79 and 80 of 9 and 13 November 1937, Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1041/1809/413825-29; C 7684/372/18, FO 371/20744; D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos, 21, 214, 266.

32. CE. Szembek Diary, 19 December 1937, p. 262. , Fr. AAAS 33. On Burckhardt’s role at this time, his meeting with Hitler, and his shielding of National Socialist activities in Danzig from scrutiny in Geneva, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 522, 531, 538; D, 5, Nos. 3-5, 668; D.DF., 2d, 6, No. 464; Burckhardt, pp. 97-103; Gallman dispatch 405 of 30 August 1937, State 860K.01-High Commissioner/41; Dettinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 158,” 8 November 1937, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, f£.383-

87; C 6547, C 7394 (including Burckhardt’s report on his 20 September meeting with Hitler), /5/55,2eO

371/20758. For National Socialist forward moves

in Danzig, see G.D., C, 6, No. 545; D, 5, Nos. 669, 15,17, 24; C

7336/5/55, FO 371/20758; C 7966, C 8088/5/55, FO 371/20759; C 8384/165/18, FO 371/20733. 34, Gallman dispatch 439 of 16 November 1937, State 860K.00/315.

35. Lipski Papers, No. 74.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

already practically a part of Germany.* Nothing suggests that Hitler seriously intended to adhere to his promises: he planned to move against Poland later and would then explain that Danzig was an issue of no importance. He wanted living space in the east, and the Danzig issue was as inconsequential in this regard in 1937 and 1938 as he would declare it to be in 1939.37 As for promises of good treatment for minorities, it is as astounding as it is sad that anyone should have taken them seriously. Hitler would make his real opinion of the Poles explicit in 1939: they were to be “destroyed and exterminated.’”8 If the Polish government attached considerable value to German promises all the same, major reasons were fear of Germany combined with a lack of interest in the fate of Austria and a hope that German ambitions might be satiated at the expense of Czechoslovakia.2? There was, furthermore, doubt about the firmness of Britain and France in

the face of German ambitions.*° Poland would try to build up her own strength, as far as possible with French assistance,*! and hoped to improve her diplomatic position by closer ties with Romania and Hungary, however much this was complicated by the hostility between these two.‘? In any case, joining in resistance to Germany involved enormous tisks, while standing aside might offer opportunities for Polish gains. As will be seen, both the Azschluss of Austria and the imposition of territorial concessions on Czechoslovakia at Munich led to Polish advances. Whether these were worth making in the circumstances will long remain a subject of dispute. It should be noted, on the other hand, that Beck was as determined now as he had been earlier and would continue to be

in 1939 that Poland should not become a German satellite. He would neither join the Anti-Comintern Pact nor establish any other formal ties with Germany. In the months after the minorities declarations of November 1937 German policy toward Poland continued to be determined by essentially the same factors as during the preceding year. Needless to say, the public declarations of Berlin and Warsaw did not end the minorities issue. Each side continued to complain to the other about instances of mistreatment and discrimination.* The Polish government had agreed to make a declaration in part in order to preclude Having its German minority discussed publicly in Germany and elsewhere in the same context as the German minority in Czechoslovakia.*¢ If the actual treatment of the German minority in Poland remained considerably worse than that of the Sudeten Germans, Berlin continued to be restrained in its interventions

with the Warsaw authorities lest Poland be pushed into a common front with Czechoslo36. Slavik report 77 of 7 November

1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413821-22

(an

excerpt in Berber, pp. 80-81); cf. D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 155.

37. See below, p. 727. 38. Helmuth Groscurth,

Tagebiicher eines Abwebroffiziers

1938-1940, ed. Helmut

Krausnick and Harold C.

Deutsch (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1970), p. 202. 39. See D.D.F., 2d, 4, Nos. 18, 96; 5, No. 245; Szembek Diary, 11 December 1936, p. 219, 7 October 1937, p-

243; Lipski Papers, p. 321. 40. This argument is repeatedly, and I believe excessively, stressed by Cienciala. 41. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 402, 405, 414, 422; 6, Nos. 134, 150, 199, 343; but see Slavik’s report of 13 Match 1937,

Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413769-71 (parts in Berber, pp. 73-74). 42. D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 369; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 76; Slavik report 32 of 20 April 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413779-81; Korec (Bucharest) tels. of 25 and 27 April and 1 May 1937, ibid.,

41384850, 413852. 43. Szembek Diary, 21 and 31 December 1936, p. 220. 44. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 479, 18; 5, No. 34; Lipski Papers, p. 315 and No. 83; Wojciechowski, pp. 336, 341; R

7385, R 8162, R 8221/837/12, FO 371/21133. In September Beck briefly visited Paris on his own initiative; nothing much appears to have happened. There are no documents in D.D.F. See Cerny (Czechoslovak chargé a.i. Paris) report 38 of 10 September 1937, T-120, 1040/1809/412954-55. 45. Some German complaints in G.D., D, 5, Nos. 23, 27, 41, 44, 47, 48, 50, 51; Polish complaints, ibid., Nos.

39, 40, 42, 43. 46. Szembek Diary, 4 November 1937, p. 245.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

441

vakia; the exigencies of the moment suggested the wisdom of restraint to both. Reassurances about future policy were exchanged when Beck was in Germany in January 1938 and Goring in Poland the following month.‘” In these meetings the Poles learned that Germany was likely to move against Austria soon but would respect Polish economic interests there (primarily as an export market for Polish coal) and that they would turn against Czechoslovakia thereafter. They also found the German government willing to continue restraining Forster in Danzig and otherwise eager to keep GermanPolish friction to a minimum. The Germans for their part could feel confident that the eastern screen which Poland provided for actions against Austria and Czechoslovakia would be maintained. When the Poles, hoping for more explicit assurances, returned to a suggestion Hitler had made in May 1937 of extending the term of the 1934 agreement,

Goring was favorable; but von Ribbentrop proved as dubious about new commitments to Poland as von Neurath; and nothing came of the project.4® When Forster in his disappointment over not being designated von Papen’s successor in Vienna once again became overly exuberant in Danzig, his earlier instructions to keep down the political temperature in the Free City were repeated.4? With all now temporarily interested in keeping the high commissioner there, the situation in Danzig was kept reasonably calm, and Forster himself was invited to Warsaw for talks with Polish officials.5° As neither Germany nor Poland wished any trouble in their relations, Danzig, the minorities problem, and all other current problems were subordinated to that desire.>! The annexation of Austria by Germany on 11 March 1938, though long expected in Warsaw, nevertheless surprised the Polish government by its timing.5? Beck was in Italy in connection with his concept of some sort of alignment joining Poland, Hungary, Yugoslavia, and Italy; and the other leaders of the Polish government waited a few days for his return before taking advantage of the situation for Polish aims. The rapidity of the German move precluded detailed planning on their part, but one of a long series of minor incidents on the Polish-Lithuanian border could be used as a pretext for action. Poland’s relations with Lithuania had been poisoned from the beginning of both countries’ independence in the wake of the war because of their dispute over Vilna and the surrounding territory. There were no diplomatic relations between the two neighbors who had once formed a single state by dynastic union. With the attention of Germany and other countries focused on Austria, the opportunity to settle accounts with Lithuania appeared to be at hand. There were apparently some in the Polish government who thought of bullying or forcing the small Baltic country into complete subservience; but 47. On Beck’s trip to Germany, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 25, 28, 35 n. 2, 29; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 105; Lipski

Papers, Nos. 75-77; Szembek Diary, 12 January 1938, p. 268; Wojciechowski, pp. 386-87, 404; Gallman dispatch 441 of 29 November 1937, State 760c.60K/362. On Géring’s trip to Poland, see Wohlthat’s briefing paper for him in T-120, 2621/5482/E 38226974; Lipski Papers, Nos. 79, 80; Sxembek Diary, 23 February 1938, pp. 275— 78; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 198; Wojciechowski, pp. 388-89, 404-7.

48. G.D., D, 5, No. 34; Szembek Diary, 21 May 1937, pp. 230-31; Lipski Papers, Nos. 80-83. 49, Gallman dispatch 465 of 11 March 1938, State 860K.01-High Commissioner/47, and his dispatch 474 of 9

May 1938, State 860K.00/323; C 4100 (including Burckhardt to Walters, 27 April 1938), C 4359/197/55, FO

371/21801.

50. ae D, 5, Nos. 36, 38; Gallman dispatches 446 and 448 of 18 and 21 December 1937, State 860K.01-High

r 45; C 8717, C 8917/5/55, FO 371/20759; C 4100, C 4359/197/55, FO 371/21801. Commissione/43,

(GuDle IO) ile 51. Wiihlisch (Warsaw) report P 12c/12.37 of 7 December 1937, T-120, 1315/2371/D 496006; Brammer, Z.Sg. No. 68; 5, No. 49; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 17 December 1937, Bundesatchiv,

appear to be 101/10, £.433 (the special propaganda directives concerning Poland mentioned in this document aus der those reflected in Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 185,” Z.Sg. 101/31, f£.547—49); “Bestellungen State 1938, June 17 of 487 dispatch Gallman £359; 101/11, Z.Sg. 1938, May 11 Pressekonferenz,”

860K.00/329. but see D.D.F., 2d, 8, 52. This surprise is well reflected in Szembek’s diary for 11 March 1938 (pp. 286-87); Nos. 298, 305.

442

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Beck on returning to Warsaw kept the Polish demands to an insistence that official diplomatic relations between the two countries be established. An ultimatum to this effect was transmitted to the Lithuanian government which, advised to yield by all, agteed to the Polish demand.°? As the Anschluss had surprised the Polish government by its suddenness, so the Germans were startled to see a few days later that at any moment Polish troops might move into Lithuania. There were several unpleasant aspects to this ftom the perspective of Berlin. The Germans wanted a quiet period in Europe after the uproar caused by the annexation of Austria. They were concerned about the fate of the Memel territory that had been ceded by Germany as a result of the Treaty of Versailles and was under Lithuanian control. Finally, as long as Lithuania remained independent, there was always

the possibility, however remote, of a German-Polish agreement by which Germany would acquiesce in a Polish annexation of Lithuania—with its access to the Baltic—in exchange for Polish agreement to return the Corridor to Germany. In the crisis, therefore, the German government cautioned the Poles about their own interests in Lithuania,

simultaneously urging Lithuania to agree to the demand for establishing diplomatic relations. Internally, orders were given by Hitler not only to prepare for the occupation of the Memel territory as soon as Polish troops entered Lithuania but to push the German forces well beyond the 1914 border and seize a substantial part of the rest of the Baltic republic. These orders were, in the event, not implemented; but it should be remembered

that in the 1939 negotiations with the Soviet Union the German government again hoped to secure a piece of Lithuania beyond the 1914 boundary, though slightly differently delineated. One can see, however, yet another indication that Hitler did not

see himself as returning to the prewar borders of the Reich. Revision of the peace settlement might provide excuse or opportunity, but it in no way defined Hitler’s aims.*4 The whole incident was settled in 1938 in a manner satisfactory to Poland as well as Germany, but although Poland had acted on her own initiative, she was obviously moving in Germany’s wake, a situation that would soon be repeated.°° The sort of tacit cooperation ‘between Germany and Poland that could be seen in the Polish-Lithuanian crisis was of far greater importance in the Czechoslovak crisis of 1938. The general development of that crisis will be examined subsequently, but the acquiescence of Poland in the hope of gains from the destruction of the Czechoslovak state must be seen as a most significant element in German-Polish relations and the general European situation in 1938. There was no formal German-Polish agreement on this subject at any time—though there is evidence that in return for German agreement to Poland’s annexation of Danzig there*could have been one.*° A written agreement was not, however, necessary. As previously indicated, each made what it considered to be the concessions

necessary

to

the

other;

Poland

to

keep

from

becoming

Germany’s

immediate victim, Germany to restrain Poland from lining up in support of Czechoslovakia. The relations between Poland and Czechoslovakia had long been bad, and all 53. Accounts of this incident may be found in Roos, pp. 305-16; Cienciala, pp. 49-53; Wojciechowski, pp. 390-401. The relevant French documents have since been published in D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 437, 487, 488, 492,

500-503, 505, 507, 514, 521-23; 9, Nos. 9, 15, 22, 38. 54. For German policy in the Polish-Lithuanian crisis of 1938, see Lipski Papers, pp. 352-55; G.D., D, 5, Nos.

33, 321-24, 337-39; Jodl diary for 11-18 March 1938, Nuremberg document 1781-PS (National Archives); Dertinger’s reports of 15, 16, and 17 March 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Se. 101/11, ff.127-37.

It should be noted that the German plans for occupying a large part of Lithuania in case of a PolishLithuanian conflict remained in effect as contingency plans; for a 7 July 1938 reference to them see TMWC, 25:450, for a 21 October 1938 reference, see ibid., 34:481.

55. The Poles were, of course, also reminded by the German position in the incident of Berlin’s interest in the future of Lithuania. See also G.D., D, 5, No. 342.

56. Note Smigly-Rydz’s comments of 12 March 1938 in S xembek Diary, p. 289.

Germany, Eastern Exrope, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

443

attempts by France and England to help improve them failed. The Warsaw government accordingly left open the possibility of siding with her French ally if a general European wat should ensue,*’ but in the meantime followed a policy predicated on the assumption that Czechoslovakia would fall apart under the pressure of her neighbors without such a war. The steps which the Polish government took in pursuit of this policy fitted in Coens with German hopes even if there was no formal coordination between the two States.

From the perspective of Warsaw, the hopes of securing territorial gains from the disintegration of Czechoslovakia focused primarily on TéSin, the area that had been in dispute between Poland and Czechoslovakia in the period of upheaval after the collapse of Austria-Hungary. Included in Czechoslovakia, part of it was claimed by Poland on the ground of the national background of a substantial portion of its population—an exceedingly dangerous basis for Poland to suggest as the criterion of state boundaries. For this area to fall to Poland presupposed that Germany would secure the portions of Czechoslovakia inhabited by Germans, that Hungary would recapture those inhabited by Magyars, that Slovakia be returned to Hungary or left independent under Hungarian or Polish tutelage, and that no one do anything to save the Czechoslovak state. The way in which the Polish government might assist these various processes was to coordinate its policy with Hungary and promote an agreement between Hungary and Yugoslavia that would, by freeing Hungary from the threat of attack on her other borders, enable her to

join in pouncing on Czechoslovakia. Furthermore, to keep any power from helping Czechoslovakia, Poland could use her ties to Romania to stiffen the independence of the

latter vis-a-vis the Soviet Union. Poland could further the same cause by striving for a rapprochement between Romania and Hungary. If Romania could by these means be encouraged to adhere to a policy of prohibiting the transit of Russian help to Czechoslovakia, a policy Poland was already following, then the prospect of a dismemberment

of Czechoslovakia from which Poland might benefit would be that much closer. These ate essentially the lines that the Warsaw government followed during the year from late 1937 to October 1938, and since they ran parallel to Germany’s policies, it should not be

surprising that they were agreeable to Berlin.*” Any analysis of German-Polish relations in 1937-38 with its partially conscious, partially unconscious, collaboration of the two nations would be incomplete without refer-

ence to the basic hopes and fears of these uneasy neighbors. The Polish government saw itself faced by a powerful and menacing Germany. Poland’s leaders were very much afraid that at some point the danger they had thought themselves in during 1932-34— that Poland would be obliged by the great powers to make territorial and other concessions in order to preserve the peace—might recur. If this became the fate of 57. For Polish interest in maintaining the tie with France, see especially the visit of Delbos to Warsaw in

December 1937: U.S. 1937, 1:189-91; G.D., D, 1, No. 64; Slavik report 84 of 6 December 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413830-36; Phipps tel. 233 of 20 December 1937, (C 8730/7888/17, FO

371/20698; D.D.F.,, 2d, 7, Nos. 319, 323 (note that Beck prevented a téte-a-téte of Delbos with Smigty-Rydz). 58. During his Rome visit of May 1938, Hitler arranged a special audience for Alfred Wysocki, then ambassador to Italy, because of his services in Berlin on the German-Polish rapprochement (Lipski Papers, Nos. 85, 86; 59. On British 75, 79;

Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 185; Wojciechowski, p. 417). Kennard, the these policies, see Roos, pp. 273f£.; Cienciala, chaps. 1 and 2; a survey by Sir Howard Papers, Nos. minister in Warsaw, of 29 June 1937 is in C 1807/29/55, FO 371/20760. See also Lipski 0555 172, 252, G.D., D, 5, Nos. 25, 28; Hungarian Documents. 1, Nos. 357, 429; 2, Nos. 105, 12391252135)

Vorgeschichte der 274, 287; Lajos Kerekes (ed.), “Akten des Ungarischen Ministeriums des Aussern zur “Documents (ed.), Adam Magda 13; document (1960), 3-4 Nos. 7, Historica, Acta Annexion Osterreichs,” ee 10, Nos. relatifs 4 la politique étrangére de la Hongrtie dans la période de la crise tchécoslovaque,” Acta

Abkommen,’ Aata Historica, 6, 1-2 (1963), document 7; Laszlo Zsigmond (ed.), “Ungarn und das Miinchener 2d, 9, Nos. 244, 248, 511. D.D.F., 298; p. 1938, March 22 Diary, Szembek 267-68; 262-63, (1959), 3-4 Nos.

60. Szembek Diary, 14 December 1937, p. 261.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Czechoslovakia instead, that could be all to the good if Poland secured her share and also

attained a common border with Hungary. They felt that an independent policy was the country’s best safeguard as opposed to subservience to any of the great powers, be it France, Germany, or the Soviet Union. That this very policy reinforced rather than reduced Poland’s danger was a dilemma from which they found no exit. They were at first happy to see other countries, notably Belgium, follow their own example, only to realize that the implication of such a Belgian stance was that France would be gravely handicapped in fulfilling her treaty obligations to Poland—a handicap temporarily welcome in its equal impact on the French obligation to Czechoslovakia.*! Nevertheless, the Polish government did, as indicated, try to keep its ties to France in existence; and Beck, in particular, undertook to improve Polish relations with England.” In his exaggerated self-esteem, he appears to have been unaware of his own unpopularity in English as well

as French government circles.°? He was pleased with the repeated German declarations of respect for Poland’s

interests

and borders, culminating in Hitler’s

speech of 20

February 1938; but one may well doubt that he really believed this situation would always continue. Not only was Beck’s policy of accommodation with Germany unpopular in Poland and limited by opposition within and without government circles, but there were strict limits as to how far he himself would go. It appears to have been Beck’s belief that Germany still had ambitions in Upper Silesia, Danzig, and the Corridor, and that she wanted a strong Poland only as a buffer against the Soviet Union while consolidating her own position in Central Europe. Thereafter he expected Germany to reach out for the Ukraine; this would menace

Polish independence; and he believed that Poland would

fight rather than allow German troops across her territory. He expected Poland to be defeated in such fighting; but equally unwilling to allow Russian or German troops into the country, he believed that France and Britain would eventually triumph over Germany.® If Hitler did in fact follow that route, the eventual result would be a catastrophe for Germany out of which Poland would reappear with great gains at German expense.°’ That the Polish catastrophe could be of even greater dimensions was hidden from his view. Nothing suggests that Hitler’s own views of the role of Poland had changed. The German-Polish

rapprochement

was

useful

for the moment;

and it is easily under-

standable why he should have asked Hungarian Regent Miklos Horthy in late August 61. See the comments of French Ambassador Noél on 1 June 1937, D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 4.

62. Roos, pp. 264-65; Wojciechowski, pp. 351-53)361-63; Beck, pp. 293-95; Burckhardt, p. 165. 63. The comments to this effect in the Foreign Office records are numerous. On Kennard’s survey cited in n. 59, above, Eden noted: “We have certainly sought to do our best with Colonel Beck, but with little success I

fear. He is an unsatisfactory individual to work with and shifty even to the extent of injuring his own country.

AE July 20 [1937].” Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 430. 64. On the reception in Poland of Hitlet’s 20 February 1938 speech, see Winship (chargé a.i. Warsaw) dispatch 354 of 24 Februaty 1938, State 762.00/183. 65. Note G.D., D, 5, No. 53.

66. Biddle to Hull, 19 June 1938, State 740.00/441. The comment of Beck to Biddle that Poland would fight to prevent German troops from crossing Poland to take the Ukraine, because German control of the latter would menace Polish independence, was made before Beck went to Sweden on 24 May 1938. He had stated that although Poland would face the possibility of defeat in such a contingency, she would delay the Germans who would then be kept from their objective by a Franco-German war. Biddle was one of the few—if not the only—important foreign diplomat who got along well with Beck, and he appears to have been better informed on the Polish foreign minister’s views than most othets. This is evident when Biddle’s reports are compared with those of other representatives in Warsaw; it was also known to the Germans (see G.D., D, 6, No. 64). For Beck’s own comments on Biddle, see U.S. 1939, 1:114; cf. B.D., 3d,

7, No. 48. A selection of Biddle’s papets has been edited by Philip V. Cannistraro and others, Poland and the Coming ofthe Second World War (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1976). 67. See Burckhardt’s report on his 23 July 1938 talks with Beck in Burckhardt, pp. 156-57.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

445

1938, at the height of the crisis over Czechoslovakia, to refrain from asking the Poles to return the Corridor to Germany.®® The major aim of his East Europea n policy was the eventual conquest of vast portions of the Soviet Union. While he ptepared for that, he wanted Poland reassured rather than alarmed; once the time came to begin moving toward the main goal, Poland could either be a complaisant and truncated vassal of Germany or be crushed on the road to great conquests further East.°? As has been noted in the discussion of the Polish-Lithuanian ctisis of March 1938,

Germany was greatly interested in the fate of her other East European neighbor. German-Lithuanian relations in the years since Hitler came to power in Germany had been at first very tense and then somewhat calmer.” The new movements that had been organized by the Germans living in the Memel territory had been temporarily suppressed by the Lithuanian authorities. A spectacular court case in Kovno had been followed by a lengthy diplomatic and economic conflict that had finally been resolved, at least temporarily, in 1936.7! The concessions made by the Lithuanian authorities had calmed the atmosphere, a trade agreement ended economic conflict, and the German press was

instructed to restrain its attacks on the Baltic state.72 The Lithuanian authorities had not allowed the process of nazification to proceed as openly as in Danzig, but the elected German representatives were again allowed to direct the internal affairs of the Memel atea in accordance with the statute that governed Lithuania’s relation to the territory.73 A few of the prisoners of the Kovno trial were still in jail, but this was due to Berlin’s refusal to accept them into Germany.”4 It is true that there were still occasions for dispute. The operations of various German agencies in support of the Memel Germans certainly continued to cause apprehension in Kovno.”

The Germans,

on the other hand, objected to some

small land

expropriations in the Memel harbor area; and this question led to nasty comments and 68. G.D., D, 5, No. 52. Note that when a Hungarian officer suggested that in the course of German-Polish-

Hungarian cooperation against Czechoslovakia there might be some military cooperation between Germany and Poland, he was told by General Kurt von Tippelskitch, then chief of the section “Foreign Armies West” of the German army general staff (which handled intelligence against France, England, Belgium, and Poland), and by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, head of the intelligence and counterintelligence office in the high command of the German armed forces, that such a procedure was out of the question. German military relations with

Poland were unfriendly, and German espionage operations were directed very much against Poland (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 252).

69. Hitler explained these views to Forster, who told Burckhardt about them on 29 November 1938 (Burckhardt, pp. 231-33). It is important to remember that Forster was himself so enthusiastic and devoted a believer in Hitler that he often repeated comments Hitler had made to him, frequently disregarding the possibility that the recipients of these confidences might not be as convinced of the brilliance of his leader’s inspirations as he was himself. There are numerous examples of Forstet’s talking about his meetings with Hitler, and in this very special and limited way Forster is often an important witness for Hitlet’s views as expressed by the latter within the circle of his immediate associates. It is as if Rauschning had recounted Hitler’s comments to others shortly after hearing them, instead of years later.

70. See above, pp. 67-69, 234-235.

71. For a review of the motives of both sides in settling this, see “Informationsbericht Nr. 173,” 1 December 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ££.451-69.

72. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 17 December 1936, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, £427.

73. See the contrast drawn by Arthur Bliss Lane in his letter to President Roosevelt of 12 July 1937, Hyde Park, P.S.F. State Department. 74. G.D., C, 6, No. 256. N 131, N 3780/125/59, FO 371/21057. The British, as one of the signers of the statute, long followed the Memel issue with special interest. 75, See Felix-Heinrich Gentzen, “Die Rolle der ‘Deutschen Stiftung’ bei der Vorbereitung der Annexion des

Memellandes im Marz 1939,” Jabrbuch fiir Geschichte der UdSSR und der Volksdemokratischen Lander, 5 (1961), 92-

93: G.D., C, 5, No. 365; 6, Nos. 520, 524, 552. There appear to have been the usual problems of organizational East rivalry, in this case involving the VDA, the Deutsche Stiftung, the Hitler Youth, Gauleiter Koch of

Prussia, and the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle (Vomi).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ruffled feelings in the fall of 1937.’ The Memel Germans were, however, as well off as

any minority in Europe, and it was obvious that Germany would start an international crisis over them only when it suited her other purposes.” To keep that possibility open, the German government was careful to ward off Lithuanian suggestions of actually signing the nonaggression pact that Hitler had offered them in his March 1936 speech. Good excuses to avoid implementing that promise could always be found by the exercise of a little ingenuity.’ As has been pointed out, when it looked as if Poland might invade Lithuania, Hitler

planned to seize both Memel and adjacent portions of that country.”? When the crisis of Match 1938 passed peacefully, however, German policy toward the situation in Memel was subordinated—like that toward Poland and Danzig—to the need for quiet in that part of Europe while Germany concentrated on destroying Czechoslovakia. When the Berlin-sponsored leader of the Memel National Socialists, Ernst Neumann, was given instructions after his release from jail, these were to the effect that the Memel Germans were to be most careful, disciplined, and quiet for the time being.®°

There could not be much tfeassurance in this temporary calm for the Lithuanian authorities whose agents in the local National Socialist movement presumably kept them informed of the nature of Berlin’s directives. The rather substantial demographic changes that were taking place in the urban area of Memel as a result of economic prosperity with an accompanying labor shortage and the immigration of thousands of Lithuanians in no way altered the political realities, though they might have done so over a longer period of time. As the Lithuanians quickly discovered during the crisis over Czechoslovakia in September 1938, when Hitler spoke publicly about being satisfied with Germany’s other boundaries and having no mote territorial demands to make, he meant only the next five minutes, and ot whatever lands he might covet the following day.§! Only the British ambassador to Berlin, Sir Nevile Henderson, appears to have credited these statements; the Lithuanians were quickly enlightened, though even they were not yet aware of how much further German ambitions with regard to them really went. Germany’s relations with the most important country of Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, were simultaneously noisy and quiet in 1937-39. Each from time to time carried on loud propaganda campaigns against the other, but there was little substance to all this. The Germans denounced the U.S.S.R. as a dangerous world menace against whose machinations Germany had to protect herself and others—while also predicting the imminent collapse of the Soviet system into feebleness and anarchy.** The Soviet goyernment reciprocated in kind. The fluctuations in these propaganda campaigns were sometimes taken as signs of a political rapprochement between the two countries, but since they did not coincide with the known Soviet approaches to Germany that will be reviewed subsequently, this interpretation would appear to have been incorrect.83 More 76. On this problem, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 318, 319; N 5386, N 6193/125/59, FO 371/21058. 77. N 5764, N 5795/125/59, FO 371/21058. Cf. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 9 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.187. 78. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 343, 346, 347. German complaints are listed in ibid., Nos. 336, 340, 341, 350.

79. See above, p. 442. Another idea suggested at the time was German assistance to Lithuania to build a new port for Lithuania at Palanga, to be joined by canal to Memel, and thus create a sort of Lithuanian Gdynia (ibid., No. 335). 80. Ibid., No. 349. 81. Ibid., Nos. 352, 355. 82. See the analysis by Frangois-Poncet in D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 295; cf. “Informationsbericht Nr. 133,” and “Nr. 135,” 10 and 11 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ff. 229-31, 235.

83. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 626, 627, 630; Gustav Hilger and Alfred G. Meyer, The Incompatible Allies: History of German-Soviet Relations, 1918-1941 (New York: Macmillan, 1953), p. 279.

A Memoir

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

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likely, the episodes of restraint were related to domestic considerations in each country and to their desire for the maintenance of trade relations between them.84 . German-Soviet trade was no longer at the levels reached in ptior years, but it was still of importance to both countries. The negotiations for a new trade and payments agreement proved difficult; and there were occasional sharp arguments about specific items; but the importance of the exchanges to the economies of the two powers led each to make the concessions needed to prevent a rupture in trade. Thus, although no substantial increases or new German credits to the Soviet Union were agreed upon, in the economic as in the propaganda field, the noise level was not a very useful clue to the real situation.®> All that one can safely conclude on the evidence of the economic relations is the point already stressed, namely, that each side thought them important. When the German government became alarmed about the widespread arrests of Germans in the Soviet Union in the summer of 1937, the German embassy was instructed to urge as many German citizens as possible to leave the country just as soon as possible, except those Germans temporarily in the country for business reasons, lest German-Soviet trade suffer.8° When the Soviet government changed its ambassadors in Germany in the course of the purge of the diplomatic corps, the new man sent to Berlin in the summer of 1938 was the former deputy people’s commissar for foreign trade.87 The same contrast between surface disturbances and underlying continuity can be seen in two other aspects of German-Soviet relations. The arrests of Germans just mentioned took place during and in connection with the great purges shaking the U.S.S.R. These arrests led to considerable

acrimony, charges, and countercharges, and Soviet

demands for assistance from Germany in the repatriation of Soviet seamen kept in Spanish Nationalist prisons. There were months of argument, but in the end this matter, too, was settled quietly.8 More troublesome were the twin problems of Soviet demands first that the German military and press attachés in Moscow be recalled and later that several of the German consular offices in the Soviet Union be closed. The attachés were allegedly implicated in some of the plots that the Soviet secret police was dreaming up in the purges, while the consulates were to be closed as part of a systematic effort to reduce contacts between all foreigners, not just Germans, and Soviet citizens. These problems were also eventually worked out, with the German military attaché remaining in Moscow; but in this case, there was for some time the real possibility that the post of German ambassador in Moscow might simply be left vacant.*? If these surface signs of calmed disturbances tell us so little about the policies of the two powers toward each other it is because the primary focus of both was on entirely different problems during this period. The general drive against foreigners in the Soviet Union, and the supposed complicity of German diplomats in various “plots” were mani-

84. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 38. 85. Information on the trade relations and negotiations may be found in G.D., C, 6, Nos. 129, 323, 336, 339; D, 1, Nos. 613, 619, 629; D, 7:534-38; Hencke to Dirksen, 2 March 1938, T-120, 1097/2082/450897—900; Hilger,

pp. 284-85. Herbert Goring of the Ministry of Economics, a cousin of Hermann Goring, appears to have played a role in the economic negotiations as he had earlier (Dodd Diary, 20 March 1937, p. 397; above, p. 242). 86. These instructions will be published as G.D., C, 6, No. 517.

87. See ibid., D, 1, No. 629. 88. Ibid., C, 6, Nos. 135, 146, 173, 187, 301, 351, 391, 491, 498, 511, 539, 575. 89. On the question of the attachés, see Hermann Teske, General Ernst Kostring: Der militdrische Mittler zwischen

dem Deutschen Reich und der Sonyetunion 1921-1941 (Frankfurt/M: Mittler, 1966); G.D., C, 6, Nos. 213, 218, 221, 253, 301; on the consulates, see ibid., Nos. 489, 498, 544, 562, 564, 569-72, 578-80; D, 1, Nos. 614, 615, 620,

621; Hilger, pp. 279-80. For the possibility that von Schulenburg would be moved to either Warsaw be Tokyo in the revirement of February-March 1938 and the Moscow embassy left vacant, see Dertinger’s Privater Sonderbericht,” of 7 February 1938, and his “TInformationsbericht Nr. 27,” of 24 March 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ££.75, 227; cf. U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, p. 321.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

448

festations of the internal upheaval of the U.S.S.R. in the era of the great purges.”” This cataclysmic epoch in Soviet history had its roots in domestic, not foreign, policy issues. It had wide implications for Soviet relations with other countries, but cannot be explained

by them. Thus the attacks on Germany and Japan as sponsors of various conspitacies might be used for purposes of domestic consolidation, but hardly made the Soviet Union a mote attractive partner for any other enemies of those two powers. If both the diplomatic and military leaders who would have to negotiate political and military agreements with other potential enemies of Germany and Japan could be expected to disappear soon after for espionage in behalf of those very powers, there could be little incentive for anyone

to

enter

into

confidential

negotiations

with

the U.S.S.R.

Simultaneously,

the

wrecking of the Soviet military and diplomatic command structures weakened the Soviet Union greatly in international affairs.?! The extreme reticence of the Soviet regime in the Polish-Lithuanian crisis of March 1938, in which one of the very few European countries that had consistently maintained good telations with Moscow was publicly humiliated, may serve as an example of the general effect of a weakened Soviet position.°? The dangerous developments in East Asia accentuated Soviet caution in Europe. With the outbreak of open war between Japan and China, the situation in Asia undoubtedly took up more of Moscow’s attention; and the

Soviet government took a firmer position there than in Europe, especially where its own borders were concerned.” The one open conflict during these years was the civil war in Spain. For some time, the Soviet government followed in Spain a procedure not entirely unlike that of the Germans, supplying the Loyalists, whom Russia was supporting, with enough equipment

and other aid to keep them from losing but not sending enough to assure a victory.?+ The reasons for the maintenance of this posture by the Soviet Union, after the Nyon Conference of September 1937 had, in effect, assured safety to Soviet ships in the Mediterranean, remain to be satisfactorily explained. Whether the Soviet government was, as

some have suggested, as interested in continuing friction between Germany and the Western Powers as Germany was ‘interested in friction between the latter and Italy is by no means clear. In any case, in 1938, most likely during the summer, the Russian government decided to reduce its involvement in Spain so that the final German assistance to Franco was left unmatched and hence assured victory to the Nationalists. In prior years, the Soviet Union had repeatedly attempted to come to a direct agreement with Hitler’s Germany, but these efforts had foundered in the face of German disinterest.’° Stalin tried once more in February 1937 to open up negotiations for improving relations between Germany and the Soviet Union, once again using David Kandelaki of the Soviet Trade Delegation in Berlin and Hjalmar Schacht as contact points; but as in the previous instances, Hitler refused to take up the offered hand.*° The German dictator

was not yet interested in an accommodation with Stalin because his own immediate goals were shielded from Soviet interference or assistance by the position of Poland and Romania.

As long as that situation continued, there was nothing to be gained by an

90. See von Schulenburg’s comments in G.D., C, 6, Nos. 170, 578.

91. For French and British concern about this, see above, pp. 353-54. For German awareness of it, see above, p. 430, and G.D., D, 1, Nos. 622, 623. 92. See D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 471. 93. See above, pp. 429-30. 94. Though in need of updating, the best study is David I. Cattell, Soviet Diplomacy and the Spanish Civil War (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1957); see also Thomas, pp. 940—42. 95. See above, pp. 173-75, 242-43. 96. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 183, 195 (published in Johann W. Briigel [ed.], Stalin und Hitler, Pakt gegen Europa [Vienna: Europaverlag, 1973], Nos. 7, 8); Walter G. Krivitsky, In Stalin’s Secret Service (New York: Harper, 1939), pp. 37—

39; Leonard Schapiro, The Communist Party of the Soviet Union, 2d ed. (New York: Random House, 1971), p. 490.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East Va ost.

449

with Russia, while the propaganda advantage of Opposit ion to her would be

The periodic rumors of a German-Soviet tapprochement during this period simply had no basis in fact; if Stalin was interested, Hitler was not.2? The French may have

thought that their pact with the Soviet Union restrained that power from aligning herself with Hitler, but the evidence indicates that this was not so; as the British ambassador to

Moscow had pointed out to the Foreign Office, the 1926 German-Soviet Treaty of Berlin failed to keep the Russians out of the arms of the French when Moscow had considered that an appropriate policy.°® The fact is that Stalin’s most critical concerns wete at home, and his interest in agreement with Germany should probably be seen in that framework. Hitler, on the other hand, looked in the immediate future to a strength ening of his position in Central Europe; and for that Poland, not the Soviet Union, was

important as a neutral shield in the east, while Yugoslavia would assist in isolating his next victims from the south.

From the point of view of Germany, Yugoslavia was important as a neighbor of Austria and of Hungary. As a neighbor of Austria, Yugoslavia’s attitude toward that country was of interest to Berlin. Would the South Slav state join others in any attempt to block the annexation of Austria or not? What would be her position if there were an attempted restoration of the Habsburgs in Vienna? The fact that Yugoslavia was Hungary’s southern neighbor was significant for Germany because of the implications of the relationship between those two countries for Hungary’s policy toward Czechoslovakia, Germany’s other prospective victim. Because Hungary had lost territory to Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia by the peace settlement of 1920, those three

had joined in an alliance, the Little Entente, pledging support to each other in case Hungary attacked any one of them. This meant that the threat of a Hungarian attack on Czechoslovakia simultaneously with an attack by Germany could be credible only if the Little Entente were disrupted. As long as Hungary had to contemplate the possibility of an invasion by Yugoslav forces across her southern border, she could not consider attacking Czechoslovakia across her northern border. As will be seen, there were still other factors restraining Hungary, but this was both the most obvious and also the one

most susceptible to an approach from Germany. Internal and external factors had made Yugoslavia receptive to German approaches even before 1937.” The difficult problems of welding together into one state the disparate national elements constituting Yugoslavia have dominated its history. The predominantly Serb elite governing the country in the interwar years never came to a satisfactory arrangement with the Croat and Slovene components; and since both of these had been

included in prewar Austria-Hungary, the possibility of a Habsburg restoration was greatly feared in Belgrade. As the power of Germany increased in the 1930s, Yugoslavia continued to prefer the maintenance of an independent and necessarily weak Austria on its border but, between a Habsburg restoration and German annexation of Austria, much

preferred the latter in spite of the potential problems of having so powerful a neighbor. The internal nationality problem, especially in regard to Croatia, not only stimulated fear of a Habsburg restoration but also provided possible external enemies of Yugoslavia with a potential internal ally in the form of the Croatian nationalist movement. The numerically predominant portion of Croatian nationalism was the Croatian Peasant party of Vladko Macek. Autonomist rather than separatist in orientation, this 97. On these rumots, see G.D., C, 6, No. 326; N 2064/45/38, FO 371/21095; Memorandum of the Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry, Nr. 90,903/III-4 of 20 June 1937, T-120, 1143/2028/444481.

98. N 546, N 1522/45/38, FO 371/21094; N 1934/45/38, FO 371/21095; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 192. 99. See above, pp. 93-94, 178-80, 244, 253-54.

450

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

movement was willing to work within the framework of a Yugoslav state—though it was accorded very little opportunity to do so—and only occasionally flirted with outside powers, primarily Italy, though at times also Germany. A mote radical group wishing to separate Croatia entirely from the South Slav state was the Ustasha. This extreme rightwing movement was led by Ante Paveli¢, looked to Italy and Germany for inspiration as

well as support, and, although hoping to use those powers for its own purposes, came to be used by them as a tool of their policies toward Yugoslavia. The economy of Yugoslavia was almost as important as its nationality problem in inclining her to a course agreeable to Berlin. Germany was an increasingly important customer for the agricultural products Yugoslavia exported and had in fact become her most important trading partner as a result of the reduction of Yugoslavia’s trade with Italy during the period of League sanctions against Italy. There were indeed problems attached to this economic situation, but there was no easy way out of Germany’s economic embrace. Belgrade had looked to the’ Western Powers and especially France for support. This had turned out to be a weak reed indeed. The immediate threat to Yugoslavia had long come from Italy, which dominated the Adriatic and through effective control of Albania

practically cut off that sea. French hopes for a rapprochement with Italy had, however, made France a most reluctant ally against Yugoslavia’s prospective foe. In the one important recent crisis with Italy, that touched off by the Italian-sponsored Ustasha’s murder of the king of Yugoslavia in October 1934, the French government had dramatically subordinated the interests of Yugoslavia to hopes for an agreement with Mussolini. As for the more remote danger possibly emanating from Germany, the passivity of France in the face of German remilitarization of the Rhineland had shown how little hope there could be of effective French help. Although Prince Paul, the most important

of the three regents designated by the late King Alexander for the period of his son’s minority, was inclined to be pro-British, the retreat of England before Mussolini’s Ethiopian venture followed by London’s equally unremitting and undignified attempts to come to an agreement with him during Italy’s open intervention in Spain suggested that little more than verbal support could be expected from Great Britain. These factors constitute the background for Yugoslavia’s interest in good relations with Germany and her resumption in the winter of 1936—37 of the efforts King Alexander had earlier made to try to work out a rapprochement with Italy. Urged on by the German government, which saw in this an opportunity to move Yugoslavia closer to the Axis and away from her prior association with France and the other members of the Little Entente, the Belgrade government engaged in negotiations with Italy that culminated in an agreement in March 1937. The course of these talks will not be traced here, but certain aspects of them are important.! The German government followed the negotiations with great interest, urged both sides forward, and hailed the conclusion of the settlement on 25 March 1937 as amount-

ing to the disruption of the Little Entente.!0! This was not an unreasonable way to view the situation in spite of the fact that one motive for both parties to the agreement had been the notion that jointly they would carry more weight with Germany, “a difficult

100. The best available account in Jacob B. Hoptner, Yugoslavia in Crisis, 1934-1941 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1962), chap. 3. It is based to a considerable extent on Yugoslav sources made available to its author. Only the Ciano papers and diaries have been published; the Italian diplomatic document volumes for this petiod have not yet appeared. 101. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 138, 143, 254, 274, 291, 297, 298; D, 3, No. 236; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 166. The Germans had earlier been pleased by the Yugoslav-Bulgarian agreement (G.D., C, 6, No. 132; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 65).

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

451

friend” as Ciano described her.!°? The extent to which the German assessment was cotrect in the long run, however, can be seen in the way the Yugosla v government kept the negotiations secret from their French and Little Entente allies until the very last moment, thus giving them meager opportunity to raise objections until it was too late.!% When the Little Entente leaders met in Belgrade at the beginning of April, they could only note that the organization was vety sick indeed.!°4 Prince Paul had had the British government informed slightly earlier and in mote detail, but the London authoriti es were in a difficult dilemma. They were quite happy to see a reduction in tension and some accommodation between Italy and Yugoslavia as part of a general calming of the European situation; on the other hand, they were very concerned lest Yugoslavia, Greece, and

Turkey drift into the Italian orbit and by strengthening the position of the Axis encourage Italy and Germany to more daring adventures. British influence was therefor e devoted primarily to making sure that Yugoslavia did not go too far, and in this regard, the caution of the Belgrade officials could be depended upon,!9> Count Ciano’s trip to Belgrade for the signing of the agreement with Yugoslavia was

productive of more than the texts that dealt with the relations between the two countries, restricting the Ustasha, protecting national minorities, and other issues. The Yugoslav prime minister, Milan Stojadinovi¢, at this time buried once and for all the plan for a

mutual assistance treaty between France and the Little Entente that had been the subject of lengthy negotiations in the preceding months.!% Having signed with Italy, he could hardly be expected to sign an agreement with France that was designed to protect Yugoslavia against her new associate. Conversely, he could not promise to assist Czechoslovakia against Germany, Italy’s Axis partner. Stojadinovié could, therefore, now safely assure the Germans that there would be no Yugoslav assistance pact with France.!0 Furthermore, in view of the close relations that had obtained for some yeats between Italy and Hungary, the alignment with Italy provided yet one more link in the effort of the Axis to bring Yugoslavia and Hungary closer together.!°8 More will be said about this subject later from the perspective of Germany and Hungary, but Italy’s switch from working jointly with Hungary against Yugoslavia to working for better relations between her two Southeast European associates must be stressed. Finally, the personal meeting between Ciano and Stojadinovi¢ was to have some entirely unexpected results. Starting with it, and reinforced during Stojadinovic’s return visit to Italy in December 1937, Ciano developed a personal liking for the Yugoslav leader, while the latter became increasingly enamored of fascism as a form of government. If Ciano did not let his personal feelings interfere with later plots against the South Slav state, the new political proclivities of Stojadinovié would contribute to his fall from power two years later.' In regard to Yugoslavia’s relations with Germany, the importance of the economic

102. Ivan Subbotic’s report of 6 March 1937 to Stojadinovié on his 3 March conversation with Ciano, quoted in Hoptner, p. 67. See also Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 220. 103. D.D.F., 2d, 4, Nos. 326, 387, 395; 5, Nos. 89, 152, 154, 164; U.S. 1937, 1:67-71; G.D., C, 6, No. 302; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 69, 71; Slavik report 30 of 8 April 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413772—76 (parts in Berber, pp. 74-75). 104. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 211, 212, 221, 227; G.D., C, 6, No. 309. 105. See R 650, R 1357/224/92, FO 371/21197; R 1623, R 1687, R 1688, R 1785, R 1896, R 2042/224/92, FO 371/21198; Harvey Diaries, pp. 24-25; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 73. p 106. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 98-105. 107. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 295, 300; D, 2, No. 37; von Neurath to Rumelin, 31 March 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biro

RAM, Akte 60964, f£.86—88.

eh ' 108. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 98-105; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 69, 70. 109. Hoptner, pp. 86-87, 126-29; Magistrati, p. 112; Lothar C. F. Wimmer, Experiences et tribulations d’un diplomate

autrichien entre deux guerres,

1929-1938, ttans. Charles Reichard (Neuchatel: Baconniére, 1946), pp. 197-203;

D.D.F, 2d, 7, Nos. 332, 334, 335; R 590/147/92, FO 371/22475.

452

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

aspect has already been mentioned. This was of great significance to Germany, which drew agricultural products from Yugoslavia and was increasingly importing minerals and investing in mining companies as well.'!° There were political as well as economic aspects to this process; Yugoslavia was becoming dependent on the German market and was being forced to increase her imports from Germany, at the expense of other countries, in order to offset the clearing debts that the Germans ran up. One plan to limit German trade was vetoed by Stojadinovié on political grounds; Yugoslavia might prefer not to

become too closely tied to Germany but also could not afford to offend her.'!! There were, in fact, various difficulties associated with German-Yugoslav trade. The

appointment of Franz Neuhausen as Goring’s special representative in Belgrade had caused friction among German agencies earlier, and continued to do so.'!* Moreover, in

a complicated series of trade transactions, that cannot yet be entirely unraveled, Gauleiter Erich Koch of East Prussia was involved in a series of barter operations that not only collided with regular German-Yugoslav trade but interfered in internal Yugoslav politics. Funds from these transactions ‘were channeled to a far right political organization, the

Zbor of Dimitrije Ljoti¢.'3 This was of great concern to Belgrade, especially because there was a fusion of the so-called Resurgence Movement within Yugoslavia’s German community with the Zbor.'!* Stojadinovic personally complained to the German minister about these and related mysterious activities of German agents; and von Neurath did what he could to secure restraint from the German side as well as to reassure the alarmed minister president.'!5 New arrangements covering the current trade between Germany and Yugoslavia were successfully worked out in 1937, with Germany more pleased than the Yugoslavs by the consolidation of her new position in Yugoslavia’s international commerce.!!¢ It should be noted that whatever efforts Yugoslavia might make to avoid economic dependence on Germany were offset by the German annexation of Austria in March 1938. During December 1937, the Belgrade government tried to find other markets, hoped to limit the growth of its blocked Reichsmark balances in Germany by restricting exports to Germany, and used up some of the balances by selling blocked Reichsmark and by arms purchases. All this would be more than compensated for by the immediately increased role of Germany in Yugoslavia’s foreign trade once Austria—third after Germany and Czechoslovakia in both export and import value in Yugoslavia—was included within the boundaries of Greater Germany.!!” If there had ever been an opportunity for the Western Powers to counter the drift of Yugoslavia into the Axis orbit by economic measures, it was largely wiped out by the Amschluss."'8 110. See Hoptner, chap. 4. 111. R 1623/224/92, FO 371/21198 (Vansittart passes on what appeats to be secret service information about Yugoslav government proceedings). 112. See above, pp. 180 n. 102, 253; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 249, 526, 561, 574. 113. See above, p. 253 n. 106; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 150, 198, 211, 219, 252, 259; Hoptner, p. 103. 114. G.D., C, 6, No. 234. On the Zbor movement, see Peter Sugar (ed.), Native Fascism in the Successor States (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Clio Press, 1971), pp. 131, 137-38. 115. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 244, 293; von Neurath to von Heeren, 16 March 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biito RAM, Akte 60964, ff.71—-72; cf. Wimmer, p. 204; Rudolf von Maltzahn, “Informationsbericht,” received in GGring’s office

16 February 1937, T-120, 2621/5482/E 38221420. 116. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 286, 345, 565; D, 5, No. 159; Lane to Moffat, 20 April 1938, Moffat Papers, vol. 13;

Roland Sch6nfeld, “Deutsche Rohstoffsicherungspolitik in Jugoslawien 1934-1944,” Véierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 24, No. 3 (July 1976), 217-18, 224-27. 117. Compare the views of Neuhausen in his “Die Wirtschaftsbeziehungen Grossdeutschland-Jugoslawien,” 5 May 1938, T-120, 2621/5482/E

382162-67, with the basically similar conclusions

reached in the British

Foreign Office in C 3249/772/18, FO 371/21705. 118. R 5338, R 5362/94/67, FO 371/22342; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 177. An introductory survey in Wilhelm Treue,

“Das Dritte Reich und die Westmachte auf dem Balkan,” Vierteliabrshefte fiir Zeitgescbichte, 1, No. 1 (April 1953),

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

453

German-Yugoslav economic relations constituted one of the subjects discussed when German Foreign Minister Constantin von Neurath visited Belgrade in June 1937. The possibility of such a visit had been canvassed eatliet in the yeat, but the German government wanted to be certain that there would be no unpleas ant surprises if von Neurath did indeed go. The elements needed to reassure Berlin were, first, a Yugoslav assurance that there would be no pact of assistance with France, second, that the planned

visit of Count Ciano to Belgrade should work out properly, and third, that the meeting of the Little Entente Powers in Belgrade, scheduled for early April, would register the continuing disintegration rather than any revival of that institution. All these conditions were met, and the German foreign minister, who could not manage a couple of days in London, went off on a lengthy tour of the Balkans with Belgrade as his first stop.1!9 No important Yugoslav official had visited Berlin in recent years; von Neurath’s trip—coming after previous visits by Goring and Schacht—must, therefore, be seen as

an indication of how seriously the German government wanted to move Belgrade toward the Axis.!7° The conversations which von Neurath held in Belgrade produced no new agreements, but they did underline the fact that Germany and Yugoslavia were drawing closer together. Furthermore, the occasion gave von Neurath an Opportunity to sound out the Yugoslavs on German-Austrian relations and to urge them toward an understanding with Hungary. Von Neurath’s mixture of threats and reassutances appears to

have left mixed feelings in Belgrade, but the open exchange of views was of a sort that

Germany’s leaders had hitherto engaged in only with the Italians from among theit enemies in the World War.'2! The converse of this development was the continuing estrangement of Yugoslavia from France. The French were annoyed by the lack of notice to them of von Neurath’s visit—especially after the Yugoslav-Italian agreement—and by all the signs of closer ties between Belgrade and Berlin. Stojadinovié’s answer to the reproaches from Paris took two forms. On the one hand, he promised to remain faithful to the existing agreement

with France’ and to make no agreement with Hungary independently of his Little Entente partners. On the other hand, he had his representatives reproach the French for their passivity in March 1936, their unwillingness to assist Yugoslavia either in rearmament ot economically, and their general willingness to let Germany and Italy have their way. In other words, he claimed to have no choice; his policy was largely the result of French actions and inactions, and in any case, he would not go further than absolutely

necessaty.'*3 When in Paris himself in October 1937, Stojadinovic defended his policy as essential for the internal consolidation and strengthening of Yugoslavia which would, in case of wat, be on the side of France but could not provoke Germany or Italy.!*4

The attempts of the French government to have Stojadinovic removed in 1937 were as unsuccessful as their earlier hopes for Beck’s dismissal in Poland, and the British were

probably correct in thinking such activities unwise and counterproductive.'° In any case, 45-64. 119. On the background of the trip, see von Neurath to Rimelin, 31 March 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM,

Akte 60964, £f.86-88; G.D., C, 6, No. 313 (DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.93—-94), ian 120. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 16.

;

121. Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 545-48, and an additional report by Wimmer, the Austrian minister in Belgrade, in

his memoirs, pp. 186-88 (Wimmer and von Neurath had been colleagues in London); G.D., C, 6, Nos. 410,

514; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 262; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 51, 84; R 4087/439/3, FO 371/21118; R 4236, R 4272/ 4067/67, FO 371/ 21141; R 4418/3174/92, FO 371/21201. ; 122. Of November 1927 (League ofNations Treaty Series, 68:373). 123. D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 25, 34, 114, 141; Osusky report of 6 May 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120,

1041/1809/413853—54. 124. D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 58.

125. See Orme Sargent’s very confidential letter to Phipps of 7 October 1937, R 6432/ 175/92, FO 371/21197.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

Stojadinovié remained in power for the time being; and when French Foreign Minister Delbos himself was in Belgrade in December 1937, he could only put a good face on a bad situation.'!2° The sole remedy was for France and Britain to rearm and assert their position in Europe vigorously; that would take time but was the only way to impress the Yugoslav leader. As the British government learned in December 1937, Stojadinovic had told a Greek diplomat, in effect, that “whatever else happened, he was determined never to fight Germany. His country had tried it once and that was enough.”!?’ As for the German hopes of getting Yugoslavia to come to a bilateral agreement with Hungary, however, that would prove a vastly more difficult project than either the Germans or the Italians, who were now urging the same thing, had anticipated. Four obvious, and one not so obvious, elements entered into the relations between the two

neighbors. One was the boundary between the two; the question being, of course, whether Hungaty was prepared to recognize once again the boundary established by the Treaty of Trianon, thus acknowledging the cession to Yugoslavia not only of CroatiaSlavonia but also of the Bacska and part of the Banat with their Magyar minorities. Second, would Yugoslavia promise to allow this Magyar minority of over half a million in

real life the rights supposedly guaranteed them by the minorities treaty that Yugoslavia, like the other successor states, had been requited to sign when she acquired the lands the minorities inhabited. Third, would Yugoslavia, with or without the consent of her Little

Entente partners, acquiesce formally in Hungary’s repudiation of the restrictions imposed on her military strength by the Treaty of Trianon? Fourth, would Yugoslavia break openly with the Little Entente by assuting Hungary that she would remain neutral if Hungary used her newly enlarged and rearmed military forces to join Germany (and possibly Poland) in an attack on Czechoslovakia? The negotiations between Belgrade and Budapest, carried on now openly, now secretly, at times directly, at times indirectly, were hampered not only by suspicions and reluctance on both sides, but also by still another factor, rarely mentioned but probably on the minds of the negotiators all the time. This was the problem of precedent. If the Yugoslav government promised to respect the rights of the Magyar minority, how could

it refuse a reasonable accommodation with the other national components of the South Slav stater If Hungary formally renounced revision of the territorial provisions of the Treaty of Trianon

vis-a-vis Yugoslavia,

how

could

she maintain

her claims

against

Czechoslovakia and Romania? Although nothing suggests that the Slovaks were any more

eager for a return of Hungarian domination than the Croats; and although the

Magyar minority in Czechoslovakia was twice and that in Romania three times as large as that in Yugoslavia, the principle was the same in all these cases.!?8 A satisfactory account of the tortuous negotiations remains to be written. Hungary alone of the participants has published a large collection of documents; there are bits and pieces from the German and Italian sides; but the Yugoslav documents remain closed.!2°

From the point of view of the Germans, the most significant aspect of the negotiations was that Stojadinovi¢ was willing to consider the possibility, but could not quite see his way to a conclusion, and that the Hungarian government acted in an essentially similar

126. D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 39; G.D., D, 1, No. 85; Wimmer, pp. 211-14; C 8730/7888/17, FO 371/20698; R 4043/835/92, FO 371/21200; R 6737/175/92, FO 371/21197; R 147, R 590/147/92, FO 371/22475; Bullitt tel. 1771 of 23 December 1937, sec. 3, State 740.00/251 (this section omitted in U.S. 1937, 1:206-7).

127. R 8116/3174/92, FO 371/21201. 128. A possible further factor on both sides was the concern of the government over possible objections from a public that in each country looked upon the other as a traditional enemy.

129. Hoptner, who is so informative on other aspects of Yugoslav foreign policy, is not only uninformed on this subject but has a somewhat misleading account of it (pp. 115-17).

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

455

fashion—willing to try but always hovering on the brink.!3° Even the personal blandishments of Germany’s leaders failed to move the hesitant pair to the altar; when Hungarian Prime Minister Kalman Daranyi and Foreign Minister K4lman de Kanya were in Berlin in November 1937, and when Stojadinovié was regaled in the German capital in January 1938, their hosts urged on them once again the benefits of a bilateral agreement, but to no avail.13! The attention lavished on Stojadinovié flattered his vanity and—by contrast with the prior less impressive reception of the Hungarians—annoyed Budapest, but the result was more a general improvement in the atmosphere of German-Yugoslav relations than concrete advances in the Yugoslav-Hungarian negotiations.!32 The maintenance of good German-Yugoslav relations was assured by Yugoslavia’s lack of alternatives, German diplomatic adroitness in handling Stojadinovié,!*> and Yugoslavia’s calm acceptance of the Anschluss.\*4* As for the negotiations with Hungary, however, Yugoslavia eventually remained in a common front with the other two powers of the Little Entente, while Hungary in spite of earlier reluctance decided at least to pretend to follow the course of working for agreement with all three simultaneously. Ironically the resulting agreement, which could be read as trading Hungarian promises of nonaggression for Little Entente promises of better treatment for Magyar minorities and acquiescence in Hungarian rearmament, was reached on 23 August 1938,

just as Hungary’s leaders were on a state visit in Germany and the latter power was getting ready to launch a war of aggression against Czechoslovakia.'*> The agreement of Yugoslavia and Hungary, so long sought by Berlin, thus came in a framework most distasteful to Hitler and was seen by him as binding rather than freeing Hungary vis-a-vis Czechoslovakia and at the worst conceivable time.'*° If most of the German wrath for this was to be unloaded on the Hungarians, there was enough suspicion left over for a Yugoslavia which had maintained some real independence from Berlin in spite of years of determined effort to convert her into a German satellite.!°” The minister president of Yugoslavia, like the foreign minister of Poland, had 130. Documents which illustrate this may be found in Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 254; 2, Nos. 66, 67, 72, 74,

75, 81,85, 91, 97, 103, 107, 108, 121, 138, 217, 221, 225, 243, 247, 257, 259, 261, 274; G.D., C, 6, No. 378; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 361; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 148-52; Ciano, Diary, 11 January 1938, p. 86. An excellent

account in Carlyle A. Macartney, October Fifteenth: A History of Modern Hungary (Edinburgh: University Press,

1956), 1:151-54, 196-200, chap. 11, passim. 131. On the Hungarian visit, see Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 313 (German text, Kerekes, document 10); Zsigmond, pp. 261-62. On the Stojadinovie visit, see Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 107; Guido Schmidt Trial, pp.

503-5; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 156, 158, 159, 162, 163, 165; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 40, 49, 68, 70, 72, 74; Lane dispatch

124 of 10 February 1938, State 760H.65/776; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 12 and 17 January 1938,

Bundesarchiy, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, ff.25, 35.

132. Géring (see also U.S. 1937, 1:170-77) had arranged the greater pomp for Stojadinovié partly because he the considered the rapprochement with Yugoslavia his personal work and partly because he remembered that 959 dispatch (Montgomery had Yugoslavs the but 1935 in officially wife-to-be his received Hungarians had not of 9February 1938, State 762.64/89). Paul was 133. See Lane to Moffat, 20 April 1938, Moffat Papers, vol. 13. For material suggesting that Prince betr. also coming to a more favorable view of Germany, see Heinrich XXXIII. Reuss, “Aufzeichnung

448; Hungarian Documents, 2, Jugoslawien,” June 1938, T-120, 2621/5482/E 38214359; but cf. G.D., C, 6, No.

No. 106.

134. See Hoptner, pp. 110-13; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 304, 424, 446. see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 75, 135. On the negotiations leading to the Bled agreement of 23 August 1938,

7, Nos. 7, 12, 25, 73, 92, 85, 87, 174, 175, 183, 208, 249, 255, 263, 271, 286, 287, 293, 294, 298, 301; D.D.F., 2d, 317, 377; and n. 130, above.

;

to arrange a Y ugoslav-Hungarian 136. By a trick of fate, the same mischance befell the later German effort to join

1940 than Hungary was invited agreement; hardly was the ink dry on the agreement of 12 December Teleki, committed suicide because of Pal minister, prime Hungarian Germany in an attack on Yugoslavia. The this dilemma. 137. See Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 267.

456

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

steered his country closet to the Axis against the inclinations of the public at large as well as those of other influential figures, Smigly-Rydz in the case of Poland, Prince Paul in the case of Yugoslavia. But Stojadinovié, like Beck, had shied away from any relationship

of an alliance type, realizing that in such circumstances the weaker partner would necessatily become a mere appendage of the more aggressive and powerful Germany. Though dubious about the efficacy of the ties to France and the Little Entente, Stojadinovié was as hesitant about giving them up altogether as Beck was about abandoning entirely the Franco-Polish alliance. Equally unwilling to be dominated from Berlin, both men steered their countries into a policy of acquiescence in rather than

resistance to German expansion, preferring the risks of the former to those of the latter

course. Simultaneously, each tried to find in other alignments some semblance of balance and protection against the obvious threat of German predominance in Central Europe; what Beck was hoping to secure by his policy of a “Third Europe” between Germany and the Soviet Union, Stojadinovié tried to attain through rapprochement with Italy. His teluctance to move with similar’ speed to rapprochement with Hungary reflected both the domestic problems of Yugoslavia and his assessment of the danger of moving completely into the Axis camp. It would provide the Hungarians with both a real reason and a welcome excuse for their own caution about adhering too closely to Germany’s policies. Hungary’s position in the pattern of German foreign policy had gone through some

ups and downs in the first years of National Socialist rule. One of the few European countries which in 1933 was led by a government headed by an admirer of Hitler, the Hungary of Julius Gémbés had hailed the advent of the new German ruler. Gombés himself was the first of Europe’s leaders to visit Hitler, and for some time, German-

Hungarian relations appeared to be getting closer.!3° Although Gombos had no intention of subordinating what he perceived to be Hungarian interests to Germany, he believed that the revisionist aspirations of the two powers could be harmonized. Furthermore, the collapse of the world market prices for agricultural products had had a devastating effect on the Hungarian economy; it was the resulting political upheavals that had brought Gombés himself to the position of prime minister. New economic ties with Germany opened up the possibility of ameliorating this desperate situation; and in spite of some difficulties, German-Hungarian trade did in fact provide a significant contribution to the slow but steady improvement in Hungary’s economic situation which culminated in the termination of the League’s financial mission in 1937.1%° By that time, Gdmbos himself was dead, but even before his final illness, diplomatic and personal factors had combined to trouble German-Hungarian relations. The diplomatic factors were largely inherent in the realities of the existing situation in Southeast Europe. The German element inside Hungary was angry about the continued efforts at Magyarization, while the Hungarian authorities were suspicious about the continuing loyalty of this element to Budapest. In the successor states, the German minorities were reluctant to cooperate with the Magyar element since even their worst grievances, real or imagined, in the curtent

situation could not compate

with their

memories of Magyar oppression—the latter having firmly established themselves in first place as oppressors of national minorities in a part of Europe where the competition for 138. See above, pp. 89-93, 178-79, 250-51. 139. Macartney, 1:191—-93. A review of German-Hungarian economic relations prepared in the German Foreign Ministry before the visit of Daranyi and de Kanya in Berlin in November 1937 is in Documents secrets du ministere des affaires étrangere de l’Allemagne, 2, Hongrie: La politique allemande 1937-1943 (Paris, 1946), No. 1; a sutvey of the statistics is in Janos Tihanyi, “Deutsch-ungarische Aussenhandelsbeziehungen im Dienste der faschistischen Aggressionspolitik, 1933 bis 1944,” Jahrbuch fiir Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 1972, No. 1, pp. 65-73.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

457

that sad distinction was extremely keen. Moreover, as Gémbés himself had suspected, the more powerful Germany became, the less interested she was in Hungary. Yugoslavia and Romania were sure to become and did become more interest ing to a rearmed Germany, and_only the possibility of joint operations against the Czechos lovakia both hated provided a basis for cooperation between Budapest and Berlin. There was also a petsonal element in this situation. The Hungarian minister to Berlin, Constantin de Masirevich, was recalled at German insistence. Although his successor, Dome Sztdjay, came to be both popular with the National Socialist authoritie s and a leading spokesman in favor of Hungary’s following all German policies, the promotion of Masirevich to the legation in London and the subsequent hints to Berlin that the German minister in Budapest, Hans Georg von Mackensen, who was von Neurath’s son-in-law,

be recalled,

hardly

suggested

the intimacy

of close

allies. Even

more

important than these matters of diplomatic personnel was the attitude toward Germany of the two men who, even while Gémbés was prime minister but more markedly after his death, played key roles in the setting of Hungaty’s foreign policy: the regent, Miklos Horthy, and the minister of foreign affairs from 1933 to 1938, Kalman de Kanya. Both men hoped that German actions in Europe would assist Hungary in reclaiming the lands lost by the Treaty of Trianon, but neither was sympathetic to the leadets of the Third Reich. Beyond a strong distaste that in the case of de Kanya went to the extent of nasty personal comments that got back, and may have been intended to get back, to the German subjects of them, a more fundamental divergence of views made both men

dubious of staking their country’s future on Germany’s success.!40 Horthy as an admiral in the Austro-Hungarian navy had developed enormous respect for the role of the British navy in controlling the oceans; while de Kanya’s long diplomatic experience, which included a term as Austro-Hungarian minister to Mexico during the war, had given him a recognition of the fact, often overlooked in Berlin, that the earth is round.'! _ Their experiences and perceptions had convinced both men that in another world war,

Germany would lose once again—with disastrous consequences for any allies dragged down with her.! The caution of these two leaders of Hungary was, moreover, reinforced by their awareness of the fact that Hungarian disarmament as a result of the peace treaty left her at the mercy of her Little Entente neighbors should they go to war with her, and that any rearmament measures on Hungary’s part—with rearmament begun seriously only after the departure of the League mission in 1937—-would not show major results for several years. Although rarely alluded to in discussions or documents, this chronological discrepancy in the initiation of German and Hungarian rearmament was a critical factor in the intermittent discord between the two possible allies, whose relationship would culminate in bitterness and betrayal in 1944.149 The concern of the Germans over the possibility that the successor of Gombés, K4lman Dardnyi, might direct Hungary along new lines disagreeable for Berlin was demonstrated by press attacks on him and an article in the Vd/kischer Beobachter, inspired

by Hitler, which asserted that not all borders needed revising, it being assumed that Hungary’s claims to Transylvania were being referred to.'4 The Germans also increased 140. See Szembek’s comments in his diary, 5—9 February 1938, p. 270. 141. For a similar, but more detailed, discussion of Kanya, see Thomas L. Sakmyster, “Hungary and the Munich Crisis: The Revisionist Dilemma,” S/avic Review, 32, No. 4 (December 1973), 728-29, 142, For an analysis of a somewhat similar kind, see R 7542/1644/21, FO 371/21154; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No.

ce See also Nandor A. F. Dreisziger, “Civil-Military Relations in Nazi Germany’s Shadow: The Case of Hungary,” in Adrian Preston (ed.), Swords and Covenants (London: Groom Helm, 1976), p. 219. 144, See above, p. 252. Cf. G.D., C, 6, No. 205. A year later, when the Goga government in Romania seemed

458

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

their interest in the fate of the German minority inside Hungary and may have increased their contacts with various far right groups on the Hungarian political scene.*° The main thrust of German policy, however, continued to be to urge the Budapest government to concentrate all revisionist aspirations on Czechoslovakia. On various occasions the Hungarians were reminded of this and the concomitant need to reach an agreement with Yugoslavia and some sort of temporary accommodation with Romania.'*° The Magyar leaders understood both the significance and the implications of this advice, but it was not as easy for them to follow as for the Germans, and the Italians, to give.'*” The very idea of giving up hopes for revision in other directions, and especially toward Romania,

was not likely to excite enthusiasm in Budapest. Furthermore, the obvious way in which Hungarian agreement to such a procedure would make Hungary into a minor satellite of Germany, which could aid or abandon her client at will, aroused fears among Hungary’s leaders.!48 They were at least equally fearful of more immediate risks. Unless Germany guaranteed Hungary against Yugoslav attack or assisted her in a rapid building up of her army, any Hungarian operation against Czechoslovakia could easily lead to a crushing defeat for Hungary. As has already been mentioned, the Hungarians tried to cope with part of this problem by lengthy negotiations with Yugoslavia, and when these did not work out, with all three members of the Little Entente.'*? Before these negotiations came

to the conclusion that so annoyed Berlin, other questions had arisen between Germany and Hungary. In the area of German-Hungarian economic relations, the occasional frictions were resolved without too much difficulty.°° Any efforts Hungary might have made to reduce her dependence on Germany in this regard were, in any case, rendered pointless by the annexation of Austria, which greatly increased Germany’s role in Hungary’s foreign trade and also made her an important factor in regard to investments inside Hungary.!5! The possibility of the incorporation of Austria into Germany had worried the Hungarians for some time; though preferring an independent Austria, they were reconciled to the probability of its disappearance.!>? They had, in fact, discussed it with von Neurath when the latter visited Budapest in the course of his Balkan journey of June

likely to secure German support, the Hungarians warned von Neurath that any German recognition of Romania’s border would have catastrophic implications for German-Hungarian relations (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 115). 145. On the German minority at this time, see Macartney, 1:178-79; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 280, 365, 437; D, 5, Nos. 144, 148, 189; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 314, 427; Jacobsen, pp. 526-28; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 9 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.187. See also L. Tilkovsky, “Volks-

deutsche Bewegung und ungarische Nationalitatenpolitik (1938-1941),” Auta Historica, 12, Nos. 1-2 (1966), 59— 112. The subject was discussed with von Neurath when he visited Budapest in June 1937 (G.D., C, 6, No. 423;

FAlungarian Documents, 1, No. 264). German contacts with Hungarian political movements in those years await detailed scholarly investigation. 146. G.D., D, 1, No. 181; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 248.

147, Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 63-68. 148. The Hungarians were thus understandably alarmed about the rumors of German-Czechoslovak negotiations in the winter of 1936-37 and not fully reassured by von Neurath’s promises in March 1937 (G.D., C, 6,

No. 238). 149. See above, pp. 454-55. For the 1937 portion of these negotiations, especially on Hungary’s right to rearm, see also Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 222, 304; 2, Nos. 64, 68, 77, 80, 82-84, 86, 88, 90, 92-96; G.D., C, 6, Nos.

181, 443; D, 5, Nos. 141, 143, 145; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 479; 6, Nos. 3, 26, 71, 170, 211, 353, 380, 388, 392, 440; Jorg KX. Hoensch, Der Ungarische Revisionismus und die Zerschlagung der Tschechoslowakei (Tibingen: Mohr, 1967), pp. 44-48, 72-75. 150. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 131, 144, 257. 151. A good analysis is in D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 467; see also ibid., No. 498. For a broader analysis of the econom-

ic impact of the Ansch/uss on the German trade position in Southeast Europe as a whole see ibid., 9, No. 47.

152. G.D., C, 6, No. 130; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 203; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 117-20, Macartney,

1:204-6.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

459

1937.18 Nothing much on this or any other subject of importance appears to have been discussed when von Blomberg visited Budapest two weeks later,!54 but a whole range of

issues, including the Austrian

and Czechoslovak

problems, were

touched

on when

declined to share the risks, or wanted

additional

Daranyi and de Kanya went to Berlin in November.!55 During the conversations between German and Hungarian leaders, outstanding economic questions were settled. The Hungarians complained about National Socialist propaganda among the German minority in Hungary, but Géring, von Neurath, and Hitler all placed the emphasis on the Austrian and Czechoslovak questions. They again urged Hungary to settle with Yugoslavia, work out something with Romania,!5° and concentrate all her energies on Czechoslovakia. The Germans, however, did not respond to the Hungarian request for a German guarantee of Yugoslav neutrality if Hungary attacked Czechoslovakia. As for the Austrian issue, the Germans indicated their strong hostility to Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg and hinted that the Anschluss would come before long. Since Hitler had told his advisers of his general plans a few days earlier at the meeting recorded in the Hossbach memorandum, the Hungarian leaders received rather similar views from all their major conversations. Nevertheless, they appear not to have recognized how quickly the Germans might move. If the possible return of Slovakia and the annexation of Ruthenia were dangled before the eager eyes of the Magyars as their loot from the destruction of Czechoslovakia, the annexation of Austria by Germany opened up the possibility of a return of the Burgenland area, ceded by Hungary to Austria under the terms of the peace settlement. The evidence on German offers of this area to Hungary and on Hitler’s policy about the fate of the Burgenland is fragmentary and contradictory.'>’ Until new information becomes available, the known details should probably be interpreted in terms of a pattern Hitler followed repeatedly. If another power would share the risks of drastic action, he would share the booty with them, and even do so generously from his point of view. If another power,

however,

benefits later, he would stubbornly decline. When the Hungarians refused to go along with him in the Czechoslovak crisis, they would get only scraps; and when they tried for more later, Hitler called a halt. When the Soviets agreed to go along with him in 1939, he was prepated to offer more than Stalin thought of. asking; but when the Russians collected a part of their booty without risks in 1940, he was annoyed. When Lithuania declined to join in the attack on Poland in 1939, she was traded to the Soviet Union for a piece of Poland instead of becoming a German satellite expanded by the Vilna area she had so long hoped to recover. When Finland and Romania played important roles in the attack on the Soviet Union, Hitler was willing to allot them generous shares of the vast lands he planned to conquer—having earlier been willing to sacrifice their interests in the 17 153. G.D., C, 6, No. 423; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 264; Travers (chargé a.i. Budapest) dispatch 711 of

;

June 1937, State 762.64/69; R 5254/4067/67, FO 371/21141.

Brammer, 154. D.D.F,, 2d, 6, No. 173; Kausch, “Informationsbericht Nr. 90,” 21 May 1937, Bundesarchiv,

'

Z.Sg. 101/30, ff.437—-41. 155. On this visit, see nn. 131 and 139, above; Macartney,

1:202—4 and the sources

cited there; Hungarian

1937 plus enclosures Documents, 1, No. 313; Zsigmond, pp. 261-62; Montgomery dispatch 891 of 2 December

D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 231, 9-12, State 762.64/84; Dodd dispatch 3767 of 6 December 1937, State 762.64/85;

ae: 276, 329. on the desirability of 156. Note that when Géring was in Poland in February 1938, he and Beck agreed improving

Hungarian-Romanian

relations, but Goring

thought progress

unlikely because

of Hungarian

SE 1 intransigence (Lipski Papers, No. 79). No. 391. This question is 157. A good summary in Macartney, 1:206, esp. n. 6. See also Hungarian Documents, 1, 8 (1972), 7-101; or Andrew not touched on in the section dealing with Burgenland in Austrian History Yearbook, (Madison: University of WisconAustria Burgenland, of Study Geographical and History A Borderland: F. Burghardt’s sin Press, 1962).

460

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

deal with Stalin. There are other examples of this pattern, but no exceptions. According to this manner of Hitler’s procedure, it is probably best to assume that had Hungary moved in March 1938 simultaneously with Germany, thereby sharing the tisks and opprobrium, Hitler would probably have left them with the Burgenland; but when they expressed a desire for it a few days later, Hitler was confident that the crisis was over and those who had not shared in the cooking could not expect to participate in the meal.!58 The best that Hungary could obtain from Berlin was a promise that Germany would respect the border of 1919.1! In subsequent months, Germany’s relations with Hungary were dominated by the ctisis over Czechoslovakia. Berlin continued to want Hungary’s participation. The Hungarians were perfectly willing and even eager to do so but were held back by fear of Czechoslovakia’s Little Entente allies, especially Yugoslavia, as well as their worry about a general war resulting from a German attack on Czechoslovakia. In regard to the latter issue, the Hungarians tried to maintain good relations with Britain and the United States.!© They would even try during the state visit of August 1938 to discourage Hitler from running the risk of what they were sure would be a losing world war. They continued the negotiations with Yugoslavia and the other Little Entente powers, hoping to keep a free hand toward Czechoslovakia but unable to do so completely.!®! Although the German leaders repeatedly reproached the Hungarians about their diffidence, they would never take the one step which might have removed its most obvious cause—or revealed that the Hungarians were merely using it as an excuse: a German guarantee against the danger of Yugoslavia’s coming to Czechoslovakia’s aid. This issue had been brought up when Daranyi and de Kanya were in Berlin; it was repeatedly raised by Hungarian military leaders with their German counterparts;!° and it was placed before the Germans several times in 1938 through diplomatic channels.'° Given the obvious military danger to Hungary, and Germany’s interest in mobilizing additional enemies against Czechoslovakia, why were the Germans not willing to satisfy the Hungarian demand for a German guarantee of Yugoslav neutrality, especially after the Anschluss gave Germany a common border with Yugoslavia and hence a stronger position for threatening that country? On this critical question, the German attitude is clear enough—Hitler refused—but the reasons must be inferred from indirect evidence.’ Several factors may be adduced 158. This was an expression Hitler used on a similar occasion, referring to the attack on Czechoslovakia during the Hungarian state visit of August 1938 (G.D., D, 2, No. 383). Macartney accepts a similar interpretation. There had clearly been no follow-up in Budapest of the 28 May 1937 suggestion by the Hungarian minister in Vienna that Hungary make diplomatic preparations to substitute for German annexation of Austria a par-

tition of that country in which Hungary would regain her pre-1919 western border, and the southern portion of Carinthia would be turned over to Yugoslavia in exchange for the retrocession of the Bacska to Hungary (Jedlicka and Neck, p. 202). 159, Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 438, 443; G.D., D, 2, No. 182; 5, No. 183. There had been occasional talk

about a German claim to adjacent parts of West Hungary. 160. Note that Hungary made its semiannual payment on its relief debt to the United States on 15 December 1937 and continued to do so until 1941 (U.S. 1938, 2:553, n. 4; cf. ibid., 555, 556). For a warning against a full

alignment with Berlin from the Hungarian minister in London, see Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 447. Hungary also refused to leave the League (ibid., 2, No. 227). 161. See n. 149, above. For the continued negotiations in 1938, see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 399, 422; 2,

Nos. 100, 102, 111, 113, 114, 116, 118, 122, 126, 130, 132, 134, 151, 153, 154, 156, 158, 159, 161, 165, 168-70, 184, 188, 195, 223, 230, 234, 236, 242, 248, 251, 253, 254, 256-88 passim; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 176, 199, 216, 219, 221. Throughout the documents, there are signs of British attempts to urge both sides to agreement.

162. Adam, p. 92.

163. A summary in Macartney, 1:207, 210-11, 235. Key documents in G.D., D, 2, No. 114; 5, Nos. 160, 161, 165 n. 1, 173, 177, 178, 190-92; Documents secrets, 2, Nos. 10-12, 17.

164. Note that at one point Hitler was apparently willing to consider some sort of guarantee (G.D., D, 5, No.

163).

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

461

to explain the German policy. First, there was the persona l element. Certainly Géring, and after the January meeting between Hitler and Stojadi novié, Hitler also greatly preferred the Yugoslav strong man to the Hungarian leaders they met. Von Neurath, and yet more strongly his successor von Ribbentrop, shared these sentime nts. Stojadinovié was a man after their own heart, while Daranyi and de Kanya, Horthy and Imrédy (Daranyi’s successor) all appeared to them as hesitant, which was bad enough , but also as somehow

not really pro-German, which was worse, and incidentally, true. A second factor, which will be examined in connection with the ctisis ovet Czechos lovakia, was Hitler’s belief

that a German attack on that country would not in fact set off a general war, so that Hungary’s fears wete unwarranted. Third, there was concetn that any German commitment to Hungary could easily have the opposite of the intended effect; instead of facilitating an agreement between Hungary and Yugoslavia that would split the Little Entente, it might result in pushing the three more closely together than ever, especially frighte ning Yugoslavia back into the arms of her old associates, Finally, there may have been a feeling that Hungary, especially after the Avschluss, really had no choice but to line up with Germany; and that if the Hungarians were as eaget to reclaim the ancient lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen as they always asserted, they would have to share in the moves and risks of German policy on whatever terms Germany might be pleased to allot them .'6 In the face of the German refusal, the Hungarians tried in May and June 1938, but

with not much greater success, to secure Italy’s support against Yugoslavia to restrain the latter. Although perfectly willing to see Czechoslovakia destroyed, the Italian government was not willing to sacrifice its new relationship with Yugoslavia to Hungary’s fears and would not commit itself as firmly as Budapest wanted.'® The only other country in the atea with which Hungary could concert her policy was Poland. This has already been touched on from the Polish side; from the standpoint of Budapest this meant coopeta-

tion with the one European country for which the Hungarians felt some real affection. From common antagonism to Habsburgs and Romanovs there had emerged a sympathy that now looked to a common border to result from the dissolution of Czechoslovakia,

there being the rather unrealistic thought that such a common border would then make the Polish-Hungarian combination a barrier to both German and Soviet expansion. The fly in this ointment was that the Slovak separatists were much more inclined to lean to Poland than to Hungary—their bad memories of Magyar domination being even stronger than their sense of grievance against the Czechs—while Beck repeatedly toyed with the idea of some association of Slovakia with Poland. Nevertheless, the Hungarians

secured at least ostensible Polish endorsement of their claim to almost all of Slovakia and Ruthenia, with only small border adjustments to be made in favor of Poland.'® In spite of the pleasant words exchanged between Budapest and Warsaw, the Hungarians were

probably not as confident of the intentions of their Polish friends as they pretended to be, so that in this direction also there were clouds over the bright hopes of revision

accompanying any partition of Czechoslovakia. As if Hungarian enthusiasm for throwing themselves into adventures on the side of Germany were not sufficiently dampened by all these factors, domestic worries provided additional problems. The new government of Bela Imrédy, who succeeded Daranyi in May 1938, was in some ways more sympathetic to Berlin than its predecessor, but the contacts of German intelligence and other agencies with the far right in Hungarian 165. Cf. C 1872/132/18, FO 371/21674. 166. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 119, 268, 269; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 213, 315; Macartney, 1:233-35.

167. Kerekes, No. 13 Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 389 (German text in Zsigmond, pp. 262-63, nn. 42 and 43),

Adam, No. 7; Zsigmond, pp. 267-68, n. 53; Hoensch, pp. 58-67.

462

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

politics aroused the detestation of the regent as well as most members of the cabinet. The ruling elite of Hungary was still inclined to look with some favor on Hitler’s regime; they found it hard to believe that anyone who in their eyes was so obviously correctly anti-Semitic could be wrong on anything else. Nevertheless, like many of Germany’s conservative nationalists, they looked down distastefully at the rowdy young loudmouths who were as conspicuous in their own as in Germany’s fascist movement, and they bitterly resented the real and imagined ties of the Arrow Cross movement to Berlin.'° The internal problems of the summer of 1938 must, therefore, be seen as another influence on Hungary’s policy toward Germany. The Hungarian explanation to the British that Horthy’s visit to Germany in August 1938 was a purely ceremonial one was certainly incorrect.!® Nevertheless, the refusal of Hungary at that time to join in a combined operation against Czechoslovakia, coming at the same moment as her agreement with the Little Entente—however that agreement might be explained by de Kanya—marked a real crack in German-Hungarian relations. The impact of this development on German policy toward Hungary during the Czechoslovak crisis will be reviewed in the context of the latter, but it had become obvious to

Berlin that Hungary was simply not a reliable ally within the definition established by Hitler. The fact that Horthy during his visit suggested to Hitler that he would be willing to utge the Poles to return the Corridor to Germany must have shown the German leader how hopelessly the Hungarian had misunderstood him. Hitler was trying to line up evetybody and anybody on his side to gang up on Czechoslovakia for a quick and decisive little war that would smash that country and transfer the pieces to her neighbors; and here was the Hungarian regent talking about revising the Treaty of Versailles and in a mannet almost calculated to split the very coalition against Czechoslovakia that Hitler was ttying to form. The German record simply states that Hitler asked Horthy to refrain from making such a proposal;!”° what he thought was presumably about as courteous as the “nonsense, shut-up!” with which he interrupted Horthy’s exposé of the danger of starting a war that would become general and that Great Britain would win in the end.!7! The repeated, even if unwelcome, German suggestions to Hungary that she arrive at some agreement with Romania must be seen as a symptom of Germany’s changed policy toward the latter country. In the first years after Hitler came to power in Germany, Berlin had looked upon Romania as aligned with France and the Little Entente against Germany. The identification of Nicolae Titulescu, Romania’s foreign minister, with the policy of collective security made him and his country the objects of German hostility; and all soundings for more friendly relations coming from Bucharest were rejected out of hand.'”* This was due to the belief that nothing could be usefully accomplished, not to any lack of interest in a change of Romania’s policy. German interests in Romania were of two kinds, diplomatic and economic. The diplomatic interest was the concern that Romania’s ties to Czechoslovakia and France might lead her to an agreement with the Soviet Union analogous to those of the other two, thereby outflanking the barrier that Poland provided against Soviet help for Czechoslovakia. Germany had encouraged the elements in Romanian politics opposed to any Romanian treaty with the Soviet Union and rejoiced in the August 1936 dismissal of Titulescu, who had himself had serious 168. Macartney, 1:210—30; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 440, 458; 2, Nos. 129, 197, 199. The German press

was instructed to keep quiet about the Hungarian cabinet crisis, “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 12 May 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 169. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 276.

170. G.D., D, 5, No. 52. 171. Macartney, 1:242. 172. For German-Romanian relations before 1937, see above, pp. 94-95, 180-81, 251-53.

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reservations about such a treaty but had been the Romanian leader most likely to approve a mutual assistance pact with Russia. The economic interests of Germany in Romania had been relatively small to begin with. Since Getmany was buying substantial quantities of agricultural products from Yugoslavia and Hungary as part of her political and economic policy toward those countries, she was not so interested as yet in taking Romania’s wheat. There were, however, some factors drawing the Germans toward Romania. The great deficit in meeting Germany’s needs for vegetable fats and oils might be met in part by expanding soybean acreage in Southeast Europe, including Romania, and efforts wete being made in this direction. Even more important was Romania’s greatest natural asset beside her tich farms: Europe’s most productive oil fields outside the Soviet Union. Because of high Ptices as compared with other petroleum exporters, Romanian oil had not been shipped to Germany in large quantities in the past; but the future needs of the growing German air force may well have been a factor in Goring’s adding Romania to his other pet projects, Poland and Yugoslavia, about the time in 1936 when he was entrusted by Hitler with responsibility for Germany’s raw materials and foreign exchange problems. A German-Romanian trade agreement had already been signed in 1935, and after the dismissal of Titulescu, the road for strengthening both political and economic relations between Germany and Romania appeared to be open. One possible source of tension did not, in fact, cause the trouble that might have

been expected. Although the German minority in Romania was substantially larger than that in Hungary—about 800,000 as compared with a bit over half a million—there was practically none of the anxiety over them that frequently had such bad repercussions on German-Hungarian relations. This was not due either to the greater beneficence of the Romanians to their national minorities or the stronger loyalty of those of German background in Romania to their adopted country. The two elements of perhaps greatest significance in calming what could have been a great source of friction were the distance between Romania and Germany—unlike the situation of Hungary with a substantial and dangerously compact area of German settlement adjacent to the border with Austria— and the internal bickering within the German minority, which was even more continuous and divisive than normally characteristic of these groups in Europe.!” The one special factor that did cast a cloud over German relations with Romania was, even more than in the case of Hungary, the practice of various German National

Socialist party and other agencies of dabbling in internal Romanian politics. Alfred Rosenberg’s National Socialist party foreign policy office (APA) and, from all appearances, a whole host of other German organizations were not only working at cross-putposes with each other in. dealing with the German element in Romania but were financing and attempting to influence, and were in various forms of contact with, a

number of groups on the lunatic fringe of Romanian politics. These contacts, especially those with the Iron Guard of Cornelius Codreanu, had greatly annoyed King Carol; they would serve as a continuing source of difficulties; and they were a cause of repeated protests to Berlin. in 173. See Jacobsen, pp. 570-80, for a brief survey. Geza C. Paikert, The Danube Swabians: German Populations

Hungary, Romania and Yugoslavia and Hitler's Impact on Their Patterns (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1967), contains considerable detail. Margot Hegemann, “Die Deutsche Volksgruppe in Rumanien—cine Fiinfte Kolonne des

confirms the deutschen Imperialismus in Siidosteuropa,” Jahrbuch fiir Geschichte der UdSSR, 4 (1960), 374-15,

insignificance of these National Socialist groups in 1937-39. The important study IIle Reich et le pétrole roumain, 1938-1940 (Geneva: A. W. Sijthoff, 1977), pp. 90-91, role of the German minority. A useful but superficial survey of their tiresome Wolfgang Miege, Das Dritte Reich und die Dentsche Volksgruppe in Rumdanien 1933-38

1972).

by Philippe Marguerat, Le takes a similar view of the quarrels will be found in (Frankfurt/M: Peter Lang,

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

464

All the details of these contacts are not clear; but it is known that the Romanian

government found out about them and that various embarrassing documents fell into the wrong hands. Furthermore, those whom the Germans most favored, the tiny group around Octavian Goga, was in a position of real influence for only a few weeks in the winter of 1937-38, while the Iron Guard could secure no real position at all—until the Germans allowed a few of its membets to set up a shadow “govetnment-in-exile” after Romania had gone over to the Allies in August 1944. German ties to the perennial losers of Romanian

politics, therefore, served to hinder rather than hasten closer German-

Romanian ties; their only importance for an understanding of those ties in 1937-38 being that the progress of the rapprochement in spite of the constant aggravation shows how imperative the factors pushing the two countries together were perceived to be in Bucharest as well as Berlin.1”4 The German desire for better relations with Romania was made evident by the assurances given to the Romanian government when Georges Bratianu, leader of the Young Liberals, was in Berlin in the fall of 1936.75 The key issue, then and later, was the

attitude of Germany toward Hungary’s desire for revision of her border with Romania. Once the Berlin authorities had indicated that their friendship for Hungary did not extend to support for the return of Transylvania to Magyar control, they could be sure of making up for Hungarian disappointment by Romanian gratitude. Although unwilling to make any public and explicit statement recognizing the existing border, for fear of excessive offense to Hungary,'” Hitler did repeat. to Mircea Djuvara, when he was appointed the new Romanian minister to Berlin in April 1938, what he had previously told Bratianu in November 1936. Germany was not interested in the territorial disputes between the Balkan states, an assertion that Djuvara correctly interpreted as meaning that Germany would not support the revisionist aspirations of Hungary against Romania.!7” Djuvara was the replacement for Nicolae Petrescu-Comnen who had been minister in Berlin since 1932 and had been appointed Romanian foreign minister in the course of the upheaval in Romanian domestic affairs; his appointment was actually a sign of King Carol’s interest in good relations with Germany, a point of considerable importance in view of the nature of that upheaval.!78 The Romanian elections of 20 November 1937 had shown a decline in the public support for the Liberal government of Gheorghe Tatarescu, prime minister since 1934. King Carol thereupon appointed Goga prime minister. Goga’s party, the Christian Nationalists, had not even secured 10 percent of the popular vote. Carol may have been trying to show up the absurdity of Goga’s pretensions, or he may have thought that the limitation this small popular base imposed on Goga would make him completely dependent on royal support. In any case, the apparent triumph of Hitler’s voluble 174, On the German ties to Goga and the Iron Guard, as well as Romanian protests, see n. 172, above, and Jacobsen, pp. 79-84; Marguerat, pp. 86-90; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 157 n. 3, 164, 186. The raids on Iron Guard head-

quarters after Carol’s coup of 10 February 1938 produced evidence of ties to Germany, some of which was used in the subsequent trial of Codreanu and his associates; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 203-5, 207-8; R 4515/9/37, FO 371/22450; Franklin Mott Gunther to Moffat, 19 May 1938, Moffat Papers, vol. 13. For an interesting effort to

place the Iron Guard in the context of Romanian history, see Stephen Fischer-Galati’s piece “Fascism in Romania,” in Peter F. Sugar (ed.), pp. 112-21. 175. See above, p. 252. 176. The reference to the existing border in Goga’s telegram of greetings to Hitler on 1 January 1938 was the main reason for neither its text nor Hitler’s reply being published (G.D., D, 5, No. 157; “Informationsbericht Nr. 2, Das deutsch-rumanische Verhiltnis,” 4 January 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammet, Z.Sg. 101/32, f. 6; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 115). See also “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 6 January 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.9.

177. G.D., D, 5, No. 196. 178. Ibid., No. 171. On Comnen, see his not always reliable memoirs, Preludi del grande dramma (Rome: Leonardo, 1947).

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

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admirer was short-lived. Unprepared for office and untouched by any leadership ability, Goga neither broadened his base at home nor atoused enthusiasm abroad. At home the Iron Guard

reluctantly tolerated him while all others stood aside, half amused, half

appalled. Abroad, the Germans thought he lacked suppott,!” while Britain and France protested against the anti-Semitic measures of the new government, pointedly reminding the Romanians of their treaty obligations.!8° Even President Roosevelt expressed his concern, giving a warning message for King Carol to the departing Romanian minister to Washington, who was himself going back to Bucharest to urge his government to keep out of the Axis orbit.!§! On 10 February 1938 King Carol dismissed Goga and in a coup teplaced the constitution as well as the cabinet.'®? It was in the new government, now

quite subservient to the king, that Petrescu-Comnen became foreign minister and under its direction that the Iron Guard leaders were tried and sentenced. Both before and after this extraordinary drama, the Romanians tried to improve their relations with Berlin. They shared with Yugoslavia in rejecting the plan supported by France and Czechoslovakia for the conversion of the Little Entente into a mutual assistance system.'*? The government in Bucharest wanted to keep its existing ties; like Stojadinovic, King Carol was reluctant to give up the reinsurance provided by the agreements with France and the Little Entente, but he was willing to have them balanced by good relations with Germany.'** He hoped for closer relations with Great Britain without France as intermediary. He admired and feared Germany, but feared and disliked the Soviet Union.!8° In the spring of 1937, the Romanian government did sound the Soviet government on the possibility of a friendship pact, analogous to the Yugoslav-Italian settlement, in exchange for formal Soviet renunciation of Bessarabia, but Moscow was not willing to go along with such a project. The Soviet leaders would not renounce their claim to Bessarabia unless Romania were more forthcoming, but their very rejection of the proposal undoubtedly heightened Romanian suspicions of Soviet territorial ambitions.'** This must be seen as part of the background to Romania’s continuing move toward the Axis. Bucharest was dubious about Germany’s urging of a settlement with Hungary, and Romanian objections to concessions in favor of the Magyar element in Transylvania proved a major delaying factor in the negotiations between Hungary and the members of 179. Note Géring’s comments to Beck on 23 February 1938, Lipski Papers, No. 79. actions, 180. U.S. 1938, 1:5-G. The exchanges between London and Bucharest protesting against Romania’s

36, reporting similar French steps, and urging a postponement of King Carol’s planned trip to London are in R

American R 109/9/37, FO 371/22447; R 924, R 926/9/37, FO 371 /22448; R 1161/153/37, FO 371/22453.

close relations with reports on the situation are in U.S. 1938, 2:672-83. For Romanian efforts to maintain government was still inFrance even during the Goga period, see D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 400, 401; but the French sistent on the issue of anti-Semitic legislation, see ibid., 8, Nos 73) 152) 163:

181. Moffat Diary, 31 December

1937, Moffat Papers, vol. 39; R 324/9/37, FO 371/22447. The text of

by the Italians who passed Romanian Minister Davila’s report of 29 December 1937 was intercepted and read

ff.141-42. Cf. DD it on to the Germans on 6 January 1938, DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60963,

Fas2de ie

No. 394.

See also Miege, pp. 237-39, 244, 328— 182. For a German interpretation of the coup, see G.D., D, 5, No. 179.

33

No. 65. 183. See above, pp. 346-48. See also G.D., C, 6, Nos. 270, 305; D, 1, to Bucharest in December 1937, see Delbos of visit the On 145. No. 5, 69; No. 1, D, 197; No. 6, 184. Ibid., C, document in T-120, 1041/1809/ vak Czechoslo 1937, December 11 of D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 327; Veverka report

413866-67.

and Masaryk to Krofta, 19 July 1937, Czecho185. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 286; Osusky to Krofta, 17 July 1937, . 497048—55 6/D 1316/237 T-120, slovak documents in Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/ 1809/ 186. D.D.F.,, 2d, 5, No. 396; Krofta circular of 3 June 1937, be reversed. The Romanians wete so afraid of the 413874. By 1938 the situation would, as will be seen,

Russian troops in exchange for recognition of Germans that they stated they would not agree to the transit of possession of Bessarabia.

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the Little Entente that culminated in the Bled agreement of August 1938, but this reticence did not apply to her relations with Germany.'*’ Especially after the coup of 10 February 1938, King Carol took pains to reassure the Germans and to try to keep the Iron Guard trials from damaging relations with Berlin.!* From the point of view of Germany, the advantages of improved relations with Romania were obvious: politically there was the possibility of isolating Czechoslovakia; economically there was the hope of increased imports of petroleum. When von Neurathwas in Rome in May 1937, he had explained to Count Ciano the desirability of bringing Romania closer to the Axis.'8? In January 1938 he told Josef Beck, the Polish foreign minister, who had been working hard to strengthen even further the close relations between Poland and Romania, that in the Titulescu years Germany had rejected all approaches from Bucharest, but that now the situation had changed and GermanRomanian relations were fine.!°° There was still the feeling that Germany had best not get too close to Romania,!*! presumably because of the repercussions on GermanHungarian relations, but Berlin was well pleased with the situation where Romania stood

aside and hence helped shield German ambitions in Central Europe. In the economic field, the agreement of 1935 worked satisfactorily, but during 1937,

the German government wanted to broaden the basis and raise the level of GermanRomanian trade.'? A series of negotiations ensued, and a special German economic delegation, headed by Helmuth Wohlthat of Goring’s staff, was sent to Bucharest in November 1937 to work out an agreement. The Germans were willing to make considerable concessions, for political as well as economic reasons, in order to secure a new

treaty with Romania. Such a treaty was signed on 9 December 1937 and clearly marked a new stage in Germany’s economic offensive in Southeast Europe as well as her hopes of realizing greater petroleum imports from Romania.!% During the course of 1938, the Germans found that they wanted even more Romanian oil, both to meet the needs of their growing air force and to keep the newly acquited oil refineries of Austria fully employed. The only way this could be accomplished was to increase German arms exports to Romania and secure Romanian agreement to additional oil exports. The Germans agreed among themselves to try for such a scheme, not only to obtain the oil supplies, but also to head off British and French economic moves designed to counter German economic influence. The fact that the Romanians approved the extra oil shipments to Germany on 13 August 1938, just as the crisis over Czechoslovakia—Romania’s Little Entente partner—was reaching a culminating point may serve as an indication of the extent to which Germany had succeeded in winning Romania to her side.!% As in the case of Yugoslavia, the strategic position of Romania had induced the Germans to develop good relations with one of the successor states and to shift their position, at least temporarily, from backing revision of the 1919 peace settlement to effective endorsement of the status quo. In the case of Romania, there was the additional 187. On the negotiations leading to the Bled agreement, see above, pp. 454-55. Cf. G.D., C, 6, No. 472.

188. Ibid., 5, Nos. 186, 203-5. 189. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 115-17 (Italian text in DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60951, ff.105—9). 190. Lipski Papers, No. 75; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 114.

191. G.D., D, 5, No. 189. 192. Ibid., C, 6, Nos. 142, 210. 193. On these negotiations, see Marguerat, p. 98; “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom November 1937,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004113-15; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 147, 154; D.D.F.,, 2d, 8, No. 184.

22.

194. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 201, 212, 218; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 262. Marguerat, pp. 15-21, 96-98, stresses

Germany’s interest in Romanian oil, but he also shows how British and French influence in the Romanian

economy thwarted German efforts.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

467

lure of oil. This not only affected Germany’s policy toward Hungarian revisionis t aspirations in Transylvania but moderated Berlin’s attitude toward Bulgaria. In the period before 1937, German-Bulgarian relations were good, though as yet not of great importance to either country.!°° The economic role of Germany in Bulgaria was already considerable and would grow further, as will be seen; but the political relations were affected by considerations only rarely alluded to in the record. Germany’s open wooing of Yugoslavia meant that Bulgaria’s aspirations for revision in that direction would get no support from Berlin. On the contrary, the Yugoslav-Bulgarian Friendship Pact of January 1937 was extremely welcome to Germany.'% As for Bulgarian hopes of recovering the Dobruja from Romania, this conflicted with Germany’s hope of weaning the latter country away from her old ties. More important even than the friendship of Bulgaria in case of war would be Germany’s need for Romanian oil, and this higher priority, although mentioned only once by the German minister in Sofia, necessarily restrained German sponsorship of Bulgarian aims.17 The atmosphere of political relations between Germany and Bulgaria accordingly remained close in 1937—38, but without any dramatic developments. Von Neurath visited Sofia during his Balkan tour of June 1937; and though there were no special results, the visit demonstrated the harmony of old friends.!°8 Within the limits set by Germany’s relations with Romania, this situation continued thereafter. The continuing evolution of German-Bulgarian economic relations was of major importance in this regard. Germany was a key market for Bulgarian tobacco but also began to pay more and more attention to the exploitation of Bulgarian ores. The Four-Year Plan’s ROWAK as well as various German private firms became increasingly involved in the Bulgarian mining industry, though most of the impact of this on actual trade would not be felt until the period of World War IL. As German imports built up great clearing balances in favor of Bulgaria, the latter turned to Germany for military supplies. Like the other powers defeated in the World War, Bulgaria had had restrictions imposed upon her army and armaments by the peace settlement; and like Hungary, she

was now beginning to rearm. Even before 1937, Bulgaria had turned to Germany for equipment for her expanded army. This tendency was greatly accelerated in 1937-38, extensive negotiations taking place to provide both the materials and the credit terms Bulgaria wanted. King Boris took a direct personal interest in the matter, and an agreement was eventually signed on 12 March 1938. Political as well as financial reasons had motivated both sides in the talks, with the agreement marking a major step in the alignment of Bulgaria with Germany.2 There were occasional minor frictions, but, on the whole, Germany could be well satisfied that Sofia would adopt no policy hostile to her

195. See above, pp. 95, 181, 254. 196. G.D., C, 6, No. 132; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 65.

197. G.D., D, 5, No. 206. 198. On the von Neurath visit, see DZA

Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.84-86; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 416

(also 1-11, 884/5632525—26), 417; D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 193.

199, “Bericht der Deutschen Revisions- und Treuhand-Aktiengesellschaft Berlin iber die bei der Rowak Handelsgesellschaft m.b.H., Berlin vorgenommenen Priifung des Jahresabschlusses zum 31. Dezember 1937,”

Anhang, p. 3, Bundesarchiv, R 2/27, £. 65; Deutsche Revisions- und Treuhand-Aktiengesellschaft to Minister in of Finance, 2 June 1937, ibid., ff.103—4; Klaus Sohl, “Die Kriegsvorbereitungen des deutschen Imperialismus

Bulgarien am Vorabend des zweiten Weltktieges,” Jabrbiicher fiir Geschichte der UdSSR und der volksdemokratischen ane Lander, 3 (1959), 99-100.

von Neurath, 200. On the negotiations, see G.D., C, 6, No. 559; D, 5, Nos. 146, 166-68, 175, 181; Rimelin to

to 22, October 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.157—-58. For some details of German supplies

Bulgaria, see Sohl, pp. 110-13. It should be noted that Parvan Draganov, who played a key tole in these Berlin until 22 negotiations on the Bulgarian side, was minister to Vienna at the time and was not transferred to

April 1938.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

and that Bulgaria would continue to follow the lead of Berlin.” The situation was by no means quite the same in Greece, appearances to the contrary.202 German influence in Greece had been growing, and German willingness to take a substantial portion of the Greek tobacco ctop had been an important element in creating a major role for Germany in Greek foreign trade. Furthermore, there was at least the presumption that the dictatorial regime of Jean Metaxas would look to Berlin for inspiration. The Greek government, nevertheless, wished to maintain good ties with Great Britain, and there was considerable resistance to German economic domination.

Although at first skeptical, the authorities in London were eventually persuaded that the protestations of King George II of Greece were indeed genuine, and that the Athens regime was in fact desperately trying to fend off a German economic stranglehold on the country.23 It would take the British government a long time to do anything about this; not until the winter of 1938-39 did London begin to move on the Greek requests for economic and political support. In the meantime, the economic dependence of Greece on Germany as well as her need of arms imports from Germany—ironically wanted in

part because of the German-assisted rearmament of Bulgaria as well as the threat of Germany’s Italian ally—all combined to keep German influence in Greece high, even if it was unwelcome.? In regard to Turkey, Germany was already in open competition for influence with Britain and France.2° The strategic position of the country which controlled the Straits made it an eagerly sought associate, Turkey’s desirability as a friend being further enhanced by her importance as a source of chrome ore. In the economic field, Germany had been trying to regain the strong position she once held in Turkey’s internal economy and foreign trade with some success before 1937.2°7 When German imports from Turkey had built up too large a clearing balance in favor of the latter, Berlin placed restrictions on them so that by the spring of 1938 a rough balance had been reached between Germany’s exports of industrial goods and weapons for imports primarily of chrome ore, wheat, and tobacco.?°8 Almost half of Turkey’s foreign trade was with Germany, and the political as well as economic significance of this tie was underlined by the sending of the secretary general of the Turkish Foreign Ministry, Numan Menemencioglu, to Berlin in the summer of 1938 for the negotiation of a new trade agreement. Numan was known in Berlin to be a leading, if not the leading advocate of close

relations with Germany in the Ankara government. It is obvious from the tecord that to strengthen his position, the Germans were prepared to go further to meet his wishes than would otherwise have been the case. There was also the clear sense of competition with England, which had signed a credit agreement with Turkey in May and was trying hard to prevent German economic domination of that country. The German-Turkish 201. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 202, 206; Rumelin to von Neurath, 19 January 1938, DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte

60964, ff. 181-82; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 245; Hans-Joachim Hoppe, “Deutschland und Bulgarian, 1918— 1945,” Funke, pp. 605-7. For the French credit to Bulgaria in the summer of 1938 and Riimelin’s calm comments, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 217, 222, 226. 202. For the 1933—36 period, see above, pp. 95, 181, 254-55.

203. R 2296, R 2346/349/19, FO 371/21147; R 2167/387/19, FO 371/21148; D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 237; Dimitri Kitsikis, “La Gréce entre l’Angleterre et Allemagne de 1936 4 1941,” Revue historique, 238 (July—Sept. 1967), 93,

99-105; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 189. 204. See below, p. 678-79. See also Ehrengard Schramm-von Thadden, Griechenland und die Grossmachte im Zeiten Weltkrieg (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1955), pp. 10-11; Pratt, pp. 148-51, 155-56.

205. G.D., C, 6, No. 396. 206. Very useful on the British effort to outbid Germany in Turkey in 1937-38 is Pratt, pp. 140-48, 207. See above, pp. 95, 181, 254-56.

208. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 538, 545.

Germany, Eastern Exrope, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

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agreement signed on 25 July 1938 went far to meet German wishes for assurances of chrome and wheat supplies in exchange for German concessions on technical questions of trade control.” Even the possibility of a German-Turkish credit agreement was discussed; but although nothing came of this until after Munich, the success of Numan’s mission guaranteed Germany an exceedingly strong position in Turkey’s foreign trade in spite of all Britain’s efforts.2!° On the political side, the competition was as keen, but Getmany’s success not quite as great. Turkey benefited from the rising power of Germany without herself having to make concessions to Berlin. The German remilitarization of the Rhineland had provided the occasion for Turkey to throw off some of the restrictions imposed on her control of the Straits by the Treaty of Lausanne. The new situation had been regulated by the Montreux convention, but the German effort to join this arrangement was delayed by Turkish legalisms and subterfuges of various sorts.”!! Von Ribbentrop had urged a settlement of this matter on Numan when the latter was in Berlin for the economic negotiations, but neither then nor when the Turkish official presented a plan to cope with this question in early 1939 was this issue settled.?!2 Just as the remilitarization of the Rhineland had enabled Turkey to secure revision of the peace settlement in one respect, so the continued growth of German power made it possible for her to obtain another major change in which she was interested—and again without having to make concessions to Germany. The one place in which a compact area of Turkish population had been cut off by the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire was at the northeast corner of the Mediterranean where the Sanjak of Alexandretta with its substantial Turkish population had been included in the French mandate of Syria. In the face of the rising threat of Germany, the French government decided to accommodate Turkey in this regard; and exceedingly lengthy and complicated negotiations led to a Franco-Turkish agreement in July 1938 under which the province received first an autonomous status and was subsequently incorporated into Turkey.?!% The Germans would have liked to offset the Franco-Turkish agreement by a neutrality treaty with Turkey themselves, but the Turkish government in 1938 declined to go beyond official assurances of abstention from anti-German groups and neutrality in case of conflict.2!4 The Turks were presumably reluctant to do anything that might openly antagonize France, the power from which they hoped to secure Alexandretta; and the Germans had to content themselves for the time being with the economic agreement and the role in Turkey’s trade that it assured them. The competition for Turkey’s favor would continue after Munich; but in spite of pleasantries and assurances, Germany did not obtain the political guarantees of Turkish neutrality in case of war that she very much wanted to secure.2!5 On the other hand, the Turkish government had been careful—and would continue to be careful—not to become involved in any atrangement pointed against der 209. Ibid., Nos. 545-47, 549; Johannes Glasneck and Inge Kircheisen, Ti/rkei und Afghanistan—Brennpunkte pp. 20-29, 36— 1968), Wissenschaften, der Verlag Deutscher VEB (Berlin-East: Weltkrieg Zweiten im Orientpolitik

40.

Germany was by far Turkey’s 210. On the credit agreement talk in July 1938, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 552, 553.

most important trading partner; see Josef Ackermann’s account in Funke, pp. 491-93. 211. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 535-37, 540, 541, 543. } é ) bas 212. Ibid., Nos. 548, 550, 556, 558. leading to incorporation 213. On these negotiations, see D.D.F., 2d, 1-7 passim; the subsequent negotiations a Ankara, 1939-1940 (Paris: are detailed by René Massigli in his memoirs, La Turquie devant la guerre, mission Plon, 1964). 214. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 548, 550, 551.

543, 544; “Bestellungen aus der Presse215. On German-Turkish relations in 1937-38, see also ibid., Nos. Z.Sg. 101/10, f£.289, 323. Brammer, iv, Bundesarch 1937, November 2 October, 20 ” konferenz,

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Germany. When the Romanian prime minister, acting on behalf of the Little Entente, was in Ankara in October 1937 to secure Turkish support for the Little Entente’s assistance to Czechoslovakia he was flatly turned down.?!° The government in Ankara was trying hard to keep the country out of any possible involvement in war; and since this was teally what Germany also wanted of Turkey at that time, the stand-off on the Bosporus could hardly be said to be damaging to German policy objectives. German interests in the Near East beyond Turkey were slowly growing but not yet of great importance in 1937-38. There was some expansion of German trade with the atea, but in no portion of it was it even nearly as significant as in Turkey.?!’ German investment and credit policies, though not well coordinated, appear to have been designed to expand Germany’s economic role in the area; but the development of the synthetic oil industry in Germany, together with the turn to increasing petroleum supplies from Romania, suggested that there was a severe limit to Germany’s interest in the oil of the Near East.2!8 Although German progtess in the field of synthetic fibers was not as dramatic as in the case of oil, the thrust of German economic policy was in the same direction and would at some point make her as independent of Egyptian cotton as of Arabian oil. The literature of German relations with the Arab world does not generally touch on these matters, primarily because the available documents take them for granted rather than discussing their implications; but without the background of a situation in

which Germany was trying as a matter of basic policy to make herself more and more independent of the Near East’s most important export products, the limited success of German policy in that portion of the world would be difficult to explain. An important factor in leading Germany to her policy of self-sufficiency was the influence of Britain in the Near East which would threaten to cut off supplies from Germany in case of war. It was this very influence of Britain, however, which also

offered Germany opportunities in the area because it made Germany look like a promising ally against England, as well as against France, to some Arab leaders. An example of this can be seen in the efforts of Rosenberg’s foreign policy office (APA) to develop ties with King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia. The basic element of the project appears to have been the shipment of German rifles and the construction of a cartridge factory on credit terms to Ibn Saud, the latter being interested in reducing his dependence on Great Britain.?! The German Foreign Ministry was willing to establish diplomatic relations with Ibn Saud, a project eventually accomplished by the accreditation of the German minister to Iraq to Saudi Arabia as well, but had doubts about the arms shipments. Not only would they bring no foreign exchange, at least in the Ministry’s opinion, but there was the apparently insurmountable problem of finding dependable Arab intermediaries and the probability that any arms shipped might end up being used against Germany in case of war. As the Saudi Arabian deputy foreign minister himself admitted in a visit to Berlin, the kingdom was so much under British influence that it might well have to go to wat alongside England. In the face of this prospect, the Foreign Ministry, with the support of 216. R 7475/43/67, FO 371/21138. Tatarescu told Sir Percy Loraine, the British ambassador in Ankara, that

only an English statement of support for Czechoslovakia would setve as a deterrent to Germany; Sir Percy pointed out that the British public would not allow such a statement. 217. For the period 1933-36, see above, pp. 255-57. A general discussion from a contemporary petspective in

D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 159. 218. German efforts to secure a part in Iraqi oil concessions had foundered by 1936 (Meier-Dérnberg, pp. 34—

30); 219. This episode is not discussed in Jacobsen’s analysis of the APA, whete only some projects in Turkey and Iran are mentioned (p. 70, n. 13). See T-454, Roll 86; G.D., D, 5, No. 583 n. 3.

Germany, Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, and the Middle East

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the War Ministry, opposed both the arms deal and various related schemes discussed by the German minister to Iraq and Saudi Arabia after his first meeting with Ibn Saud.220 This policy was not teversed until the summer of 1939 when war with England looked incteasingly likely. The Foreign Ministry recommended that the weapons deal now be handled through official channels and actually carried out, and a special emissary of Tbn Saud was assured by Hitler and von Ribbentrop in person of Germany ’s sympathy and willingness to build up Saudi military power.??! It is not clear whether the promised rifles ever reached

Saudi Arabia; but the long and complicated negotiations, further

delayed by German concern for the sensitivity of Italy—which did nothing to help her with the Arabs—may serve as an example of the difficulties of converting German -Arab exchanges of assurances of friendship for each other and hostility to Britain and the Jews into concrete programs of collaboration. This difficulty was particularly obvious in regard to the problem which dominated public attention in the Near East: the conflict in and over Palestine. The Arab rising of 1936 had led to the establishment of a special royal commission, the Peel Commission, - to examine possible solutions to the conflicting claims of Arabs, Jews, and others in the Palestine mandate. Although the details were not revealed until July 1937, it was understood considerably earlier that the commission would recommend partition of the area. In the event, the proposed tripartite division into an Arab state, a small Jewish state, and

a residual mandate, was never implemented in either its original or any amended form.

The Arabs, who rejected the concept of partition entirely, succeeded in having the British

drop any idea of partition. In the face of the rising German menace in Europe, the London government was reluctant to offend the Arab world and the Muslim inhabitants of the British Empire. As France tried to appease Turkey by territorial concessions on the Syrian-Turkish border, so Britain hoped to appease the Arabs by giving up the idea of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine and by imposing even stricter limits on Jewish immigration into the mandated territory (after previously closing the eastern threefourths to Jewish immigration altogether). These gestures would not deter the leaders of the Arab uprising from siding with Germany during World War I, but they seemed to offer Britain some hope of ending the diversion of military resources to Palestine that interfered with the progress of British rearmament.?”2 When

it looked, however, as if there were indeed the prospect of a Jewish state

being created within a portion of Palestine, the Berlin government was greatly concerned; and there seemed to be a basis for cooperation with Arab opponents of the plan.

As for the Arab side, there was no lack of approaches to Germany and expressions of hope for German assistance in scuttling the Peel Commission recommendations. The government of Iraq, in particular, sought German diplomatic support.”*? Haj Amin alHusayni, the leader of the revolt in Palestine, tried to work out some agreement with Germany; it is not clear just when his contacts with Berlin started, but he was already well on the road to his World War II role of recruiter for Heinrich Himmler’s armed units.224 220. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 574, 578, 582-85, 588-90, 592.

;

221. Ibid., 6, Nos. 313, 422, 498, 541; Fritz Grobba, Manner und Machte im Orient (Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1967), p. 106; Werner Otto von Hentig, Mein Leben eine Dienstreise (GOttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1962), pp. 346-47; “Informationsbericht Nr. 65,” 21 June 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, ££.325-27. 222. For a French view of this issue, see D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 174. For the broader problems, see Lukasz

Hirszowicz, The Third Reich and the Arab East (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1966), pp. 22-25; Michael J. Cohen, “British Strategy and the Palestine Question, 1936-39,” Journal ofContemporary History, iG Nos. 3-4 (July-Oct. 1972), 57-83 and “Appeasement in the Middle Hast: The British White Paper in Palestine, May 1939,” Historical Journal, 16, No. 3 (Sept. 1973), 571-96; Pratt, pp. 126-28; Australian Documents, No. 328.

223. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 567, 581.

a

224. Tbid., Nos. 566, 568, 572, 576; Hirszowicz, pp. 34-35. The material on German deliveries to the Arabs

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If the German response to these gestures was not as enthusiastic as might have been anticipated, the obvious disunity among the Arabs as well as the German doubts about the reliability of those with whom they dealt were important factors. There was, moreover, some concern about the fate of the German Templer settlements in Palestine. These small nineteenth-century German Christian settlements were mostly located in the atea provisionally assigned to the Jewish state in the partition plan; and as long as there appeared to be any chance that the plan would be implemented, it behooved Berlin to exercise some caution.225 Germany certainly did not want a Jewish state to be established; Berlin saw in such a state a dangerous strengthening of world Jewish influence but without the prospect of all Jews being concentrated there.?”° On the other hand, as long as the German government was interested in the emigration of Jews from Germany, the Jewish community in Palestine was bound to be strengthened rather than weakened by German policy. Both to hasten Jewish emigration from Germany and to blunt the possibility of a worldwide Jewish boycott of German exports, the German government had agreed in the summer of 1933 to the so-called Haavara Agreement. Under its terms, Jews who emigrated from Germany to Palestine could secure the transfer to Palestine of at least some of their money by arranging for the export of additional German goods to Palestine. The emigrant received proceeds from the sale of the additional German goods in Palestine in exchange for payments out of his blocked funds inside Germany to the German exporter.??”7 This system had worked well from the German point of view. Of the approximately 120,000 Jews who had emigrated by the fall of 1937, one-third had fled to other European countries, one-third had gone to Palestine, and one-third had moved overseas to the United States, Latin America, South Africa, and elsewhere.?28 The

prospects of further Jewish emigration were closely tied up with the maintenance of the Haavata system, even though it obviously contributed to the growth of the Jewish community in Palestine. The prospect of a Jewish state being established within the Holy Land caused the German Foreign Ministry to reexamine the whole question. The Haavara Agreement could be seen as contributing to the thing Berlin certainly did not want—a Jewish state— but there was no assurance that ending it would affect the British decision to go ahead with partition as Berlin expected. Furthermore, there was no certainty that it would make much difference to Jewish immigration into Palestine if Germany pushed her own emigrants in other directions. It was all very easy for Arab leaders to suggest that the Germans use their influence with Poland to keep that country from supporting the creation of a Jewish state to which Poland might drive its Jews. The plausibility of this request merely suggested that any space in Palestine not filled by Jews leaving Germany

during the 1936-39 riot period published in Efraim Dekel, Shai: The Exploits of Hagana Intelligence (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1959), pp. 230-35, suggests that very little was actually sent. 225. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 565, 569. For the history of the Templer settlements, see Alex Carmel, Die Siedlungen der

wiirttembergischen Templer in Palastina, 1868-1918, trans. Perez Leshem (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1973); Carmel has summarized his findings in “The Political Significance of German Settlements in Palestine, 1868-1918,” Jehuda Wallach (ed.), Germany and the Middle East, 1835-1939 (Tel Aviv: Istael Press, 1975), pp. 45-71.

226. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 387, 516; D, 5, Nos. 561, 564, 570, 571. 227. See above, p. 256 n. 127. A detailed study of the system is in Werner Feilchenfeld, Dolf Michaelis, and

Ludwig Pinner, Haavara-Transfer nach Paldstina und Einwanderung deutscher Juden, 1933-1939 (Tiibingen: Mohr, 1972). 228. A sutvey of the whole project by the Reichsstelle fiir Devisenbewirtschaftung, the government agency in charge of foreign exchange controls, which both administered and favored the system, was prepared in November 1937, G.D., D, 5, No. 575. The arrangement also helped the Templer bank (Feilchenfeld, pp. 27, 2):

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would simply be available for those from Poland.22° The National Socialist party’s foreign section, the Auslandsorganisation (AO) had long been arguing for abolition of the Haavara system. The new German consul general in Jerusalem shared this point of view, and the head of the German Foreign Ministry’s section dealing with the Jewish question, Vicco von Bulow-Schwante, argued in favor of more severe persecution of the Jews as a way to drive them out of Germany even if the special transfer system were ended. Others in the Foreign Ministry objected, and the conflict continued for most of 1937 and 1938.20 Even the argument that at some point Arab newspapers might make information about the atrangement public with serious tesults for German prestige in the Arab world did not move the Berlin authorities beyond a willingness to revise the scheme slightly.?3! Although the evidence is indirect, it appears that Hitler decided in January 1938 that he wanted the emigration of Jews to continue and that emigration to Palestine was to remain a significant option for Jewish refugees from Germany.?32 By that time, the probability of a Jewish state being created by Great Britain had almost vanished, a consideration which may have contributed to Hitler’s decision. In any case, the German desire to continue driving out Jews was greater than the interest in pleasing the Arabs. The only consolation the Arab nationalists appear to have received was a trickle of weapons, a remedy perhaps thought analogous to the quantities of aspirin Germany exported to the European countries whose leaders suffered headaches over Berlin’s threats.?33 The opportunities for the expansion of German influence were not in reality as great as they appeared to be. Germany could expand her trade in the area, but with not much capital to invest and no interest in great oil imports, there were severe limits to any such ptocess.**4 The political divisions among the Arabs made them uncertain prospective allies for the Germans, and the alignment of Germany with Italy restrained the Arabs, who feared the expansion of Italian power, especially in the Red Sea area. If some elements of the Egyptian nationalist movement looked to National Socialist Germany for inspiration, they also soon became awate of Germany’s subordination of her own policies in the Near East to those of Italy, which was correctly perceived as threatening Egyptian aspirations to the Sudan. In the case of Egypt, as in the Near East as a whole, Hitler’s view of what might be called a division of the world into spheres of Lebensraum, with the Mediterranean allocated to Italy, could only restrict German prospects. 229. It must be recalled that all discussion of the subject in the 1930s and 1940s was affected by what subsequently proved to be absurdly low estimates of the “absorptive capacity” of Palestine. 230. On this subject, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 561-64, 579, 580, 587; Hirszowicz, pp. 30-33; Ernst Marcus, “The

German Foreign Office and the Palestine Question in the Period 1933-1939,” Yad Washem Studies in the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance, 2 (1958), 179-204. 231. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 577, 579. This is also the conclusion of Eliahu ben Elissar, pp. 209-19. 232. See the references to a Hitler-Rosenberg meeting in G.D., D, 5, No. 579. Marcus, p. 193, refers to a Hitler

decision of the fall of 1938. 233. Another Near Eastetn area in which there was some German interest in this period was Afghanistan, where the APA was very much involved. See Glasneck and Kircheisen, pp. 186-89, 194-97; Rosenberg to

Wiedemann enclosing a note on Afghanistan by Malletke, 12 January 1937, Nuremberg document 1360-PS,

National Archives. 234. For an analysis of a reduction rather than an increase of Germany’s role in Iran during the National Iran: Continuity Socialist as contrasted with the Weimar period, see Yair Hirschfeld, “German Policy toward

of Germany and Change from Weimar to Hitler,” Wallach, pp. 117-40. On the other hand, the increasing role is demonin Iran’s foreign trade, until the Third Reich became the country’s main trading partner by 1938-39, 1960), pp. strated in Abolfazl Adli, Aussenhandel und Aussenwirtschaftspolitik, des Iran (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot,

; ~ 49_50, 61, 65-66. Radical on alism National-Soci German of Influence “The Shamir, Shimon in is summary 235. A useful Movements in Egypt,” Wallach, pp. 200-208.

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The supposed bond of Germans and Arabs in their common enmity to the Jews, furthermore, was on closer inspection a delusion. Germany wanted to drive out her Jewish population without allowing them to take their assets along in the form of foreign exchange; and in the era of the depression, the Haavara Agreement was one of the few ways to do that. Many Arab nationalists, on the other hand, wanted no further Jewish immigration into Palestine, so that their interests on this issue ran directly counter to German policy. Hitler’s own mental assignment of the whole area to Italy’s appropriate sphere of Lebensraum made him most dubious about concessions to Arab requests if these in any way interfered with his more important priorities. In the years when British and French power in the Near East was beginning to wane, Germany found the region as difficult to deal with as have other outside powers before and since.

Chapter 22

Germany and the Western Hemisphere 1937-38 Capes relations with the Western Hemisphere have been touched on in several respects. The special problems caused for British policy toward Germany by the attitude of the Dominions, including Canada; trade questions in Latin America, especially Brazil; and the questions posed by the relation of German agencies to people of German descent abroad have received attention. In regard to the United States, the major policy issues posed by the American tendency toward isolationism, as well as President Roosevelt’s various abortive soundings that looked toward some attempt at settling European problems by an international conference have been discussed. In addition, a number of specific, essentially symbolic difficulties in Germany’s relations with the United States have also been mentioned. What remains is to add some other elements to the picture and to fit the whole matter of German relations with the Western Hemisphere into the broader framework of German foreign policy and its impact abroad. Germany’s

relations with the United

States in 1937-38

followed, if not in any

straight linear fashion, the deteriorating course that had been set in 1933.! Many of the specific causes of friction previously present continued to contribute their share of aggravation. One that attracted great public attention at the time and assumed an importance out of all proportion to its intrinsic significance was the activity of the National Socialistsponsored organizations in the United States, primarily the “Friends of the New Germany,” later reorganized as the “German-American Bund.” Always few in number, never mobilizing any appreciable proportion of the people of German background in the United States, periodically torn by internal dissension, the Bund was an absolute disaster area in German-American relations. Its display of National Socialist symbols disturbed the American public and provided a perfect focus for antiGerman sentiments and publicity. The combination of German and American citizens was a dangerous affront to American opinion, but there was no ready solution to this problem of combining citizens of different countries within the same organization, a necessaty step if any viable organization at all were to continue. If the German citizens were told to withdraw from membership, as they eventually were, the Bund might well collapse because of its small size, inadequate leadership, and lack of financing—unless

funds were provided by Germany in some clandestine fashion that was likely to become 1. For the period 1933-36, see chap. 6.

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embarrassingly public. Even if it did not fall apart, the idea of a movement on National Socialist principles among German-Americans was not likely to do anything for Germany’s popularity in the United States. The Bund, however organized, contributed to the internal divisions among the German-Americans, already very weak politically. It provided evidence for all those who argued that Germany threatened the United States. It also touched the sensitivity of an American public that expected assimilation of immigrants, if not culturally, at least to the American constitutional system, and resented the transplantation of European political parties to American soil, especially when such patties advocated a political system entirely opposite to that established by the founding fathers. And the Bund did all these things without any beneficial effect discernible to German diplomats or to Hitler’s adjutant, Fritz Wiedemann, who returned from an American trip convinced of the harm being done by the Bund. If in spite of all warnings, troubles, and acrimonious discussions, Berlin could see its

way only to ordering German citizens to leave the Bund, while a variety of clandestine German channels to what was now ostensibly a purely native American organization continued—with predictable results—the cause of this policy must be seen in the unwillingness of Hitler to give his deputy, Rudolf Hess, a clear mandate to terminate the whole ridiculous operation. This in turn can be explained only by Hitler’s general disregard for the potential importance of the United States to his own plans. The same disregard of American susceptibilities characterized the German handling of other issues, big and small. The agreement that had been reached in Munich in the summer of 1936 on the American claims for German sabotage in the United States in the early years of the World War was never implemented by Berlin. Goring’s special appointee for this issue, Franz von Pfeffer, could not secure the support of others in the German government to remove this sore in German-American relations.? One reason Goring had become interested in this problem was its possible relation to German trade with the United States; the situation in that regard continued to deteriorate as well. The Germans had denounced the German-American trade treaty in order to eliminate its most-favored-nation clause. The German gamble that this would pressure Washington into a new trade agreement had failed utterly, and nothing occurred to change that situation. German diplomats reported that there was no real prospect of a new trade treaty, and they read the situation correctly.4 Cordell Hull, the American secretary of state, who was a devotee of freeing the channels of world trade, believed strongly that this was an important aspect of preserving the peace and had only the most scathing

2. On the Friends of the New Germany and the Bund, see Jacobsen, pp. 528-49; Arthur L. Smith, The Deutschtum ofNazi Germany and the United States (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1965); G.D., D, 1, Nos. 414, 420, 428, 433,

435, 437, 438, 441-43, 448, 453-55; U.S. 1938, 2:461-64; Moffat Diary, 28 February 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 40; Gilbert to Moffat, 23 September 1937, Moffat Papers, Vol. 12. On the German-Americans in general, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 73, 81; D, 1, Nos. 430, 431. A useful study of the whole problem based on wide-ranging

research, though not always sufficiently critical of the sources, is Klaus Kipphan, Deutsche Propaganda in den Vereinigten Staaten, 1933-1941 (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1971). On the career of the most famous American apologist for the National

Socialist regime, see Niel M. Johnson,

George Sylvester Viereck, German-American

Propagandist (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1972). Sander Diamond’s The Nazi Movement in the United States, 1924-1941 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1974), is the best general account of the Bund to date in spite of some inaccuracies. Diamond argues that Hitler did turn against the Bund in the end. 3. The earlier phase of this issue is discussed above, pp. 121-22. For the later period, see U.S. 1937, 2:348-67; Dodd dispatch 3463 of 12 May 1937, Lester Woolsey to Green H. Hackworth, 24 May and 4 June 1937, State 462.11 L 5232/872, 878, 881. Karl M. Markau, the president of the German Chamber of Commetce in London, who had participated in the earlier negotiations, continued to do so, with Federico Stallforth representing American claimants; see C 9949/15/18, FO 371/22974.

4. G.D., C, 6, No. 72; D, 1, No. 458; U.S. 1937, 2:329-31; 1938, 2:422-25; Moffat Diary, 23-24 January 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 40.

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comments for German trade practices.5 An additional element of bitterness was introduced into Germany’s economic relations with the United States by the German repudiation of Austrian debts in the United States after the Amschluss. The supposedly destitute and ailing Austrian economy had regularly met its international financial obligations, but once the assets of the Austrian economy had been seized by Germany, the latter claimed that it was too poor to continue payments. In the case of several other countries, whose trade accounts with Germany enabled them to threaten Berlin with the imposition of potentially harmful clearing mechanisms, the Berlin government found it expedient to work out special agreements. This was not done with the United States, however, and the repudiation of these obligations—after the assets built up with American help had been sequestered by Germany—provided still another source of acrimony. German efforts to tie the question of debts to a trade treaty only served to complicate an already deadlocked set of negotiations.’ What was happening in the United States during these years was a hardening of public attitudes. Although there was a general aversion to any direct American role in what were seen as European affairs, the generally positive attitude toward Germany that had replaced the anti-German hysteria of the war years had once again been replaced by negative feelings.’ The persecution of the Catholic church as well as of the Jews had a strong impact.’ Reports in newspapers, magazines, and newsteels on the militarization of German life, during the very years when pacifist sentiments were growing stronger in the United States, were repulsive to Americans, who were further angered by the public behavior of the German-American Bund. On the other hand, sympathy for Britain and France was clearly growing; surely these countries had done everything possible to satisfy any legitimate German grievances. If some segments of the American public thought the Western Powers too weak and yielding in the face of German moves, there was practically no one who credited either England or France with any desire to provoke Germany—a significant contrast with the attitudes of the 1920s. The result of these perceptions was that the prospect of another war was implicitly tied in the public mind with German aggression; if war did break out, it would be Germany’s fault.!° German representatives in Washington reported on this trend in American thinking. They warned Berlin that if war ever came, the United States could be expected to side with Germany’s enemies sooner of later, and probably soonet.!! If none of this made any impact on Hitler, the explanation must be found in his assessment of the United States. Some day a German-dominated Eurasia would fight America; but until then he adjudged the United States as of no great importance as an actual or potential military power, and most certainly not one to be feared by Germany. In the 1930s, he believed that there was no reason to have any special regard for 5. U.S. 1937, 2:328-29, 331; 1938, 2:441-46; G.D., C, 6, No. 159; D, 1, No. 460. 6. U.S. 1938, 2:483-502; 1939, 2:559-67; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 756, 458. (Wiesbaden: 7. U.S. 1938, 2:419-21; Hans-Jiirgen Schroder, Deutschland und die Vereinigten Staaten, 1933-1939 Steiner, 1970), pp. 178-90. 8. Note Hugh Wilson’s comments to Joseph Goebbels on 22 Match 1938, U.S. 1938, 2:434-38. property of Ameri9, For State Department consideration of retaliatory action if Germany started seizing the

can Jews, see Moffat Diary, 16 June 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 30. 1:434-35, 442-45, 451-53; G.D., 10. This can be seen from the American reaction to the Anschluss, U.S. 1938, é' 460. No. 1, Documents, Hungarian 445; 391, Nos. 1, D,

Dieckhoff’s Reports mon 11. On this subject, see Manfred Jonas, “Prophet without Honor: Hans Heinrich

“Dieckhoff and America: A German’s Washington,” Mid-America, 47 (July 1965), 222-23; Warren F. Kimball,

218-43, both of which are very favorView of German-American Relations,” The Historian, 27 (February 1965), Nos.

G.D., C, 6, Nos. 207, 306, 338; D, 1, able to Dieckhoff. For some of the reports from Washington, see 20 May 1937, DZA Potsdam, Buro RAM, Neurath, von to Dieckhoff 451; 447, 419, 423, 427, 440, 444, 445, 437; 6, No. 75. For an incident involving the Akte 60964, £.143. For a French analysis, see D.D.F, 2d, 3, No. Moffat Papers, Vol. 41. German consul in Manila, see Moffat Diary, 22 August 1938,

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American policy; on the contrary, he thought that the depression’s impact on the country confirmed his own assessment of American debility.!2 The fact that the Americans did not like Germany’s racial and religious policies only showed what dolts they were. He thought that an extraordinarily idiotic misassessment of the United States (which was sent to him in August 1937 by a German of dubious background, Baron Bernhard G. von Rechenberg, who had emigrated to the United States in 1924 and returned to become head of the foreign section of the National Socialist veterans organization) was such a wonderful document that he asked for extra copies to enlighten the foreign and propaganda ministries.!3 The misconceptions in this document about the decay of the United States fitted in so well with Hitlet’s own views that he would not allow them to be shaken. Soon after, his adjutant, Fritz Wiedemann, made an extensive tour of the

United States during which he obtained a reasonably accurate impression of both the strength of the country and the degree of anti-German feeling. Appalled by what he had found, Wiedemann attempted to explain the situation to Hitler, but Hitler was so pleased by the confirmation he had just received of his prior views that Wiedemann’s efforts were of no avail.!4 What Hitler would not learn from his friend and associate Wiedemann he was certainly not going to accept from the traditional diplomats.!° There was really nothing that American diplomats could do about this situation. Under circumstances which reflected no credit on President Roosevelt or on the higher officials of the State Department, Ambassador William E. Dodd was recalled from Berlin at the end of 1937.1° Consideration of a successor involved several persons, but Roosevelt decided that if he was not to have a Jeffersonian Democrat in Berlin, he would emphasize the routine nature of the position by appointing a career diplomat. When Hugh Gibson declined the appointment, Hugh Wilson was appointed instead.'7 Dodd’s

critical attitude toward the National Socialist regime had so infuriated Hitler that he was at first unwilling even to receive his successor, but was persuaded after receiving reassuring words about the new ambassador.'® Wilson was indeed prepared to do his best. He had spent more than a quarter of a century in the foreign service, and although

certainly not pro-Nazi in any real sense of the term, looked with some sympathy on Germany.!? But his appointment made no more difference in German-American relations than had the earlier replacement of Hans Luther by Hans Heinrich Dieckhoff in Washington. During his months in Germany, Wilson could not bring about any more change in 12. Gerhard L. Weinberg, “Hitler’s Image of the United States,” American Historical Review, 69, No. 4 (July 1964),

1010-13. A somewhat different perspective is to be found in Andreas Hillgruber, “Der Faktor Amerika in Hitlers Stategie 1938-1941,” reprinted in his Deutsche Grossmacht- und Weltpolitik im 19. und 20. Jabrhundert (Disseldorf: Droste, 1977), pp. 197-222. 13. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 416-18. The memorandum of von -Rechenberg is in T-120, 2568/5264/E 315836-72. 14. Wiedemann, pp. 215-18, 220-21; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 427, 433 (the “Wohnbesuch” referred to in this document was Wiedemann); Gilbert tel. 303, 29 December 1937, State 811.00 Nazi/330; Speer, Erinnerungen, p.

135. Wiedemann claims in his memoirs that the one thing he persuaded Hitler to do was to participate in the New York World Fair; on that subject see also the meeting of Hitler with Sosthenes Behn referred to in Moffat Diary, 15-16 January 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 40.

15. Diamond’s analysis of German, and especially Hitler’s views of the United States is rather similar; he also shows how the sad fate of the Bund could be fitted into this perception. The very fact that Americans rejected the Bund illuminated their short-sightedness, and the signs of official action against the Bund proved that the United States was dominated by Jews. 16. The best account of the incident is in Offner, pp. 203-12. 17. On the Gibson appointment, see U.S. 1937, 2:383; Dodd Diary, 23 and 30 November

Moffat Diary, 13 May 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 40. 18. G.D., D, 1. Nos. 436, 439.

1937, pp. 433-35;

19. See Offner, pp. 214-16. Wilson’s own works, Diplomat between Wars (New York: Longmans, Green, 1941),

and A Career Diplomat: The Third Chapter, the Third Reich, ed. Hugh R. Wilson, Jr. (New York: Vantage Press, 1960), give a fair picture of the authot’s views.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1937-38

479

German policies than his predecessor. His tone may have been more amiable; and the higher tegard in which he was held by the permanent officials of the German Foreign Ministry probably helped in the handling of current business of no major importance; but on the key issues of German-American relations, his short mission was as batten of success as Dodd’s longer one.” He did contribute to the scare ovet Germany ’s air force by making an alarming report to President Roosevelt in July 1938,?! but the president was in any case interested in assisting the French in building up their air force.2? In October 1938, Wilson was trying hard, though entirely unsuccessfully, to make some contribution to an improvement in German-American relations by securing some concessions from Berlin on the subject of Jewish emigration.*? Soon after, the anti-Jew ish pogroms of November 1938 led the president to announce the recall of Wilson with a statement denouncing the German government. The ambassador never returned to Germany. It is doubtful whether Wilson ever had much influence on President Roosevelt. The president had sensed a kindred spirit in Dodd and took the general thrust, if not the details, of Dodd’s warnings seriously. As in prior years, Roosevelt continued to receive unofficial reports on the European situation from Samuel R. Fuller, Jr.24 Unquestionably mote important than the change in the Berlin embassy was the president’s decision that

the United States minister to Vienna, George S. Messersmith, who had previously been

consul general in Berlin, should return to Washington as assistant secretary of state in 1937.9 Messersmith had observed the National Socialist accession to power in Berlin and had been at the center of the European crisis in Vienna; from these posts he had been warning

Roosevelt

and Hull of the dangers

ahead.

Unlike

von

Rechenberg,

Messersmith was a shrewd observer, and his concern over the implications of German expansion in Europe reinforced the president’s perception of those problems, just as von Rechenberg’s delusions fed Hitler’s concept of a weak and decaying United States. If the German dictator remained disdainful of the North American giant, the American prtesi-

dent, though still hoping for the maintenance of peace in Europe, was very clear in his own mind about the nature of the dangers to it; and on this point, if almost no other,

most Americans agreed with him. German relations with the countries of Latin America took a decided turn for the worse in 1938. In the first years of National Socialist rule, the expansion of German trade with Latin America had been considerable, and the first stages of nazification among those of German descent abroad had not yet aroused any substantial antagonism in either the rest of the population or the governments of the countries in which they resided. Early in 1938, however, there was a distinct change in this situation, approximately simultaneous in several of the most important countries of South America. This shift was most dramatic in the largest, Brazil. There were large numbers of Germans and descendants of German immigrants settled primarily in Brazil’s southernmost three states, where they constituted between 10 and 20 percent of the population. Having arrived as settlers, these Germans had built up 20. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 450, 456; U.S. 1938, 2:438-41.

21. Wilson to Roosevelt, 11 July 1938, Hyde Park, War Department.

22. Haight, pp. 6-8, 11. 23. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 645, 646. 24. See Hyde Park, PPF 2616 (Fuller’s role is mentioned above, pp. 113-14, 119 n. 82, 123-24, 192 n, 21, 217-

ae whose prior service had been mainly in Latin America, had in fact been scheduled for i appointment as minister to Uruguay, and the agrément for him had already been requested, when he was reassigned to Washington. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 302.

480

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

essentially homogeneous German communities, and their numerous children had then opened up adjacent areas, so that there were substantial areas of almost solid German settlement. The private school system of these ateas, combined with a substantial Protestant population in an otherwise overwhelmingly Catholic country, made these Germans an obvious butt of those tendencies in the Brazil of Getulio Vargas which aimed at national assimilation through vast expansion of state-supported schools and restrictions on immigration, although the latter measute was directed more at Japanese than German immigrants. The acceleration of industrialization and urbanization during the Vargas era was no doubt transforming the German element, but at a rate that proved too slow for the government, especially when the Germans themselves drew attention to their separate cultural interests by taking steps to preserve them in the face of current social trends. These special characteristics of the situation in Brazil must be kept in mind as the background for developments in German-Brazilian relations.” Brazil had become an important trading partner of Germany in the mid-1930s, and political relations between Berlin and the government of Getulio Vargas were generally good.2”7 There was even some discussion in November 1937 in both Berlin and Rome about asking Brazil to join the Anti-Comintern Pact. After the Vargas coup of 10 November 1937, by which he perpetuated his term in office, that project was dropped, largely in response to concerns expressed by Washington, but some sort of antiCommunist cooperation was discussed by the Brazilian and German governments.”* In the first months of 1938, however, the Germans noticed that the Brazilian government

was increasingly concerned about the activities of its German population and was taking more and more drastic steps against them and their institutions.*? The November 1937 coup ended the period in which the German question in Brazil was essentially cultural; hereafter it would become a political and diplomatic issue of major proportions. Here was the other side of Germany’s use of racialist arguments in foreign policy. Since the German government was interested in the treatment of Germans outside the borders of the Reich and made louder and louder noises about their fate, the Brazilian

regime, which looked forward td the assimilation of all immigrants, naturally became more and more alarmed about the activities of the German settlers in the south. The Germans were by now tegimented by the National Socialist element among them, and their organizations and institutions could be seen as a threat to the unity of the country. The public activities of local National Socialist organizations were increasingly drawing the attention of the Brazilian press and parliament, and the very active Foreign Organization of the party (AO) thus drew the attention of those who were pushing the policy of “nationalizing” the country’s minorities.°° Many individuals who played important roles in the party were given to boastful statements, often had ties to various party and government agencies in Germany, and were an obvious affront to the Brazilian authorities.*! The growth of Germany’s strength made the activities of the minority look 26. There is a fair and balanced account in Kate Harms-Baltzer, Die Nationalisierung der deutschen Einwanderer und threr Nachkommen in Brasilien als Problem der deutschbrasilianischen Beziehungen, 1930-1938 (Berlin: Colloquium Verlag, 1970). 27. See above, p. 293. 28. Frank D. McCann, Jr., The Braxilian-American Alliance, 1937-1945 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1973), pp. 54-55, stresses American objections in discussing the decision of Vargas to drop the idea of adhesion to the pact; see also ibid., pp. 69-70; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 147; Ciano, Diary, 9 November 1937, pp. 40-41; G.D., D, 1, No. 97; D, 5, Nos. 593, 594; Harms-Baltzer, pp. 173-74 n. 23.

29. G.D., D, 5, No. 599; cf. ibid., No. 602. 30. Harms-Baltzer, pp. 30-37; Donald M. McKale, The Swastika Outside Germany (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1977), pp. 84-86. 31. Jacobsen, pp. 549-62; Alton Frye, Nazi Germany and the American Hemisphere, 1933-1941 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), pp. 65-70.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1937-38

481

more dangerous than ever, and the influence of the United States began to be exerted to ward off such dangers from the Western Hemisphere. In the winter of 1937-38, a series of measures impinging upon the German schools and National Socialist otganiza tions in southern Brazil were enacted, which indicated the direction in which the country was

moving.*? A German step with fateful implications for most Latin American countries came on 10 April 1938. That was the date of the plebiscite in Germany and Austria on the annexation of Austria. As a part of the ritual of ratification, the plebiscite was extended

to include Germans overseas—many of them holding dual citizenship—who, in order to

vote, either boarded German ships that then went outside the three-mile limit or entered

their names on lists in German (or former Austrian) diplomatic or consular offices.34 Whatever the propaganda value of such rituals and whatever the legal status of this procedure, here was a gesture guaranteed to alarm countries containing large numbers of immigrants. From the literature, press, and diplomatic documents of the time one can deduce something of the sense of shock which this action caused both government officials and the public. Suspicion of Germany and restrictions on the local organizations of the German community increased immediately and radically. In the case of Brazil, this tendency was accentuated by the aftermath of the attempted coup of 10-11 May 1938 by the Integralists. This right-wing movement, the “Acc¢ao Integralista Brasileira,’ had supported Vargas in November 1937 but felt betrayed by him. Its philosophy had some resemblance to fascism; it had certainly received strong electoral support from Brazilians of German descent; and German complicity in the coup was immediately suspected.*> The Brazilian authorities did not, in fact, secure evidence of ties between several German officials and the Integralists until sometime later, but the extraordinarily rude

and threatening behavior of German Ambassador Karl Ritter converted what was already a difficult and embarrassing situation into an impossible one. In spite of reprimands from Berlin, where the usually obstreperous von Ribbentrop was for once attempting to restrain one of his diplomats, Ritter, for reasons never fully explained, escalated the conflict—only to find himself declared persona non grata by the Brazilian government.*° It is quite possible that those in the German embassy working with the Integralists really were doing so without Ritter’s authorization, as he claimed; but when the Brazilian police secured some incriminating documents, he had already so compromised himself personally that no one in Rio de Janeiro believed a word he said.°’ 32. McCann, pp. 71—72, 82-83. 33. Because of her focus on the German element in Brazil, Harms-Baltzer (p. 42) places the greatest emphasis on the nationalization measures following the 10 November 1937 coup as the turning point in GermanBrazilian relations, but this ignores the great significance of the plebiscite, especially as viewed by people in Brazil and throughout Latin America. The chronological relationship between the plebiscite of 10 April and the Brazilian government’s decree of 18 April barting all political activity by foreigners in Brazil is simply ignored by her otherwise excellent book. McCann (p. 88) lays heavy stress on an article of 21 March in the Deutsche Diplomatische Korrespondenz criticizing Brazilian measutes. 34. For the voting in Chile (or rather offshore), see Frost (chargé a.i. Santiago) dispatch 960 of 13 April 1938, State 863.00/1721. A large number of similar reports from all over the world may be found in the 863.00 file. A

summary of the worldwide extraterritorial plebiscite activities is in Arnold J. Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs 1938, 1:234. he 35. Harms-Baltzer, pp. 63-66; McKale, pp. 145-48. 36. The Brazilian government did not wish an abrupt deterioration of relations and utilized a home leave of

Ritter in the fall of 1938 to suggest, at first informally, that he simply not return to his post. Note the letter of Oswaldo Aranha to Luis Sparano of 16 November 1938, from the Vargas papers, published in Helio Silva, 1938: Terrorismo em Campo Verde (Rio de Janeiro: Civilizacao Brasileira, 1971), pp. 314-17.

37. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 604-7, 609, 610, 612, 617, 622, 623, 625, 627; McCann, pp. 86-91, 95-101; Hilton, pp. pp. 168-76; Arnold Ebel, Das Dritte Reich und Argentinien (Cologne: Bohlau, 1971), pp. 277-88; Harms-Baltzer,

482

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Once the Brazilian government had demanded Ritter’s recall, Berlin retaliated by insisting on the recall of the Brazilian ambassador to Germany.** The relations between the two countries, once so good, had turned sour, and there was serious concern in

Berlin that there would be an impact on the trade relations which were so important to Germany.? They were important to Brazil also, especially in regard to arms purchases in Germany.” Although there were further measures against the German settlers within Brazil, the Rio government took care not to let matters go too far. The needs of Brazil for export markets and the pressure of the Brazilian military leaders for the importation of German artillery provided strong motives for maintaining the tie to Berlin.” Over the winter of 1938-39, the combination of interest in trade, consolidation of

Vargas’s rule, and German politeness made a rapprochement possible, and in June 1939 an exchange of ambassadors was again arranged.” The days of good German-Brazilian telations were, however, clearly over. The repulsive behavior—even by National Socialist standards—of Ambassador Ritter served more as a focus than as a cause of this development. The basic issue was the incompatibility perceived by most Brazilians, both supporters and opponents of the “Estado Névo” of Vargas, between the national unity and modernization of Brazil and control by a European power over a substantial segment of Brazil’s population. Since the attainment of that control was an aspect of National Socialist policy which Hitler was not prepared to renounce in Brazil—as he was in Italy—there could be no continuation either of good political relations between Germany and the largest country of Latin America or of the opportunities such a relationship might have offered. . Germany’s relations with other Latin American countries took a somewhat similar course. In Argentina, the April 1938 plebiscite was taken very much amiss, and the German settlers in the country found themselves objects of suspicion.4? There as in Brazil, the desire to develop a unified population out of a diverse immigrant population made the organizations of the German element appear most dangerous.“ As in the case of the United States, the mixing of German citizens with Argentine citizens in these organizations was the subject of argument, with the problem complicated by the large numbers

of people with dual nationality. Efforts were made to cope with these matters by new regulations of the Foreign Organization of the National Socialist party and by some

69-80. The incriminating documents were, it would appear, concerned primarily with the attempts of several German organizations, especially the “Federagdéo 25 de Julho,” to operate in a manner that was contrary to Brazil’s nationalizing legislation, as well as with the involvement of German embassy officials in those efforts. There was no evidence of sponsorship of the Integralist coup, a fact which may have influenced the Brazilian government to keep quiet after the discovery of the documents in connection with the arrest on 24 June 1938 of Fedetico Colin Kopp and his murder or suicide in jail soon after. The whole subject is still shrouded in mystery; the absence of any additional evidence to substantiate the assertions in Jiirgen Hell’s account in Der deutsche Faschismus in Lateinamerika, 1933-1943 (Berlin-East: Humboldt-Universitat, 1966), pp. 115-16, suggests

that there is no material on the subject in the archives of the German Democratic Republic. 38. G.D., D, 5, No. 628; Harms-Baltzer, pp. 105-11; McCann, pp. 103-4. 39. G.D., D, 5, No. 629; cf. Dr. Kausch, “Informationsbericht Nr. 51,” 20 July 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101/33, £.47; Harms-Baltzer, pp. 117, 120-23; McCann, pp. 165-68. 40. McCann, p. 111. 41. Hilton, pp. 176-82, 187-90. 42. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 632 (note that von Levetzow, the German chargé, expressed in writing his belief that

Brazilian Foreign Minister Oswaldo Atanha had been bought by the United States), 636, 638, 639; HarmsBaltzer, pp. 111-16; McCann, pp. 115-16, 176-78; Hilton, pp. 190-91, 206-10. 43. Jacobsen, pp. 562-65; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 613, 614, 621; cf. ibid., No. 595.

44. The memoits of Eduardo Labougle, the Argentine ambassador to Germany 1932-39, concentrate very heavily on the question of Germans abroad which practically dominates the book; see his Mision en Berlin (Buenos Aires: Guillermo Kraft, 1946), pp. 12-144, passim, and 163ff. On the last days of Labougle’s mission, see Lipski Papers, pp. 540-42.

Germany and the Western Hemisphere, 1937-38

483

reorganization of local groups, but to little avail.45 The situation in Chile was developing in the same way.‘¢ If the Germans kept talking about the ethnic solidarity of all those of German descent, they could hardly be surprised when foreign governments became susPicious, not only of the party organizations abroad, but also of cultural activities that would have had no political significance but for the context in which the Germans themselves were placing them. As the Latin American countries defined themselves and their independence against the North American colossus, they might—like some Arab nationalists—have looked to Germany as a counterweight. This possibility, however, was realized only to a very slight extent, the one instance being the sale of Mexican oil to Germany after the nationalization of the oil wells in 1938.47 For the most part, however, the nations of Latin America

did not turn to Germany as a counter to the United States. The church struggle in Germany automatically made the powerful Catholic church hostile to Germany. The fear of another war, which was generally associated with German initiative in South as in North America, inclined many to anti-German feelings.48 The fear of what the local German population, regardless of citizenship, might do was a powerful factor in several countries, including Brazil and Argentina, the two largest.

It was in this framework that the efforts made by Washington were increasingly successful. The “Good Neighbor Policy” blunted many of the traditional—and frequently justified—complaints in Latin America against the United States, while the common threat of Germany provided a unifying consideration previously absent from consultations among the countries of the Western Hemisphere. At times, the countries of Latin America quite deliberately played on their possible ties with Germany to secure concessions from Washington, but the United States was in any case predisposed to such concessions by Hull’s doctrinaire belief in the Good Neighbor Policy.*? The Germans could only watch in displeased quiet as the Pan-American movement developed an increasingly close and anti-German character during 1937 and 1938.°° Until considerably more evidence on the clandestine relations between German agencies and their Latin American contacts becomes available, it will be exceedingly difficult to make a balanced judgment on the real nature of German policy in that part of the world. One thing, however, is sure. There was enough of an appearance of threats, enough evidence of obviously illegal and conspiratorial activity, to provide a common bond of fear of German aims, whatever they might be. For the first time, the peoples of North and South America thought of themselves as facing the same menace.°!

45. See G.D., D, 5, Nos. 624, 626, 630; Ebel, pp. 288ff.; McKale, pp. 149-52. 46. G.D., D, 5, No. 603; cf. ibid., No. 637; Jacobsen, pp. 565-66; McKale, p. 145. 47. See above, p. 292 n. 18. It should be noted that William Rhodes Davis, who played a role in unofficial

German-American

peace soundings in the winter of 1939-40, was involved in these deals. There is con-

siderable information on Davis in Klaus Volland, Das Dritte Reich und Mexiko (Frankfurt/M: Peter Lang, 1976),

pp. 83-86, 125-27, 134-48, 154-56. The general subject of German oil purchases from Mexico is reviewed,

ibid., pp. 86-164, passim. Vollard also argues that the timing of the Mexican nationalization decree of 18 Match

reaction, 1938 was influenced by the belief that the crisis over the annexation of Austria would limit the British the American one being in any case affected by the Good-Neighbor Policy (ibid., pp. 109-11).

48. Note the comments of the German minister in Peru in G.D., D, 5, No. 619. : : 49. See, e.g., Hilton, chap. 5. of the polidiscussion German of review a For 167-71. pp. Offner, 635; No. 5, D, 67; 50. See G.D., C, 6, No. Harms-Baltzer, pp. 132— cies that might be adopted in the face of these trends during the summer of 1939, see

Politik gegeniiber Siid- und Ni The survey by Reiner Pommerin, Das Dritte Reich and Lateinamerika, Die deutsche definitive. means no by but useful is 1977), Droste, Mittelamerika 1939-1942 (Diisseldorf:

Chapter 23 German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

he development of German-Italian relations that culminated in Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano’s visit to Germany in October 1936 and the subsequent public proclamation of the Axis by Benito Mussolini has been traced in my preceding volume.! A sequence of events largely unplanned by either power had brought together in an uneasy partnership a Germany and an Italy that both attracted and repelled each other. They were attracted to each other by what seemed to be similarities in ideology at home and in enemies—or imagined enemies—abroad. There was also at least the possibility of their expansionist aims being complementary. This concept, most strongly held by Hitler, posited German expansion into Eastern Europe and a natural sphere for Italy in the Mediterranean and North Africa. Although Hitler clung to this view and allowed it to play an important role in his military strategy during World War II, the fuzziness, or self-contradiction, inherent in

these supposedly complementary expansionisms was one of the major causes of difficulty between the two countries. There was, first of all, the question of Austria. Italy, out of fear and self-interest, found herself concerned for the independence of her own tradi-

tional enemy—Austria—where, in spite of Austrian dependence upon support from Rome, the feelings of hostility were heartily reciprocated. Two elements combined to inspire the Italian fear and self-interest which had made her the defender of Austria. There was first the concern for Italy’s own territorial integrity. The possibility that a large Germany rather than a small Austria might support an irredentist claim on the South Tyrol, or might even strive for a port on the Adriatic, was feared above all other con-

ceivable dangers to Italy. Hitler had recognized this real obstacle to any German-Italian association and had publicly and repeatedly repudiated all claims to the South Tyrol, in spite of reluctance among his associates and revulsion among the German public at such cold-blooded sacrifice of a German minority.? Although Hitler’s understanding of this Italian worry would lead him to an even mote extreme concession after the Amsch/uss—arrangements for the removal of the German population from the South Tyrol—he never recognized until well into World War II that implicit in German annexation of Austtia was another source of conflict between German and Italian ambitions. Italy’s interests were not confined to the southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean, but extended to the Balkans. There

the expansion of German influence, once firmly centered on Vienna, was as likely to 1. See above, pp. 258-62; see also Jens Petersen, Hitler-Mussolini: Die Entstehung der Achse Berlin-Rom, 1933-1936 (Tubingen: Niemeyer, 1973). 2. See above, pp. 17-18, and the sources cited there. A survey of the issue in Jens Petersen, “Italien in der

aussenpolitischen Konzeption Hitlers,” Historisch-politische Streiflichter, ed. Kurt Jitgensen and Reimer Hansen (Neumtnster: Wachholtz, 1971), pp. 212-17.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

485

clash with Italian as with French or British interests, This soutce of complications was more readily perceived by Rome than Berlin3 If these two considerations of power and interest made an alignmen t of Germany

and Italy difficult, there was a further factor, harder to define and document, but no less

teal. Insofar as one can speak of the likes and dislikes of the broader public, the Germans and Italians disliked and mistrusted each other. In England and France not wholly dissimilar popular antipathies were countered by substantial support for close relations between the two nations on the part of some portions of the public and by an awareness of the need for coordinated policies in government circles. In Germany and Italy that countervailing element, far more

limited, but still decisive, was

to be found in the

attitudes of the two dictators.‘ The first meeting between the two leaders at Venice in June 1934 had not been a particular success, though the attempted coup in Austria six weeks later had probably made it appear less fortunate in retrospect than it really was. The course of events since 1934, however, was seen by both as bringing them closer together. Because Hitler was determined to come to an agreement with Italy under almost any circumstances, he was not himself as influenced by the Italian reaction to the murder of Austrian Chancellor

Engelbert Dollfuss as might have been expected.° Mussolini, on the other hand, would

soon isolate himself from any possible coordination of his support of Austrian independence with Britain and France by the attack on Ethiopia. The conflict in East Africa may have brought the Italians temporary control of the somewhat meager resources of Ethiopia and the emotional euphoria of a successful defiance of world opinion, but its

benefits for Germany wete of a more substantial nature. The wat opened opportunities

for the expansion of German influence in the Balkans, provided a focus of attention elsewhere while her rearmament continued apace, and assured a division among the

other Locarno powers when Germany remilitarized the Rhineland.° Mussolini’s abstaining from any concerted policy with England and France did not end when the Duce officially proclaimed the Ethiopian war over on 5 May 1936. By the time the long haggling over the ending of sanctions and the formal recognition of Italy’s control of Ethiopia was over, other events had combined with Mussolini’s own inclina-

tions to rule out a rapprochement with the Western Powers. Though not subject to precise proof, there are indications that the advent of the Popular Front government of Léon Blum in France in June 1936 had a lasting effect on the Italian dictator. Representing everything in the world that Mussolini detested, Blum’s government might well have been sincere in its desire for an accommodation with Italy, but the Duce was simply unwilling to consider the possibility.’ France’s permanent enmity toward what he considered the natural ambitions of Italy, an enmity which Hitler had always posited as the basis for a German-Italian alignment, appears to have impressed itself on Mussolini only

in 1936. From Mussolini’s perspective, this new view of France reinforced the clash of French and Italian interests that was opened up by the outbreak of civil war in Spain in

July 1936.

3. Petersen, “Italien in der aussenpolitischen Konzeption Hitlers,” p. 208, comments that in Hitler’s discussion

of Italy’s possible policies “there is nowhere the least mention of Italy’s interests in the Balkans and Danubian atea.” ‘ ae 4, Manfred Funke refers to this very personal element on the part of Hitler as a sign of Hitler’s power of autonomous decision making (Entscheidungsautonomie) in the face of the practically unanimous contrary view of party officials, diplomats, and military leaders (Funke, pp. 830-31). i ; 5. See above, pp. 183-84. 6. The discussion of this topic too often overlooks that England and Italy were the intended joint guarantors of the Locarno settlement. 7. Dreifort (pp. 152-58, 177-80), on the other hand, argues that Blum and Delbos teally did not expect or want better relations with Italy.

486

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The failure of the July uprising to secure immediate control over all of Spain resulted in requests to both Germany and Italy for assistance in moving the troops of General Francisco Franco from North Africa to the Spanish mainland. The essentially independent but simultaneous decisions of Hitler and Mussolini to grant such assistance involved them both in a venture that soon proved to be longer than either had originally anticipated. When the failure of Franco’s offensive on Madrid in November 1936 raised the question of even larger German and Italian commitments in Spain, the two dictators,

as previously described, decided on different responses. Mussolini, originally hoping to assure a speedy victory by Franco, sent Italian units to Spain whose share, first in the Nationalist victory at Malaga, and then in the defeat at Guadalajara, firmly tied the Italian

leadet’s prestige to the fortunes of Franco throughout the long conflict. This assured continued friction between Italy on the one hand and France and England on the other,

the latter two favoring nonintervention, generally sympathizing with the Spanish Republic, and worrying about Italy’s role in the Balearic Islands. It was the prospect of these very factors that helped incline Hitler to a different decision. He would continue to assist Franco to prevent a Nationalist defeat, but unlike Mussolini, he would not send substantial regular land forces to Spain. As Hitler had con-

cluded by late December 1936, a long rather than a short war in Spain was in Germany’s interest. Among the reasons for this view, besides the diversion of attention from German policies elsewhere, that a long war might provide, was the fact that the con-

tinued estrangement of Italy from Britain and France was seen as pushing Italy to Germany’s side.’ Hitler even speculated that if a great war did break out in the Mediterranean, it would provide an opportunity for Germany to move in Central Europe, but this idea does not appear until later. In any case, starting in the late summer of 1936, the

cooperation of Germany and Italy in Spain, though often marked by rivalry and friction, did serve to bring them closer together. It certainly precluded an Italian return to the defense of Austrian independence.° The German-Austrian agreement of 11 July 1936 had been both a symptom of the German-Italian rapprochement arid a sign of Germany’s ascendancy in Europe.!? With Mussolini’s

encouragement,

Austrian

Chancellor

Kurt von

Schuschnigg had made

a

series of agreements with Germany that he considered the fixed basis for future policy of both countries, while the Germans saw it as another step on the road to the annexation of Austria. The subsequent months saw discussion over the significance and international repercussions of the agreement as well as arguments between the two parties over its practical application. Though relieved at what appeared to be a relaxation of tension in Central Europe, the Western Powers viewed the situation with concern." What a high Austrian official described to the Hungarians as a necessary evil,!2 was seen by the Polish government as a prelude to the Axsch/uss, something Warsaw thought of as a useful diversion of German attention from Eastern Europe.!3 The German-Austtian negotiations over the implementation of the agreement were complicated from the start by the differing perspectives of the two parties, one seeing it as a possible bulwark of Austrian independence in spite of its concessions to Germany, the other viewing it as a shield for greater German control of Austrian affairs in spite of its recognition of Austrian independence. Parties holding such divergent views naturally 8. On this point, see the evidence cited above, p. 232 n. 148.

9. Cf. Siebert, pp. 51-53. 10. See above, pp. 206-11.

11. U.S. 1936, 1:325; D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 479; 3, No. 178. 12. Kerekes, No. 5 (the text in Allianz Hitler-Horthy-Mussolini: Dokumente zur ungarischen Aussenpolitik [11933-44] [Budapest: Akadémiai kiad6, 1966], No. 12, omits the P.S.). 13. D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 458.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

487

could not arrive at further agreements quickly and easily.!4 The situation’s inherent difficulty was compounded by special complications on each side. On the German side, it

was the Austrian National Socialist party; on the Austrian side, it was the inclination of

von Schuschnigg as well as some others in the Austrian government to use the prospect of a Habsburg restoration as a way of trying to strengthen Austria’s bargaining position. The National Socialist party of Austria had always been a caricature of the German one in its internal dissensions, never papered over effectively by a charismatic personality like Hitler. The amnesty granted many of its jailed leaders as a result of the GermanAustrian agreement served to accentuate this situation by increasing both the number of those feuding as well as the subjects to feud about. A solidly founded history of the Austrian party remains to be written; but the performer of this labor of Hercules will have to deal not only with the purely internal complexities but also with the conflicting ties of the factions with party and state agencies inside Germany, the directives they received from these agencies, and the efforts of the Austrian National Socialists to play the agencies and personalities in the Reich off against one another for the benefit of their own policies and personal positions.'> The efforts of Captain Josef Leopold to reassert his role in the Austrian party after his release from jail must be seen in this context, emphasizing as it did both the internal divisions in the party and the rivalry with Franz von Papen’s attempts to push forward by diplomatic pressure.'¢ On the Austrian side, von Schuschnigg was periodically tempted to go beyond the specific details of the negotiations over the economic, political, and press implementa-

tion of the 11 July agreement by alluding to the possibility of a Habsburg restoration,!” Though von Schuschnigg was undoubtedly sincere in his personal dedication to a monarchical restoration, and although a theoretical case could indeed be made for the view that a restoration might serve as a barrier to the Azschluss, in practice the concept had serious disadvantages both abroad and at home.!® Abroad it was more likely to unite Italy and Germany against Austria than to keep at least some Italian support for Austria. Precisely because of the theoretical implications of a restoration for the Anschluss, a restored monarchy was certain to be violently objected to by Berlin; in fact, it would be taken as a signal for a German invasion. This was not only the internal view of the German government, but had also repeatedly and emphatically been conveyed to von Schuschnigg.'? As 14. On the negotiations and concerns in the later summer and fall of 1936, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 156, 158-61,

163; von Papen to Hitler, A 4153 of 30 July 1936, T-120, 778/1549/376310-12; von Papen to Hitler, A 4801 of 1 September 1936, TMWC, 30:44-48; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 15 July, 16 September 1936,

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/8, ff.29-31, 159; Wolfgang Rosar, Deutsche Gemeinschaft: Seyss-Inquart und der Anschluss (Vienna: Europa-Verlag, 1971), pp. 108-17. This book, though something of an apologia for SeyssInquart, is useful for many details turned up by the author. 15. The riot arranged by the Austrian National Socialists for the Olympic ceremonies in Vienna on 29 July 1936 will have to be fitted into the framework. See the description in G. E. R. Gedye, Betrayal in Central Europe (New York: Harper, 1939), pp. 192-93; Messersmith dispatch 848 of 31 July 1936, State 863.00/1298. A preliminary

Hitler survey of the Austrian party is in Francis L. Carsten, Fascist Movements in Austria: From Schonerer to

(London: Sage, 1977). There is now a fine introduction to the subject by Bruce E. Pauley, Der Weg in den wis Nationalsozialismus: Urspriinge und Entwicklung in Osterreich (Vienna: Bundesverlag, 1988). 16. A good account in Jiirgen Gehl, Austria, Germany, and the Anschluss, 1931-38 (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), pp. 147-50.

re

for It is indicative of the changed situation in Austria that Rost van Tonningen, the League commissioner

busy preparing for the Austria, who had previously tried to mediate between Dollfuss and Mussolini, was now p. 78 n. 52; G.D., C, 5, Dutch National Socialist leader Anton Adriaan Mussert to meet—Hitler (see above,

Nos. 539, 565; 6, No. 41).

T-120, 778/1549/376310-12; 17. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 157, 195, 209; von Papen to Hitler, A 4153 of 30 July 1936,

No. 46. von Papen to Hitler, 11 February 1937, T-120, 2500/4439/E 27255253; D.D.F., 24,4, 1963), pp. 111Lippincott, (Philadelphia: Anschluss The d, Brook-Shepher Gordon in subject the of survey A 18. 15; ; é 30 January 1937, Guido 19. For German warnings of invasion to von Schuschnigg, see Berger to Schmidt,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

for Italy, the Habsburgs were hardly popular favorites with those who saw themselves as the heirs, if not the reincarnation, of the anti-Habsburg Risorgimento. When the government in Rome came to believe that von Schuschnigg might conceivably be serious about a restoration, Mussolini saw to it that appropriate articles in the official press enlightened the Austrian chancellor on Italy’s objections to such experiments.?° The fact that by this time von Schuschnigg could probably have counted on French agreement to a restoration, and might even have felt confident of the tacit consent of Czechoslovakia," hardly outweighed these foreign dangers, accentuated as they were by the way in which the issue cemented Yugoslavia’s new ties to the Axis powers.”” Even at home there was a serious defect to this ploy. The legitimists within Austria were in any case behind the government, but the main reservoir of potential additional supporters for the regime had other sympathies, and was likely to be even more alienated by such schemes. The Austrian Socialists viewed the government with sullen indifference, if not defiance, since the Dollfuss government had violently suppressed them on 12 February 1934. If von Schuschnigg had been at all perceptive about the possibility and feasibility of strengthening his government, it was in this direction that he might have made some gestures in the years between the military attack on the Socialists and his own trip to Berchtesgaden on the fourth anniversary of the shelling of Vienna’s public housing. By flirting with a Habsburg restoration, he was deliberately facing the other way. With the restoration scheme adding no real leverage to von Schuschnigg’s negotiating position, all that was left for him was delay and careful maneuvering—often the same thing—in the face of German pressure. The months following the signing of the July agreement were, therefore, a period of complicated negotiations within Austria and between the German and Austrian governments.” If von Schuschnigg had hoped to use the threat of a restoration in these talks, the Germans had mote immediate and concrete

resoutces. A patt of the July agreement had provided them with one certain and one possible ally within the Austrian government; Berlin made full use of the former and did its best to charm the latter. Edmund Glaise von Horstenau, the military historian, had

been involved in the negotiations for the July agreement and was one of the members of the so-called National Opposition who were included in the Austrian cabinet under the terms of the agreement. Though not yet thinking of himself as a National Socialist—that would come later—Glaise did see himself as an officially recognized agent of the Germans within the Austrian government and was not above calling for pressure from Berlin in order to subvert the government he had sworn to support.”* He also suggested that the other prospective agent for Berlin, the new state secretary in the Austrian Foreign Ministry, Guido Schmidt, be treated well by Germany and invited to Berlin for appropriate flattery and personal contact.” Schmidt Trial, p. 516; the material on von Neurath’s visit cited in n. 46, below; also Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 217, 279. 20, Elizabeth Wiskemann, The Rome/Berlin Axis, 2d ed. (London: Collins, 1966), p. 100; cf. Gedye, p. 199. The survey of Blair R. Holmes, “Europe and the Habsburg Restoration in Austria, 1930-1938,” Hast European Quarterly, 9, No. 2 Summer 1974), 173-84, does not fill the need for a searching study of the subject.

21. Note the perceptive report of the Hungarian minister in Prague in Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 234; cf. ibid., No. 266. 22. See above, pp. 449-56. 23. The best account is in Gehl, chap. 6. Some of the documents have been published in G.D., D, 1, e.g., Nos.

168 and 171. 24. See ibid., No. 166. Note how, in a similar fashion, the new political movement designed to rally support for the regime, the Fatherland Front, worked to alienate the Protestants in the country; Irmgard Barnthaler, Die

Vaterlandische Front (Vienna: Europa Verlag, 1971), pp. 177-86. 25. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 163, 166. On Glaise, see also Ludwig Jedlicka and Rudolf Neck (eds.), Osterreich 1927 bis

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

489

In the trial conducted in post-World War II Austria, Guido Schmidt was acquitted of charges of treason.26 Although the suspicion of treasonable relations with the Germans could not be proved, it was certainly shown that the vain and ambitiou s young man was indeed flattered by the attention paid to him in Germany, that he often followed German suggestions, and that he enjoyed—even if he did not earn by treason —the personal friendship of Hermann Goring, a friendship which secured him a well-pai d post in the Four-Year Plan while his former colleagues in the Austrian government languish ed in jails and concentration camps. Although Schmidt’s personal integrity was eventual ly cleared in court, the fact that von Schuschnigg’s closest adviser on foreign affairs was widely thought then and later to be an agent of the Germans may serve to show how tenuous the position of the Austrian government actually was once it agreed in 1936 to sup with the devil, as it was doing so with the demitasse spoon more appropriately used for stirring the famous Viennese whipped cream.2” The role of Hermann Goring in Austrian affairs was not confined to his wooing of Guido Schmidt.?8 Goring, in fact, took an increasingly active part in pushing for the

annexation of Austria. His range of activities, spurred on by the hope of gaining economic resources for his Four-Year Plan, included a number of different but complementary procedures. He talked about closer relations with von Schuschnigg when they met at the funeral of Gombés in October 1936.2? He told all and sundry at every opportune and inopportune moment that the annexation of Austria by Germany was just a matter of time. This tactic, repeated too often to be anything other than calculated, must

be seen as a form of psychological warfare, conditioning third parties to the inevitable and cajoling and threatening the Austrians into resignation in the face of what was certain to happen.*? The most important recipients of Géring’s views, however, were the

Italians. Having repeatedly visited Rome earlier, Géring now had the added subject of the Spanish Civil War to discuss with the Axis partner. The Condor Legion was the main element in German support for Franco, so that as commandet-in-chief of the German air force, Goring had every reason to take a hand in the discussion of Axis aid to Franco.

Before Goring appeared in Rome in January 1937, the stage for the next phase of German-Italian relations and their still differing attitudes toward Austria had been set by important meetings in November 1936. The Rome Protocols Powers—lItaly, Hungary, and Austria—had met in Vienna to assess the new situation.>! More important than the talks of the participants was the refusal of Germany to take part. Berlin wanted to handle its relations with each country bilaterally rather than risk dealing with a group.*? They were to deal directly with Italy on economic issues,*’ and in like fashion to invite Guido 1938 (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1973), pp. 198-99. 26. The transcript, documents, and verdict of the trial are published in Guido Schmidt Trial. 27. On Schmidt, see in addition to the trial, Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 141: Die oesterreichische Frage,” 4 October 1937, Bundesartchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, ££.301-5; R 7270/303/3, FO 371/21116; cf.

Filippo Anfuso, Rom-Berlin im diplomatischen Spiegel, trans. Egon Hyman (Essen: Pohl, 1951), pp. 58-59. , 28. Letters exchanged between Goring and Schmidt are printed in Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 302-17; their relationship was a major subject of the trial. 29. See G.D., C, 5, Nos. 597 n. 9; 600, D, 1, No. 169.

;

30. For examples of Géring’s tactic, see his comments to Schmidt in November 1936 (Messersmith dispatch 983 of 4 December 1936, State 863.00/1324); his comments, direct and indirect, to Berger-Waldenegg in Rome

in May 1937 (G.D., D, 1, Nos. 203-5); his calculated “indiscretion” to Austrian industrialists in June 1937 (D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 167; von Papen to von Neurath, 19 June 1937, DZA Potsdam, Buto RAM, Akte 60964, f£.144-45; R 6541/139/3, FO 371/21115); his comments to Revertera in November 1937 (Guido Schmidt Trial,

a pp. 292-97, and Nachtrag, p. 4). 31. The Hungarian record is in Allianz Hitler-Horthy-Mussolini, No. 15; the Italian recotd in Ciano, Diplomatic

Papers, pp. 63-68; see also Messersmith to Hull, 16 and 23 October 1936, Hul/ Papers, folder 93.

32. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 16, 17.

‘

cf. 33. See von Hassell to von Neurath, 13 November 1936, DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.31—32;

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Schmidt to Berlin, not only to secure additional specific concessions in direct GermanAustrian negotiations, but above all to obtain an Austtian promise not to participate in any multilateral Balkan agreement without Germany.*# If Schmidt’s visit to Berlin proceeded smoothly, it was because the Germans were satisfied to settle for minor concessions on current issues—Hitler urged but did not insist on Austria’s leaving the League—as long as they received the one major concession that in their eyes really mattered: the promise of Austria not to join new economic (and potentially political) coalitions in the Balkan area without prior consultation with Berlin.» Schmidt’s and von Schuschnigg’s satisfaction with the visit** only shows their failure to understand the general thrust of German policy. If Austria were isolated, she could be effectively brow-beaten and eventually absorbed by her large and powerful neighbor. The when and how of this absorption could be left open, and it was the subject of

differing views within the German government, with Hitler himself leaving the precise details open; the essential prerequisite was the same regardless of which procedure was finally adopted.3” An isolated Austria would fall to Germany sooner or later; only an Austria aligned with other countries might conceivably have maintained her independence longer. A steady stream of official German visitors poured into Italy in late 1936, so that Goring came on the heels of such National Socialist notables as the Hitler youth leader Baldur von Schirach, Minister Hans Frank, State Secretary Erhard Milch with an air force

delegation, police leader Kurt Daluege with Reinhard Heydrich and other SS officials followed by Heinrich Himmler himself, Gauleiter Wilhelm Bohle of the Foreign Section

(AO) of the party, the chief press official of the government, Otto Dietrich, as well as other dignitaries of the Reich.** The Italians were quite prepared to be cooperative, as they showed by agreeing to Germany’s unilateral denunciation of the provisions governing the Rhine and Elbe rivers,*? and by reinforcing the determination of the Germans not to come to any general agreement with France, as the French government was then suggesting.” That did not, however, mean

that Goring’s impassioned

and impulsive

demands for Italian acquiescence*in the Amschluss wete as yet received in Rome with enthusiasm. Hermann Goring and his Italian hosts had litle difficulty in coordinating their respective plans for intervention in the Spanish Civil War regardless of whether the then pending ban on foreign volunteers went into effect. Contrary to what Ciano had just G.D., C, 6, No. 44.

.

34, On the preparations for the Schmidt visit, see Messersmith to Hull, 16 October 1936, Hull Papers, folder 93;

G.D., C, 6, No. 21; D, 1, Nos. 172-74, 176-80. 35. On the Schmidt visit, see Geyl, pp. 138-39; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 181-85, 188. It was at this time that Schmidt invited von Neurath to visit Vienna.

36. The subsequent testimony of the two at the Schmidt trial (pp. 431-39), is confirmed by Schmidt’s contemporary accounts to French Ambassador Frangois-Poncet (D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 13) and to the American minister

to Vienna (Messersmith dispatch 979 of 30 November 1936, State 762.63/331). 37. Note that in spite of recriminations over von Schuschnige’s Klagenfurt speech of 26 November 1936, von Neurath did go to Vienna in 1937 to further German aims. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 186, 187, 190, 191; cf. U.S. 1936,

2:8-9,

38. In his letter to von Neurath of 19 November 1936, enclosing lists of these visitors, von Hassell referred to them as an “avalanche” (DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60694, ff.33—36). Hitler’s decree of 16 December

1936 concerning trips abroad by National Socialist officials appears to have been inspired by von Hassell’s complaints (Anordnungen des Stellvertreters des Fuhrers, pp. 386-88). It is known that von Hassell saw Hitler just

before this (Akte 60964, ff.37—38), but no record of their talk has been found. Cf. Petersen, Hitler-Mussolini, p.

481.

39. See above, pp. 214-15; excerpt of von Hassell’s telegram of 1 December 1936, Germany, Auswartiges Amt, Alussenpolitische Dokumente, 1936, No. 2 (Berlin: Reichsdruckerei, 1937), No. 38.

40. G.D., C, 6, No. 90; D, 3, No. 161; cf. ibid., C, 6, No. 86.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

491

been telling the Germans, Mussolini even said kind words about a possible FrancoGerman tapprochement, pethaps meaning this metely as a rejoinde r to Géring’s polite expression of approval of Italy’s Mediterranean agreement with England (signed just before Goring’s arrival), On the Austrian question, however, there was no such pleasant agreement—even if both sides afterwards professed satisfaction on all points. Goring stressed the inevitability of an Anschluss and urged the Italians in the immedia te future to press Austria to adhere to the July agreement; ie., to make concessions to the Germans while in the long run reconciling themselves to the Anschluss. je In return, Goring implied that Germany would support Italy in any Mediterranean crisis—something of an echo of Hitlet’s views. Furthermore, although the evidence is not definitive on this, Géring most probably went beyond a simple promise to respect the Brenner border after an Anschluss by hinting at the evacuation to Germany of any persons in South Tyrol who wished to retain their German culture.4! This idea of moving people to fit borders, rather than the other way around, would play a most important role later, not only with respect to the South Tyrol, but also in the lives, and deaths, of

millions. As in the other extreme measure of treating human beings as mere objects of policy—the mass extermination program—the leaders of the Third Reich applied their doctrines first to Germans, the resettlement of the South Tyroleans was in this sense analogous to the mass extermination of the tens of thousands of victims of the euthanasia program inaugurated in the fall of 1939. The Italians, who at first seem to have thought that Goring meant that there was to be an immediate annexation of Austria, calmed down when reassured that the Anschluss was not that imminent, but Mussolini did make Géring understand that there was still great apprehension in Italy over any rapid change in the status of Austria. The agree-

ment, reached orally rather than in writing, to the effect that Italy would urge Austria to base her policy on the July agreement while Germany would take no steps changing the status of Austria without consulting Italy, represented a reasonable accommodation between the two points of view, but in reality left many questions open.*? Three aspects of the conversations of G6ring with Mussolini and Ciano must be mentioned if the development of the Axis and its practical import for German policy and international affairs are to be understood. Coming two weeks after the British-Italian gentlemen’s agreement of 2 January 1937, the emphatic public cordiality of the Goring visit showed that those who did not sign gentlemen’s agreements might be capable of 41. Goring made this point quite bluntly to Ulrich von Hassell on 15 January when the two discussed Goring’s forthcoming meeting with Mussolini (G.D., D, 1, No. 199). In the absence of a full tecord of the Mussolini-

Géring talk of 16 January (as opposed to that of 23 January), there is no way of knowing whether Goring touched on the subject. The fine study of Conrad F. Latour, Siidtirol und die Achse Berlin-Rom, 1938-1945 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962) quite properly stresses the German government’s shared responsibility for the radical decision to move the people as opposed to those who have insisted on Italian pressure as primarily responsible, but Latour does not refer to this important passage in von Hassell’s memorandum. It should be noted that the memorandum itself was kept in the files of the German embassy in Rome, and there is no evidence to suggest that von Hassell informed officials in the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin of Géring’s willingness—hardly given without Hitler’s approval—to promise the Italians absolute security on the border, including a population transfer. Mario Toscano, in his book on the South Tyrol question, Storia

diplomatica della questione dell’Alto Adige (Bari: Laterza, 1967), pp. 129-31, notes this document, states that he found no reference to the transfer idea in the Italian records of the Géring-Mussolini talks, and on the basis of a comment by Goring in 1938 assumes that the suggestion was made on Goring’s own initiative. See also Jedlicka and Neck, p. 201. 42. Sources on G6ring’s visit are: Jodi Diary, 9 January 1937, TMWC, 28:347; G.D., C, 6, No. 164; D, 1, Nos.

199, 207, 208; 3, Nos. 209, 210; Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 515-16; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 80-91 (German

text in DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60951, ff. 75-97); information received by von Hassell, Akte 60951,

Adige, ff.98-100. There are accounts in Gehl, pp. 139-40; Wiskemann, pp. 97-98; Toscano, Ouestione dell’Alto

pp. 127-31; Schmidt (who confuses the January and May trips), pp. 345—47; Siebert, pp. nen The conversation Mussolini-Liebitzky of 23 January 1938 (Jedlicka and Neck, pp. 202-3), reflects Mussolini’s changing views.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cooperating (even if they did not claim to be gentlemen). The conversations themselves dealt with the Austrian question in a way astonishingly similar to that of Mussolini’s talk with Pierre Laval about Ethiopia two years earlier. If after that earlier fateful meeting Laval had no reason to complain that Mussolini had left him with any doubts about Italy’s real intentions toward Ethiopia, so Mussolini could not say that Goring had failed to explain the objectives of Hitler’s policy toward Austtia. If the details and timetable had been left open, and to this Mussolini’s own objections contributed, it was not because Goring was concealing a specific plan, but because there was no specific plan. Mussolini, on the other hand, like Laval two years earlier, had hinted at acquiescence

without giving a firm assurance. Finally, the visit set the stage for what would become the turning point both in German-Italian relations and in the subsidiary question of Austria’s future. Goring repeated, and Mussolini accepted in principle, Hitler’s invitation for Mussolini to come to Germany and see the renewed Reich for himself. When Hans Frank had raised this possibility in September 1936, it had seemed best to send Ciano first; now that cooperation between Germany and Italy had progressed in many spheres, the Duce was willing to follow the path explored by his son-in-law. There would be considerable delay while other questions came to the forefront and preparations were made, but the signals had

been set during Goring’s visit. Upon returning, Goring realized that there were still obstacles to overcome, but he exuberantly assured—or threatened—the French ambassador on 7 February that Anschluss would surely come and that Czechoslovakia would have to be “operated on”; wat would result if Germany were not allowed to have her way. In the spring and early summer of 1937, other issues dominated the international scene. The war in Spain, with the Italian defeat at Guadalajara, weakened the position of Italy, while the Italian-Yugoslav rapprochement served to restore the balance. During the first half of the year, the internal developments in Austria, along with the negotiations

and relations between Germany and Austtia, were characterized by extremely complex cross-currents. The details of these need not be recounted here. What does have to be noted are the main characteristics‘ and trends, as well as those specific events which

illuminate them. The negotiations inside Austria and between the German and Austrian governments were marked by insistent pressure from Germany (stemming from Hitler himself), some attempted resistance by von Schuschnigg, and internal divisions among the Austrian National Socialists, though all were pushing for greater concessions from the Austrian government.** While von Schuschnigg did make some concessions, he did not go as far as the Germans wanted in terms of recognizing the Austrian National Socialist party, partly because of his own preferences and partly because of counter pressures from other elements in Austria. Certainly Berlin remained dissatisfied.* German Foreign Minister Constantin von Neurath himself tried to obtain greater concessions from von Schuschnigg when visiting Vienna on 22-23 February 1937, but, aside from bullying the Austrian chancellor about any Habsburg restoration, accomplished little in spite of signing a cultural agreement.‘ It was at this time, however, that 43. D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 423. 44. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 197, 198, 200-202, 206, 210, 211, 217-19; report on the internal situation in Austria,

14 January 1937, Nuremberg document 2831-PS, National Archives; von Papen to Hitler, A 482 of 21 January

1937, T-120, 2500/4939/E 272547-49; Messersmith dispatch 1022 of 18 January 1937, State 863.00/1328; Gehl, pp. 150-53. 45. D.D.F., 2d, 4, No. 464; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 202. 46, On von Neutath’s visit, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 212-14; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 204-7, 210, 211, 214; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 19; Messersmith dispatches 1067 of 26 February, State 762.63/344, and 1078 of 8 March 1937, State 863.00/1337; Dodd tel. 35 of 1March 1937, State 863.01/484; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekon-

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

493,

the closer cooperation between Germany and Italy became publicly evident. The Italian denunciation of the idea of a Habsburg restoration came on 26 February, right after von Neurath’s visit, and must have shown von Schuschnigg which way the wind was blowing.‘7 The Hungarians might give him fair words when he visited Budapest in March; the publication of the papal encyclical ‘Mit brennender S.orge’’ a few days later provided a measure of moral support; and the visit of Czechoslovak Prime Minister Milan Hodza to Vienna hinted at the possibility of cooperation with Prague; but none of these factors could make up for the defection of Italy.48 German-Italian relations in the period following Goring’s January visit were marked by a further degree of cooperation. Both the German ambassador in Rome, Ulrich von Hassell, and the ambassador in Vienna, Franz von Papen, were advising Hitler to follow

a cautiously steady policy in Austria in ordet to achieve better relations with Italy (which alone could facilitate an eventual Avschluss), and both—though separately—discussed the situation with Hitler in Berlin on 13 and 19 March 1937.49 In the meantime, the German

press had again been instructed to make no reference to Italian measures in South

Tyrol.°° The Italians, on the other hand, were beginning to reconcile themselves to what

now seemed inevitable. Count Ciano’s share in the Italian rapprochement with Yugoslavia was inspired in part by a view of Italian-Yugoslav cooperation as barring any further German advance southward after the Ayschluss.5! A number of reports from this time show that the Italians actually held this attitude and were not merely using it as a tactical argument for the Yugoslavs.” The shift in Italy’s position from absolute objection to the Anschluss toward preparing to cope with its implications once it had occurred had been hinted at to Go6ring when he was in Rome in January and was shown by Italian public denunciation of any Habsburg restoration in February; it was then made clear to the Southeast European countries in March and explained by Mussolini himself to von Schuschnigg when they met for the last time in April 1937.% In the discussions of Mussolini and Ciano with von Schuschnigg in Venice on 22 and 23 April 1937, the Austrian chancellor found his hosts initially courteous but substantially changed. Their nice words could not offset, in fact they enhanced, the general thrust of their advice that Austria should continue to “work actively” in the direction of better relations with Germany.°* Von Schuschnigg was warned against cooperation with ferenz,” 23 February 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, £.151; “Informationsbericht Nr. 68,” 26 February 1937, ibid., 101/30, f£.189-95 and 211-16. 47. See above, n. 20; and D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 34; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 210, 213, 215, 229, but see also No. 219. 48. On the Budapest visit, see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 223, 225, 226; R 1949/989/3, FO 371/21119. On the Hodza visit, D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 183; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 227, 228. On the papal encyclical, see above, p. 302; “Informationsbericht Nr. 75,” 24 March 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, ff. 291— 95; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 216; G.D., D, 1, No. 220. 49, Von Papen’s memorandum is in G.D., D, 1, No. 216; von Hassel’s correspondence is in ibid., C, 6, Nos. 193, 216 (note von Hassell’s request that this report be shown to Hitler, DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, £.67), 247, 312. On von Hassell’s appointment to see Hitler, see Akte 60964, ff.67—70; I have been un-

able to find a teport on the conversation. Hitler spent a longer than usual period in Berlin at this time.

50. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 3 March 1937, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, £. 173.

51. This is properly stressed by Gehl, pp. 140-41.

:

52. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 218, 229; Girsa (Belgrade) to Benes, 1 April 1937, Czechoslovak document in

T-120, 1041/1809/413847; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 243. 53. See Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 231. Glaise had been to see Hitler just before and told von Schuschnigg and

Schmidt about his impressions before the latter departed for Venice; von Papen to Hitler, tel. 37 of 22 April

1937, T-120, 2500/4939/E 54. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, G.D., CG, 6, Nos. 319, 333; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos.

ain 272596. p. 113. On the Venice melting, see, in addition to the record in ibid., pp. 108-15, D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 254, 326, 334, 341, 343, 348, 354, 362, 376, 378, 380, 390; 238, 240, 243, 244, 246; Wiskemann, pp. 100-101.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Czechoslovakia—which he forswore—and was also required to explain his actions in playing around with the possibility of restoration. The studied discourtesy of the Duce in leaving his guest to go to the railway station by himself while the Italian leader visited a German cruise ship showed the world as well as the Austrian chancellor that Rome’s priorities had changed. The text of the communiqué issued on the occasion of this visit contained no reference to the independence of Austria. In their conversations with foreign diplomats, von Schuschnigg and Guido Schmidt

might try to put a good face on the situation,*> but no one was fooled. Before the meeting the Austrians had explained to the British government that an independent Austria needed real guarantees, not just kind words,*° and afterwards the reports of Britain’s representatives in Vienna and Rome helped to stimulate the London government to make a public declaration of interest in Central Europe in Parliament; but such

declarations had little substantive effect.57 When in London for the coronation of George VI, Guido Schmidt held detailed talks with Anthony Eden and Sir Robert Vansittart; but his message, that Austria’s prospects would improve if Britain secured better relations with either Germany or Italy, was futile even if true.°* As has already been explained, the British efforts at better relations with Italy never accomplished anything in spite of such apparent successes as the gentlemen’s agreement; and the long and complicated attempts to arrive at a settlement with Germany on the basis of colonial and economic concessions in exchange for German restraint in Central and Eastern Europe were making no progress at that time—when they were being carried on with Schact— and were to be firmly rejected by Hitler ten days before the Anschluss. Schmidt’s soundings in Paris could not accomplish anything either.°? French Foreign Minister Yvon Delbos had explained to American Ambassador William Bullitt in February that France would not fight for Austrian independence; in late April he told the American in the presence of the British ambassador to Paris that Germany could take over Austria at any time. It should be easy to understand that the Germans were most pleased with the Venice meeting, and that German ‘Foreign Minister von Neurath, who had accepted an

invitation to visit Rome in early May, went with the attitude—explained to the Hungarian rather than the Italian government—that the main focus of strength in the Axis had shifted to Berlin.“ During his stay in Rome, von Neurath had an opportunity to review with Mussolini and Ciano the progress made in the development of the Axis since his meeting with Ciano the preceding October.** The Axis leaders exchanged complaints about Franco’s slow progress and agreed to continue coordinating their tactics in the Non-Intervention Committee. While the German foreign minister took up Goring’s theme of urging Italy to pull out of the League of Nations, Mussolini repeated his own prior advice that the German government make peace with the churches. There was agreement that efforts should be made to try to bring Romania closer to the Axis if that 55. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 239, 241.

56. G.D., D, 1, No. 220, Annex 1. 57. R 2967, R 3033, R 3108/438/3, FO 371/21117; R 3401/1979/3, FO 371/21119. 58. On Schmidt’s London conversations, see R 3302/1979/3, FO 371/21119; Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 520-21; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 257, 258; G.D., D, 1, No. 225. 59. On Schmidt’s Paris visit in May 1937 see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 245, 253, 257-59; G.D., D, 1, No.

225. There is only the briefest summary in D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 448 and n. 4.

60. U.S. 1937, 1:46—54. 61. Ibid., pp. 84-86. 62. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 242; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 330, 366; “Informationsbericht Nr. 86,” 24 April 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, ff.393-97.

63. On the visit, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 315, 341, 346, 347, 350, 354, 355; D, 1, Nos. 222, 650; D, 3, Nos. 246,

255; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 115-17.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

495

could be done without excessively antagonizing Hungary; a project to square the circle with which Germany and Italy would wrestle for years. The two powers reassured each other about their respective hostility to England, a touchy subject since each always suspected the other of scheming to sell out its interests for a deal with Great Britain. There was also agreement that the Austrian government should continue to be pressured into concessions to the National Socialists inside Austria, while the country’s formal status would not change. The proposed visit of Mussolini to Germany was discussed again. Von Neurath had talked this over with Hitler, who was anxious to impress the Duce with Germany’s great might and hence suggested setting the trip to coincide with the German army maneuvers scheduled for September. Mussolini thought this a great idea, but reserved his final decision, which was affirmative and given to von Neurath at their farewell meeting on 5 May.% Indicative in its own way of the correctness of von Neurath’s view that Germany was the senior partner in the Axis was the fate of a proposal Ciano first made to him on 4 May and repeated at their final meeting the following day. Ciano wondered whethet some new agreement on cooperation might not be signed at the time of Mussolini’s visit. Von Neurath was doubtful about the idea then and became even mote hesitant when Ciano developed his project during the summer. Securing the approval of Mussolini, Ciano suggested to the Germans

through his brother-in-law, Massimo Magistrati, the

counselor of the Italian embassy in Berlin, a four-power consultation pact among Italy, Germany, Austria, and Hungary. This was the last thing Germany wanted. Such an agreement would explicitly recognize the independence of Austria and implicitly recognize the Rome protocols with their emphasis on the same subject. There was also the possibility, probably a part of Ciano’s motivation, that in any consultations under this agreement the Austrians and Hungarians might well side with Italy and thus enhance her position in the German-Italian partnership. Perhaps this was what Ciano had in mind when he told the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister in Budapest on 21 May that though the Anschluss was inevitable, he hoped to delay it.° Von Neurath wanted no pacts of this sort; Hitler emphatically agreed, and von Hassell was left with the task of making the German refusal as palatable as possible to Count Ciano.°° Germany would move forward according to her own preferences by dealing bilaterally with each of the other three countries; all the Italians would get for the time being was more visits, first by Goring

again and then by German Minister of War von Blomberg. Goring’s second trip to Italy in 1937 was not of political importance, but in one way,

von Blomberg’s had a significant effect.°’ Although von Blomberg was dubious about 64. See von Neurath’s handwritten addendum to his memorandum of 4 May in DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60951, £.113 (this is another copy of G.D., C, 6, No. 355). 65. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 254; this is not in Ciano’s memorandum in his Diplomatic Papers, pp. 117-20.

66. The relevant documents, including the proposed text, from the foreign ministet’s file-—RM 619 of 7 July, RM 637 of 12 July, and von Neurath to von Hassell of 13 July 1937—ate in DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60951, ff. 124-29; they will appear as G.D., C, 6, Nos. 453, 458, and 461. The letter of von Hassell referred to

in the last of these documents is his letter to von Neurath of 2 July 1937, DZA Akte 60951, ff. 120-21. Von

Hassell’s subsequent views ate in G.D., C, 6, Nos. 469, 476; for confirmation of Mussolini’s role, see ibid., No.

485. The subsequent fate of the project is discussed below. Magistrati’s account in his memoits, pp. 58—59, is not very informative. 67. On GGring’s visit, see “Informationsbericht Nr. 84,” 19 April 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammet, ZSg. 101/30,

££361—69; Dodd tel. 105 of 14 May 1937, State 762.65/308. On von Blomberg’s visit, see Magistrati, pp. 41-46;

des D.D.F, 2d, 6, Nos. 31, 52; Wiskemann, p. 103; Enno von Rintelen, Mussolini als Bundesgenosse, Erinnerungen Miller, Ich Deutschen Militarattachés in Rom, 1936-1943 (Tibingen: Rainer Wunderlich, 1951), pp. 20-24; Vincenz deutschfand das wahre Vaterland (Berlin-East: Deutscher Militarverlag, 1963), p. 367; Enno von Rintelen, “Die 2, National italienische Zusammenarbeit im II. Weltkrieg,” 21 April 1947, Foreign Military Studies, B-495, p. £.114. Atchives; von Hassell to von Neurath, 12 May 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60951,

496

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

what he saw of the Italian army in early June 1937, he was favorably impressed by the Italian air force and navy. Given the general skepticism of Germany’s military leaders about the military potential of the Italians, the partial conversion of the Reich’s highest

officer served to restrain the doubts expressed by the German high command. Before the stream of German visitors to Rome was balanced out by Mussolini’s trip to Germany, a new element had been introduced into the relations between Germany and Austria. The internal feuds of the Austrian National Socialists continued, as did their

quarrels with von Papen’s proclivity for intrigue rather than spectacle. The multifarious contacts of the Austrian with the German party also remained, serving as a constant em-

barrassment for the diplomats, since the conspiratorial habits of the National Socialists invariably dumped vast quantities of incriminating evidence into the hands of the Austrian government. Similarly, there was no substantial change in the pattern of direct German-Austrian diplomatic contacts. There was pressure from Berlin and hesitant resistance from Vienna, with the visit of a special German commission to Vienna in July providing little more than a slight change in the terms of the arguments.’”° The new element was the introduction into the picture of two individuals, one on the Austrian and one on the German side, who would play key roles in the ending of Austrian independence.

Arthur Seyss-Inquart was an Austrian attorney who belonged to various right-wing groups but had not officially joined the National Socialists, although he was sympathetic to them. He was known

to Guido Zernatto, the general secretary of the Fatherland

Front—a main source of von Schuschnige’s political strength—who introduced him to the chancellor in April 1937.71 Von Schuschnigg was favorably impressed by SeyssInquart and came to depend upon the man who would betray both him and Austria. What apparently brought the two together was an overlap of views in which their agreements obscured their fundamental differences. Seyss-Inquart wanted the far right of Austrian politics to be decorously incorporated into the Fatherland Front and was prepared to join it himself. This meant abstention from the demonstrative activity of which Leopold and his followers were so fond and naturally appealed to von Schuschnigg. While Seyss-Inquart saw this as a‘means of taking over Austria quietly from the inside with

a “respectable”

National

Socialist

government

in Austria

as

the

aim,

von

Schuschnigg thought of defusing the internal conflicts in Austria as a way of strengthening the Austrian state so that it could cooperate with Germany while maintaining its integrity as a separate country. For a short time the superficial similarity in method hid the divergent goals. The rowdy demonstration arranged at Wels in July by the Austrian National Socialists loyal to Leopold, which was designed to undermine the 68. On this whole subject, see Hans Meiet-Welcker (ed.), “Zur deutsch-italienischen Militarpolitik und Beurteilung der italienischen Wehrmacht vor dem Zweiten Weltktieg,” Militargeschichtliche Mitteilungen, 1970, No.

1, pp. 59-93.

69. On these tedious, and at times ludicrous, matters, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 223, 229, 231-33, 242, 248, 249, 257, 258; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 269; von Papen to Hitler, A 2826 of 30 April 1937, T-120, 2500/4939/E 2726035; von Papen to von Neurath, 19 June 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, ff. 144-45;

Rosar, pp. 125, 145. 70. The visit of the commission did provide an opportunity for Giinther Altenburg to return to the scene of his 1934 conspiratorial activities (see above, pp. 82-3, 84). On the commission’s trip as well as the preceding and succeeding diplomatic talks, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 227, 234-38, 240; D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 237; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 263, 268, 269, 275, 277, 278, 282; Leonidas Hill (ed.), Weixsacker-Papiere, 1933-1950 (Frankfurt/M:

Propylaen, 1974), p. 117; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 6 July 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

101/10, £.13; “Informationsbericht Nr. 106,” of 13 July, and Nr. 107 of 15 July 1937, ibid., 101/31, ££.51—55: von Papen to Hitler, tel. 55 of 2 June 1937, T-120, 2500/4939/E 272617-18; von Papen to von Neurath, 19 June 1937, DZA Potsdam, Buito RAM, Akte 60964, ff£.144—45; and a number of documents in the Foreign

Ministry file “Pol. Abt. 09.01, Abkommen und Vertrage mit Osterreich,’ DZA Potsdam, AA, Akte 61147 (also in Dokumentationsarchiv des dsterreichischen Widerstandes, No. 2863). 71. Geyl, pp. 154-55.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

497

collaboration of von Schuschnigg with Seyss-Inquart after Seyss-Inquart had received a measute

of support from Berlin, may well have served to bring the two even closer

together.’? On the German side, the new entrant was Wilhelm Keppler. Keppler had for some years setved Hitler on various special assignments in the economic sphere and had ties to both Goring and Himmler. He was assigned, it would appear at Hitler’s request, to represent the National Socialist party’s interests when the Getman commission went to Vienna in July 1937.73 Kepplet’s initial participation in Germany’s Austrian policies was quickly enlarged. When he and von Papen reported to Hitler about the Vienna negotiations, von Papen utilized the opportunity to complain about the feuding Austrian National Socialists and their multifarious contacts in Germany, so Hitler placed Keppler in charge of all party affairs in and about Austtia.74 This step had several significant implications. It would reduce the independence of the Austrian National Socialists by impairing their ability to maneuver among the contending factions in the German government and party. It served to bring the Austrian question even mote into Hitler’s immediate hands on a continuing basis than had been the case in the preceding years. Finally, it further reduced the role of the Foreign Ministry, which had been alarmed

about von Papen’s direct reporting to Hitler—and now often found out what was going on only when Keppler chose to share his knowledge.’ Keppler’s assignment by Hitler must not, however, be taken as evidence of a less

aggressive attitude on the part of von Papen and the Foreign Ministry than Hitler wanted. On the contrary, the evidence of the time shows that von Neurath and von

Papen, von Mackensen and von Weizsacker, were bullying the Austrians as much as possible at this time and made Guido Schmidt’s visits to Berlin on 8 August and 13 September as unpleasant as they could.”° Keppler’s appointment represents much more Hitler’s preference for his own personal representatives over the ministerial bureaucracy as well as his understandable interest in effective control of the Austrian National Socialists. Such control was especially important in view of the forthcoming visit of Mussolini. Hitler himself had suggested that the timing of this visit coincide with the German fall maneuvers; he hoped to make a maximum favorable impression on the Duce, and he certainly did not want that imperiled by some incident in Austria. There is no direct evidence on the subject, but the way in which the first meeting of the two dictators had been affected by their divergent views of the Austrian question was probably on Hitler’s mind as he looked forward to the second. Leopold’s failure even to secute a hearing for his case from Hitler in spite of lengthy written appeals shows Hitler’s desire to avoid any disturbance of the atmosphere at this moment.”’ In his memoirs, Filippo Anfuso, Mussolini’s last ambassador to Hitler, asserts that

the secret of the Axis is to be found in Mussolini’s visit to Germany from 25 to 29

72. On Seyss-Inquart, see Rosar, passim, esp. pp. 122-60; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 242, 257, 258; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 267, 272; Seyss-Inquart to Keppler, 3 September 1937, Nuremberg document 3392-PS, National

Archives; Brook-Shepherd, pp. 26-28. For his July 1937 trip to Germany, see Geyl, p. 156; for the demonstration at Wels, ibid., pp. 156-57; Guido Schmidt Trial, p. 415; von Papen to Hitler,

A 4770 of 19 July 1937, T-120,

2500/4939/E 272635—37; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 281. 73. Keppler to von Neutath, 13 August 1937, DZA Potsdam, AA, Akte 61147, £.45. 74. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 241, 242; cf. Guido Schmidt Trial, p. 496. 75. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 244, 245. text 76. On the views of those named, as well as Schmidt’s visits, see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 260 (German von in Kerekes, No. 9), 277, 287, 289-91; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 239, 244, 245 n. 1, 247, 250, 251; von Papen to Bile)2ale Neurath, 1 September 1937, Emessen, pp. 94-97; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 59, 431; R4087/439/3, FO “InformationsberichtNr. 137,” 18 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/31, £251.

77. Gehl, pp. 160-61.

498

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

September 1937.78 Although often tendentious and inaccurate, in this instance Anfuso, who himself took part in the visit as the head of Ciano’s secretariat, is unquestionably correct. It was certainly not the case that any special agreements were signed between the two dictators. On the contrary, the Germans had rejected the proposal that Ciano originated and Mussolini drafted in its final form and that the Italians had hoped to have signed at the time of the visit. Unwilling to recognize Austrian independence again or to be bound to consultations in which they might be confronted by a united front of Italy, Austria, and Hungary, the Germans had eventually suggested substitutes so speciously anodyne as to be meaningless; and the whole scheme was dropped when the Germans refused to consider all references to Austria and Hungary.”? The development in economic relations which brought Germany and Italy closer together in 1937 at a time when Italy was eliminating the special trade preferences hitherto accorded Austria and Hungary also does not carry major implications.®° On the contrary, during the very days that Italy was loosening her trade ties to Austria and Hungary—thereby making them even more economically dependent on Germany—the government in Rome was positively terrified lest the planned visit of von Neurath to London herald an Anglo-German agreement, possibly at Italy’s expense. There was no need for the hysterics in Rome; Hitler was uninterested in the sort of agreement obtainable with the British and used the first handy, if unconvincing, excuse to cancel the trip. Hitler wanted Italian concurrence in the Anschluss, not a German commitment promising London to respect the independence of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe in return for economic and colonial concessions. But the reaction in Rome to the news of the intended visit reflects the lack of trust between the Axis partners at the time.*! The significance and lasting repercussions of Mussolini’s visit must be seen from an entirely different perspective. The planning, like the timing, of the visit was keyed to the details of show and protocol, not to the preparation of specific agreements.** There is some evidence of a secret Italian approach to France just before the visit to Germany,®? but the main concern of Mussolini, who alone counted among the Italians, appears to have been to see what the new Germany was like. Me was willing to be impressed, but he was still a bit skeptical. His approval of the proposed agreement that would include some reference to Austria shows that before the visit he was by no means willing to endorse all German aspirations. On the German side, there was no lack of touchy subjects that might be taken up. The hapless South Tyroleans even thought that Mussolini might be asked to pardon some deported co-nationals.*4 Ernst von Weizsicker was worried lest Italy drag Germany into her own adventures or sell Germany out to Britain.85 Von Neurath, von 78. Anfuso, p. 39. 79. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 494, 496, 499, 502, 503. On Mussolini’s not even receiving the Austrian and Hungarians

ministers to Berlin during his visit, see Magistrati, pp. 63-64. 80. On German-Italian economic relations in the summer and fall of 1937, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 368, 390, 424, 523, 532, 536, 546; on the end of Italian trade preferences for Austria and Hungary, see ibid., Nos. 486, 556; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 283, 284, 286, 308. 81. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 122-25; G.D., D, 3, Nos. 318-20, 327-29; Eden, pp. 506-11; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 252. 82. G.D., C, 6, Nos. 385, 441, 518, 527; Note by Weizsacker, 26 June 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biiro RAM, Akte 60951, f. 116; von Hassell to von Neurath, 2 July 1937, ibid., ff. 120-21; von Neurath to Hitler, 5 July 1937,

ibid., ff. 122-23; “Wichtige Bestellung fiir die Redaktion:

Das Programm

des Mussolini-Besuches,”

17

September 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £.217; “Informationsbeticht Nr. 119,” 20 August 1937, ibid., 101/31, £163; Dertinger, “Vertrauliche Information,” 23 September 1937, ibid., ff.259-61; Ciano, Diary, 27, 31 August 1937, pp. 4, 7; U.S. 1937, 1:121—22. 83. D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 481, 491; cf. G.D., D, 3, No. 421. 84. G.D., C, 6, No. 549. 85. Ibid., No. 550.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

499

Papen, and von Mackensen discussed plans for taking up with Mussolini the most difficult subject of all: Austria.8° While they wanted to get Mussolini’s agreement to closer German-Austrian ties and the replacement of von Schuschnigg, leaving Austria

only nominally independent, Hitler was mote cautious and preferred to secure Mussolini’s goodwill by moving more slowly at first.87 This approach would work very well in the context of the visit. What Hitler wanted to do was to demonstrate to his people the end of German isolation; even though they had left the League and torn up Locarno, Germany could still have friends. He hoped to show Mussolini the organized might and industrial strength of Germany as well as the unified enthusiasm of the German people. Surely, if he saw these things, and if he was really the great leader that Hitler thought him, then Mussolini would align himself with Germany, and far from

putting obstacles in her path, would consider it in his own and Italy’s best interest to move forward alongside the Third Reich. As in other situations—relations with Poland and the Vatican to name only two—Hitler was quite prepared to be cautious for a while and appear more conciliatory than many of his advisers, if he saw the eventual prospect of more substantial gain. In this respect the visit was a great success.88 Mussolini was feted extravagantly wherever he went and greatly relished the public applause. Although his speech to the assembled multitudes was in a German his listeners found hard to understand, their dis-

ciplined enthusiasm was not dampened by the torrents of rain which accompanied the Duce’s eloquence. In words that Hitler would echo half a year later, he assured the audience of his gratitude for Germany’s refusal to join in sanctions at the time of the Ethiopian war: “We shall never forget that.’”’®? He was vastly impressed by what he saw of the German maneuvers in Mecklemburg,” though his subsequent insistence on introducing the goose-step, designated as the passo Romano, enhanced neither the popularity of

the Germans in Italy nor the military effectiveness of the Italian army. A tour of the Krupp armament works in Essen and vast parades of military forces in Berlin and of party elements in Munich gave the Duce an impression of overwhelming strength. Here was a power with which Italy would do well to align herself. It is too easily forgotten in this connection that Mussolini had taken over power in Italy when Germany was at her weakest—after defeat in the war. He had been the head of the Italian government at the time of the occupation of the Ruhr and for a full decade before Hitler became chancellor. His association with Germany since 1933 had been uneasy and a matter more of convenience than conviction. Under the impact of his visit,

this was changed. The late chronicler of the Axis, Elizabeth Wiskemann, is surely correct in claiming that “the impression Nazi Germany made upon Mussolini was probably the most profound impression of his life.”?! Closely tied to this changed attitude toward Germany was a changed relation to 86. 87. 88. pp.

Ibid., Nos. 551, 557; D, 1, Nos. 251, 252. Ibid., D, 1, No. 256. Accounts and details in Anfuso, pp. 39-58; Rintelen, p. 28; Siebert, pp. 56-59; Schmidt, pp. 364-70; Frank, 268-69; Speer, Tagebiicher, pp. 198-99; Wiskemann, pp. 104-8; D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 483, 497, 502; G.D., C, 6,

No. 568; D, 1, Nos. 1, 2; 3, No. 423 n. 3; Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 117-18; Ciano, Diary, 29 September 1937, P20; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 291; “Mitteilungen fiir die Redaktionen,” 24 September 1937, Bundesarchiv, R Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, ff.227-29; “Informationsbericht Nr. 140,” 2 October 1937, ibid., 101/31, ff.295-99; 6722/438/3, FO 371/21117; Gilbert (chargé Berlin) dispatch 3703 of 8 October 1937, State 762.65/346; Mack Smith, p. 97; Domatus, 1:'732=39, ere 73 A, 89. Domatus, 1:738.

pp. 330-31, 90. It should be added that he was not the only one. The British impression is referred to on ten é above; for the great impact on the Belgians, see Overstraeten, pp. 263-64. in Mack 91. Wiskemann, p. 107. There is a good general discussion of Mussolini’s conduct of foreign policy

Smith, pp. 82-83.

500

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler. Mussolini now sensed in Hitler what Hitler had long felt about him: that here was a man of destiny with whom he should, nay must, ally himself. And one should add that Hitler’s own prior belief was reinforced by this experience. Whatever differences and ageravations might subsequently take place in German-Italian relations, the two dictators saw in each other—quite correctly—the guarantors of continued cooperation. Not friendship but mutual veneration was the tie. Perhaps each thought of the other as his mirror image, and in extolling the other man, each was reinforcing his perception of himself and his own role. The outcome of the visit in specific terms, aside from the discussion of Spain, was

mainly on the Austrian question. Precisely because Hitler had not asked for concessions in this regard, the happy and untroubled course of the visit left the impression that Mussolini had given the Germans a free hand. He had not really done so, as Frank and Hess learned when they visited Rome soon after,?? but the very fact that everybody thought Mussolini had done so had its impact. Certainly the French and Poles thought this was the case.?? Anthony Eden had commented on 22 September that Germany would now pay Italy nothing for Austria; Mussolini’s policy of the two preceding years had made Germany’s presence on the Brenner inevitable, and the Duce would rue the day if he lived.”* It would in fact be several months before the first part of this prophecy was fulfilled, but fulfilled it was before Hitler made the return visit in Rome to which his

happy Italian guests had invited him. In the period from September 1937 to March 1938, the last months of Austrian independence, the critical issue was no longer whether that independence would be ended, but how. In chapters 17 and 18 we have already traced the failure of the British and French effort at a general settlement with Germany that might have preserved an independent status for Austria. Hitler merely took these efforts, of which the Halifax visit of November was the most visible aspect, as signs that he might be able to go forward in the first steps of his expansionist program without regard for the Western Powers. The intentional spreading of stories that Eden and Halifax had agreed to the Anschluss, like the impression that Mussolini had given Hitler a free hand, all combined to create an international climate in which it was assumed that Austria would be annexed. The dilemma which faced the Western Powers in Central Europe was especially acute in regard to Austria. The French, who at one time did hint that they might mobilize

if Germany took Austria, were unwilling to go to war for a country which quite possibly did not want to be independent—a problem the Italians also noted.% If war did come, the British public would hardly support entering it, while the Dominions had already made clear that they would not.”’ The Austrian issue posed for the first time the questions that would bedevil Britain and France over Czechoslovakia. If war came, could they win? Even if they won, would and could they reestablish the status quo and enforce its maintenance? But if they let Germany have her way, or even encouraged her, would not the subsequent danger from an enlarged and strengthened Germany be even greater? The internal British correspondence on these matters from the summer of 1937 points 92. Frank, pp. 274, 278. 93. See Lipski’s comments in Szembek Diary, 4 October 1937, pp. 242-43; Blum’s comment in R 6741/1/22, FO 371/21162; and Delbos’s comment in Bullitt tel. 56 of 12 January 1938, State 740.00/264. See also Gordon

(The Hague) tel. 11 of 5February 1938, State 762.63/415; D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 6, 50.

94. C 6494/4222/12, FO 371/20749, £.137.

95. G.D., D, 1, No. 5. 96.°G 4757/3/18, FO 371/20711; C 7785/3/18, FO 371/20712; R 7948/303/3, FO 371/21116; 1:152—53.

U.S. 1937,

97. Note Géring’s comments reflecting Hitlet’s and his own knowledge of this position in Guido Schmidt Trial, p. 295.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

501

out the dilemma of the time and the direction of events. The British ambassador in Paris commented that he doubted the French would even mobilize for Austria; they might fight for Czechoslovakia, though it would not do much good. The Austrians were not

expecting a coup just then, and the Foreign Office thought a coup in the immediate future unlikely, though little could be done if one were to occur. It was also thought that internal German developments might precipitate events. Von Schuschnigg’s comment to the French minister in Vienna, that only a BritishFrench declaration that the political status quo in Central Europe was untouchable could avert all danger, was both unrealistic and inaccurate.°? It was unrealistic in that there was no prospect of such a declaration, and it was inaccurate because the status quo, especially in Austria, was crumbling steadily and could quite easily dissolve without the kind of Overt international crisis in which any foreign power might usefully intervene. That the Anschluss eventually took precisely this form would be partly due to the unwise action of the Austrian chancellor himself. But even without the refusal of von Schuschnigg to reconcile his domestic socialist opponents, without his extraordinary willingness to make concessions to Seyss-Inquart even before his trip to Berchtesgaden, and without the plebiscite scheme, it is most doubtful that the outcome would have been different even if the details of the story had been otherwise. Hitler was determined to annex Austria by one means or another, and with no solid opposition to that aim either within or without that country, there was not much prospect of diverting him from his goal. Inside Austria, the last months of 1937 saw a continuation of the feuding between

the Austrian National Socialists and Seyss-Inquart, while Seyss-Inquart as well as his German mentors were increasingly unhappy with the stalling tactics of von Schuschnigg. The various schemes and projects, which included plans for a visit by Goring to Vienna, contacts between the Austrian and the Czechoslovak governments, as well as a host of other activities, all merely served to indicate that a temporary stalemate had been reached. This stalemate was highlighted by the inability of the Rome Protocols Powers of Italy, Austria, and Hungary to reach any agreement at their last meeting on 10-12 January 1938 in Budapest.!% The ability of the Germans to take advantage of this stalemate and to push the Austrian government further down the slippery slope was assured by the maintenance of good German-ltalian relations growing out of the Mussolini visit. The closer telations between Germany and Italy were evidenced by a number of concrete measures in the months immediately following. After the Germans had made some concessions to meet a personal request of Mussolini, a new German-Italian

economic agreement was signed on 18 December.'! What is revealing about this agree-

98. C 5126/3/18, FO 371/20711. 99. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 463.

1, Nos. 307, 309; Emessen, 100. On the planned Goring visit to follow Schmidt’s visit, see Hungarian Documents, Biiro RAM, Akte 60964, ff.168—69; pp. 98-99; von Papen to von Neurath, 16 November 1937, DZA Potsdam,

1, Nos. 269, 273; R 7695/303/3, D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 157, 298; Magistrati, p. 107; Rosar, pp. 169-70; G.D., D,

1, Nos. 254, 259; Hungarian Documents, 1, FO 371/21116. On the Austrian-Czechoslovak contacts, see G.D., D,

762.63/497. On the Seyss-InquartNos. 292, 294, 295, 299, 300; Wiley dispatch 138 of 25 February 1938, State 275; Seyss-Inquart to Keppler, 1, 272, 267, 260, 255, Nos. 1, G.D., D,

Leopold conflict and Kepplet’s role, see 21, and 25 October, 2 November 1937, Nuremberg documents

3393-PS, 3394-PS, 3390-PS, and 3395-PS,

document 3626-PS, National National Archives; Seyss-Inquart to Keppler, 7 December 1937, Nuremberg Diplomatic Papers, pp. 148— Ciano, see meeting, Powers’ Protocols Rome the Archives; TMWC, 32:253-54. On aspects of Documents, 1, Nos. 323, 329. For other 49; Ciano, Diary, 10-12 January 1938, pp. 85-88; Hungarian 264, 268; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 293, 301, Nos. 1, D, G.D., see time, this at relations rian German-Aust 53 of 10 December 1937, State 762.63/403; R dispatch Wiley 210; No. 7, 2d, BLOw Sts 325, 3277 D-D.E,,

7842/303/3, FO 371/21116. 1937,” T-120, 2612/5650/H 004119—20; 101. “Sitzung des Handelspolitischen Ausschusses vom 8. Dezember Ciano, Diary, 18 December 1937, p. 64.

502

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

ment is the implicit assumption that any joint war of Germany and Italy against other countries would be against the Western Powers. In case of “abnormal times,” Germany and Italy’s mutual support for “special circumstances” would be shipped exclusively over land, thus avoiding any possible interference with their communications by sea, something open only to England and France. If such plans were kept secret, equal care was exetcised to draw public attention to others. The adherence of Italy to the AntiComintern Pact in November was accompanied by as much fanfare as her departure from the League of Nations. Closely related to this symbolic shift was the Italian recognition of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo. And all of these actions were accompanied by still more German visitors to Rome, including Hitler’s deputy, Rudolf Hess, Hans Frank, the Prince of Hessen, and Joachim von Ribbentrop.! While the German government was most careful to keep Rome informed about the Halifax visit, lest new Italian suspicions be aroused,'> Ciano expressed to his German

visitors the desirability of replacing von Hassell as German ambassador in Rome. Ciano thought von Hassell neither sufficiently enthusiastic about closer German-Italian relations nor influential enough with Hitler, and he wanted a party man as successor.!"% From the Italian point of view, there was substance to both complaints,!°° and Hitler had promised to change his own ambassador in Rome if requested to do so when he asked for Vittorio

Cerruti’s

transfer

from

Berlin.!°° The

change was, however,

not made

immediately, partly because von Hassell tried very hard to keep his post,!°’ and partly because Hitler was not able to decide quickly on a replacement.!°* Eventually the change was included with those announced on 4 February 1938, and von Hassell, like his old

rival von Neurath, was retired on that fateful day. Von Neurath remained a loyal minion of the Fuhrer and ended up in the dock at Nuremberg, while von Hassell was active in

the opposition to Hitler and was among those executed after 20 July 1944. The successor to von Hassell was Hans Georg von Mackensen, an unimaginative

diplomat of distinguished lineage whose brief service as state secretary ended with the removal of his father-in-law von Neurath from the post of foreign minister. He was to be on better terms with Ciano, in part no doubt because he was at all times faithful to the idea of the Axis. Ciano’s happiness at the change was also probably enhanced by the fact that unlike his predecessor, who had enjoyed direct access to Mussolini in the years when the Duce had himself held the position of foreign minister, von Mackensen had to rely 102. On the Anti-Comintern Pact and Italy’s departure from the League, see above, pp. 415-18; see also Ciano, Diary, 22: November 1937, p. 50; U.S. 1937, 1:194-95; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 67, 76; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 8 November 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg, 101/10, £.337; R 8244, R 8302/655/22, FO

371/21179; Magistrati entitled the chapter of his memoirs dealing with this and related episodes: “L’Italia si allontana dalla collaborazione internazionale.” On Italian recognition of Manchukuo, see Weinberg, “Recognition,” pp. 157-58; see also Magistrati, pp. 108-10. On the visits of Hess, Frank, and von Ribbentrop, see Frank, p. 274; Ciano, Diary, 27 and 30 October 1937, pp. 33, 35; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 144-46; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 26 October 1937, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £303;

“Informationsbericht Nr. 150,” 27 October 1937, ibid., 101/31, ff. 275-77. 103. See especially von Neurath to von Hassell, 25 November 1937, DZA Potsdam, Biito RAM, Akte 60964, ff.172—73; cf. G.D., D, 1, No. 92; Magistrati, pp. 102-5. 104. Ciano, Diary, 27 and 30 October 1937, pp. 33, 35. There is a good retrospective analysis in D.D.F., 2d, 8,

No. 284.

105. Note von Hassell’s advice to Henderson on 2 November that only a quick Anglo-German agreement

could keep the Axis from becoming permanent (C 7550/270/18, FO 371/20736). 106. See above, pp. 183-84.

107. Ciano, Diary, 4 and 6 January 1936, pp. 81, 82; von Hassell to von Neurath, 19 Januaty 1938, DZA Pots-

dam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, ff£.177-80. Von Hassell’s smuggling of art objects out of Italy for Géring (Emessen, pp. 28ff.) may belong in this context. 108. Note the Prince of Hessen’s comment that von Dirksen would take von Hassell’s place (Ciano, Diary, 18 December 1937, p. 64). For Hitler’s consideration of prominent National Socialists for the post, see above, pp. 321-22. Cf. Magistrati, pp. 121-23.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

503

entirely on Ciano as foreign minister for his contacts and information, The Italian attitude toward Austria by this time was one of quiet resignation. As the Duce explained to von Ribbentrop on 6 November, in response to the suggestion that this question would “at a certain moment” have to be settled finally, Austria was a German country. Italy would do nothing if a crisis arose; the situation should be allowed to take its natural course. Independence could not be imposed on Austria.!!9 Ciano, who was beginning the preparations for Hitler’s visit the following May, noted in his diaty that he had instructed the Italian minister in Vienna to administer oxygen to the dying Austrian government so that the German heir would not notice, but that the heir was more important than the dying. “The alliance with the Slavs,” he noted in connection with the planning for the visit of Yugoslav Prime Minister Stojadinovié, “allows us to view the eventual prospect of the Ansch/uss with equanimity.”"! There is indirect evidence that the attitude of the foreign minister may well have been influenced by the belief that the South Tyroleans could be sent to Germany, never to return. Renato Prunas, the Italian chargé in Paris during the two-year period when there was no Italian ambassador to France, asserted to the Ametican

ambassador in

January 1938 that agreement had been reached between the German and Italian governments for the transfer of the South Tyroleans.'!? Though presumably an exaggeration, this statement could reflect the internal Italian interpretation of what they had been told by their German visitors, especially by G6éring on his January 1937 trip.!!3 Since there is definite evidence that G6ring believed there was authorization to give such assurances to the Italians, it is not unreasonable to suppose that whether or not he himself did give them, the Italian government had learned of this German attitude by a year later. The Italian view of a possible Axsch/uss may be more easily understood, then, if the presumed willingness of the Germans to accept those desiring to leave the South Tyrol is considered in conjunction with Ciano’s comment on the agreement with Yugoslavia. As mentioned previously, not love of the Austrians, but fear of German territorial demands for the South Tyrol and perhaps an outlet to the Adriatic had been a primary factor in Rome’s support of Vienna. Surely a Germany willing to agree to a population transfer in South Tyrol would not lay claim to Adriatic ports once under Habsburg control against the combination of those who had inherited them, Italy and Yugoslavia. Events were to bear out a large portion of the Italian government’s expectations. After the Anschluss, the

Germans did agree to the transfer of the South Tyroleans, and it was not until Yugoslavia had disappeared by partition and Italy herself had abandoned the Axis that Hitler moved in 1943 toward the annexation of South Tyrol and Trieste by the creation of “Operational Zones,” A/penvorland, and Adriatisches Ksistenland.

In the last months of 1937 there was agreement in German government and party circles that some initiative, probably from the German side, would be needed to break

what appeared to be a stalemate in German-Austrian relations. After Hitler’s comments on his desire to annex Austria at the meeting of 5 November recorded in the Hossbach memorandum, all the key figures in Germany told foreign visitors that action against Austria was imminent.!!4 The economic assets to be seized in Austria constituted an especially attractive lure at a time when German rearmament was causing increasing 109. Rintelen, p. 39. On Mussolini’s isolation from contact with diplomats after Ciano became foreign minister, see R 8563/1/22, FO 371/21163. 110. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 146.

20; 111. Ciano, Diary, 10, 24 November, 5 December 1937, 2 January 1938, pp. 41, 51, 57, 78; see also Di Dike 8, No. 15.

112. Bullitt tel. 55 of 12 January 1938, State 740.00/263.

113. See above, p. 491. 114. U.S. 1937, 1:170-77; C 8830/3/18, FO 371/20712.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

504

strains in the German economy.!!>

There were numerous indications that new steps were needed and that action would be taken eatly in the next year.!!° The difficult question to answer is what initiatives Hitler himself was thinking of. Kepplet’s comment that action would come in the spring may reflect what Hitlet’s special representative for Austrian questions was hearing from his mentor.!!7 When von Papen talked to Hitler with Goring present on 14 December, Hitler wanted the question carried forward in such a manner as to avoid force as long as European considerations made that desirable.!'® Around 10 November, Danzig Gauleiter Albert Forster had learned that after January 1938 he was expected to keep the Free City quiet so that the Reich could concentrate on Austria.'!° Either at the same time or early in 1938, Forster was told by Hitler himself that he was to be transferred to Vienna—as von Papen’s replacement—where he would be expected to stage a coup in June or July.!2° In view of the occasional references in the documents to following, in Austria,

the Danzig model of a National Socialist government subordinate to but formally independent of Berlin, the possibility of using the very man who had been successful in Danzig and who belonged to the circle of Hitler’s party associates must have looked very attractive to the Fuhrer.!?! In this context, the schemes for an uprising of Austrian National Socialists which

ate generally assumed to have had no support from Hitler should perhaps not be dismissed quite so readily.!?2 The documents found by the Austrian police when they raided the Vienna party headquarters on 25 January and, arrested Gauleiter Leopold Tavs, Leopold’s deputy, provided for a planned series of provocative acts which would eventually lead to such stringent measures on the part of the government as to justify German

intervention. The documents

themselves have not been published, and it is

difficult to prove or disprove whether, for example, Rudolf Hess had signed or initialed some of the documents as asserted by several reports.!23 What should be noted is that whether ot not such schemes were authorized by the highest circles in Germany or merely reflected the enthusiastic strategy of Captain Leopold’s efforts to gain control of the situation for himself and away from von Papen, this was the course Hitler had at his disposal if Forster had assumed his projected responsibilities in Vienna.!2+ Certainly 115. This point is heavily stressed by Norbert Schausberger, “Osterreich Anschlusspolitik,” in Funke, pp. 744ff. See also Forstmeier (ed.), p. 149.

und die nationalsozialistische

116. Examples in TMWC, 32:253-54; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 63, 273; U.S. 1937, 1:158-59; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 34. 117. IMWC, 32:253-54. Cf. the report of the Austrian consul general in Munich of 21 January 1938, Guido

Schmidt Trial, p. 507. 118. G.D., D, 1, No. 80. 119. Gallman dispatch 439 of 16 November 1937, State 860K.00/315.

120. C 4359/197/55, FO 371/21801; Gallman dispatch 474 of 9 May 1938, State 860K.00/323. 121. Note Seyss-Inquart’s own admission that “Danzigfication” was the German policy, reported in Wiley tel. 53 and dispatch 148 of 8 March 1938, State 762.63/495 and 544.

122. For an example of a “Plan for an Uprising” (“Aufstandsplan”) of Captain Leopold of early January 1938, see Wilhelm Canaris, “Aktenvermerk tber Besprechung Leiter Abw.-Leiter Ausl. am 31.1.38,” 2 February 1938,

Nuremberg document 3574-PS, National Archives. 123. See G.D., D, 1, Nos. 279, 280; U.S. 1938, 1:385-87; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 51; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 26 January 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.55; “Informationsbericht Nr. 13,”

26 January 1938, ibid., 101/32, £.59; Wiley dispatch 106 of 31 January 1938, State 863.00/1372. In view of his contacts in the Austrian government, the account of Gedye, pp. 209-10, cannot be dismissed out of hand. Gehl, pp. 167—68, bases his summary on the Zernatto memoirs, and concludes that “it seems most improbable, in view of the rest of the documentary evidence, that Hitler knew about it or even approved of it.” BrookShepherd, pp. 15-18, also leaves the question open. Rosar, pp. 188-89, discusses the documents which he examined in the Austrian archives, but has nothing to say on this aspect. 124. The inclusion of the assassination of von Papen by the Austrian National Socialists as a provocation in what came to be known as the “Tavs Plan” does not speak for or against German official sanction. One source

claims that the German military attaché, General Wolfgang Muff, was the originally intended victim and that

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

505

Forster had not been designated by Hitler to keep things calm on the Austrian front; quite the contrary, it was the Danzig Gauleiter’s penchant for violent words and drastic action that had led Géring to urge his removal from Danzig and recommended him to Hitler as just the right instrument to provoke the internal upheavals in Austria that would open the way for domination or annexation by Berlin. Although pressure from the National Socialists inside Austria did not start the slide toward the Anschluss, it was used by the German government to assist the ptocess. The initiative grew out of a combination of internal Austrian negotiations, pressures by the German on the Austrian government through von Papen, and internal developments in Germany that led Hitler to think the moment opportune for an external action.!25 The deadlock at the end of 1937 had discouraged Seyss-Inquart and Glaise-Horstenau, but Goring and Keppler worked to keep them from withdrawing; Goring and Keppler believed that Hitler was determined to move on the Austrian question in the spring or summer of 1938, and would need assistants within the Austrian government even if the details of procedure were still open.'2° Von Papen had suggested that the way to get things moving was

to have von

Schuschnigg

meet

Hitler, a suggestion which

the

Austrian chancellor had agreed to on 8 January only after von Papen had received Hitler’s formal approval. Originally, the meeting was scheduled for the end of January, and the actions of the Austrian government in the period immediately after 8 January can be understood only in the framework of von Schuschnigg’s expected visit to Berchtesgaden in the immediate future. To strengthen his own position in the forthcoming meeting, von Schuschnigg moved dramatically on two fronts. The first concerned what he considered the most radical and dangerous of the domestic National Socialists, and the second was the recon-

ciliation of the so-called moderate National Socialists with their Austrian allies. The action on the first front has already been mentioned. The government took the earliest convenient opportunity to raid the Vienna headquarters of the Austrian National Socialists, which had been operating openly for some time. It may be that the authorities found even more than they had anticipated; the large number of arrests and subsequent release of those against whom there was not sufficient evidence suggests a measure of surprise on the part of the police. Whatever the details, here was a serious blow to one

segment

of the Austrian

National

Socialists which

also gave the government

the

option—which it never exercised—of publishing a collection of documents, similar to

those of 1933 and 1934, which could embarrass the German government.'!?” If the raid on the Vienna National Socialists was accompanied by considerable publicity, even if the seized documents were never published, the other front on which von

Schuschnigg moved—his

negotiations, carried on through Zernatto, with Seyss-

Inquart—was shrouded in secrecy for the time being,'7° It was von Schuschnigg’s hope this had been vetoed by Heinrich Himmler (Wiley dispatch 106 cited in the preceding note). It should be noted that the assassination of the German minister in Czechoslovakia was considered by Hitler in April 1938 as one possible provocation to excuse a German invasion of that country (IM WC, 25:416). Analogous arrangements for provocation, though involving concentration camp inmates as victims, were made for the invasion of Poland, and Hitler placed major emphasis on it in his speech announcing the beginning of the war. 125. The best accounts in Brook-Shepherd and Gehl. Sources cited in these accounts will generally not be cited here unless there are special reasons to do so. See also Kral, Manchen, No. 12. 126. G.D., D, 1, No. 276; TMWC, 32:254-55, 332-34; cf. Rosar, pp. 180-88, where most of the blame for

developments is laid to von Schuschnigg.

;

after the July 127. For the Reichspost revelations of August 1933 see above, p. 76; for the collection published

ps 1934 putsch, see ibid., pp. 89ff. 128. Gehl, p. 171, makes a major point of von Schuschnigg’s decision to continue these on or about 8 February (p. 173) when the new date for his meeting with Hitler had been set; but the negotiations, as Gehl himself says of events can had been going on “for about a fortnight” before 12 February. It appears to me that the sequence

506

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

that if he could work out an agreement with Seyss-Inquart before seeing Hitler, he could confront the Fithrer with a situation in which he had smashed one part and successfully appeased the other part of his domestic National Socialist opposition. He could then deal with whatever further proposals the Germans might present from a position of strength. It was for this reason that he tried to keep Seyss-Inquart from knowing of his own forthcoming meeting with Hitler. There were two basic flaws in von Schuschnigg’s strategy. In the first place, his belief that Seyss-Inquart was loyal was a pathetic delusion: Seyss-Inquart was in constant contact with German party and state agencies. This meant that he learned of the forthcoming meeting between Hitler and von Schuschnigg and that the German government knew every detail of the concessions von Schuschnigg was prepared to make to SeyssInquart. The other flaw in von Schuschnigg’s strategy lay precisely in the concessions he was willing to offer. Imagining that in men like Seyss-Inquart and Glaise he was dealing with honorable Austrians, and himself desirous of a settlement that would enable Austria

to be closely associated with Germany and still retain a measure of independence, von Schuschnigg practically gave away the whole situation by agreeing to a vastly greater role for National Socialists in the Austrian government, including the appointment of SeyssInquart as minister of the interior. The sole concession of Seyss-Inquart was the promise to make a public speech condemning illegal activities once the agreement were made public.!2° The meeting of Hitler and von Schuschnigg, originally scheduled for late January, was postponed because of developments in Germany. The Fritsch-Blomberg crisis intervened, first to delay and then to speed up the course of German-Austrian negotiations. To a letter from von Papen about the scheduled meeting, von Neurath replied by telegram that Hitler was now willing to meet von Schuschnigg “in the first half of February,” something von Papen transmitted to the Vienna authorities on the same day, suggesting “about the 15th of February” as the new time.'3° Von Schuschnigg accepted the proposed change on the understanding that Hitler would give his final decision on 30 January.'3! In the meantime, the seSsion of the Reichstag at which Hitler was expected to speak on foreign policy was also postponed, to be held eventually on 20 February.'*? As Hitler concentrated on the internal changes in Germany, he combined the wholesale shifts in the military command structure with an almost equally large-scale set of changes in the diplomatic area.'33 Although this set was to include the removal of von Papen from Vienna at the same time as von Hassell, von Ribbentrop, and von Dirksen were re-

called from their diplomatic posts, the Austrian question figured in Hitler’s handling of the crisis in still another way. The very time when Hitler was examining the various ways of dealing with the be understood more easily if the original decision of von Schuschnigg to negotiate with Seyss-Inquart is considered first—and by Gehl’s own reckoning this about coincided with the raid on National Socialist headquarters—and the decision to continue on 8 February then becomes a teaffirmation of a prior conclusion which had been reached for the same reasons in a similar situation: strengthening von Schuschnigg’s hand before what previously and now again was thought to be an imminent meeting with Hitler. 129. The full text in Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 557-59. See also Canaris, “Zusammenstellung politischer Nachrichten aus Osterreich,” 1 February 1938, Nuremberg document 3582-PS, National Archives. Rosar, pp. 186-206, believes that the Seyss-Inquart-von Schuschnigg negotiations were held specifically looking to the meeting with Hitler. 130. Von Neurath tel. 6 of 26 January 1938, T-120, 2500/4939/E 272688. The Austrian record of von Papen’s

conveying of the new schedule is in Guido Schmidt Trial, p. 557.

131. Note von Neurath to von Hassell, 26 January 1938, stating that Hitler was seeing no one before January 30 (DZA Potsdam, Biro RAM, Akte 60964, £.183). 132. See Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht Nr. 12,” 20 January and Nr. 14, 28 January 1938, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ff. 57, 63.

133. See above, pp. 319-25.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

507

internal German situation was during the period when he had originally been scheduled to meet the Austrian chancellor. That meeting had now been postponed, but with the news stories on the Vienna police raid in the paper, Hitler thought it best to take steps which would prevent the Austrian chancellor from becoming too cocky and would simultaneously divert European attention from the internal German crisis to the Austrian question,'** while also diverting the attention of the German public. When von Papen,

therefore, saw Hitler on 5 February, the day after the announ cement of his own recall,

Hitler told him that the planned meeting should still go forward and sent the dismissed diplomat back to Vienna to make the necessaty attangements.' °° Thus von Papen’s mission ended as extraordinarily as it had begun: his appointment had been announced from Berlin before the Austrian government had given the agrément, and he returned to Vienna after his dismissal to arrange the details of von Schuschnigg’s trip to Berchtesgaden to see Hitler. Von Schuschnigg informed the Italian government on 10 February and notified the British, French, and Hungarians on the 11th that he was going to meet Hitler on the 12th.'°° When he arrived to meet the German dictator, he was confronted by Hitler, who

laid down the ultimatum that von Schuschnigg agree to a set of terms which were essentially an expanded version of the very ones he had conceded tentatively to SeyssInquart—hardly a coincidence since Seyss-Inquatt had had them transmitted to Hitler, but therefore all the more shocking to the trusting and overconfident von Schuschnigg. The terms of the conversations and the auta of military coercion reinforced by the summoning of German military figures, were designed by Hitler to put the utmost pressure on the Austrian leader. Von Schuschnigg was given to understand that the

Germans would invade Austria. General Keitel, who had just been designated chief of the high command of the armed forces, General von Reichenau, who commanded the military district adjacent to Austria, and General Sperrle, who had been demonstrating

his capacity for leveling cities in Spain, were brought into the meetings to overawe the Austrian chancellor.!°’ Von Schuschnigg found himself forced to agree that the German demands would all be met by 15 February.138 Several aspects of this meeting need to be noted. The similarity between the Berchtesgaden agreement and the prior Seyss-Inquart-Zernatto discussions should not obscure the difference between concessions made to a foreign government under the threat of force and concessions agreed to in domestic political negotiations. The threat of force was used by Hitler in direct German talks with another country for the first time 134. Jodl Diary, 31 January 1938, TMWC, 28:302; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 181, 182.

135. The story of von Papen’s initiative in this, as well as of Hitler’s having allegedly forgotten about the planned meeting with von Schuschnigg, rests only on assertions of von Papen at the trial of Guido Schmidt (p. 378) and in his memoirs, entitled with unconscious irony, Der Wahrheit eine Gasse (“a narrow route for the truth”). In view of the contemporary evidence of Jodl (see the preceding note) that Hitler talked about “making von Schuschnigg tremble” on 31 January, I find this tale of von Papen’s, like so many others, unconvincing. 136. Wiley dispatch 129 of 19 February 1938, State 762.63/484 (hereafter cited as Wiley Report). This is a detailed report on the background and course of the Berchtesgaden interview by the U.S. chargé in Vienna. On the first page is a comment by the former U.S. minister to Austria, then assistant secretary of state, George S. Messersmith: “This is a really excellent dispatch.” With insignificant exceptions, all the details in the report have been substantiated since. On the period just before von Schuschnigg’s trip to Berchtesgaden, see also Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 350, 352, 353; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 140, 144, 148, 203; Jedlicka and Neck, pp. 204, 235-36.

137. Jodl Diary, 11 February 1938, TMWC, 28:367; Rosat, pp. 206-15; Keztel Papers, p. 177; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 356; D.D.F,, 2d, 8, Nos. 159-61; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 14, 15, 17, 18 (the bulk of the documents from the

Czechoslovak archives pertaining to the Anschluss appeat to have been kept separately and were not found by the Germans, see Mitis to Berber,

7 April 1939, T-120, 1039/1809/411929-30;

Kral’s work, it is possible that they have been lost). 138. Texts in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 294, 295,

from the sparse number in

508

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

on this occasion, and its success would inspire repetition. Von Schuschnigg’s agreement to the inclusion of Seyss-Inquart in his government as minister of the interior as a stooge of Hitler rather than as an Austrian politician, as well as a host of other changes, assured that the situation inside Austria, once it had started to slide, would continue sliding. To

make sure of this, Hitler ordered military pressure on Austria during the days following the meeting of 12 February.!*° While von Schuschnigg was busy implementing the Berchtesgaden agreement,'*? and still trusted Seyss-Inquart—hard though it is to believe such credulity'*!—the Germans could ward off all foreign protests by referring to the Austrian chancellor’s public pretext that the meeting had been friendly. Hitler, furthermore, took two steps, one of which had few, but the other numerous repercussions. First, to assure the success of the combination of his own pressure from the outside and Seyss-Inquart’s boring from the inside, he dismissed the protesting Leopold and temporarily held back the

Austrian National Socialist rowdies.'*2 His second step was to rescind the concession he had promised von Schuschnigg as the sole compensation for the agreement of 12 February. The Austrians correctly believed that they had been promised the inclusion in Hitler’s speech of 20 February of appropriate passages praising the agreement and promising to respect the independence and to refrain from interfering in the internal affairs of Austria.!43 In the draft of this section of Hitler’s speech (prepared by Gunther Altenburg of the German Foreign Ministry after talking with Seyss-Inquart in Berlin on 17 February immediately after Seyss-Inquart’s appointment to the von Schuschnigg cabinet), the kind words about the agreement and the promise not to interfere in internal affairs can still be found.'44 When

Hitler spoke on 20 February, however, even this

promise had vanished and only praise of the agreement remained.!45 Although Guido Schmidt, as usual, professed himself pleased with whatever was done by the Germans, von Schuschnigg was very disappointed by this breach of promise and, in turn, decided that he himself would have to alter his approach. He adopted a far less friendly tone than he had planned in his own speech, scheduled for 24 February, and he began to consider a countermove of his own for a couple of weeks later, possibly a sudden plebiscite. Von Schuschnigg’s speech of 24 February merely irritated the Germans; his decision to try a plebiscite, however, had more far-reaching implications.

While thinking about the possibility of calling for a plebiscite, von Schuschnigg did canvass the British, French, and Italians about the general situation, but the evidence

suggests that he was only half-hearted in this. After the Berchtesgaden meeting, von Schuschnigg had done everything possible to reassure the British and French governments that all was well and had deprecated all expressions of concern about the situation. Instead of using the occasion of Hitler’s bullying—about which a good deal had leaked out in spite of the good face put on it by Vienna—to arouse international support for Austrian independence, von Schuschnigg had done his best to dampen any such 139. Jod! Diary, 13 and 14 February 1938, TMWC, 28:367; Keitel to Hitler and response, 14 February 1938,

1775-PS, ibid., pp. 299-300. 140. Dertinger, “Vertraulicher Informationsbericht,’ 14 February, and “Abendmaterial, Wien,” 15 February 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ff.101-7. 141. Palairet (Vienna) No. 22 of 15 February 1938, R 1442/137/3, FO 371/22311.

142. A good summary in Gehl, pp. 180-82. 143. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 355, 361.

144. G.D., D, 1, No. 307. 145, Domarus, 1:802-3. The noninterference promise was relegated to a circular by Hess (G.D., D, 1, No. 304). G6ring told Frangois-Poncet that reference to Austrian independence had been omitted because it would end sooner or later anyway (D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 219; cf. ibid., No. 293).

146. Note Wiley’s tel. 34 of 21 February 1938 in U.S. 1938, 1:405. See also Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 378; Wiley tels. 48 of 3 March, State 762.63/481, and 49 of 4March 1938, State 863.00/1393.

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interest.'47 Once he had been confronted by Hitler with the threat of force, von Schuschnigg changed his whole approach, and his conduct in the crisis cannot be undetstood unless it is recognized that he was absolutely determined not to risk an outbreak of hostilities. All the evidence of contemporary documents and observers as well as von Schuschnigg’s own memoirs reveal this attitude; thus foreign assuranc es of support were of interest to him only if they served to deter a German invasion, not if they offered Support in the case of hostilities. Since he knew that military support would neither be offered by others nor wanted by himself, the whole point of taking international soundings during the last half of February and the first days of March was to determine whether other powers would take positions in favor of Austrian independence that were so public, obvious, and convincing as to deter Hitler from further threats of using force, to say nothing about carrying out such threats. If von Schuschnigg still had any illusions about receiving that kind of public affirmation of Support, he was to be quickly enlightened. Neither the British nor the French government was willing to go beyond expressions of concern. The questions which loom so large in the documents, whether

the representations in Berlin should be joint or separate, and whether the inclusion of references to Austria in the British approach were likely to have a deleterious effect on

the planned British sounding of the Germans for a proposed general settlement, were of no substantial importance.'#8 Whatever was said severally or jointly, and whatever the British might be preparing to offer, Hitler could not cate less; as has been discussed in

connection with Hitler’s turn to Japan at the end of the effort to mediate the SinoJapanese war, it was his hope and expectation that Japan’s advance in East Asia would help immobilize Britain, and hence France, in Europe.'4? Western statements and hopes were irrelevant to his intentions toward Austria.

The Italian government would have preferred the Germans to wait a bit, but not so much because of their position in Austria. That position had been written off,!5° but

there was the possibility of securing concessions from London out of Britain’s hope that an Anglo-Italian rapprochement might result in a stabilization of Austtia’s position.!5! Obviously, this bargaining position would vanish with Austria’s disappearance,!*2 and the frantic last-minute attempts to start Anglo-Italian talks—over which Eden resigned and during which the Italians refused to discuss Austria, which they had written off but pre-

tended to the English might still be saved—should be viewed in this context. As previously mentioned, G6ring was in Poland on 23 February to follow up Hitler’s extravagant praise of the state of German-Polish relations in his speech of 20 February. It was clear that Germany had no need to worry about her eastern flank.!° Nothing makes the 147. The details are summarized well in Brook-Shepherd, pp. 65-95. See also D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 166, 179, 215. 148. On French attitudes and perspectives, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 169, 185, 189, 190, 231, 258, 274, 276, 301, 304, 403; G.D., D, 1, Nos. 291, 302, 124, 125, 133; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 379; Bullitt tel. 269 of 18 February 1938, State 740.00/298. On the British attitude, see G.D., D, 1, Nos. 305, 310; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 365, 373, 394; C 1095/62/18, FO 371/21655; British Cabinet 5 (38) of 16 February 1938, R 1623/137/3, FO 371/22311. On the idea of a joint approach, see Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 364, 377, 393, 408; Wiley tel. 31 of 19 February 1938, State 762.63/461; U.S. 1938, 1:35-39; Foreign Office Memorandum of 16 February 1938, R 1442/137/3, FO 371/22311.

149. See above, pp. 421-22. 150. D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 263 (was Ciano trying to persuade himself?). 151. Gehl, pp. 178-80; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 371, 382 (German text in Kerekes, No. 12); 2, No. 110; G.D., D, 1, No. 129; U.S. 1938, 1:418; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 226; minutes of 24th meeting of British cabinet

Committee on Foreign Policy, 1 March 1938, CAB 27/623. 152. See Ciano’s instruction to the Italian ambassador in London of 16 February 1938, quoted in Renzo de Felice, “Betrachtungen zu Mussolinis Aussenpolitik,” Saeculum, 1973, No. 4, p. 325. 153. Lipski Papers, No. 79; the whole subject is discussed in chap. 21, above.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

isolation of Austria more evident than the fact that in these critical days, only Hungarian Foreign Minister Kalman de Kanya had any encouraging words for the Austrian chancellor.'>4 It was thus at a time when the internal situation in Austria was deteriorating rapidly under continued German pressure,!®5 and in the absence of either the promised German statement recognizing Austrian independence or strong outside support, that von Schuschnigg considered the possibility of holding a plebiscite. A quickly held popular vote might well arrest the drift toward an Anschluss, the German government would either have to take overt action to interfere in the internal affairs of Austria or see von Schuschnigg strengthened and the situation substantially changed. The British Foreign Office comments on a 23 February report that the plebiscite idea originated in the Fatherland Front and had not yet been adopted by the Austrian government all show that a plebiscite looked from London like a good, and perhaps the only, way of saving Austria, but that it was precisely for this reason that Germany would never allow it.'° The Austrian chancellor prepared the way as best he knew how. He made a lastminute effort to conciliate the socialists whose votes he suddenly needed,!*’ and informed the Hungarian government of his intentions on 7 March.'°§ Because the Austrian minister to Rome no longer had direct access to the Duce since the latter had turned over the position of foreign minister to Ciano, only the Austrian military attaché could still go directly to Mussolini in his continuing capacity as minister of war. Von Schuschnigg,

therefore, had him tell the Duce

the real story of the Berchtesgaden

meeting and inform him of the planned plebiscite. Mussolini still believed that he had Go6ring’s firm assurance that there would be no German move against Austria without prior consultation—something that Hitler would take care of in his own way on 10 March. The Duce therefore mentioned the dangers inherent in the plebiscite proposal but did not, as he later clatmed to the Germans, advise against von Schuschnigg’s project.!*° By the time von Schuschnigg learned Mussolini’s views, he was in any case already committed and was reluctant to turn back. On the evening of 9 March he announced publicly that a vote would be held on 13 March with procedures likely to produce a favorable vote for “a free and German, independent and social, for a Christian

and united Austria.” Seyss-Inquart and the Austrian National Socialists were unsure what to do when confronted by von Schuschnige’s move after they found out about it on or about 8 March, and consulted Hitler. Because Hitler had just imposed tighter control on the

Austrian party, there was for once a situation in which the orchestration of German policy in Austria was undoubtedly completely in the hands of the Fuhrer. Hitler ordered immediate preparation for the military occupation of Austria, drawing on the preliminary drafts of “Case Otto,” the plan for a quick occupation of Austria to forestall a Habsburg 154. Gehl, p. 184; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 366, 387, 388, 392, 395; G.D., D, 1, No. 332; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 381; 2, No. 110. 155. Wiley to Moffat, 21 February, 4 March 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 14; G.D., D, 1, No. 313 (note that

Keppler sent a copy of this report of his associate Veesenmayer to Géring, Nuremberg document 3576-PS, National Archives), 323, 333-35; TMWC, 32:329-31; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 308, 347; Jod/ Diary, 3 Match 1938,

TMWC, 28:369; Goring to Schmidt, 8 March 1938, Emessen, pp. 105-7. Rosar, pp. 215-57, disregards all German pressure, assumes that the Germans, especially Seyss-Inquart, remained loyal to their promises, and blames von Schuschnigg for the course of events.

156. Palairet tel. 39 of 23 February 1938, R 1713/137/3, FO 371/22313. 157. Gehl, pp. 183-84; Brook-Shepherd, pp. 105-11, 125-26; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 368, 372. 158. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 398.

159. The postwar account of Colonel Emil Liebitzky, the Austrian military attaché in Rome 1933-38, is in Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 222-24, The French government learned of this episode by June 1938; see the feport in D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 537. Mussolini’s denials to the Germans are in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 349, 350.

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restoration, a contingency which might have stabilized Austrian independence and which Hitler had intended to react to by invasion. In May of 1937, the chief of staff of the army, General Ludwig Beck, had declined to prepare the implementing orders for “Case Otto” because he believed that such a German operation could lead to a general wart he expected Germany to lose.!° Now that there seemed to be a real possibility that the whole operation could be carried out without violent international complications, Beck improvised the necessary orders and the army prepared to move in.1° Hitler was under no circumstances going to tolerate von Schuschnigg’s use of his own tactic of plebiscites. Even if the planned Austrian one was not rigged nearly as completely as those held in Germany, the very idea that anyone might use such tactics against him infuriated Hitler. He now gave orders to his Austrian followers that were the precise reverse of von Schuschnige’s strategy before Berchtesgaden. The radical Austrian National Socialists were now directed to put maximum pressure on the Austrian government, while Seyss-Inquart was to demand postponement and changes in the plebiscite under threat of German military action. The assumption was that von Schuschnigg would give way in the face of massive internal and external pressure. When he did so on 11 March, Goring believed that the situation was sufficiently fluid to permit even more far-reaching demands. With Hitler’s approval, Goring now instructed Seyss-Inquart to demand that von Schuschnigg resign and that the Austrian president ask Seyss-Inquart himself to form a cabinet. Goring sent Seyss-Inquart a list of cabinet members as well as instructions to send a request for German troops as soon as the new cabinet was installed.'* The text of this request had already been sent to Seyss-Inquart on 10 March in connection with the ultimatum on the plebiscite. Faced with the threat of an immediate German invasion, von Schuschnigg gave way. Last-minute consultations with other governments were essentially pro forma, and the diplomatic corps in Vienna knew it. In fact, their understanding of von Schuschnigg’s position was such that the British minister did not even convey the frequently quoted passage that “His Majesty’s Government cannot take the responsibility of advising the Chancellor to take any course of action which might expose his country to dangers against which H.M. Government are unable to guarantee protection.” As Michael Palairet explained, “it would not have done any good.’”!® It is not likely that the British believed Géring’s promise that German troops sent to Austria would be withdrawn so that a truly free plebiscite could be held; they were quite familiar with the free plebiscites conducted by the Germans in their concentration camps.!°4 The Italian government asserted that since von Schuschnigg had not followed the advice they now claimed to have given him advising against the plebiscite, they would not involve themselves in the outcome of his plan.!® The French government was immobilized by an internal political crisis.1 in the The Austrian chancellor knew all this, had lost all confidence in himself and

160. Summary of the evidence in Miller, pp. 235-37.

ibid., 34:335-38, 774; Hungarian 161. Kertel Papers, pp. 178-79; Jodl Diary, 10 March 1938, TMWC, 28:371-72; Documents, 1, Nos. 402, 405.

record of Géring’s telephone conversa162. A major source for the development in these hectic days is the full

; D, 7: 504-15. tions, printed partly in TMWC, 31:354-84, and partly in G.D., 371/22315. The nondelivery of this message 163. Note by Mr. Nichols, 11 March 1938, R 2478/137/3, FO 3d, 1, No. 26), but scholars have overlooked what could be inferred from the published documents (see B.D., archives. the can now be confirmed from ' 131 n. 38. 164. G.D., D, 1, No. 376; B.D., 3d, 1, No. 46; see above, p.

diplomatic record is particularly skimpy at this 165. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 406, 416, 417. The French during the war; see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 364, destroyed been having s document the of n point, a high proportio 366, 368, 369.

‘es

ibid., No. 416. 166. For the bad impression this made in London, see

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support he could muster inside the country, and was in any case unwilling to risk an open conflict.!67 He submitted his own resignation to the president with the text of the latest German ultimatum—the existence of which, like the prior one about the plebiscite, the German government publicly denied. President Wilhelm Miklas, however, refused to appoint Seyss-Inquart as successor to von Schuschnigg. From the confusing accounts of the details of developments on 11 March two things are clear.!68 Hitler wanted to cover any action with a veneer of legality in order to facilitate an internal Gleichschaltung of Austria on the Danzig model and an invasion by German troops. The first would have to be carried out by the constitutional or pseudoconstitutional transfer of power within Austria to men who had his confidence. This was the procedure he had used in Bavaria and Danzig and had previously tried unsuccessfully in Austria with Theo Habicht. Those efforts in 1933 and 1934 had been unsuccessful: pressure had not worked and a coup had failed. Now pressure was again to be the means. Once Gkeichschaltung had been achieved, then the National Socialist government of Austria could itself take the second step of providing a legal cover for invasion by inviting German troops.!® Hitler had seen the great political and psychological advantages, internally and externally, that pseudolegal procedures gave him; and he would try

to use them in this case as in others, restraining the exuberant Goring when necessary. Hitler’s other major concern was the attitude of Mussolini. He knew that the Italian dictator was amenable to internal changes which would in effect transfer power to Hitler’s agents, but that he was still hesitant about an end to Austria’s formal separate status as a nominally independent state. Furthermore, there were the assurances Goring had given in January 1937 and that had been reiterated to Mussolini on his visit in September to the effect that Germany would not change the formal status of Austria without prior consultation with Italy. Here was an issue calling for prompt resolution. These two objectives, the legal cover for invasion and the acquiescence of Mussolini, were sought and obtained simultaneously. Since Miklas would not appoint Seyss-Inquart chancellor, Goring dreamed up the idea that, since Seyss-Inquart had not joined in the resignation of the von Schuschnigg cabinet, he could, as the only remaining

cabinet member, act on behalf of the rest by issuing the invitation to German troops. Seyss-Inquart liked the implication that he was in charge but would have preferred to leave it at that and play Forster’s Danzig role without the presence, at least for the time being, of German troops. This was hardly what Goring had in mind; so Seyss-Inquart was declared to have sent the telegram requesting German troops when in fact he had not done so.'79 Because the telegram had been written in Germany in the first place, it was easy enough to produce the text afterwards as spurious evidence of its having been dispatched from Vienna. This thin veneer of “legality” was reinforced when a successful coup in the Austrian capital during the night of 11-12 March forced Miklas to agree to Seyss-Inquart’s becoming chancellor. Seyss-Inquart’s preference for running Austria with his associates but without the presence of German troops could be ignored by Hitler because, by this time, Hitler had the faked invitation Mussolini.

and also the agreement

of

167. On the situation in Austria, Leiter Abwehr-Abteilung, “Nachrichten tiber Ostetreich,” 27 January 1938,

Nutemberg document 3583-PS, National Archives. Von Schuschnigg held the portfolio of minister of defense himself and issued the orders not to shoot; see Jedlicka and Neck, p. 247. 168. Gehl and Brook-Shepherd offer the best reconstructions of events. 169. The idea of the invitation may have originated with von Weizsicker; at least he lays claim to having thought up this artifice on 10 March in his diary (Weizsacker-Papiere, pp. 122-23).

170. G6ring’s persistent pressure for speed in the crisis is connected by Rosar (pp. 159-60) with his interest in the rapid seizure of Austria’s economic assets; a lengthy crisis was sure to lead to the flight of the very Austrian capital Goring wanted to confiscate and utilize.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

5s

On the morning of the 11th, Hitler had sent the Prince of Hessen to Mussolini with a letter explaining both his belief in the need to occupy Austria and the reasons for giving such short notice. He also recalled Germany’s attitude at the time of sanctions, assuring Mussolini of similar favors in the future, and reconfirmed the Brenner border with the reminder that this had always been his publicly recorded position. !7! The first soundings of the prince in Rome were apparently positive, and in the evening Mussolini personally assured him that there were no objections to Hitlet’s course. Hitler, when told on the phone, had the Prince repeat to Mussolini the words that Mussolini had himself used in September: “I will never forget this.” On 12 March Getman troops occupied Austria. Hitler himself entered the country to the cheering of vast crowds, while thousands were arrested by the temporarily ascendant Austrian National Socialists. The latter soon found themselves displaced, at least from the top positions, by Germans, who would institute a system of control analogous to that established in the rest of the Reich.!72 There would be only one significant exception to the pattern: while Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and the other former German

States remained as nominal entities even under National Socialism, the very name of Austria was to disappear soon after its independence had been destroyed.!73 All this was to be confirmed by a plebiscite in which a thoroughly rigged vote on the question of annexation was coupled with the election of those like Seyss-Inquart, GlaiseHorstenau, and the historian Ritter von Srbik as representatives to the Reichstag on the National Socialist ticket. Unlike the planned plebiscite of von Schuschnigg, this one was

to be really free—meaning, of course, that everyone was not only free but compelled to vote yes. And for good measure, those in the rest of Germany would be called upon to vote yes also. For what would be the last time in the Third Reich, all were called upon to give their yes to the Fuhrer. To the general chorus of approval orchestrated by Propaganda Minister Goebbels, a special voice was to be added on this occasion: that of Austria’s Theodor Cardinal Innitzer. The primate of Austria had ordered the Austrian churches to hoist swastikas and toll their bells as Hitler entered Vienna, had personally greeted the Fuhrer, and then on 18 March had issued a proclamation, also signed by five other bishops, calling on Austria’s Catholics to do their “obvious national duty” in the plebiscite. This proclamation was sent to the man whom Hitler had charged with controlling the process of absorbing Austria into the Reich, Gauleiter Josef Biirckel. Having performed similar duties in the Saar, Burckel was a logical choice from Hitler’s point of view; his violent attacks on the Catholic church there endeared him to the Fihrer and should have inspired a little caution in the cardinal.!74 But Innitzer was himself an extreme nationalist, and even the

best efforts of his authorized biographer could not convert him posthumously into any sort of humanitarian.!” 171. The German draft from Géring’s files in Emessen, pp. 108-13; see also G.D., D, 1, No. 352; Magistral,

pp. 143-45. 172. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 462, 463. The whole process is admirably described in Radomir Luza,

Austro-German Relations in the Anschluss Era (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1975). 173. Some recent apologias for Seyss-Inquart, Neubacher, and others have stressed their alleged pteference for an Austria only associated with rather than swallowed by Germany, and in this connection have cited evidence that Hitler himself originally probably intended a personal union of some sort with a special status for Austria. The Bavarian example certainly showed contemporaries how long such particularism was likely to endure. 174. See G.D., D, 1, No. 663. For references to the idea of having Birckel manage a plebiscite in Austria as

i early as 1936 (the year after he had done it in the Saar), see Rosar, pp. 107-8. 175. Viktor Reimann, Innitzer: Cardinal zwischen Hitler und Rom (Vienna, Munich: Molden, 1967). The author tries

his best, but it is indicative of the theme of the book that the “Jews” for whom the cardinal exerted himself in

the war years were always and only those who had converted to Catholicism. For Innitzet’s effort to have the German bishops join the Austrian ones in an appeal to the voters, see Walter Adolph, Kardinal Preysing und xwvet

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War i

The Vatican—which had issued its encyclical condemning National Socialism just a year earlier—was aghast at this public embrace. Innitzer was summoned to Rome and told off in no uncertain terms. The Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pacelli (later Pope Pius XII) even transmitted to President Roosevelt through Ambassador Kennedy a detailed written condemnation of the action.!7° But the damage had been done long before this document was published—presumably with the approval of the Vatican—in 1955, since over 99 percent of the Austrian people voted for Hitler. They would find the bed of roses in which they had joined Germany filled with more thorns than petals; and in being made to live, and die, as Germans, they discovered that they really were Austrians after all. There were, however, plenty of petals for the German government. An analysis Keppler had prepared for von Ribbentrop on the economic aspects of the Asschluss claimed that it would be good for Austria, but all the examples he listed were of German needs that would be met.!77 The Germans took over the assets and repudiated the debts, thus creating some additional difficulties in their relations with Britain and the United States. Berlin eventually worked out an agreement with Italy to take care of the economic interests of its ally without creating a precedent for similar treatment of other claimants.!78 At the same time, the international trade effect of the Axschluss was

to

nullify any efforts on the part of Hungary and Yugoslavia to become less economically dependent on Germany.'”? As Hitler had gleefully anticipated at the Hossbach conference, Austria also provided the manpower base for additional German army divisions.'80 Furthermore, the Germans now outflanked the Czechoslovak border fortifica-

tions and also had common borders with Hungary and Yugoslavia, making both more susceptible to German pressure. The disruption of all efforts on the part of the Western Powers for a general settlement with Germany has already been discussed. The British had been taking the initiative in this matter, and the methods used in the Axzsch/uss, more than the event itself, shocked

the government and public in Britain. Von Ribbentrop had been back in London at the time of the Anschluss to say his official farewell as ambassador and was warned by those with whom he spoke of the repercussions of a German resort to force.'$! He preferred not to take any of this seriously and to think, or claim to think, that “prospects of an

Anglo-German understanding would not be affected.” The Foreign Office comment was that if he really believed that, he must be “unbelievably dense.”!®* If von Ribbentrop failed to understand the impact of German actions, the British ambassador to Germany, Sit Nevile Henderson, understood it all too well. The despairing comment of this advocate of a rapprochement with Germany to the new British foreign secretary, Lord Halifax, has already been quoted: “All the work of the past 11 months has crashed to the ground!” Halifax responded less dramatically but equally precisely: “Our constructive efforts have suffered a pretty severe set-back.”!83 Diktaturen (Berlin: Morup, 1971), pp. 128-33. 176. Text in U.S. 1938, 1:474-76. See also G.D., D, 1, Nos. 698, 701, 702; Wiley dispatch 176 of 2 April, and Phillips dispatch 857 of 8 April 1938, State 863.00/1705 and 1727; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 459; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 423; 9, Nos. 72, 114, 125, 134, 145, 209. 177. G.D., D, 1, No. 281; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 431.

178. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 747, 752, 754, 756, 765, 773; Magistrati, pp. 189-90. 179. See above pp. 452, 458; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 47; C 1872/132/18, FO 371/21674; C 3249/772/18, FO 374/21705:

180. For German acquisition of Austria’s code-breaking capability, see Wiley to Moffat, Papers, Vol. 14. 181. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 145, 147, 149, 359; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 410.

182. Mack (Vienna) tel. 133 of 15 March 1938, R 2659/173/3, FO 371/22316. 183. Henderson Papers, FO 800/269.

6 May 1938, Moffat

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

505

The British, French, and Czechoslovaks themselves all feared that German designs

on Czechoslovakia would be next.'*4 This subject is the focus of the following chapters, but the interrelation of the two issues must be noted. The military impact of the Anschluss for any successful defense of Bohemia has already been mentioned. There was also the general contemporary belief that the two wete in fact related questions. Not only did outside observers take this view,!85 but Hitler had mentioned the two jointly in his 20 February speech, and Goring—during the very days when he was giving spurious assurances of safety to the Czechoslovak minister in Berlin—explained to the Hungarian minister that Czechoslovakia would be next.!8° To be sure, a short pause was expected by all.\Neville Chamberlain “likened Germany to a boa constrictor that had eaten a good meal and was trying to digest the meal before taking anything else.”!7 But that there would be a next step was generally assumed. Finally, the German tactics in the Anschluss—moving quickly without warning while denying that they were moving; issuing ultimatums to another country while asserting to others that the ultimatums did not exist—created a situation of nervousness and public anxiety out of which the first international furor over Czechoslovakia, the May Crisis of 1938, would arise.188

The internal German repercussions of the Alschluss are also significant. The euphoria of the German public exceeded all previous heights.'®° All concern about the methods used was buried under the acclamation of an ecstatic populace. More important, perhaps, was the effective suppression of all doubts concerning the dramatic changes in personnel at the beginning of February. Both within the army and in the public at large, expansion abroad served to avert discontent at home. What Bismarck had

done so successfully during the period of unification, and what the German annexationists had hoped to do in the World War—the substitution of expansion for domestic reform—was accomplished once again. If Bismarck could resort to bribery to secure the letter from the king of Bavaria offering an imperial crown to the king of Prussia, Hitler could use a faked telegram to justify sending troops into Austria to complete the greater Germany. There were even elaborate plans to issue a White Book which would demonstrate to the world the illegal character of the Schuschnigg regime, its oppressive nature, and its breach of domestic and international legal obligations. This grandiose project, however, was buried at the end of 1938 after the pogrom of November 1938 had presumably demonstrated beyond the need for further proof the superior quality of rule from Berlin.!”° Hitler had won a triumph of enormous political and psychological significance. For the first time, one of the countries created by the peace settlement had disappeared. The first change in the territorial arrangement of 1919 had taken place, and it is worth noting that the land acquired by Germany had not been “lost” by the Treaty of Versailles. The threat of force had sufficed in this case, the only one in which Hitler himself preferred to avoid actual hostilities. Hitler’s caution following the abortive coup of 1934 had been 184. Ibid.; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 452; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 200, 248.

185. See the Messersmith memorandum of 18 February 1938, U.S. 1938, 1:17-24. No. 408 (German text in Kerekes, No. 14). 186. Hungarian ta

i a 187. U.S. 1938, 1:44. May Crisis, 1938,” Journal of 188. Henderson, pp. 122-23; B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 18, 34; Gerhard L. Weinberg, “The

Germany, CRechoModern History, 29, No. 3 (September 1957), 213, 215. The book by Hendetson B. Braddick, ignores the in1969), Denver, of University (Denver: 1938 Crisis, May the in Alliance’ Grand the and slovakia terrelation of the two events. : 189. A good report in U.S. 1938, 1:462-64.

November 1938, in DZA Pots190. See Altenburg to Wachter, 12 August 1938, and Altenburg to Megerle, 10 , Nr. 2863), ff.47-50. In view Widerstandes hen dsterreichisc des ionsarchiv (Dokumentat 61147 dam, AA Akte

the appropriate judge of of Altenburg’s role in the murder of Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, he was obviously

in 1938, see T-84, Roll R-18. Austrian legal niceties. For police documents on von Schuschnigg’s incarceration

516

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replaced at the last moment by a rush of action, but only as the opportunity for it appeared. Hitler’s outrage at von Schuschnigg’s daring to pretend that Austria was an independent country in which the government could hold a plebiscite when it wanted to—like Germany herself—was carefully contrived and controlled. As the American ambassador to Berlin wrote the secretary of state in discussing the Amschluss. “ .. .in calling attention to Hitler’s personal feelings in decisions of external policy, I do not wish to suggest that these decisions are made only on impulse or emotion. He has the profound political sagacity to give his resentment effective outlet only when conditions are propitious and when the most careful preparation has been made.’”"”! That preparation had included, even if at the last minute, the notification of Mussolini. It was the reaction of Italy that had most concerned Hitler. He had completely disregarded the shock to England that interrupted—permanently, as it turned out—the British attempts at a rapprochement with Germany. But in spite of both his own occasional protestations and the fertile constructs of some historians, a rapprochement with Britain was always a subject for purely speculative contemplation with Hitler and never an issue of serious policy to be taken into account in the conduct of German affairs. Relations with Mussolini were in an entirely different category. The great joy over Italy’s attitude, expressed to Mussolini on Hitlet’s behalf by the Prince of Hessen, was

genuine and was reiterated at length as the basis of future German policy when the Fuhrer briefed Hans Georg von Mackensen, his new ambassador to Italy.!”?

The German government observed the repercussions of the Azsch/uss in Italian government circles with great care.!°> The concessions to Italy on economic questions growing out of the Aschluss belong in this framework, as do the kind words von Mackensen poured out to Mussolini, Ciano, and othets upon his arrival in Rome.’

It

was this concern not to do the least thing that might annoy the Duce that appears largely responsible for the good face that the Germans turned toward the Italian-British negotiations which culminated in a new Mediterranean agreement on 16 April 1938. Kept informed by Rome about both the successful Italian negotiations with England and the warding off of French efforts at a similar agreement, the Germans accepted the new turn in British-Italian relations for what it was: a gesture of little practical significance.!" The fact, of course, was that once the independence of Austria had vanished, there

was no way for Italy to make that country reappear. Under those circumstances, whatever one might think of the Azsch/uss in Italy, the maintenance of good relations with Germany afterwards did make sense. The willingness of the Italian government to make a new agreement with Britain can, however, be seen as an effort to strengthen the posi-

tion of Italy after the shock of the Axsch/uss and before the visit of Hitler scheduled for the first week of May.!°° A factor of far greater importance in the eyes of the authorities in Rome was the question of South Tyrol. The Axzschluss brought about some uneasiness 191. Wilson to Hull, 24 March 1938, Cordell Hull Papers, folder 104. 192. On this conversation of 2 April 1938, see the references in G.D., D, 1, Nos. 741, 745; Weizsacker,

Erinnerungen, p. 158; Weixsdcker-Papiere, pp. 125-26; Adam, No. 4. Hitler’s telegram of thanks to Mussolini sent from Linz on 13 March is in Domarus, 1:821; the section of his Reichstag speech of 18 March praising Mussolini, ibid., p. 831. 193. G.D., D, 1, No. 399; Georg Dettinger, “Bemerkungen zur derzeitigen Politik Italiens,” 30 March 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ££.251—-59; cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 433; Grant (Tirana) dispatch 600 of 30 March 1938, State 740.00/365. 194, G.D., D, 1, No. 741. For some reports on negative public reaction to the Axschluss in Italy, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 388, 486, 525; 9, Nos. 85, 87. 195. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 728, 733, 735, 737-40, 742, 755, 779; D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 278, 310; 8 and 9, passim; U.S. 1938, 1:143-45; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 201; Moffat Diary, 18 April 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 40. See also

the discussion in the 25th and 28th meetings of the British cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, CAB 27/623. 196. Perth to Halifax, 22 April 1938, R 4251/23/22, FO 371/22411.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

517

on this score, and the assurances of Hitler and von Mackensen on the permanence of the Brenner border were accordingly welcome in Rome.'%” The agitation accompanying the annexation, however, followed as it was by the propaganda campaign for the 10 April plebiscite, aroused the wildest hopes, speculations, and rumors in South Tyrol. A variety of incidents took place, the understandable nervousness of the local Italian authorities now reinforcing their general tendency to repress the German element as much as possible. Under these circumstances, the extreme sensitivity of Mussolini and Ciano to any signs of trouble in or about South Tyrol was only to be expected, and the Germans were warned that everything must be done to assure absolute quiet in the area.!%8 At this time Ciano’s brother-in-law, Count Magistrati, alluded to the possibility of transferring the South Tyrol Germans to Germany!’ and Ciano discussed the idea with the Duce on 3 April.2°° Scholars who have written on the subject consider these to be the earliest allusions to such a project,??! but as previously mentioned, it had been discussed during or after G6ring’s Rome visit of January 1937. Against such a background, Ciano’s decision to write a letter about the question to Magistrati for him to discuss with GGring, as well as Mussolini’s agreement to the letter, Magistrati’s meeting with Goring

at which a population transfer was discussed, Ciano’s additional request to the Prince of Hessen to talk about the South Tyrol with Goring, and the use of Mussolini’s old contact to the German National Socialists, Giuseppe Renzetti, to review the matter with Goring,?? can be fitted into a coherent picture.? If the Germans responded more by efforts to restrain any polemics concerning South Tyrol than by extensive negotiations about populations transfer, and if Hitler during his Rome visit tried to reassure Italian public and government opinion by assurances about the Brenner rather than by repeating the assurances of a transfer that Goring had been willing to make and repeat, this was not because of concern for the German element in South Tyrol, but because of an entirely different matter.?™ By this time, Hitler had decided to use the Sudeten Germans as the pretext for the destruction of Czechoslovakia. He had met with Konrad Henlein, the leader of the

German-financed and controlled element among the Sudeten Germans on 28 March and had instructed him on the tactics he was to follow. The details of this scheme and its application form the subject of the following chapters. In this context, however, it is essential to remember that Hitler was not only making such secret political preparations—and military ones as well—but that the whole publicity-conscious approach of Hitler to the Amschluss question and the alleged sufferings of the Germans in Czecho-

slovakia was based on the loud assertion that Germans should be allowed to live as they wanted—meaning as he wanted them to—wherever they were located. In this frame197. 198. 199. 200.

G.D., D, 1, Nos. 385, 396, 397, 741. 160-64. Ibid., Nos. 118, 384, 729, 730, 734, 741, 744, 748, 749; Latour, pp. 22-25; Magistrati, pp. G.D., D, 1, No. 384. Ciano, Diary, 3 April 1938, pp. 137-38.

er, “Hitler-Mussolini: Das Sudtiroler 201. Latour, p. 23; very tendentious and erroneous, Winfried Schmitz-Ess

dubious, his “Die Genesis des Abkommen von 1938,” Aussenpolitik, 13, No. 6 (June 1962), 401-2; equally (ed.), Sidtirol: Eine Frage des Huter Franz in 1939,” Januar 23. Siidtiroler Umsiedlungsabkommen vom ' exropaischen Gewissens (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1965), pp. 321-39. South Tyroleans who did not want to be 202. Géring assured Renzetti that there was no great problem; those , dell’Alto Adige, pp. 145-46. Italian citizens would simply come to Germany; see Toscano, Ouestione

April 1938, pp. 147-49. An account, including a 203. Latour, p. 25; Wiskemann, p. 134; Ciano, Diary, 17-21 full text and related details may be found in ipso portion of Ciano’s letter, in Magistrati, pp. 163-67; the ha’s

1963), 173-80. See also Hore-Belis Toscano, Pagine di storia diplomatica contemporanta, 2 (Milan: A. Giuffré, a Papers, p. 119. account of Ciano’s comments to him on 23 April in Hore-Belish

see Latour, pp. 26-27; “Bestellungen aus 204. On the German efforts to restrain the situation in South Tyrol, There is no additional Brammer, der Pressekonferenz,” 25 April 1938, Bundesarchiv,

Z.Se. 101/11, £313.

Diplomatie um Siidtirol (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1964). information on this aspect of the issue in Karl Heinz Ritschel,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

work, any suggestion of population transfer would immediately vitiate his strategy against Czechoslovakia, and it was precisely the hope of securing Italian cooperation in that strategy which constituted one of the main objectives of Hitler’s trip to Rome. It must be noted that the Germans did not reject the suggestion of a population transfer from South Tyrol at this time; they merely ignored the subject; and it is significant that it was Hitler himself who returned to it during a conversation with Mussolini in Munich in September 1938205 and who in the spring of 1939, following the final destruction of Czechoslovakia, gave his full approval to a total population transfer. In May 1938, however, Hitler’s visit to Italy would as yet be only the occasion for a different handling of the question of South Tyrol. Agreement on the schedule for Hitlet’s visit had been reached months before, and as a tesult of a leak in early January,

the date had been

announced

officially in

Februaty.2°’ The preparations on the Italian side were in Ciano’s hands and were to be as elaborate as the imagination would allow. On the German side, the ceremonial prepara-

tions were concentrated on the numbers and uniforms of those who were to participate. As to the numbers, these were large enough to evoke memories of the Germanic inva-

sions; with regard to uniforms, von Ribbenttop’s foreign office entourage was now provided with a special garb. In spite of what can only be interpreted as soundings from the Vatican, it was agreed that Hitler should not visit the Pope while in Rome, and the Pope

retaliated by closing the Vatican museum during the visit and making an unkind speech from his summer residence at Castel Gondolfo.2°° On the economic side, Hitler was cautioned against compromising the German position on economic questions growing out of the Anschluss, but there is no indication that this subject was actually discussed during

the visit. The political preparations were more elaborate, though the surviving record is fragmentarty.?!0 In the German Foreign Ministry, a list of topics for possible discussion was drawn up; more significant was the preparation at von Ribbentrop’s instructions of drafts of a German-Italian alliance in various formulations but all directed against Britain and France. Von Ribbentrop took several alternative drafts to Rome with him to hand over if the Italians appeared receptive, with the option of further redrafting during the visit itself, but with the hope of making the signing of a treaty the signal event of this visit. Although none of the drafts refer to it explicitly, the context of these preparations was evidently the forthcoming German attempt to destroy Czechoslovakia, just as the Germans would return more successfully to the alliance drafts in 1939 in the context of their plan to destroy Poland. It is not known to what extent Hitler himself reviewed the alliance plans with von Ribbentrop before setting out for Rome. One may assume that the new foreign mifister was acting with Hitler’s approval, but in the absence of any evidence that Hitler ever even mentioned the project to the Italians, all comment on his views as to the impor-

tance of this treaty must remain speculative. The evidence shows that Hitler planned to discuss and did discuss the Czechoslovak question with the Duce and Ciano in general terms but left the alliance project to von Ribbentrop’s negotiating skill. Hitler’s intended 205. Latour, pp. 27-28.

206. Ibid., pp. 33-35. 207. “Informationsbericht Nr. 1,” 3 January 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, f.1; U.S. 1938, 1:385. 208. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 691-93, 695, 703, 708; Wiskemann, p. 135; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 5, 41.

209. G.D., D, 1, No. 756; cf. ibid., No. 765. 210. The most complete discussion in Donald C. Watt, “An Earlier Model for the Pact of Steel: The Draft

Treaties Exchanged between Germany and Italy during Hitler’s Visit to Rome in May 1938,” International Affairs, 33, No. 2 (April 1957), 185-97. The individual documents printed or cited in this article are not again cited separately here. For earlier internal German discussion, see Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 123-24.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

519

discussion of Czechoslovakia in Rome was from the point of view that Germany could solve that question in the face of French and British objections only through a close alignment with Italy, which could be attained if Mussolini still had further ambitions in Africa requiting German support. Such an exchange of promises of support would enable him “to return with Czechoslovakia in his pocket,” but the evidence that exists about Hitler’s precise view of a German-Italian alignment is restricted to military contacts, and is not explicit about these.2!! Hitler himself, as we now know, was somewhat

preoccupied with his own health in the days before his departure for Italy, and, concerned that a throat polyp—which must have been vety bothersome considering his many public speeches in the plebiscite campaign—was a sign of cancer, wrote his last will before leaving Germany on the trip.2!2 During their stay in Italy from 3 to 9 May, the German guests were entertained spectacularly in Rome, Naples, and Florence. In addition to the usual parades, they were shown large portions of the Italian navy and air force. Although Hitler evidently enjoyed the sightseeing, especially in Florence, and was very favorably impressed by what he saw of the Italian navy, the prominent role of King Victor Emmanuel III, the generally unfriendly attitude of court circles, and a number of minor incidents served to spoil his mood somewhat. Among these incidents, the one which attracted most attention—a scheduling mistake which caused him to review some troops while he was wearing a tuxedo—led to the dismissal of the German chief of protocol, who was later made the ambassador to Belgium. If correctly reported, a knife attack on his mistress, Eva Braun,

would also not have improved Hitler’s attitude.2'3 The enthusiasm of the Italian crowds was also quite restrained to begin with. The shock of the Azsch/uss and concern over the South Tyrol were surely important factors in this attitude, a view that is corroborated by the change in atmosphere after Hitler’s speech at the banquet of 7 May at the Palazzo Venezia.*4 In this speech, Hitler talked enthusiastically about the “natural frontier which Providence and history had clearly drawn for our two peoples.” With the Alps as the permanent and inviolable border between the living spaces of the two, the Germans and Italians could live in permanent harmony. The way in which Hitler said this could not fail to impress his immediate as well as his greater audience, especially since the combination of an abandonment of the South Tyrol Germans with the concept of complementary living spaces reflected quite accurately what Hitler had been preaching for many years. Accordingly, the conversations about the South Tyrol during the Rome visit concentrated on exchanges of verbal assurances. The border was final, the German government and party agencies would stop all agitation in or concerning the South Tyrol, while Mussolini promised to be more accommodating toward the German element in the South Tyrol out of his friendship for Germany.?!5 The question of a population transfer was vot discussed, presumably because the Italians felt reassured by Hitler’s lyrical praise 211. Notes by Schmundt, evidently from late April 1938, TMWC, 25:414-15. Weizsacker claims that at the 2

April meeting of Hitler and von Mackensen (see n. 192), the former spoke of a treaty with Mussolini with each giving the other a free hand (Erianerungen, p. 158). 212. Gerhard L. Weinberg (ed.), “Hitler’s Private Testament of May 2, 1938,” Journal ofModern History, 27, No. 4

(December 1955), 415. Cf. Speer, Erinnerungen, p. 118; William S. Allen (Ed.), The Infancy ofNazism: The Memoirs of Ex-Gauleiter Albert Krebs, 1923-1933 (New York: Franklin Watts, 1976), pp. 163-65. The possible implication of Hitler’s fear of cancer, particularly acute at this time, on his urgency in considering military action against Czechoslovakia, is discussed on p. 581 n. 52 below. 213. This incident is referred to in Domarus, 1:859; it is not mentioned in most accounts of the trip. The report

in Nerin E. Gun, Eva Braun, Hitler's Mistress (London: Leslie Frewin, 1968), is somewhat skeptical about the sue. attempt but leaves no doubt that Eva Braun went along on the trip. 214. Text in Domatus, 1:860-61; a good translation of most of it with some helpful comments in Wiskemann,

pp. 136-37. Cf. G.D., D, 1, No. 764. 215. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 761, 767, 768; cf. Magistrati, p. 181.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

of the existing border and because the Germans were interested in sounding out the Italian government on the Czechoslovak question.”!° The phraseology of the German Foreign Ministry’s information telegram to German missions abroad makes the point evident by indirection. “As for the Sudeten German question, the discussions clearly showed that the Italians understand our concern about the fate of the Sudeten Germans.”2!7 If this maintains the fiction of Germany’s interest in the Sudeten Germans—a fiction that would be difficult to uphold in public if agreement to transfer the South Tyrolean Germans had been reached simultaneously—the information on the visit recorded for internal use in the German Foreign Ministry is much more explicit about teal German aims. State Secretary von Weizsacker recorded that Italy would remain neutral in a German-Czechoslovak war and intended neither to hinder German ageression not to support German pressure on Prague. The Germans concluded that Mussolini and Ciano did not consider the dangers attendant on a German-Czechoslovak wat to be very great: Germany would handle it in such a way that a European war would not result, and the French and English were probably not willing to fight for Czechoslovakia anyway.?!8 Ciano’s subsequent comments to the American ambassador confirm the accuracy of this impression;?!9 similar information on the forthcoming destruction of

Czechoslovakia with the acquiescence of Italy reached the Hungarians.” These tacit understandings about Czechoslovakia were not, however, reinforced by

any wrtitten commitments. Von Ribbentrop first took up the possibility of a military assistance pact with Ciano during the trip to Naples for the naval inspection.”*! Ciano was skeptical and produced the draft of a vague treaty of friendship and mutual respect that he himself had worked out in the days before the arrival of the Germans when concern about the border and the South Tyrol had been uppermost in the minds of Mussolini and Ciano.?” Although the German drafts dealt with Italy’s worries about her northern border, there were other factors preventing agreement. The Germans wanted to secure Italian support if France and Britain came to the aid of Czechoslovakia when Germany attacked it, but at least some of the officials of the German Foreign Ministry were worried about being dragged by Italy into an adventure in the Mediterranean that could lead to war with the Western Powers on issues and at a time not in Germany’s interest. It was, therefore, not until early 1939, when the civil war in Spain was clearly about to end, that Berlin was agreeable to a firm commitment to Italy. If these were the German reservations, there were political and psychological ones on the part of Italy. The Italians were not interested in the fate of Czechoslovakia and no mote eager to go to war with the Western Powers over the Sudeten Germans than the Germans, in von Weizsacker’s words, wanted “to fight for Majorca.” The prospect of League recognition of the conquest of Ethiopia still debarred the Italians from an action that ran too obviously counter to the agreement just reached with Great Britain. The short time that had elapsed since the Azschluss may also have contributed to Italian hesitations. Certainly the very bad impression von Ribbentrop made at this time on both Mussolini—who was more favorably inclined to the alliance project—and Ciano—who 216. Latour, p. 25 n. 9; cf. Toscano, Questions dell’Alto Adige, p. 159 n. 35.

217. G.D., D, 1, No. 761. 218. Ibid., No. 762; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 163; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 72, 77.

219. U.S. 1938, 1:53-54. 220. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 177, 180.

221. Watt, “Earlier Model.” pp. 191-92. The apparent conflict about dates in the evidence is most likely to be resolved by the explanation that von Ribbentrop did not give any draft text to Ciano on 5 May at all—Ciano’s diary refers to an offer but not to an actual text—but only talked about the subject, withholding a text in the face of Ciano’s objections and alternative pact proposal. 222. Toscano, The Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 10-13. 223. Weizsacker, Erinnerungen, p. 158.

German-Italian Relations and the Anschluss

521

often let his attitude toward individuals influence his diplomacy—had a restraining effect on the handling of the alliance project.24 Finally, the German informat ion circular on the meetings asserts that the general situation in Southeast Europe was not discussed, but it may well be that Italian concern about possible future conflicts of interest with Germany in that part of the world increased Mussolini’s reluctance to undertak e a firm alliance with Germany at that time.225 The result of this inability to come to an agreement on a treaty during the state visit of the German leaders to Italy was that the alliance project, for the time being, suffered

the same fate as had the Italian proposal for a German-Italian agreement prior to Mussolini’s visit to Germany. What had taken several months then took a few days now: the exchange of views showed that the Axis partners were still too far apart on specifics and on theit respective assessment of the risks of an alliance, so that a public show of solidarity was vastly more valuable than either a secret agreement difficult to work out or a public agreement that would necessarily be so watered down as to undermine tather than reinforce the public impression both wanted to make. For the time being, therefore,

the project was allowed to languish.226 In spite of the fact that no formal agreement between Germany and Italy was signed, both sides could be pleased about the outcome of the meeting. The assurances

Hitler had given about the Brenner border satisfied the Italians, and the fact that they had been given in a manner persuasive to the Italian public was especially gratifying to

Mussolini, who was sensitive to his standing with the people. Mussolini showed his firm

identification with Germany after the visit in both word and action. The words were in a major speech in Genoa on 14 May in which he extolled the Axis and warned that in any ideological conflict, “the totalitarian states will immediately make common cause and march together to the end.’””?’ The deeds were in the one major field of domestic policy and ideology on which the German and Italian forms of totalitarianism had hitherto differed, that of anti-Semitism.

The National Socialists were hysterical anti-Semites in the face of a Jewish population in Germany of less than 1 percent; the Jewish population of Italy constituted perhaps one-tenth of 1 percent, and had never attracted similar attention from the fascist movement.”?8 On the contrary, during the earliest months of Hitler’s rule, Mussolini had

intimated to the Germans that there might be wiser policies to follow; but now he paid Hitler the compliment of flattery by imitating German anti-Semitic legislation after Hitler’s visit as he had copied the goose-step after his own visit to Germany. The history of the anti-Jewish measures of fascist Italy is not properly a part of an analysis of German foreign policy; what is relevant here is the deliberate adoption by Mussolini of a

policy he had hitherto rejected and which had no basis of popular support in Italy—as it certainly did in Germany—solely as a means of demonstrating his solidarity with the German dictator. Nothing demonstrates the real power situation in the Axis more clearly 224. Ciano, Diary, 6 May 1938, p. 157. Cf. Rintelen, pp. 44-45. 225. See the discussion of this topic in G.D., D, 1, No. 745.

226. Watt, “Earlier Model”; Toscano, The Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 22-26; Anfuso, p. 66. 227. Full text in Edoatdo and Ruilio Susmel (eds.), Benito Mussolini, Opera Omnia (Florence: La Fenice, 1959),

29:99-102; cf. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 763, 764; D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 335, 339, 355, 360, 361, 372. 228. On fascist anti-Semitism, see A. James Gregor, The Ideology of Fascism (New York: Free Press, 1969), chap. 6; Renzo de Felice, Storia degl ebrei italiani sotto ilfascismo, 3d ed. (Turin: Einaudi, 1972). Nicholas A. Stigliani and Antonette Margotto, “Fascist Anti-Semitism

and the Italian Jews,” Wiener Library Bulletin, 28, Nos. 35-36

(1975), 41-49, provides a brief summary. See also Wiskemann, pp. 140-44; Funke, Pp. 840-42. The article by

Gene Bernardini, “The Origins and Development

of Racial Anti-Semitism in Fascist Traly,” Journal ofModern

History, 49, No. 3 (Sept. 1977), 431-53, points out the role of issues in the Italian colonial empire in fascist

racial thinking; but its argument that the inner dynamics of the system rather than the concept of drawing closer to Germany led to the turn of Italian policy in 1938 is unconvincing.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

than this reversal of imitation. Once Hitler had looked to Italian fascism and its leader as a model for his movement, including his own title and the form of salute that came to be identified with him; now the Duce attempted to persuade a skeptical Italy which had defied the world in the period of sanctions that its purity was threatened by the few thousand Italian Jews.” On the German side, the visit confirmed that the close ties of the Axis had survived

the shock of the Axschluss. The assurances on the South Tyrol were easy for Hitler to give since they involved only a public reaffirmation of what he had always asserted. The close relationship of his policy on this question with the view of complementary German and Italian expansion into their respective living spaces made it logical to tie an affirmation of the Brenner border to the sounding of Italian opinion on German policy towatd Czechoslovakia. As will become clearer in the context of Hitler’s views and decisions about Czechoslovakia during the first half of 1938, the German leader could feel confident that the collapse of the Stresa front against German moves on Austria was permanent and would not be turned by the Axsch/uss into a new alliance of the Western Powers with Italy in defense of Czechoslovakia. Since this was really all he felt he needed, he could return to Germany secure in the knowledge that he could pursue his policy against Czechoslovakia without concern about a hostile coalition. There is also evidence that Hitler’s own impression of Italian military power was very much affected, and his subsequent overestimation of Italy’s armed forces is traced to this visit by Germany’s military representative to Rome at the time.”7! The two dictators faced the world joined by personal ties and a public image of harmony. Whatever questions about a more formal relationship might have been left open in quiet talks during the visit, the people in both countries and the world at large were again presented with an image of solidarity that served the interests of Germany and Italy as the leaders of both perceived them at that moment.

229. For an interesting analysis of Mussolini’s turn toward Hitler, see the memorandum by Harold H. Tittmann of 2 June 1938, State 762.65/464. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 202. 230. See Magistrati’s comments, pp. 185-86. 231. Enno von Rintelen, “Die deutsch-italienische Zusammenarbeit im II. Weltkrieg,” 21 April 1947, p. 4, Foreign Military Studies, B-495, National Archives.

Chapter 24

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia Part 1

he question of German relations with Czechoslovakia has been touched on " bemgereni in connection with aspects of German military planning as well as Germany’s policy toward the Western Powers, Poland, Lithuania, Hungary, Yugoslavia,

and Italy. The annexation of Austria obviously exposed Czechoslovakia to German threats—her southern bordet was now open to invasion and a large part of the country was surrounded by German territory on three sides. It looked to all observers in Eutope and to the governments of all the powers as if Czechoslovakia were likely to be menaced by Germany in some way, though there were, of course, differences of opinion as to just what that menace was, whether this was a good or a bad thing, and what should or could be done about it. After the Azschluss, attention shifted to Czechoslovakia almost auto-

matically. The months of negotiations of 1938 and the hectic days that culminated in the Munich agreement have attracted enormous attention from scholars and have come to hold a certain symbolic significance. The Munich agreement in particular has come to have its own significance not necessarily based on an accurate reading of the events those who speak of the “lessons of Munich” have in mind. Here the focus is on German policy at the time and on the way that policy interacted with the situation inside Czechoslovakia and culminated in a temporary settlement seen by the public then and later as a victory for Germany but by Hitler as a great, perhaps the greatest, setback and mistake of his career. This paradox can be understood only if the perceptions, hopes, and actions of the

main participants to the drama are analyzed separately, and the conclusions each drew from the same events ate also separately viewed. Hitler’s antagonism toward the Czechs was profound and longstanding; it included the view that it was *heir presence in Bohemia and Moravia that constituted the key nationality problem of the area, and that their expulsion was the appropriate solution.! 1. Summary

in Gerhard

L. Weinberg,

“Germany

and Czechoslovakia,

1933-1945,”

Czechoslovakia Past and

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

There was, of course, no prospect of implementing such a grandiose scheme in the first yeats of National Socialist rule in Germany, when Hitler, worried about Czechoslovakia’s possibly joining with Poland and France in a preventive attack on Germany, followed a course of extreme caution toward his southern neighbor.? The Germans inside Czechoslovakia were to restrain themselves while Germany built up her own strength. The Berlin government did, however, begin to develop a different kind of tie to this German segment of the citizens of Czechoslovakia. During the Weimar years, the German government and a variety of semiofficial and private organizations had provided financial support for the German minority not only in Czechoslovakia but in a number of East and Southeast European countries, but the general nature of that support now changed in the Czechoslovak case. Whatever the indirect political implications of the financial subventions in the past, they had been allotted directly to cultural, educational, and

economic institutions. It was in the period preceding the Czechoslovak national elections of 1935 that the German government began to subsidize the campaign of a political party, the Sudeten German party of Konrad Henlein.* Inside that party various elements still contended for influence, but in the absence of any immediate desire on Hitler’s part to move on the Czechoslovak question, there was as yet no need for Berlin to involve itself decisively into such matters.° It was enough for the Sudeten German patty to grow in strength as a possible future tool. The most immediate concern of the German government in the mid-1930s was the building up of Germany’s armed might. While that process went forward, the first plans for an attack on Czechoslovakia wete considered in Berlin but not fully developed because of the objections of General Beck, the army chief of staff.° Only diplomatic measures were taken. The Germans began a lengthy and persistent effort to persuade the Hungarians to reach an accommodation with Yugoslavia in the hope of focusing all of Hungary’s revisionist aspirations against Czechoslovakia, while Hungary’s accommodation with Yugoslavia and Germany’s own better relations with the latter would disrupt the Little Entente.’ The dramatic shift in German-Polish relations during the first year of Hitler’s rule from open confrontation to tacit accommodation served to screen Germany’s eastern border. If Czechoslovakia had never been interested in defending Poland’s territorial integrity against German—or Soviet—ambitions, Poland was even less interested in defending Czechoslovakia’s. In fact, Poland had her own territorial dis-

pute with her southern neighbor over Té8in, and at times thought of sponsoring the Slovak autonomists against Prague.? The German government, once Hitler had rePresent, ed. Miloslav Rechcigl (The Hague: Mouton, 1969), 1:764-65. Pre-1933 German-Czechoslovak relations

ate described in F. Gregory Campbell, Confrontation in Central Europe (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, fs) 2. See above, pp. 24, n. 7, 86-89. 3. For the mechanism of the Weimar period, see Norbert Krekeler, Revisionsanspruch und geheime Ostpolitik der Weimarer Republik: Die Subventionierung der deutschen Minderheit in Polen, 1919-1939 (Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1973). John Hiden, “The Weimar Republic and the Problem of the Auslandsdeutsche,” Journal of Contemporary History, 12 (1977), 273-89, is critical of this book. Some small payments for electoral purposes in

Poland are noted in Riekhoff, p. 213. 4. See above, pp. 176-77. 5. On this whole subject, see Ronald M. Smelser, The Sudeten Problem, 1933-1939: Volkstumspolitik and the Formulation ofNazi Foreign Policy (Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1975). 6. See above p. 176.

7. Ibid., pp. 178-80, 228-29. 8. On this effort in the spring of 1938, see Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 65-66, and Thaddeus V. Gromada, “The Slovaks and the Failure of Beck’s ‘Third Europe’ Scheme,” in T. V. Gromada (ed.), Essays on

Poland's Foreign Policy, 1918-1939 (New York: Josef Pilsudski Institute of America, 1970), p. 60, n. 5. By the summet of 1938, Warsaw had returned to the idea of Slovakia falling to Hungary in any disruption of the Czechoslovak state.

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oriented its Polish policy, was in a position to take advantage of the Polish-Czech antagonism, and we have already seen how German policy toward Poland in 1937-38 was catefully subordinated by Hitler to the needs of his aims against Czechos lovakia. Germany’s western frontier was open to invasion as long as the Rhinelan d remained demilitarized; so there could be no German military adventures in Central and Eastern Europe without French approval—which was not forthcoming. Only a remilitarized Rhineland and a defended western border could Open up at least the possibility of German moves

that risked French intervention; then the threat, or bluff, of a bloody

battle on the western border could serve as a possible deterrent to any French move. It is in this sense that the German action of March 1936 of remilitarizing the Rhineland matks a major turning point in the interwar years. The Germans did not know that the French army had no plans to cope with such a step, and they did not know that there wete no serious French plans to assist Czechoslovakia or Poland militarily either before or after March

1936; but Hitler could and did gamble on the belief that France was

unlikely to move in 1936. Thereafter, he would do everything possible to reinforce French reluctance to march if he took other steps in Central Europe, until he was ready to move against France herself. The impact of this German screening procedure in the east and west was not lost on the government of Czechoslovakia. With other possible sources of support dubious or

even hostile, the leaders of Czechoslovakia participated during the winter of 1936-37 in

an attempt at a direct accommodation with Germany and were at one point confidently

hopeful that such an accommodation was attainable.? Hitler, however, had no interest in

tying his own hands vis-a-vis Czechoslovakia and allowed the negotiations to peter out. Just as he refused the Italian attempts to commit him to new promises that implied tespect for Austrian independence, so he would not agree to anything that might limit his freedom of action toward Czechoslovakia. He had been willing to follow a contrary procedure with Poland and concerning the status of Danzig; one can only conclude that in spite of the opportunistic shifts in his approach and the way he allowed events to influence his timing, Hitler did in fact have a sort of mental priority schedule in which Austria and Czechoslovakia were to disappear as independent countries in some

fashion, but

before Germany concerned herself directly with Poland. By the time knowledge of the secret German-Czechoslovak negotiations had reached the British and French governments, therefore, the whole project was already without any prospect of success.!” The building up of Germany’s military forces was the main element in Hitler’s policy toward Czechoslovakia during 1937, and the military planning to which this buildup was geared specified Czechoslovakia as the immediate target of Germany’s aggressive designs. The work on these plans had been carried forward as part of the general development of Germany’s new armed forces and the staff work for their employment. Hitler’s discussion of his intentions concerning Czechoslovakia at the meeting of 5 November 1937 provides the historian with some insight into the way the German leader visualized the diplomatic and military aspects of the destruction of Czechoslovakia; it gave his military advisers both an impetus to further military preparations and a focus for their planning.!! Hitler thought of the conquest of Czechoslovakia as a military operation that would shorten Germany’s border, thereby freeing troops for other employment as well as providing the territorial and population basis for additional

9. See above, pp. 247-51. re 10. For information reaching the French government, see D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 19, 104, 148, 231; the British

government, see R 1655, R 1910, R 2021, R 2163/188/12, FO 371/21128; N 3287/461/38, FO 371/21104; the United States government, U.S. 1937, 1:88-89; Dodd, Diary, 15 March 1937, p. 393, 3 April 1937, p. 296. 11. See above, pp. 313-317.

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divisions, especially after the removal of many of the Czechs. It was his hope that the wat which would accomplish this could be localized. This hope was based on several considerations. The reluctance of the French and British to go to war was obvious enough, and the efforts of France and Britain to obtain German assurances of restraint in Central and Eastern Europe in exchange for colonial and economic concessions were interpreted in this light. German knowledge of the objections to British involvement in Centtal Europe voiced by the Dominion prime ministers at the Imperial Conference of 1937 contributed to Hitler’s expectation of British unwillingness to assist France in a war for the defense of Czechoslovakia.’ The major diplomatic measure that might assist in the isolation of Czechoslovakia from potential support on the part of the Western Powers would be the stressing of the alleged grievances of the Sudeten Germans. Just as the German government had once used its debts in the United States to force Americans to subsidize German exports— while carefully avoiding a repudiation of the debts themselves—so now the Sudeten Germans would be utilized to isolate Czechoslovakia from outside support with every precaution being taken to make certain that the grievances would not be settled. Aspects of that strategy have already been touched upon; its full development and the way it succeeded in a manner contrary to Hitler’s own intentions are major themes of this and the following chapter. The point which must be reiterated here is that at the beginning of the year which culminated in Munich, Hitler himself was quite explicit that the major issue was the destruction of Czechoslovakia, while the Sudeten Germans, far from being

the focus of his concern, were to serve solely as the tool of broader aims. Those present at the meeting of 5 November fully understood this, and their arguments with Hitler at that meeting reflect their understanding. It was the war for the total destruction of Czechoslovakia that they feared might not be isolated; there is no sign that any of them expected interference with efforts to aid the Sudeten Germans. The idea that Czechoslovakia must be destroyed was, however, accepted and agreed to by all those present,

and they parroted these sentiments

to all who would listen in the weeks after the

meeting.!3 : As for the military side of the operation, there were several ways in which Hitler’s decisions and preferences expressed at the November meeting provided both an impetus to the German armed forces and a focus to their planning. Two interrelated aspects of this should be noted. The preparation and construction of a vast system of defensive fortifications on Germany’s western border would serve a double purpose in shielding Germany during an attack on Czechoslovakia: it would provide a basis for the weaker German forces that could be used in the west to hold up any French offensive to relieve Czechoslovakia, and by its very existence—knowledge of which in a hopefully and intentionally exaggerated form would be allowed to become public—might serve to deter the French from even trying the difficult attempt to break through. As Hitler put it: “It is vety unlikely that France would move forward without the support of England and in the expectation of having its offensive stalled at our western fortifications.”’!4 There was the further element in Hitler’s views that only such a successful defense in the west, if France did move, would serve to keep Poland from taking advantage of Germany’s preoccupation with Czechoslovakia and France to strike at East Prussia. The tapid building of fortifications in the west would become one of Hitlet’s great interests in 1938: the appointment of Fritz Todt to replace the regular army construction chiefs on the Westwall (often referred to as the Siegfried Line), the preparation by Hitler of a 12. See above, pp. 298-299, 13. See above, pp. 315-16.

14. G.D., D, 1, No. 19, p. 30.

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detailed memorandum on the fortifications—one of the vety few he ever wrote!5—and his violent reaction to the assertion of some of his generals in the summer of 1938 that the fortifications could hold out only a very short time are all aspects of Hitler’s close personal involvement in what he considered a key part of the military and political pteparation for the action against Czechoslovakia. Years later he would recall the Westwall as the best example of the frustration of his program for expanding Germany ’s army by the army’s own leaders.!6 The implications of the May Crisis of 1938 for the Westwall construction program, which will be discussed in connection with the account of that crisis, also have to be seen in this context.

The other aspect of military preparations stressed at the meeting of 5 November was the problem of speed in dealing with Czechoslovakia militarily, a major concern of Hitler’s in 1938 the importance of which was also reinforced by the May Crisis. Speed in the conquest of Czechoslovakia opened up the possibility of moving German troops tapidly back from that front to the west if France did intervene, increased the possibility that hostilities might be finished even before French intervention started if a few days of agitated diplomacy preceded a French declaration of war, and would certainly help to deter any move to help Czechoslovakia on the patt of the Soviet Union, which was in any case diverted from risky involvement in European problems by the advance of Japan _ in East Asia. The emphasis in German military planning for the actual operation against Czechoslovakia was, therefore, to be placed on speed in breaching the border fortifica-

tions and gaining control of the main part of Bohemia. The commander-in-chief of the German army, General von Fritsch, mentioned that he had already ordered a study of this very problem; it would be a major theme in all the plans for an attack on Czechoslovakia. The changes in German military planning immediately after the November conference reflect the view that a German move to crush the Czechoslovak state was to be ptepared for the near future, possibly in 1938, and the revisions made were approved by

Hitler on 13 December.'” The situation of Czechoslovakia in the face of these dangers was difficult indeed. Internally, the Czechs constituted just over half the population and were confronted by agitation for more autonomy from many of the Slovaks, to say nothing of the even mote numerous Germans and the smaller Polish and Magyar minorities. Early in 1938, coinciding with the greater pressure from Germany, there was a substantial activation of Slovak demands which weakened and embarrassed the Prague government and to which it made no substantial response in the first part of the year.'® The Prague regime’s treatment of the German minority of over three million had been simultaneously very good and very bad, very wise and very unwise. As for treatment as a cultural minority, these Germans were without doubt the best treated large group of Germans under foreign rule in Europe.!? Nevertheless, they had been left with real 15. The text of the “Denkschrift zur Frage unserer Festungsanlagen” of 1 July 1938 has been published in Otto-Wilhelm Forster, Das Befestigungswesen: Rickblick und Ausschau (Neckatgemind: Vowinckel, 1960), pp. 123— 48; see also p. 98n. This memorandum has not received the attention scholars have given Hitler’s memotandum on the Four-Year Plan. Useful for the progress of construction are the two top secret reports “Sechs Monate Festungsbau” of 20 December 1938, and “Bericht vom Westwall,” of 20 April 1940, in Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Nos. 6893 and 6446. For good descriptions of what the Westwall was actually like after construction, see First United States Army, Report of Operations 1 August 1944-22 February 1945 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1945), 1:51-54; and Charles B. MacDonald, The Svegfried Line Campaign (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1963), pp. 30-35. 16. Hitler’s Table Talk (Ttevor-Roper, ed.), 16 August 1942, p. 634. 17. See above, p. 317-18. The account in Boris Celovsky, Das Miinchener Abkommen von 1938 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1958), pp. 91-93, is still an excellent summary. 18. Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 38-39, 70-72. See also D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 34, 106, 177.

19. This point is fully documented inJohaim W. Briigel, Tschechen und Deutsche, 1918-1939 (Munich: Nymphen-

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gtievances of obvious substance, especially over discrimination in the employment of government officials and the awarding of government contracts. Both of these areas were particularly sensitive issues during the depression, which hit hard at the Sudeten Germans with their involvement in the cyclically sensitive manufacturing and export fields. The political structure of Czechoslovakia was also a mixture of good and bad, wise forethought and dubious procedures. In theory, the rights of all citizens were protected by a democratic constitution; but in practice that constitution, drawn up without any participation from the German element, gave power to political parties organized along national lines, so that the German parties could always be outvoted. The years in which representatives of some of these parties, called Activists, participated in the government

could not obscure the fact that the government of the country was and would presumably always remain in the hands of Czechs and Slovaks, there being no parties which transcended nationality lines. Had there been a longer period of time for adjustments to be worked out and a clearer show of determination on the part of the Czechs to reconcile the German element in response to the pleadings of the Activist parties, the siren

song from Berlin might have found a lesser echo within the Czechoslovak state, as was true in Switzerland. Neither condition was fulfilled, and by 1938 it was perhaps already too late. The government in Prague was unwilling to take a chance on the one tactic that might have worked by revealing the nature of Hitler’s aims. Had the concessions offered in the fall (or anything like them) been made in the spring of 1938, the Sudeten leaders would have been forced to show their hand at a time singularly inconvenient for Berlin: they would have had to accept the offer or reject what they themselves had been demanding and hence destroy the credibility of their grievances before Germany was ready. The unwillingness of the Czechoslovak government to try such an approach was surely founded on the location of the German minority and the special problems inherent in that factor. P The German minority in Czechoslovakia was concentrated in a practically solid band along the border of Bohemia; a border that had hardly changed for many centuries. Disregarding the fluctuation of the nationality distribution in the center of Bohemia— fluctuations that were far more substantial than usually recognized—the critical question was that of the border areas where the population was predominantly German and was directly adjacent to Germany and the newly annexed Austrian provinces of the Reich. Here the Paris peace settlement had allowed economic, historical, and strategic factors to dominate.”° If the critics of that settlement, especially John Maynard Keynes, had railed against the alleged insensitivity of the peacemakers to economic considerations, here was a good example of an effort to pay heed to such factors by maintaining the economic unity of the interdependent portions of Bohemia.! Any shift of the border that went beyond the transfer of small strips of land to affect the bulk of the German population would, however, not only disrupt the economic viability of the new Czechoslovak state

but deprive it of its natural borders and its main railway arteries. It was the fear that any grant to the Germans of special autonomous rights couched in territorial or national—as opposed to individual or personal—terms would be likely to burger Verlagshandlung, 1967) (the English-language edition is deplorably inferior), and Radomir Luza, The Transfer of the Sudeten Germans (New York: New York University Press, 1964). 20. The best account is Dagmar H. Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State (Leyden: Brill, ee historical memorandum on the problem, originally drafted by Sir James Headlam-Morley and put into '€lean form by Sir Maurice Hankey, was circulated to the Committee on Foreign Policy of the British cabinet by Lord Halifax on 21 March 1938 as “an instructive commentary on much with which we are now concerned (C

2399/2399 /18, FO 371/21754). 2

21. Ironically Keynes urged a modification of this border in the New Statesman of 26 Match 1938.

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lead to their secession from the Czechoslovak and adherence to the German state which held back the government in Prague. The defenses of the country were located in the very areas that might thus be lost, and the territorial configuration of Czechoslovakia after their loss would be indefensible. There was, furthermore, the vety great probability that any major concessions made to the Germans under international pressure would be utilized by Czechoslovakia’s other minorities to make analogous demands with attendant analogous, if not equally dangerous, implications for the integrity of the Czechosl ovak State.

At the peace conference, the demands of some Czechs for taking from Germany the territory of Lusatia, which had been lost to Bohemia in the seventeenth century, had

been ignored, and there had been, on the other hand, no German demand for parts of

Bohemia; but in the atmosphere of the 1930s the concept of national self-determination could be raised as a slogan by which the performance of Czechoslovakia and the wisdom of its borders could be measured and challenged. In an age when it was still thought appropriate to adjust boundaries to populations, rather than to shift people to fit boundaries, this was a difficult problem indeed. As has been mentioned in connection with Hitler’s handling of the South Tyrol question, he was very careful to protect himself in 1938 against any undermining of this propaganda weapon by not agreeing formally to a transfer of the South Tyrolean Germans until after the Munich agreement. That such measures were still believed inconceivable at the time can be seen from the handling of a parliamentary inquiry in the House of Commons about the possibility of the Sudeten Germans who did not like living in Czechoslovakia simply leaving that country for Germany. The very idea was then still outside the realm of alternatives that might be considered.” The strategy that Hitler followed in dealing with Czechoslovakia was both simple and clever. German propaganda would focus on the alleged injustices suffered by the Sudeten Germans. Insofar as these were real ones, they would be exploited; where there were none, they would be invented in sufficient detail to appear credible. When incidents could be provoked, they would form the basis for great publicity; when it proved impossible to provoke incidents, they would be fabricated. And all this would be carried forward in steadily increasing volume during the course of the year. Simultaneously, the Germans within Czechoslovakia would be harnessed to this campaign. They would furnish part of the basis for the propaganda and incidents, being given to believe that the German government was interested in their security and welfare. They would thus form the cover for an eventual German attack on Czechoslovakia that could be made to appear in the guise of defending Germans—trather than attacking Czechs—and which would find Czechoslovakia so isolated morally that she might also be isolated diplomatically and militarily.” Before some of the major steps in this campaign are briefly outlined and documented, a word should be said about the receptivity of the public inside and outside Germany to such a campaign. In an age when the triumph of the national over the dynastic principle of state organization was widely regarded as both good and necessary, when the questions of minority rights and national self-determination were very much to the fore, and when the public in Central and Western Europe had long heard of struggles of oppressed minorities from the Bulgarian to the Armenian massactes, from the Alsace22. The suggestion was formally raised in Parliament and dismissed as not serving any useful purpose by the parliamentary undet-secretary for foreign affairs, R. A. B. Butler, on 22 June 1938, C 6243/1941/18, FO MW: , 371/21725. 23. The utilization of the Palestinian refugees by Israel’s Arab neighbors in the 1950s and 1960s for similar purposes suggests that the technique has not been discredited by the ultimate fate of the Sudeten Germans.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Lorraine to the Polish question, the possibility of arousing concern over the fate of the Sudeten Germans was clearly present. The other side of this coin was, of course, that

Berlin could play its cynical tune credibly only once: when Hitler tried the same strategy again in the following year, to isolate Poland, almost or actually identical tales about the mistreatment of the German minority there failed to produce the same results. It was not just that there were fewer Germans in Poland than in Czechoslovakia; they were, after all, treated much less decently than those in Czechoslovakia. The real point was that having been tricked by faked concern about Germans in other countries once, no one

was interested. One can read the record of the almost interminable discussions of the British and French governments in 1939 and practically never see a reference to the minority about which Berlin was then bleating into the wind. A number of the main themes that would characterize the crisis over Czechoslovakia in 1938 were already well established before the annexation of Austria brought the Czechoslovak question to the fore. The isolation of Czechoslovakia from possible support was well advanced. The way in which Germany could rely on Poland to screen and even assist German moves against the Czechoslovak state has been described. From Warsaw, the possibility of the dissolution of Czechoslovakia was viewed with equanimity. Although there was no actual German-Polish agreement on the subject, the Poles looked

forward to the prospect in terms of territorial gains for themselves, no great likelihood of a European war, and the possibility of a common border with Hungary. It was equally cleat that Czechoslovakia could not count on Yugoslavia for anything other than mild diplomatic interest.2? Hungary hoped for territorial gains from the dissolution of Czechoslovakia and was restrained only by concern over involvement in any general European wat or Yugoslav support for the Czechs. The latter possibility had, as previously explained, largely disappeared in view of the drift of Yugoslavia toward the Axis. The most spectacular sign of that reorientation had been the rapprochement of Yugoslavia and Italy. The authorities in Rome, certainly, saw nothing to fear from a German move against

Prague. Even before Italy acquiescéd in the annexation of Austria by Germany, the Italian foreign minister had repeatedly stated that he thought Czechoslovakia an artificial state which had best be demolished. His comments to this effect were repeated by so many diplomats that it may be assumed Count Ciano meant them to be taken as Italy’s position.”© He let it be known to Czechoslovakia’s partners in the Little Entente that there would be no help for Czechoslovakia from Rome;?’ he looked forward over the

ruins of Czechoslovakia to that Rome-Belgrade-Budapest-Warsaw alignment from the south that Colonel Beck envisioned from the north.” The assumption in Rome appears to have been that Czechoslovakia would collapse under international pressure, her component parts becoming the booty of her neighbors without war.”” With Italy still deeply involved in the fighting in Spain, the Italian leaders clearly did not expect that Italy herself would either play an active part or derive any direct or compensatory gains; the disappearance of another democracy from Europe would be a side benefit.3° 24. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 274; 2, Nos. 104, 117; Lipski Papers, Nos. 79-80; S zembek Diary, 14 November

1937, pp. 252-55; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 307, 314, 355; 10, No. 95; R 7385/837/12, FO. 371/21133; U.S. 1938, 1:33-35; Gunther to Roosevelt, 10 December 1937, Hyde Park, P.S.F. France, 1937. 25. D.D.F., 2d, 6, No. 11; G.D., C, 6, No. 542; Koloman Gajan and Robert Kvaéek (eds.), Germany and Crechoslovakia, 1918-1945, Documents on German Policies (Prague: Orbis, 1965), pp. 119-20. 26. Girsa to Bene’, 1 April 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413847; Guido Schmidt Tnal, p.

517; R 2802/26/67, FO 371/21137; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 236.

27. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 149-52. 28. Kerekes, No. 12; Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 382; 2, No. 120.

29. Cf. G.D., D, 2, No. 24.

30. The contrast between Italian willingness to see German gains at the expense of Czechoslovakia unmatched

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Czechoslovakia did have a formal alliance with France which obligated the latter to

come to her assistance in case of a German attack. There was, however, no staff agree-

ment as to how such French assistance would be provided, an aspect frequently discussed in the literature in connection with the Franco-Soviet and Franco-P olish pacts but rarely mentioned in connection with Czechoslovakia.3! Any resolution of this problem was complicated by the remilitarization of the Rhineland and the beginning of the construction of German fortifications there. The French, having suffered horrendously from the devastation of the last war, were determined to hold off the Germans from French

territory in the initial stages of any future war and to move to the offensive only when, presumably as the result of a vast British continental army having been built up and sent to France, the Allies could advance into Germany. By that time, of course, the Germans

would have overrun whatever Central and East European allies were faithful to France and could well be even stronger than at the outset of hostilities. Until the French archives are opened, the historian must depend upon the sketchy comments of General Maurice Gauché” for what must remain the most extraordinary failure of French intelligence: the preposterous overestimation of the progress in German construction of fortifications in the west. Perhaps the wish for a defensive military strategy was father to the thought that Germany’s defenses would be terribly difficult and costly to breach; whatever the reason, the results would become evident diplomatically in 1938 and militarily in 1939: Under these circumstances, French expressions of loyalty to the alliance and its commitment to go to war were phrased in broad and vague terms in 1937.33 Implicit— and sometimes explicit—was the hope that such assertions would serve to deter Germany from aggression, and there was assuredly much sense in the view expressed by the French to their Polish ally that giving Germany any other impression was dangerous in the extreme.*4 Beyond the nartowly military question of how French help might in fact be given, however, there were two further problems. There was the very complicated question of what France would do if an internal upheaval in Czechoslovakia led to German intervention. Though in the event this contingency never arose, its discussion raised questions and doubts about French policy.*> Even more difficult was the puzzle of British policy: would Britain support France in a war arising out of the latter’s obligation to assist Czechoslovakia; and, inherently tied to this question, was the further one of

whether the French posture of fidelity to her alliance was credible in the absence of assurances of British support.*° French Foreign Minister Yvon Delbos was doubtless by Italian ones in 1938, and her unwillingness to do so in 1939 can probably best be understood by reference to the fact that by March 1939 the Spanish Civil War was obviously in its final stage. 31. Note Gamelin’s memorandum for Daladier of 28 April 1938, which opens with the statement that no military convention complementing the pact of mutual assistance existed and which contains a vague allusion to “moving offensively under the conditions foreseen by our operational plan” without any indication of what these might have been—as will be shown later, the conditions were not expected to obtain until long after Czechoslovakia had been overrun by the Germans. See Maurice Gamelin, Servir (Paris: Plon, 1946), 2:318-19. 32. Le deuxitme bureau an travail (1935-1940) (Paris: Amiot-Dumont, 1953), pp. 141-42. The work of Georges Castellan, Le réarmament clandestin du Reich 1930-1935 (Paris: Plon, 1954), which exploits the French records in far more detail, unfortunately does not deal with the period after the remilitarization of the Rhineland; and the

documentary series D.D.F. is necessarily limited to including only a few important items from military and naval archives. 33. C 383/1/18, FO 371/20705; C 4757, C 5126/3/18, FO 371/20711; G.D., D, 2, No. 21; Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 572-73; U.S. 1938, 1:35-39; Krofta circular of 10 October 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413878; Osusky telegram of 15 October 1937, ibid., frame 413861 (bits in Berber, No. 85); cf.

Slavik report 85 of 10 December 1937, ibid., frames 413837—42 (distorted excerpt in Berber, p. 82). 34. D.D.F., 2d, 5, No, 383. 35. Ibid., 7, Nos. 3, 18, 24, 94; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 10, 13, 20-22, 24, 28; C 6875, C 6994/3/18, FO 371/20711. 36. U.S. 1937, 1:89—92; 3:301—2; R 3718/770/67, FO 371/21139.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cottect in his view that France would descend to the tank of a second-rate power if she abandoned Czechoslovakia, but if carrying out a stronger policy depended not on her own tesolution but the expectation of English help, had not that descent already taken

placer?’ When Delbos told U.S. Ambassador Bullitt on 18 February 1938 that nothing could be done to keep Austria from being swallowed up by Germany, the latter noted the rapid spread in France of the view that the country should follow a purely defensive policy and abandon her friends and allies in Central and Eastern Europe. Bullitt commented in his report that “there may be a rapid reversal but at the present moment, for the first time since I arrived at this post, it is questionable that France would support Czechoslovakia,

except in a case of direct and flagrant German invasion.” He thought that peace might be maintained by acquiescence in German triumphs, that if the Germans followed a policy of fortiter in re, suaviter in modo, there might be no wat because of the absence of resistance.*8 Under these circumstances, the development of the crisis over Czechoslovakia would depend heavily on two factors. First, how did the issue look to the British government; how did London see the situation in Czechoslovakia and its own interest in the position and strength of France? In the second place, would the Germans move with

care and deliberation, or would they turn to “direct and flagrant” invasion?

The concern of the London authorities about the situation in and of Czechoslovakia was of long standing. Reports of the difficulties faced by the Sudeten Germans under Czech rule and the implications of the reaction of the Germans for the existence of Czechoslovakia in its 1919 borders had been arriving at the British Foreign Office with some tegularity.*° The conclusion reached there was, in Vansittart’s words, “the plain fact is that the Sudetendeutsche ate being oppressed by the Czechs.’4? This was not some abstract problem; as Eden asked, “What is to be the position of France if this problem leads to conflict between Germany and Czechoslovakia? and our position?’’4! What looked so troublesome from London was the obverse of the general German strategy previously described: “It may well be that Germany has designs on Czechoslovakia in any event, but it is quite certain that’at present the Czechoslovak Government are providing them with an ever open door and a first-class pretext.’”4? One conclusion drawn in London was that it would be best to urge the Czechs to do their utmost—and certainly much more than hitherto—to remove the grievances of the Germans in their country; and such advice was given both in London and in Prague in the hope that the German case against Czechoslovakia would thus not have such a strong basis, or, if carried forward nevertheless, would be clearly exposed.*? There was

the converse thought that the Czechs would be able to afford adoption of a more liberal internal policy if they could be absolutely certain of external military support in case of a crisis with Germany," but there was great doubt in London that France would stand by 37. C 3685/532/62, FO 371/20702. 38. Bullitt tel. 269 of 18 February 1938, State 740.00/298. 39. After Sir John Addison, the British minister in Prague, had sent a long and gloomy report to London on 25 August 1936 (R 5216/32/12, FO 371/20375), a collection of extracts of his ptior warnings from 1931 to 1936

was pulled together'on 7 October 1936 (R 6487/32/12, FO 371/20375). The subject is covered in detail in Jonathan Zorach, “The British View of the Czechs in the Era before the Munich Crisis,” SVavonic and East

European Review, 57, No. 1 (Jan. 1979): 56-70. 40. Minute of Sir Robert Vansittart of 12 September 1936 on R 5296/32/12, FO 371/20375. 41, Minute by Anthony Eden of 15 September 1936 on R 5337/32/12, FO 371/20375.

42. Vansittart’s conclusion in the record of his meeting with Henlein on 20 July 1936 (R 4395/32/12, FO 371/20374). 43, Examples in R 2128, R 4487/32/12, FO 371/20374; cf. above, pp. 244-45; Masaryk to Krofta, 29 July 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1316/2376/D 497052-55.

44, Minute by Sargent of 15 October 1936 on R 6724/32/12, FO 371/20375.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

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her ally. This doubt lent strength to the other conclusion drawn in London, namely, that the French should be urged to use their influence in Prague in favor of concessions to the Sudeten Germans that might pacify the latter but would in any case remove the inner

weakness of Czechoslovakia’s diplomatic position.‘5 In January 1937 the British government accordingly made an effort to persuade the French to press concessions on the Czechs. The French ambassador in London and the French foreign minister were told that the British believed efforts needed to be made to meet the grievances of the Sudeten Germans, especially in the economic field.4¢ The immediate response of the French was, however, the opposite of what London wanted. The French minister in Prague, Victor de Lacroix, warned against bilateral negotiations with Germany and argued to both the Czechoslovak and his own government that concessions made to the German government or the Sudeten Germans would only weaken Czechoslovakia in view of the inequality of the parties involved.*’ Lacroix’s belief that any Czechoslovak-German agreement or concessions to the Sudeten Germans would be dangerous both for Czechoslovakia and for the position of France made sense, but only in a situation where either France by herself could and would stand by Czechoslovakia in a crisis or where France could count on British support and move jointly with England to defend Czechoslovakia. The first of these two contingencies was, however, excluded by a French policy that saw France as too weak to act by herself; and the Czechoslovak government itself had recognized this the preceding month.** As for the second alternative, that of British assistance, this too was recognized by Prague and Paris as doubtful,”

and it was further recognized by Lacroix himself that the failure to reduce friction on the Sudeten issue would make it even less likely.°° The optimism about Czechoslovakia’s prospects that Czechoslovak President Eduard Beneé habitually voiced was not rebutted by Lacroix.>! When the French foreign minister became worried enough to have Lacroix sound Benes out on some steps in the Sudeten German question, the hesitations of the latter were not met by any serious effort on the part of the French minister to urge action; on the contrary, he continued to warn against any German-Czechoslovak agreement.** Benes was or professed to be hopeful that the agreement reached between the Prague government and the Activist parties which was announced by the government on 18 February 1937 would strengthen those parties, weaken

Henlein’s

Sudeten

German

movement,

and allow Czechoslovakia

a

breathing spell. The fact of the matter was, however, that Prague neither followed up the February agreement with major new steps nor created any momentum that might have changed the whole situation by shifting the initiative to the Czech leadership. The failure of anything substantial to come from the February agreement was soon evident to all, and the absence of French pressure at this critical juncture was a significant disservice to France’s own ally. Given the unwillingness of the French government to make serious military plans to assist Czechoslovakia—to say nothing about determination to catty them out—it was hardly either fair or honest to leave Prague under the illusion that all might yet be well.* 45. See Vansittart’s and Eden’s comments, ibid.

46. D.D.E., 2d, 4, No. 295; R 320/188/12, FO 371/21126; cf. D.D.B., 4, No. 204.

the very time when, as became 47. D.D.F.,, 2d, 4, Nos. 359, 375, 442, 474. It should be noted that this was

known later, the Czechoslovak government was secretly negotiating with Berlin. 48. D.D.F.,, 2d, 4, No. 165. 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid., 5, No. 52.

ibid., No. 40, and R 6804/154/12, FO 51. Ibid., 4, No. 393; 5, No. 149; for similar expressions by Krofta, see

B71 219255 “) 52. D.D.F., 2d, 5, Nos. 202, 205, 228; 6, Nos. 28, 48, 139. the Activist parties, and suband t governmen vak Czechoslo the between agreement 1937 53. On the February

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Throughout the summer of 1937 the situation of Britain and France working at cross-purposes on Czechoslovakia continued. The London government urged Prague to initiate conversations with Henlein and to try to meet as many of the demands of the Sudeten Germans as possible, simultaneously urging the Sudeten German party to respond to any opportunity offered by the government, while Lacroix did what he could to teinforce the reluctance of the Czechoslovak authorities.°* Although aware of the enormous importance of the minorities question for British public opinion, the French minister was still reluctant to urge concessions on the Czechs.*° Fearful that this course would lead to an explosion, the British government began a major effort to convince the French that their own policy was one of lesser dangers than the rigid line which the French were still advocating in Prague.*° This difference highlighted the French dilemma: they would neither advise their ally to make concessions that might leave Czechoslovakia subservient to Germany nor were they prepared to back up the Czechs if the situation became really dangerous. In September, October, and November 1937 the British government made a series of unsuccessful attempts to convince the French that Czechoslovakia would be strengthened, not weakened, by a settlement with the Sudeten Germans, and that in any case, a serious

effort by Prague would weaken the German case. The simultaneous British efforts to persuade the Czechoslovak government of the wisdom of such a policy foundered on Czechoslovak opposition and the continuing contrary advice they were receiving from Paris. The Czechs and French repeatedly warned that there was no relying on German good faith, to which the British responded by agreeing that this was so, but that there was no prospect of demonstrating this fact unless the Czechoslovak government made— and was seen to make—a major effort and as a result became internationally less vulnerable.*’ Although it was generally expected in Paris and Prague as well as London that Germany might find a way to swallow Austria, thereby opening up Czechoslovakia to invasion from the south, the English were alone in insisting that time was crucial; it might well be too late already, but thé danger would become still greater if the situation were allowed to drift. By the end of 1937 the French were coming around to London’s point of view and agreed to discuss the situation with the British leaders when visiting London to hear the report of Lord Halifax on his trip to Germany. The immediately following tour of the French foreign minister would provide an opportunity for him to discuss the matter with Benes in Prague, but the evidence shows that little came of this. The last months of Austrian independence, therefore, did not see any new initiatives on the Sudeten question by the leaders of Czechoslovakia. They had sounded out Henlein in the fall, but they appear to have preferred the risks of delay to those of action, fearful that any action might set off a slide which could not be halted.58 sequent events, see Briigel, pp. 308ff.; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 22; G.D., C, 6, Nos. 151, 220, 224; R 2886/188/12, FO 371/21128; R 3707, R 4408/188/12, FO 371/21129; R 5855/188/12, FO 371/21130. 54. D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 3, 222; R 4942, R 5708/188/12, FO 371/21130. 55. D.D.F., 2d, 6, Nos. 222, 242. 56. R 5455, R 5986, R 6098/188/12, FO 371/21130.

57. On this argument in the fall of 1937, see R 6258/188/12, FO 371/21130; R 7004, R 7005, R 7107, R 7357, R 7540, R 7705/188/12, FO 371/21131; D.D.F,, 2d, 7, No. 136. 58. R 8196, R 8587/154/12, FO 371/21126; R 7705/188/12, FO 371/21131; R 7857, R 8128, R 8249, R 8261, R 8515/188/12, FO 371/21132; C 8730/7888/17, FO 371/20698; C 7852/7324/18, FO 371/20751; Vaclav

Kral (ed.), Die Deutschen in der Tschechoslowakei 1933-1947 (Prague: Ceskoslovenské Akademie Véd, 1964) (hereafter cited as Kral, Die Deutschen), Nos. 80, 82; Robert Kvacek, “Zur Beziehung zwischen der Tschechoslowakei

und den Westmachten vor dem Miinchener Diktat,” Acta Universitatis Carolinae, Philosophica et historica, 1968, pp. 209-12; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 99; D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 191, 193, 340, 365, 377; Veverka report, 11 December 1937, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1041/1809/413866-—67.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

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bg If the attempt of the British government to move Prague by direct advice and indirect pressure during 1937 has been discussed at some length, it is because the conduct of Chamberlain’s policy in 1938 cannot be understood without this background. The fact that world attention did not focus on Czechoslovakia until 1938, and the subse-

quent decision of the editors of the Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939 to omit internal comments and memoranda and to start the third series of their volumes with the annexation of Austria in 1938 rather than, say, the beginning of the Chamberlain cabinet

in 1937, have joined to direct later public and scholarly interest to the year of Munich. The perspective from which the London government saw the problem s of Czechoslovakia had, however, been fairly precisely defined well before Hitlet’s initiative made Czechoslovakia item number one on the diplomatic agenda.° And some of the impatience with which the British leaders in 1938 treated both the Czechos lovak and French governments on the matter of concessions to the Sudeten Germans must be seen as an outgrowth of London’s unsuccessful effort to make some progress on these questions before they had become quite so acute. From the beginning of 1937 the Foreign Office had believed that some steps to conciliate the Sudeten Germans were needed. There was a clear recognition that

Germany might well want to end the independence of Czechoslovakia altogether, but that was seen as no reason for not trying to remove a major pretext and at least gain time. The fear of German aims that reinforced the reluctance of the Czechoslovak government was also understood, but if Germany created an international crisis over the grievances of the Sudeten Germans, France was seen as unlikely to fight and Hitler as possibly willing to move aggressively on the assumption of French abstention.S! There were, in fact, few illusions in London. The German ptess campaign about the Soviet air-

fields and the bolshevization of Czechoslovakia were taken as preposterous efforts to whip up opinion inside Germany and to frighten Czechoslovakia into weakening its ties to the Soviet Union. The fact that the Sudeten German party was financially supported from Germany was also known in London. When the News Chronicle was advised not to publish internal correspondence it had obtained showing German financing of the Sudeten German party in 1936, it was noted in the Foreign Office that “they do not really tell us anything very new.” Henlein had, to be sure, asserted the contrary but was not taken at face value. The critical issue was that publication of the documents in April 1937 would simply stir up the issue and reinforce the pressures inside Czechoslovakia against any concessions to the Sudeten Germans.®? When the situation of the Sudeten Germans, emphasizing their economic suffering and political difficulties, were being presented to the British public by such articles as those of Arnold J. Toynbee in the Economist in July 1937, the way to show up Henlein as disloyal was for the Czechoslovak government to make him a real offer which he would either have to accept, thereby recognizing the willingness of the Prague government to make meaningful concessions,

ot teject and thereby show himself uninterested in agreement.“ Such a development 59. Note the conversations between Colonel Christie and Hans Steinacher in Berlin in the summer of 1937. Christie warned that there would be war if the Germans did not stop at the nationality border, and that there were those in Germany who just pretended an interest in the Sudeten Germans but in reality merely wanted to use them (Jacobsen, Sveinacher, pp. 400-403). 60. See the Foreign Office comments on Bentinck’s tel. 1 (Saving) from Prague of 5 January 1937 in R

133/133/12, FO 371/21125. 61. Note Orme

Sargent’s memorandum

| on the “Problem

of Czechoslovakia”

of 11 January 1937 in R

622/188/12, FO 371/21126. 62. R 278, R 287, R 433/188/12, FO 371/21126; cf. R 3710/188/12, FO 371/21129. a 63. R 2979/188/12, FO 371/21128. For temporary optimism in April 1937, see R 2993, R 2994/188/12, ibid.

64. See Cadogan’s letter to Newton of 7 July 1937 in reply to Newton’s of 21 June, R 4400/188/12, FO 371/21129. Newton had reminded Cadogan that Benes’s playing off the Activitists against Henlein might

536

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

would not take place until the very last stages of the 1938 negotiations. In 1937 the London government was still hesitant about pressuring Prague as contrasted with giving gentle warnings. Fearful of being embroiled in the CzechoslovakGerman controversy, the British government did not wish to mediate between the two countries and wanted neither to push Prague into Berlin’s arms nor to discourage the possibility of agreement. As to the Sudeten issue, London’s policy was “to urge upon the Czechoslovak Government the importance of a far-reaching settlement... not so much on the ground that such a settlement would make an agreement with Germany possible ... but because it would fortify Czechoslovakia’s reputation in the eyes of the world for humane and generous treatment of her minorities in accordance with her treaty obligations.’ It was this emphasis on the minorities issue as a critical weakness in Czechoslovakia’s position that had induced the Foreign Office to urge the News Chronicle to withhold publication of the incriminating documents the newspaper had obtained and that led such officials as Sir Robert Vansittart to maintain contact with Henlein and to meet with him when he returned to England in mid-October 1937. The protestations of the Sudeten leader were regarded with great skepticism, but the dilemma of a real gtievance which he represented remained.® What was so threatening was the fact that the Sudeten Germans were both well organized and adjacent to a Germany which wished to utilize their grievances, thus both creating a danger and rendering it difficult to remove by means that decreased rather than increased the dimensions of the problem.°’ As they prepared Lord Halifax for his trip to Germany and as they hoped to persuade the French ministers on their subsequent visit to London of the wisdom of urging concessions on Czechoslovakia, the staff of the Foreign Office began to look at the specifics of Sudeten German demands. The whole problem of autonomy for the Sudeten areas was canvassed in London seriously for the first time. Would the Czechs fight over this question? Could Czechoslovakia be expected to make so great a concession when the Sudeten German party was likely then to insist on the transfer of the territory to Germany once autonomy had been secured?® The only way of stabilizing such a situation was seen to be a guarantee by Britain, France, and Germany. Such a guarantee would secure the Sudeten Germans in

their autonomy and Czechoslovakia in its borders and independence; but whether the Germans would accept such a restraint, whether France would agree to such a change in its commitment to Czechoslovakia, and whether the British public—to say nothing of the Dominions—would agree to “a new and extremely important commitment in Central Europe” were all extremely questionable. Although agreement for Delbos to indeed be unwise, but what would the British do “if Southern Ireland abutted on a potential enemy of kindred

blood and most formidable strength.” Cf. R 7085/188/12, FO 371/21131. For Toynbee’s bad impressions from his trip to Czechoslovakia, see R 4023, R 4215/188/12, FO 371/21129; on his Economist articles, see R

5361/188/12, FO 371/21132. 65. Eden instructions for Newton of 12 March 1937, filed with related papers under R 1421/188/12, FO

371/21128, Cf. R 451/188/12, FO 371/21126; R 689, R 839/188/12, FO 371/21127; R 5854/188/12, FO 371/21130; R 7376/188/12, FO 371/21131; R 3764/770/67, FO 371/21139; Hugh Dalton, Diary, 24 June 1937, Dalton Papers. 66. On Henlein’s October 1937 trip, see R 6733, R 6899, R 6900/154/12, FO 371/21125; R 6982, R 7574/188/12, FO 371/21131; Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 78; Celovsky, pp. 118-19; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 8, 14; Dalton Diary, 4 November 1937, Dalton Papers.

67. Note the Foreign Office brief for Lord De La Warr (Lord Halifax’s successor as lord privy seal) of 4 November 1937, R 7036/188/12, FO 371/21131; cf. Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 82.

68. R 7145, R 7574/188/12, FO 371/21131; R 7807/188/12, FO 371/21132. 69. Here is the germ of the idea of combining a settlement with a guarantee that became, in greatly modified form, the essence of the Munich agreement (Foreign Office memorandum of 26 November 1937, R 8248/188/12, FO 371/21132). Anthony Eden commented on this document: “This question is full of trouble but a further attempt to make progress with it is indispensable. We should start with the French. Ask M.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

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talk about the problem with the Czechoslovak government was reached at the London meeting, as has already been explained, nothing came of either that project or the subsequent British approach for a comprehensive settlement with Germany which followed in early 1938. In the very days when Hitler rejected that effort out of hand, the Austtian question was being rushed to a rapid conclusion by Hitler and Goring, in part to divert attention from the internal ctisis over the dismissals of von Blomberg and von Fritsch.

The Czechoslovak question would, therefore, come to the forefront of British concern

again in citcumstances when their own views were already rather clearly defined but in which any practical way out had become mote difficult than ever. The German government had carefully stayed away from the main issue in GermanCzechoslovak telations—the nature of the future political relationship between the two—during 1937. The unofficial soundings on this subject had foundered in the winter of 1936-37 because of German reluctance to accept commitments limiting the freedom of action of the Third Reich. Von Neurath gave the Czechoslovak minister in Berlin, Vojtech Mastny, the definitive no of the German government on 20 Match 1937.7 A number of direct and indirect efforts made by the Czechoslovak government during 1937 to reopen the possibility of negotiating a political settlement were thwarted by the Berlin authorities, who were willing to take advantage of any concessions offered by Prague but did not want these to eventuate in an accommodation between the two neighbors.” Even Ernst Hisenlohr, the German minister in Czechoslovakia who though no friend of the Czechs was nevertheless personally in favor of an agreement that would have left the Czechoslovak state at least nominally independent,” fully recognized that his own government did not think that a political settlement of Getman-Czechoslovak relations was opportune.’? A few days after the meeting recorded in the Hossbach memorandum, von Neurath noted that Eisenlohr was indeed correct in this regard.” The delaying policy of thwarting all efforts at a permanent settlement until Germany was stronger was accompanied by a policy of hostile propaganda against Czechoslovakia, pressures on Prague for concessions, and a slow tightening of control over the Sudeten German patty whose internal dissensions were not seen as a hindrance to Germany during this preliminary period. Little purpose would be served by a detailed chronicle of Delbos to have a frank talk with M. Benes when he is in Prague and ascertain from him if he can—it will not be easy for M. Benes is a shrewd negotiator—the maximum that he will give. I am naturally reluctant to become committed in any way in Central Europe, but in the event we shall have to be associated in some form with any settlement reached, indeed none can be reached without our active collaboration. A.E. Nov. 28.” 70. The German record will be published as G.D., C, 6, No. 288; there is an English translation in Gajan and

Kvacek, pp. 117-18. 71. In my judgment, the attempts of Mastny to work with Goring and Steinacher in 1937 and to have the VDA and AO legalized ought to be seen in this context; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 273; Jacobsen, Sveinacher, Nos. 110, 117, 141; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 17, 63; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,’ 8 November 1937, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/10, £337; Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry, No. 7/37 and 3/38 of 13 May 1937 and 27 January 1938, Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1809/1041/ 414051-52, 414003. It must also be noted that according to the introduction of Gajan and Kvaéek (p. 31), Hubert Masatik, the head of the Czechoslovak foreign minister’s cabinet, was in Germany on 15 and 16

October 1937 and heard a refusal of any basic agreement from State Secretary von Mackensen. Furthermore, the Germans used the excuse of Czechoslovak Prime Minister Milan Hodza’s having talked about his plan for the economic development of the Danubian area in London to evade discussing it with him even informally (G.D., C, 6, No. 373; on Hodza’s London talks, and the text of the plan, see R 3445, R 4475/770/67, FO

371/21139). 72. On Hisenloth’s views, see the conclusion of G.D., D, 2, No. 47. Brigel and other scholars also think him

opposed to total German control of Czechoslovakia.

;

73. The point is made in Eisenloht’s report on his meeting with Benes on 9 November 1937, G.D., D, 2, No. 18; the Czechoslovak tecord of a portion of this conversation is in Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 81. Note also Hisenlohr’s comment in the second paragraph of G.D., D, 2, No. 19; cf. ibid., No. 25; Celovsky, pp. 127-28. 74. See G.D., D, 2, p. 31, n. 1.

538

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the phases of German propaganda operations in 1937 as complaints about mistreatment of the Sudeten Germans replaced attacks on mythical Soviet air bases, a recital of the alternation of threats and blandishments used by Berlin to try to push the Prague authorities into improving the lot of the Sudeten Germans and worsening the lot of the political refugees from Germany in Czechoslovakia, or a review of the seemingly endless squabbles within the Sudeten German party.” A comment explaining one of the changes in the German propaganda line during 1937 can be applied with equal force to other temporary shifts in Germany’s procedures: “The directive is accordingly of a purely tactical nature; it does not signify any basic change in German policy toward Czechoslovakia.’’” In the last weeks of 1937 and the first two months of 1938 the German government was focusing on Austria, and hence left German-Czechoslovak relations in a quiet state.’”

It was during this period that Henlein sent Hitler his lengthy exposé explaining his own past policies and procedures.”* He affirmed his own belief that it was impossible to reconcile Germans and Czechs to:living in the same country and assured Hitler that his and his party’s prior public declarations to the contrary had been tactical devices required by the current political situation. He wanted German support for himself among the Sudeten Germans, he urged that the German government place the Sudeten question high on its agenda, and he called for a discussion of future policy and procedures between the German government and himself.” In the interval between Henlein’s report and his receiving the requested instructions at meetings in Berlin there were new German steps in regard to Czechoslovakia only in the field of relations with the Hungarians. There were conversations by both Sudeten German leaders and von Ribbentrop and Keitel with Hungarian officials, but these contacts, looking to joint action within Czechoslovakia as well as against her from the outside, were of a tentative nature. The Germans were as yet not ready to move; and,

worried about Hungarian indiscretions and excessive speed, Berlin tended to hold back the Magyars at this point rather than to spur them on; Hitler wanted staff talks post-

poned until at least after his trip to Italy scheduled for early May.®° When the Hungarian minister asked GGring at the time of the Amsch/uss why the German-Hungarian talks for 75, On the propaganda campaign and discussion of a press truce, see G.D., C, 6, No. 153; D, 2, Nos. 7, 11, 16; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 65; 7, No. 188; Kral, Dze Deutschen, No. 81; Krofta’s comments to the section chiefs of the

Czechoslovak

Foreign

Ministry,

No.

17/37,

25 November

1937,

Czechoslovak

document

in T-120,

1041/1809/414070-72; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 3 March, 19 October, 5 November 1937, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/9, £.173, 101/105 ££.285, 329; “Informationsbericht Nr. 70,” 4 Match 1937,

ibid., 101/31, f£.221, 223; Nr. 154, 4 November, and Nr. 155, 5 November 1937, ibid., 101/31, ££.367, 375. On the efforts to secure practical concessions from the Czechoslovak government, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 226, 239, 240, 318; D, 2, Nos. 3, 6, 12, 15, 17, 19; Celovsky, pp. 126-27; D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 69; Kral, Die Deutschen,

No. 71.

On the internal affairs of the Sudeten German party, its squabbles, and its financing from Germany, see G.D., C, 6, Nos. 200, 204, 228, 317, 519, 525; D, 2, No. 26; Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 74, 84; Gajan and Kvacek, pp. 118, 123-24; D.D.F., 2d, 5, No. 216; and the details in Smelser. It should be noted that Henlein was able to

have a press attaché at the German legation in Prague transferred because of contacts with elements in the Sudeten German party opposed to himself (G.D., D, 2, No. 26; Georg Vogel, Diplomat unter Hitler und Adenauer [Disseldorf: Econ Verlag, 1969], pp. 27-28; Kral, Miinchen, No. 42). 76. Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 70,” 4 March 1937, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/30, £223.

77. The discussions in this period and the reports from German diplomats on the visit of Delbos to Prague may be found in G.D., D, 2, Nos. 78. The text of the 19 November pp. 116-17. 79. For a subsequent request, see 80. On this subject, see Hungarian

29-68, passim; Celovsky, pp. 126-36. 1937 document is in G.D., D, 2, No. 23; a good discussion of it in Celovsky,

G.D., D, 2, No. 53. Documents, 1, No. 407; Adam, p. 91, n. 8, and No. 6; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 65, 66;

TMWG, 31:110-13. On contacts between Henlein and the Slovak autonomists and the Hungarians at this time, see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 112, 124; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 54, 57-60.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 1

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cooperation against Czechoslovakia had been broken off just when it would be Czechoslovakia’s turn, the response was that the Austrian question had to be fully settled first but that Czechoslovakia would surely follow. Goring added that the Germans were not quite ready for that operation, which would require greater strength.*! In the days of the Anschluss itself, Germany was primarily interested in keeping Czechoslovakia quiet, and Goring himself assured the Czechoslovak government that no military action against them was contemplated.®2 The opportunity for Henlein to receive the guidance and instructions he wanted came little more than two weeks after the Anschluss in a series of meetings in Berlin on 28 and 29 March. Hitler told Henlein at a long meeting on 28 Match that the question of Czechoslovakia would be “solved before very long” and prescribed the general tactic that the Sudeten German party was to follow: to raise demands that the Czechoslovak government could not agree to. Henlein himself repeated this formula to Hitler—“we must always demand so much that we cannot be satisfied”—to be sure he fully understood. Not only did he describe the Fiihret’s instructions as requiring the constant raising of demands to preclude agreement in so many words to the officials of the German Foreign Ministry; but as early as 5 April the Hungarian foreign minister quoted Henlein as declaring that “whatever the Czech government might offer, he would always raise still higher demands . . . he wanted to sabotage an understanding by all means because this was the only method to blow up Czechoslovakia quickly.” The more precise details of the demands Henlein was to make in this process were developed in a meeting at the German Foreign Ministry on 29 March; and these were then elaborated into Henlein’s famous Karlovy Vary (Carlsbad) speech of 24 April 1938. In his Berlin meetings, Henlein also was granted freedom to coordinate his procedures with the other national minorities

in Czechoslovakia,

cautioned

not to move

more

quickly than his mentors in the Reich desired, and given full assurance that he had Hitler’s backing against any rival personalities and tendencies within the Sudeten German party. It is important to emphasize that Hitler’s instructions to Henlein not only dealt with the tactics to be followed inside Czechoslovakia to prevent any agreement but also touched-on the other aspect of Hitler’s plan. The Fuhrer commended Henlein’s successes in England and urged a further trip to London to aid in assuring nonintervention by Great Britain. He speculated on the possibility of some upheaval in France, a subject on which he often commented. It is this broader discussion that allows us to see that in the weeks after the Axsch/uss Hitler was defining his approach to the destruction of Czechoslovakia, not just in general terms as in the conference of 5 November 1937, 81. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 408 (German text in Kerekes, No. 14; French text in Adam, No. 1). 82. On the promises of this moment, see G.D., D, 2, Nos. 72, 74, 78, 80, 81; Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry notes of 12 March 1938, Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1040/1809/412666, 412668; Mastny reports 42

and 43 of 12 March 1938, ibid., 1041/1809/414221-25 and 41421820 (mostly in Berber, pp. 94-98); Krofta circular of 12 or 13 March 1938, ibid., 1040/1809/412669—70; Kral, Mianchen, Nos. 33-38, 43; D.D.F., 2d, 8,

No. 398; Celovsky, pp. 151-55. Hitler set the tone for this effort to reassure the Czechoslovak government right after von Schuschnigg’s trip to Berchtesgaden (Kral, Mdinchen, No. 16). wd 83. The sources for these meetings are G.D., D, 2, Nos. 106, 107 (note that this is a document of military origin

which appears not to have reached the German Foreign Ministry until 1939), 109 (the “annexed demands” not printed here may be found in Kral, Die Deutschen, p. 162); Erich Kordt, Nicht aus den Akten (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1950), p. 207. See also G.D., D, 3, No. 559 which states that Hitler saw on 4 April what must

have been D, 2, No. 109. Henlein had again requested a meeting in a letter to von Ribbentrop of 17 March ; 1938 (ibid., D, 2, No. 89; cf. Celovsky, pp. 161-63). 84. Zsigmond, pp. 267-68, n. The observant Dertinger had figured out this strategy by 27 April 1938: “The demands which will be put forward by the Sudeten Germans will in each situation be calculated to be a few percentage points above what in the worst [sid possible situation the Czechoslovak government could accept (Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101 /32,6295).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

but in terms of political and military procedures to be initiated forthwith. The one thing most to be avoided was the very one which the British had been urging on Czechoslovakia and which the Czechoslovak government had been taking some steps toward in the winter: an agreement between the Sudeten German party and Prague. Everything possible had to be done to make sure that Germany’s pretext was not removed. It is in this context that one must see Hitler’s suggestion that the Sudeten German party demand separate German regiments with German officers and German as the language of command within the Czechoslovak army. Here was the issue on which the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary had almost fallen apart in its greatest internal crisis between 1867 and 1918; and the fact that Henlein preferred to reserve this demand for later—and in the event did not make it—in no way detracts from the light that the proposal sheds on Hi#er’s thinking. From his experience of a multinational state, this was the one demand that the central government could not agree to grant.®° The hope Hitler expressed for British neutrality may or may not have been understood by Henlein in all its implications. After all, Henlein may at an earlier time in his career have been at least partially sincere in hoping for British support in securing concessions from the Prague government. That, of course, would require just the opposite of the nonintervention he was now expected to obtain. Hitler’s desire for British nonintervention points clearly and directly to a German military attack on Czechoslovakia, which he hoped to keep isolated from intervention by England and France, with the neutrality of the former reinforcing internal turmoil in restraining the latter. The German military plans for the attack on Czechoslovakia, which are yet to be examined, were thus to be prepared in a context of the hope and expectation of a war that could be limited the way the Central Powers would have preferred to limit the war of 1914 to AustriaHungary and Serbia. If at that time Austria’s diplomatic and military delays had forfeited the unique opportunity of the Central Powers for limiting war that the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand might have provided had Austria struck immediately, on this occasion Hitler would plan with greater care. The general political climate created by the demands of the Sudeten Germans would isolate Czechoslovakia so that she could be attacked with a minimum risk of general war. The timing of the final incident would not be left to chance or opportunity—as in the case of Sarajevo—but would be scheduled for the correct day and hour to maximize German tactical advantage. While Hitler and von Ribbentrop talked to diplomats about the possible need for German intervention in case of some bloody incident in Czechoslovakia (or, in 1939, in Poland), there was never

even the slightest internal German discussion or planning for such a contingency. The way to control timing was, of course, to plan and arrange the incident for the moment considered appropriate for the planned attack; only if by some extraordinary stroke of good fortune there was a real incident at the “right” time could you dispense with the fake.86 These “finer” details of German planning were worked out at a later stage in the scenario—as would be the case in 1939 when the actual preparations for the attack on 85. The Hitler-Henlein meeting, and especially this section, is completely misunderstood by Donald C. Watt (“Hitler’s Visit to Rome and the May Weekend Crisis: A Study in Hitler’s Response to External Stimuli,” Journal of Contemporary History, 9, No. 1 [January 1974], pp. 23-32). He takes the demand for military units as something to be obtained instead of what the text makes clear—something that might be asked because it was believed unobtainable. Watt has also reversed the time element: the text says that Henlein would run events in the immediate future (xdchs/), but that there would have to be close coordination. This scheme for steady escalation of demands to preclude agreement is converted by Watt into letting Henlein take the lead. 86. It is unfortunate that in his perceptive analysis of the German planning to take advantage of an incident that the Germans would probably have to arrange themselves, Celovsky (p. 159, esp. n. 1) does not allude either to the outbreak of World War I or to the Gleiwitz incident staged by the Germans at the beginning of World War

IL.

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the Gleiwitz radio tower did not start until the first days of August. The most pressing problem in March and April of 1938 was the revision of what planning for an attack on Czechoslovakia had already been done in the light of the opening up of that country’s southern border as a result of the annexation of Austria. The plans had just been revised after the conference of 5 November. Now they were to be redrawn again to take account of the new strategic situation. Time was not that pressing: as Géring had told the Hungatians and as Hitler appears to have said to his military entourage, “Austria had to be digested first.’”87 The last week of March and the first ten days of April were devoted to the plebiscite on the annexation of Austria; thereafter the process of incorporating that

country fully into Germany required only occasional decisions by Hitler, such as the formal appointment of Josef Biirckel on 23 April as the man in charge of that process.% 8 Von Mackensen’s interpretation of Hitlet’s view as being that a few months were needed for the digesting process before the Czechoslovak question could be made the focus for pape probably an accurate reading of Hitler’s time schedule at the beginning of April 1938. Hitler’s developing perception of how the operation against Czechoslovakia should be mounted can be seen in his discussion of the subject with Keitel on 21 April and the draft for an operational directive that the latter prepared on the basis of Hitler’s comments at their meeting.? In drawing on the account of the discussion and Keitel’s subsequent drafting work, however, we must remember—as some historians have not— that Major Rudolf Schmundt himself appears not to have participated in the meeting and to have prepared his summary of the conversation on the basis of what Hitler or more likely Keitel told him,?! and that Keitel was quite new to his position as something like a 87. Jodl Diary, TMWC, 28:372. This undated entry probably reflects comments of Hitler about 20 Match (the special section of Jodl’s diary in Nuremberg document 1781-PS [National Archives] includes entries through 18 March). Watt repeatedly quotes the text of this portion of the published Jodl diary (pp. 46 and 47 of the original), but the references appearing between the entries of 11 March (preceding the unpublished 1781-PS) and 23 May 1938 can easily be misunderstood. The internal evidence of the diary shows that a// the entries on these two pages were made affer Jodl returned from leave on 24 July 1938. Like most scholars, the otherwise meticulous Watt has overlooked the fact that p. 48 of the original diary begins with an entry for 20 May which is followed immediately by an entry noting leave from 21 June to 24 July. Failure to pay careful attention to the original has obscured from most that the two inserted pages are a chronologically somewhat confused text, prepared long after the events; they begin with a sentence connecting with the separate (unpublished) portion of the diary about the Azsch/uss and Memel and end with a general discussion of the conflict between Hitler and his generals over the plan to attack Czechoslovakia in 1938. The interpretation given by Jodl in these pages must, therefore, be read in the context of his siding with Hitler in that dispute in the summer as he had sided

with Hitler in the Fritsch-Blomberg crisis in the winter. If the Jodl diary pp. 46-47 are read in this way, they make sense as part of the version of events as perceived in the late summer by Hitler and those siding with him; if the point is disregarded, we find such absurdities as a reference to a past meeting of 9 June being included in something described as “an entry of 23 May” (Donald C. Watt, “The May Crisis of 1938: A Rejoinder to Mr. Wallace,” S/avonic and East European Review, 44, No. 103 [July 1966], 478). 88. The decree is in Domarus, 1:853-54. There is considerable information on the subjects in Rosar and in Luza, Austro-German Relations. . 89. Von Mackensen so told the Hungarian minister after seeing Hitler on 2 April, see Adam, No. 4; cf. “Tnformationsbericht Nr. 27,” 24 March 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/32, ff.227-29.

90. The notes of Major Rudolf Schmundt, who had replaced Hossbach as Hitlet’s armed forces adjutant a few weeks earlier, are in TMWC, 25:415-18. These documents are a part of Schmundt’s special file on “Fall Grin,”

the planned attack on Czechoslovakia, submitted at Nuremberg as document 388-PS and of critical importance for the insight they give into Hitler’s policy. Several things of significance in interpreting these documents must be noted: Schmundt, like Keitel, was new at his post and was developing his competence at it. The documents in the file are of always in chronological order; thus the handwritten notes of item 2c (pp. 417-18) were clearly written before the clean typed version in item 2a (pp. 415-17). The assumption of Celovsky (p. 157, n. 5) and others that item 1 (Hitler’s discussion of his forthcoming trip to Italy) must antedate 21 April cannot be proven. The draft of Keitel, with a covering letter to Hitler, is on pp. 421-27.

91. Schmundt’s

preliminary notes

are dated 22 April. Furthermore,

'

although Keitel’s attorney refers to

Schmundt as being present (TMWC, 10:508), Keitel himself does not. In his memoirs (p. 182) Keitel dates the

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

chief of military staff for Hitler in the reorganization of the German supreme command structure following the dismissal of von Brauchitsch and Hitler’s assumption of the powers of the minister of war. In the case of the invasion of Austria, Keitel had simply turned to General Beck to prepare the necessary orders. Now he was asked by Hitler to take a hand himself, and he may well really have been as surprised as he claimed at his trial at Nuremberg.°? The conclusions which some have drawn from the introductory wording of Keitel’s 20 May draft as showing a change in Hitler’s intentions before and after the May Crisis are certainly fallacious. The draft reflects not Hitler’s views on the day Keitel submitted it but rather Keitel’s formulation in language he thought appropriate for a general directive to the German armed forces of what he understood Hitler to have explained a month earlier at their 21 April meeting.®? At that time Hitler had described himself as not intending to destroy Czechoslovakia by an unprovoked attack in the immediate future unless forced to in reaction to an incident inside Czechoslovakia— a phraseology for which no implementing planning took place—or tempted by a European situation that made an attack especially opportune, meaning presumably the sort of

development Hitler often referred to on other occasions: an upheaval inside France or a wat in the Mediterranean between Italy and the Western Powers. In the days between the plebiscite on the annexation of Austria and the appointment of Burckel as commissioner for the process of unification, Hitler thought of an

attack on Czechoslovakia as not immediately imminent. He had explained part of his basic political strategy toward Czechoslovakia to Henlein; he explained other parts to Keitel. An attack out of the blue was too risky because it might lead to international complications when his primary hope was to isolate the conflict. It was on this hope that diplomatic and military planning had to focus. There would be a slow escalation of tension which would justify Germany’s military buildup and which would terminate in a German attack following either a decision by Germany that a surprise attack was now appropriate or an incident arranged inside Czechoslovakia that might provide a handy pretext.* In any case, once the attack had started, utmost speed of operations was the critical point. The first four days would be decisive in the sense that quick military action to breach the border defenses and penetrate the interior of Czechoslovakia would have the triple effect of encouraging Hungary and Poland to join in to secure their share of the booty, discouraging France and England from assisting Czechoslovakia and pro-

moting the internal and morale collapse of the Czechoslovak state.9° The army was to move as quickly as possible while trying to avoid having the defensive screen in the west appear provocative to the French; the air force was to help the army attain a speedy success by destroying the Czechoslovak air force and its bases as well as by tactical support operations; and the navy was to act as a security force in a manner that would avoid any unfavorable influence on the policies of the major European powers. meeting with Hitler to 20 April. 92. TMWC, 10:508. 93. There is no evidence of any discussion between Hitler and Keitel on the subject between 21 April and 20 May. Keitel pictures himself as working on the 20 May draft without further contact with Hitler (ibid., pp. 508— 9); the account in his memoirs (Keitel Papers, pp. 182-83) is similar. 94. Hitler mentioned the possible murder of the German minister to Czechoslovakia. Later, on 30 August, a British Foreign Office official would speculate that “A spectacular method of creating the necessary conditions would be to arrange for the murder of Henlein—or even Lord Runciman—by a Czech ‘Van der Lubbe’, With Himmler in charge such a plot cannot be ruled out as inconceivable” (Sargent memorandum, 30 August 1938, C 9041/1941/18, FO 371/21734, £261). The reference to van der Lubbe reflects the general belief that the National Socialists themselves, not the Dutchman executed for it, had set fire to the Reichstag in 1933.

95. Note that on 24 April von Weizsacker wrote in his diary that on 22 April Hitler had told the Hungarian minister that when Czechoslovakia was partitioned, the Hungarians would receive all the territory they had lost at the end of the war (Weizsacker-Papiere, p. 126).

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Although detailed operational plans were not yet spelled out, the repeated references to having the air force spare Czechoslovakia’s industrial installat ions as much as possible so that these could be utilized to enhance Germany’s military economic

strength show that Hitler intended, and Keitel understood him to intend, a complete and permanent occupation of Bohemia and Moravia. In his memoirs , Keitel claims that

Hitler alluded to the sufferings of the Sudeten Germans as one reason for the attack on Czechoslovakia, but there is no trace of this in the contemporary documents. Instead, the ostensible beneficiaries of German action appear in a very different way. They are mentioned explicitly as recipients of instructions for assistance to the German military Operations, and they ate mentioned implicitly as useful “for placing the blame for war on the enemy” and for “providing the moral justification for military measures in the eyes of at least a portion of world opinion.” The Sudeten Germans, in other words, were to help Germany, not the other way around. As Hitler a few days after this meeting discussed his hopes for the trip to Italy scheduled for the beginning of May, one can see still a third way in which he phrased his plans toward Czechoslovakia in addition to those voiced to Henlein and Keitel.” If Mussolini had no further ambitions—a contingency it is difficult to imagine Hitler’s believing likely—then the attack on Czechoslovakia would have to be postponed for a long time. The German border in the west would have to be completely closed off by fortifications first, and then one could tackle the project.°® But with a close alignment or alliance with Italy, as a result of which Italy could move forward with her own ambitions,

Germany could safely defy France and England by destroying Czechoslovakia quite soon. The Western Powers would then reftain from interfering. The alignment with Italy would enable Germany to pass safely through the four weeks required to redeploy het forces from the Bohemian theater of operations to the West. Italy should not make the mistake that Prussia had made in 1805 and 1806 in allowing her potential continental allies to be defeated by Napoleon only to be crushed herself when fighting him by herself in the following year. The armaments situation was in any case favorable to the Axis powers with their headstart over the rearmament programs of Britain and France. Hitler, however, wanted his coordination with Italy limited to the political sphere— the implied threat of the Axis alignment would be sufficient. There would be no detailed staff conversations; he preferred to keep his military plans secret.°? The implication is clear: there would be no occasion for joint military operations because a Germany aligned politically with Italy could expect to be allowed to attack Czechoslovakia without a general war. As the Germans learned in Rome, this was also the view of their Italian hosts.!°° When Hitler returned from his Italian trip, therefore, he was ready to review the

plans for his next adventure as an operation for the immediate future. As von Weizsacker noted in his diary on 13 May, Hitler interpreted Mussolini’s attitude on the Czechoslovak question as expressed during the conversations in Italy as an encouragement for Germany to move forward; a week before the May Crisis von Weizsacker records Hitler as wanting to settle with Czechoslovakia still in that year.'°! 96. The exact timetable was still to be worked out with the army and air force according to a marginal comment

(IMWC, 25:422). 97. Schmundt’s undated notes, ibid., pp. 414-15.

98. The phrase “Grenze Westen schliessen, dann weitersehen” appears to me to mean that Hitler thought that actually completing the Westwall first was the alternative to moving while it was still being constructed, 99, Watt, who otherwise makes so much of the Italian trip, avoids citing this portion of Hitler’s comments,

which contradicts the thrust of his account (“Hitler’s Visit to Rome,” p. 29). 100. See above, p. 520. For a prior Italian view of the question, see the 20 March 1938 report of the Czechoslovak minister to Rome in Kral, Mainchen, No. 51.

oo.

'

101. Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 127-28. This portion was omitted from the account of the Italian journey in von Weizsicker’s memoirs, perhaps because it is too obviously inconsistent with the theory that Hitler made his

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler had sketched out the broad outlines for his plans against Czechoslovakia the men who were to help him direct the tools of his strategy, Henlein and Keitel, in weeks after the Azschluss. Now he thought that the time had come for working out details. It was into his deliberations over the detailed plans that what has come to

to the the be

known as the May Crisis burst. Before its impact on those deliberations can be assessed,

it is necessary to turn to the reaction of other powers to the Azschluss, for if the German dictator turned from that success to the preparations for his next venture, others were

seeking ways of coping with such a move on his part. The main ally of Czechoslovakia was France, obliged by treaty to come to her defense in case of attack. It was the French who had been even more concerned about the impact of the Axsch/uss than the British, in part no doubt because of their recognition of the military implications of the opening up of Czechoslovakia’s southern border.! The new government of Léon Blum which emerged from the French governmental crisis that coincided with the Axschluss was at least theoretically interested in the problem of what to do about Czechoslovakia, but the brief tenure of the cabinet—13 March to 9

April—sufficed only to illuminate the most critical point of all, namely, that the French thought or pretended to believe that in practice they could do nothing at all. At a meeting of the Permanent Committee of National Defense on 15 March, attended by the key figures of the French government and armed forces, there was agreement that France could hardly assist Czechoslovakia in her hour of danger.!°° French mobilization would, it was hoped, oblige the Germans to keep a substantial proportion of their forces

in the west, but an attack in the west—clearly alluded to with utmost distaste—would be held up for a long time by the (at this time largely imaginary) German fortifications.!“ There was little hope that the Soviet Union could help substantially, given the intervening territory of Poland and Romania which might in fact themselves feel threatened by Russia. There were pious hopes that the British might be persuaded to pressure the Belgians into allowing an offensive across their country and the Romanians to allow the Russians to send aid to Czechoslovakia. Nothing suggests that there were serious expectations as to the prospects of either of these ideas. With good reason, the French had no faith in Belgian assistance.!°5 The

Belgians were doing everything possible to maintain their neutral position.!°% King Leopold was at the time more worried about a French than a German attack, a form of delusion accentuated rather than removed by the Anschiuss.!°’ The Belgians were in fact telling the French government that they would deny transit to French troops even if the League asked for it under Article 16 of the Covenant and would prefer to give up the French guarantee than to assist France against Germany in any such move to support Czechoslovakia. If British Foreign Office officials commented on a report to the same general effect from the British minister in Brussels that there was little else the Belgians could do until Britain and France were strong enough to protect Belgium, they were pointing to the reciprocal way in which the weaknesses of the Western Powers interacted

decision after and as a result of the May Crisis. 102. See the French general staff assessment of 14 March 1938, D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 432. This may account for

the new note in Lacroix’s conversation with Hodza on 22 March 1938 (ibid., 9, No. 26). 103. The record is in Gamelin, 2:322—28; on this meeting, see also D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 331, 445, 446, 462.

104. For French self-delusion on this point as early as May 1936, possibly as a result of a German plant, see D.D.F., 2d, 2, No. 172. 105. The documents cited in note 117 below show Daladier and Gamelin doubtful that Belgium would even resist a German attack. 106. See D.D.B., 5, Nos. 4, 6-8, 15. 107. See Overstraeten, 25 February 1938, p. 272, and 12 March 1938, pears: 108. D.D.B., 5, Nos. 10, 11; D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 34, 274.

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with each other.! The Romanians were known to shate the views of the Belgians.!10 What 1s most obvious to the reader of the record of the Match meeting is that there was simply no will or determination behind French public assurances of fidelity to the treaty with Czechoslovakia. The impetus to this dispirited meeting had come from the question of the British to the French about what the latter really intended to do to defend their ally.!4! On 28 March Maurice Gamelin confirmed to Winston Churchill, who told Lord Halifax, what

the British military attaché in Paris had already reported to his incredul ous superiors in London the preceding month: if it came to a wat over Czechoslovakia, the French could not attack the Germans in the west or the Italians in the Alps but would attack the Italians in Libya!!!? The French had arrived at this project by eliminating an attack on Germany as too costly in lives and an attack on Italy as too difficult because of the terrain in the Alps and the weakness of the Yugoslav army,''> while the growing Italian garrison in Libya presented both a potential threat and an inviting target.!'4 From what evidence there is, one must conclude that the plan to focus any French offensive operations on North Africa if war developed anywhere in Europe, crystallized in the winter of 1937-38. The French military scheme, which in its logical lunacy bears an uncanny resemblance to General Alfred von Schlieffen’s pre-World War I idea of defending AustriaHungary against a Russian attack by invading Belgium, was received in London with a mixture of astonishment and disbelief. There was astonishment over what was thought to be—correctly as we now know—a vast overestimation of the strength of the German fortifications in the west as well as over the insistence on attacking Italy in North Africa when there seemed to be no point in bringing Italy in if neither Germany nor Italy could be attacked in Europe. There was some disbelief that the French really thought themselves already so weak; and the conclusion drawn was that British-French staff talks were surely necessary and that the French government would have to be asked formally once again what their plan for assistance to Czechoslovakia really was.115 With no continental army of their own, the British were to be greatly influenced

throughout 1938 by their understanding that the French would in fact do nothing at all that could help Czechoslovakia except at the end of a long war of attrition. At the British-French

meeting of 29 April in London,

which will be discussed

below, the

French tried to avoid this point by stressing the need to present a united and determined 109. Note Clive’s letter to Sargent, 22 March 1938, C 1995/1378/4, FO 371/21565,

110. U.S. 1938, 1:42; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 225. 111. B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 62, 81; D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 400, 417. The holding of the 15 March meeting appears to

have been precipitated in part by the repeated requests of Czechoslovak Minister Osusky for public reaffirmation of loyalty to the alliance by the French government, see Kral, Miinchen, No. 30. 112. Gamelin’s account in his memoirs (2:317) recounts only Churchill’s comments. For a Foreign Office minute of 4 April 1938 on Churchill’s report to Lord Halifax, see

C 2580/2307/17, FO 371/21616. Note that

the earlier French scheme of opening a front at Salonika appears to have been dropped, presumably because of doubts about Yugoslavia (see above, p. 282). Perhaps these indirect approaches have to be seen as the “lesson” learned by the French military from the disastrous failure of their Plan 17 offensive in 1914. 113. French concern about the weakness of the Yugoslav army may be seen in D.D.F., 2d, 7, Nos. 81, 204, 325. Gamelin, it should be added, appears to have believed in April 1938 that in the spring of 1939 even the Italian

army, to say nothing of the German, would be stronger than the French (ibid., 9, No. 121)! 114. See the minutes of the meeting of the Permanent Committee on National Defence of 8 December 1937,

ibid., 7, No. 325. Alarmist reports about the Italian military buildup in Libya are scattered throughout this

volume. Combined with the continuing civil war in Spain and Italian activity in the Balearic Islands, these troop movements drew French attention to their territories and communications in the Mediterranean. 115. Some staff talks were already under way; on 3-4 March French and British air force officers met in Paris to arrange an exchange of target files and related information on Germany and Italy (ibid., 8, No. 316). Target files are the folders containing accumulated pictorial, geographic, statistical, espionage, and other information

about possible industrial and other objectives of bombing raids. See also D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 144.

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front to the Germans,!!° but Gamelin himself had confirmed to the British secretary of state for war, Leslie Hore-Belisha, on 25 April that “it was impossible for France to give military assistance to Czechoslovakia.”"'7 It was in the face of these grim prospects that the British government viewed the immediate aftermath of the Anschluss. When the Czechoslovak minister in London, Jan Masaryk, had his first meeting with Lord Halifax as the new British foreign secretary on 4 March, Masaryk noticed that Halifax had carefully reviewed the record of all his prior meetings with Eden and repeated the line that the more Czechoslovakia could do for its Germans, the stronger Czechoslovakia’s international position would be. Though recognizing the efforts the Czechoslovak government had made, Halifax stressed the unfavorable geographic situation of the country.!!8 Chamberlain and Lord Halifax were at this very time receiving the disappointing news of Hitler’s rejection on the previous day of the British approach to Germany on colonial and economic concessions in return for German restraint in Europe—something of which Masaryk was aware. The need for a new orientation of British policy thus occurred undg¥ circumstances where the rejection of an attempt at appeasement, the acceleration of the ctisis over Austria, and the moving of the Czechoslovak question to the immediate * aeaat of international interest coincided.!!” The insistence of the Prague’government on assurances from Paris and London at the time of the Azschluss, therefore, was greeted not only by constantly repeated expressions of loyalty to the alliance from Paris but also with considerable sympathy in London.!2° When Masaryk and Lord Halifax met again on 12 March, annoyance over German tejection of the British approach combined with horror and disgust over the German aggression against Austria to make the British foreign secretary sympathetic to the problems faced by Czechoslovakia.!*! Halifax had just told off von Ribbentrop in no uncertain language and repeated the substance of this to the Czech minister; but it is evident from the record that Lord Halifax failed to grasp that his own chagrin over the impact of Germany’s actions as damaging the prospects of an Anglo-German agreement was not shared by the German foreign minister, who was not the least bit interested in such an agreement and had in fact jut explained to Hitler why he thought such an agreement positively dangerous for Germany. To Masatyk’s insistence that Germany’s word could not be trusted and that concessions to Henlein would not alter the policy of Berlin, Halifax responded that he had learned a great deal in the last few days but that he did not wish to give up all hope of some day being able to negotiate with Germany. Though disagteeing about the long-term prospects for peace which Masaryk considered hopeless while Halifax preferred to retain a shred of hope, they agreed on the utility of some gesture for the immediate future; and it was out of this that there evolved the British

public and diplomatic references to G6ring’s assurances to the Czechoslovak govern-

116. The relevant passage is in B.D., 3d, 1:218.

117. C 3783/3474/17, FO 371/21617. The Foreign Office noted the contradiction, Gamelin’s account of his talk with Hore-Belisha is in Servir, 2:317-18, and D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 238; it omits the point quoted. His report to Daladier (Serr, 2:318-19; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 251) begs the question of what could be done to help

Czechoslovakia, and thus in effect confirms Hore-Belisha’s account. Gamelin’s report to Daladier should in my opinion be seen in connection with the Anglo-French talks of 29 April.

118. Kral, Miinchen, No. 31 (excerpts in Berber, pp. 92-93). 119. The fact that it also coincided with negotiations with Italy right after the cabinet crisis that led to the replacement of Eden by Halifax helps explain the great determination with which the British pushed for an agreement with Italy in those days; note Masatyk’s report on his conversation with Cadogan on 9 Match, Kral, Miinchen, No. 32 (a tiny excerpt in Berber, p. 93). 120. Kral, Miinchen, No. 33; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 474, 475. 121. The account of Lord Halifax is somewhat restrained (B.D., 3d, 1, No. 61); that of Masaryk is fuller (KrAl,

Miinchen, No. 40, a tiny excerpt in Berber, p. 99).

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ment in the days of the Axsch/uss that no attack on Czechoslovakia was intended.!?2

The basic issue which the British government reviewed in mid-Mar ch, however, was

one not of temporaty expedients but of basic commitments. In the ten days from 15 to 24 March the question to be faced in London was whether or not to give a further commitment, public or private, to Czechoslovakia either directly or indirectly by Promising to help France if that country went to war under her treaty obligations to Czechoslovakia. As one reads the extensive documentation on the licy debates within the British government in those days, certain conclusions energe{The members of the

government, with almost no exceptions, were doubtful that anything much could be

done to save Czechoslovakia from being overrun by Germany, so that if it came to wat, only an eventual victory after a long and costly conflict offered any hope for Czechoslovakia at all his view appears to have been held but not expressed earlier; it was strongly reinforced by a report of the Chiefs of Staff Sub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence which is dated 21 March 1938 but the tenor of which was clearly anticipated for several days by key figures in the cabinet and the Foreign Office.!?9 Bir Maurice Hankey, who served as secretary of both the cabinet and the Committee of Imperial Defence summarized its “dominant conclusion” as being “that no pressure which this country and its possible allies could exercise would suffice to prevent the defeat of Czecho-Slovakia [si.”124 The memorandum and the diScussion of it in the cabinet explored in great detail the poor military conditions for the allies if any war began in 1938. Not only could they do nothing for the Czechs, but during the long war that was anticipated, the German air

force was likely to concentrate on bombing England at a time when her antiaircraft preparations were deficient and the radar screen as yet incomplete,{ while the French army could take shelter in the Magiriot Line. The emphasis of this¥eport, the discussion of the military prospects, and the repeated references to Germany’s ability to throttle Czechoslovakia by economic measures even without war all point to a focus of attention on the practical problems of implementing any commitment if it failed to deter Germany from aggression and did then lead to war. This concern over the practical problems tied back into the basic one that|a war with Germany, especially at a time when neither France nor England thought hetself militarily prepared for it, would be a lengthy and difficult one.}T his placed the dilemma in its crudest form: if Germany were deterred by a British warning, welland good, but‘if she were not,

Was this the occasion to challenge her? On this point not only the military

difficulties mefitioned but doubts concerning British public opinion and the likelihoo that Canada and South Africa would stay out of such a wat wete raised as site The latter considerations

grew, of course, out of a focus.of interest on the question of

the Sudeten Germans.fThere were those who argued—correctly as we,now know—that this was purely a German pretext and that Germany’s real aims not onlyl went far beyond the Sudeten Germans when it came to Czechoslovakia but that she would utilize the domination of Czechoslovakia and Central Europe for a subsequent assault from’ a strengthened position, on Britain and France’ Both Chamberlain and Halifax considered this a real possi, hywere unwilling to assume the inevitability of war at this time, it was because of a €ombination of factors: reluctance to give up all prospect of an agreement with Germany that might prevent another world war; a failure to perceive the 122. Ibid.; B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 63, 71, 79. The German press was forbidden to print this portion of Chamberlain’s House of Commons speech (“Vertrauliche Bestellung vom 14.3.38,” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11,

eH)

123. in full copy

of the report,

C.O.S.

698, “Military

Implications

of German

Aggression

against

Czechoslovakia” is in C 2038/1941/18, FO 371/21713; cf. Harvey Diaries, 17-24 March 1938, pp. 118-23. 124. British Cabinet 15 (38) of 22 March 1938, C 2040/1941/18, FO 371/21713.)

548

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

possibility that German expansionism might include the desire to seize territory inhabited by non-Germans with the intention of expelling or exterminating them; a real uncertainty over the prospects of Britain and France in a war with Germany; and a belief that there was a genuine grievance on the part of the Sudeten Germans that should have been removed earlier and might still be removed by negotiations. All these combined with the hope that something of Czechoslovakia’s independence might be salvaged to restrain ~ both the prime minister and the foreign secretary from supporting any new commitment _=— to France or Czechoslovakia and secured them the full support of the British cabinet on this position. é : There was, on the other hand, also the confirmed view, shared by all in the govern-

ment, that as a practical matter and regardless of commitments or treaties, Britain could not afford to see France defeated by Germany and would have to come to her assistance if hostilities were to break out on the continent.

{t therefore seemed best, and this was

the form of compromise on which the member: the government could unite in good conscience, to temper their refusal of any new commitment—which might encourage Germany and discourage France—through a public repetition by the prime minister of a warning similar to that which Lord Halifax had given von Ribbentrop in private at the time of the Azschluss. On 24 March Chamberlain said in the House of Commons:

Where peace and war are concerned, legal obligations are not alone involved, and, if war broke out, it would be unlikely to be confined to those who have assumed such obligations. It would be quite impossible to say where it might end and what Governments might become involved. The inexorable pressure of facts might well prove more powerful than formal pronouncements, and in that event it would be well within the bounds of possibility that other countries . . . would almost immediately be involved. This is especially true in the case of two countries like Great Britain and France.!*° The hope was that the refusal of new promises of support combined with a warning of possible British involvement in any war that might break out would serve to nudge the French in their urging concessions on Czechoslovakia by withholding the certainty of British aid, and nudge the Germans away from enforcing their demands through military aggression by reminding them of the real possibility of British involvement if war did come.!76 It was Chamberlain’s expectation that the French would welcome rather than tesent such a policy; he found it “difficult to believe . . . the French would not be glad to find some method to relieve them of their engagement,’”!?7 an assessment that proved to be as correct in 1938 as it would have been in 1939 when British policy had been reversed. The evidence suggests that both Chamberlain and Halifax at first favored a British commitment, and if they came down on the negative side of the issue in 1938 but the positive side in 1939 the intervening experience of a demonstration ad oculos of 125. B.D., 3d, 1:97. The British government informed the United States and the Dominions ahead of time that this declaration would be made; U.S. 1938, 1:40; C 2017/1941/18, FO 371/21713. For earlier drafts of the

statement, in part the result of a parliamentary question, see C 1969/1941/18, FO 371/21712. I cannot agree

with Celovsky’s description of this statement as sophistry (p. 173). The prior internal British discussions, as well

as subsequent developments, show that the final formulation was carefully prepared, seriously believed to be meaningful, and intended to be taken as an accurate description of British policy in the face of the contingency of war. It is worth recording that the Czechoslovak minister to London understood the nature and import of Chamberlain’s speech and, though generally a bitter critic of the prime minister, was satisfied with it (Kral, Munchen, No. 56). 126. Note the corresponding interpretation by the German chargé in London in G.D., D, 2, No. 104. 127. See n. 124.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 1

549

Germany’s willingness to annex non-German territory must be seen as one critical factor. In 1938 it was a fear voiced by many,'’* in 1939 it was a reality in the face of solemn pledges to the contrary. If the use of German minorities as a pretext was not recognized in March 1938 as it would be in March 1939 it was again the contrast between warnings of future prospects—voiced in the Foreign Office and cabinet—and the harsh reality of German action. The fundamental problem was whether to try to take a democracy into a world war over a possible danger—which might or might not be realize d—or over a danger already demonstrated for all to see.129 {Sir Alexander Cadogan in his “Memorandum on the Situation Created by the German Absorption of Austria and the Possibility of German Action on Czechoslovakia” of 17 Match 1938, phrased his view of the puzzle in these words: “On the whole, I certainly feel that it would be a very difficult decision to choose any coutse of action ‘that might plunge Europe into wat now to avert what may be a worse wat later on.”130 ~] At the meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy on 18 Match, Chamberlain, when asked whether Germany was likely to be satisfied with the Sudeten area or really wanted to absorb all of Czechoslovakia, tesponded “that it might be rash to forecast what Germany would do, but at the same time the seizure of the whole of Czechoslovakia would not be in accordance with Herr Hitler’s policy, which was to include all Germans in the Reich but not to include other nationalities.”!3! On the following day, Lord Halifax wrote: While I do not think the wise man ought to shrink in his own mind from preparing himself for any exhibition of German power politics, yet I do not think also that it is necessary to assume that Hitler’s racial ambitions are necessarily likely to expand into international power lust. It is really on this that the thought on one side of the arena now turns, namely that when Germany has done this and that and the other in Central Europe, she will in overwhelming might proceed to destroy France and ourselves. That is a conclusion which I do not believe myself to be necessarily well founded and, if you do not necessarily believe this, it makes you look jealously at the remedies that are immediately proposed to forestall it.!%2 These views may be contrasted with the one Lord Halifax would expound for the benefit of a fellow peer in the summer of 1939:

Last year the German Government put forward the demand for the Sudetenland on purely racial grounds; but subsequent events proved that this demand was only put forward as a cover for the annihilation of Czechoslovakia. In view of this experience ... itis not surprising that the Poles and we ourselves are afraid that the demand for Danzig is only a first move towards the destruction of Poland’s independence.'*? ae

[istheBritish government reviewed the danger to Czechoslovakia and to the peace 128. Note Henderson’s comments in his letter to Lord Halifax of 16 March 1938: “Hitler has achieved the crown of his life’s ambitions. Will success intoxicate him or tranquillize him? That is now the question. Most people will probably believe the first. In any case we have now to consider how to secure, if we can, the secutity of Czechoslovakia” (Henderson Papers, FO 800/269). 129. For two useful French analyses of the British position, seed),

D.F., 2d, 8, No. 318; 9, No. 222.

130. C 1866/132/18, FO 371/21674; cf. Cadogan Diary, p. 63. 131, 26th meeting of the British cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 18 March 1938, C 1932/132/18, FO 371/21674. ' 132. Halifax to Henderson, 19 March 1938 (responding to the letter quoted in n. 128, above), Henderson Papers,

FO 800/269. 133. Halifax to the Earl of Bessborough, 20 July 1939, Halifax Papers, FO 800/316.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

of Europe after the Anschluss, it was their judgment that the anya German intentions

was not yet clear enough in reality as distinct from speculation.'*4 Certainly military considerations played a major part in the decision, and internally there would be comments later that this had been the first time that military weakness had compelled the British government to abandon a course initially thought proper—a commitment to come to the defense of Czechoslovakia—and

instead adopt a more

cautious approach;!*° but the

political considerations were, in my opinion, the determining aie |maematonts would be pushed and staff conversations would be held with the French, but the diplomatic efforts of Great Britain would be exerted in favor of trying for a peaceful solution of what was perceived as a German-Czech quarrel over the Sudeten Germans in the hope that the settlement which in British eyes should have been reached much earlier might still be attained without war on the one hand and without the destruction of Czechoslovakia—which might be jointly guaranteed after a Sudeten settlement—on the other.!°° Having made their choice, the British now had to put their view to the Czechoslovak government, discuss their policy with France, and see how Germany would respond. The British government’s public announcement of 24 March did have a certain steadying effect as they had hoped, but the refusal to assume new formal commitments was received by the French with considerable disappointment. French Foreign Minister Paul-Boncour immediately took the line that only a firm warning to Germany could avoid wat, a view that Lord Halifax did not share.'3’ As the latter told the French ambassador: “I felt there was a great difference of approach in these matters by the French and English minds. They were disposed, perhaps, to rate more highly than ourselves

the value

of strong declarations;

we

were

naturally reluctant

to make

strong

declarations unless we were in fact assured of being able to implement them should the need arise.”!38 It was this difference of view that would become a subject of discussion when the leaders of the French government, by then Edouard Daladier and Georges Bonnet as successors to Blum and Paul-Boncour, went to London at the end of April to

work out a coordinated approach on the Czechoslovak question with the British. The meeting was to have been held earlier but had been postponed because of another 134. There is some evidence to suggest that the Russian call on 17 March for a conference, discussed later, tended to restrain rather than encourage the British. It looked all too obviously like an effort on the part of the Soviet Union, which had no common border with either Czechoslovakia or Germany, to embroil the Western Powers in a war with Germany. See the comment of Chamberlain quoted in Feiling, p. 347, and the fact that

the mandate to examine the question of war given to the Chiefs of Staff Sub-Committee assumed the neutrality of the Soviet Union. ? 135. See text and commentary of Creswell’s memorandum of 22 April 1938, “Relative Strengths of British and German Air Forces,” C 5874/1425/18, FO 371/21710. 136. In addition to other documents cited, I have relied on the following sources: B.D., 3d, 1, No. 86 (Foreign Office comments in R 2755/152/12, FO 371/22337); Henderson to Halifax, 16 March 1938, Henderson Papers, FO 800/269; Memorandum of Lord Halifax, “Possible Measures to Avert German Action in Czechoslovakia,”

18 March 1938, C 1865/132/18, FO 371/21674; Hadow Memorandum of 18 March 1938, FO 371/22337, ff. 267-68; 27th meeting of the British cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 21 March 1938, C 2039/1941 /18,

FO 371/21713 (note that it was at this time that Lord Halifax circulated the historical memorandum on the borders of Czechoslovakia cited in n. 20, above); Duff Cooper, p. 218; Ironside Diaries, pp. 53-54; Roskill, Hankey, 3:314; D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 480; 9, Nos. 3, 12; Australian Documents, Nos. 143, 149-58, 160-63; Hungarian Documents, 1, Nos. 436, 437.

It could be argued that a British intimation to Prague that extensive concessions to the Sudeten Germans would lead to a British guarantee might have produced such concessions by offering the Czechoslovak government some security against the risks attendant upon that course. The absence of any indication of new initiatives by Prague after the May Crisis, on the other hand, suggests that any such British step would have made little difference. 137. The British information for the French is in B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 106-9; Paul-Boncour’s response, ibid., No. 112. But see also D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 42, 45.

138. B.D., 3d, 1, No. 109.

ie

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

551

change in the French government; contemplated in mid-March for one French cabinet, it was held on 28 and 29 April with another. In the interim, the French had worried considerably about the problem of British support, fearful that its absence would encourage Germany and undermine the credibility of their own assurances of loyalty to the alliance with Czechoslovakia. Bonnet himself had told the American chargé before becoming foreign minister that he believed that without a promise of support it would not be possible, for France to come to the aid of Czechoslovakia, and that this was the privately held opinion of the Blum government, even though its members, like himself, had to affirm the opposite in public.!%9 If this was a correct assessment—and there is considerable evidence that it was—the show of French confidence after the 24 March statement that the British would come in on the side of France in spite of the refusal of England to make a formal promise to this effect, can only be interpreted as a device to “smoke out” British policy. The subsequent clarification from London, underlining the indefinite nature of the British commitment and

warning against reading into it an unwarranted certainty that might retard the French in joining in the process of applying pressure for concessions on Prague, would have been secretly welcomed rather than resented in Paris.'4° Certainly nothing the British learned in the interval between the 24 March announcement in Parliament and the meeting with the French five weeks later led them to change their decision. At the end of March, disquieting reports on the advance of German and the lagging

of British aircraft production upset the Committee of Imperial Defence, and the subject was taken to the cabinet for discussion.'*! There the line to be taken with the French was approved, especially the concept of continued pressure on Czechoslovakia, which Lord Halifax thought was producing some real results.'4 In these days there were conflicting currents of advice. The Foreign Office was skeptical of suggestions that Czechoslovakia be urged to give up her ties to France and the Soviet Union;'*9 Sir Nevile Henderson expressed the hope that Germany might calm down if the Sudeten issue were settled;' and eatlier advocates of concessions to Germany like Lord Lothian were increasingly skeptical of the wisdom of continuing such a policy.!4° On the other hand, there was emphasis on the need to take the grievances of the Sudeten Germans setiously,'*© while the Canadian ptime minister reinforced the belief that he favored concessions to avoid the danger of wat.'47 Contradictory opinions were sometimes voiced by the same person: 139. U.S. 1938, 1:39-40; cf. 1936/132/18, FO 371/21674; Hungarian Documents, 2, No 141.

140. C 2186/1941/18, FO 371/21713; B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 135, 138, 139.

141. C 3028/1425/18,

FO 371/21710; cf. Charles A. Lindbergh, The

Wartime Journals of Charles A. Lindbergh

the British Air (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1970), 2 and 27 April 1938, pp. 11, 22..Note, however,

inform the cabinet in Ministry’s refusal to credit the performance of the new German ME 109 fighter and to Foreign Office memoranspite of Foreign Office prodding (C 1774/1425/18, FO 371/21710). A subsequent

situation. The dum on the comparison of air force strength underlined the devastating nature of the British

those new permanent undersecretary, Sir Alexander Cadogan, quoted in his comments our Robert Vansittart, that “for the first time within memory we have been driven from that suggesting while and helplessness,” national sheer by ] Czechoslovakia of question above; cf. should be made, fully agreed with this description of the situation. See n. 135,

of his ptedecessor, Sit political course [on the new diplomatic efforts

D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 131.

that the Foreign Secretary 142. Cabinet 18 (38) of 6 April 1938, C 2664/1941/18, FO 371/21714. The effort Sit Samuel Hoare and Jan Masaryk thought was making progress came through informal contacts between 293ff.;

beginning of April (Hoare, pp. which the latter utilized in pushing for concessions while in Prague at the

B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 122, 124). 143, B.D., 3d, 1, No. 134; comments in C 2989/1941/18, FO B72

7S.

Henderson to Lothian, 22 April 1938, Lothian 144, B.D., 3d, 1, No. 121; C 2777/1941/18, FO 371/21715;

Papers, GD 40/17/396-98.

, 14 April 1938, Lothian Papers, GD 40/17/352/8 145. Lothian to the Aga Khan, 31 March, and to Henderson

and GD 40/17/362/394—95. 146. C 3865/1941/18, FO 371/21717. 147. Feiling, p. 349.

Doe

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

when Carl Goerdeler, one of the leading German opponents of Hitler, was in London at the beginning of April, he argued both that the British government should be clear and firm—and that the Sudeten area should be transferred to Germany.'*® The efforts made by the Czechoslovak government in the weeks after the Anschluss to move towatd a reconciliation with the Sudeten German party only accentuated the contradictory considerations before the British government. London was impressed by the slowness and lateness of the attempt as well as the resistance within Czechoslovak political circles.'4° There was dismay over the obduracy of the Sudeten German party in the negotiations;!5° suspicion that Henlein had been instructed

from Berlin to raise

impossible demands until Germany could annex the Sudeten area, create a vassal Czech duchy centered on Prague, and divide most of Slovakia between Poland and Hungary;'°! and the beginning of consideration that a “neutral” British intermediary be sent to the scene.!52 Henderson’s view that a settlement of the Sudeten issue on the basis of selfdetermination was the best way to restart the Anglo-German negotiations and need not imply the destruction of Czechoslovakia met with extreme skepticism.!*? On the other hand, the unfavorable reports on relative military strength suggested that this was a very poor time to run the risk of warlChamberlain’s speech in Birmingham on 8 April made in public a point he would repeat almost verbatim to the French three weeks later, that a warning to Germany was a gamble, not with money but with lives, and that he would not

give the word to face “the stern necessity for wat” unless he were “absolutely convinced that in no other way could we preserve our liberty.”!°4 | There was no realistic prospect that such perspectt¥es would be changed by the proposal made by the Soviet Union on (17 March calling for international cooperative action against aggression and offering to participate in collective actions, explicitly referring to Czechoslovakia as the immediately menaced country. The Soviet Union was bound by treaty to assist Czechoslovakia if that country were attacked and already assisted by France. When asked by correspondents how the Soviet Union would implement any policy of support for Czechoslovakia, Foreign Commissar Maxim Litvinov responded to the effect that a way would be found, some sort of corridor would be used.'55 This last point, of course, went to the heart of the matter: having no common

border with

Czechoslovakia or Germany, the Soviet Union could neither assist the former nor attack the latter without the agreement of Poland—which was inconceivable—or Romania. The latter contingency was almost as difficult both in theory and practice; in theory because the Soviet Union herself would not recognize the borders of Romania and was suspected

148. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 205-6; C 3448/541/18, FO 371/21702. 149. This is best pursued in the published British documents, B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 97-161, passim; cf. Kral,

Miinchen, Nos. 48, 50, 58, 62, 63 (excerpts in Berber, p. 107); Cadogan Diary, 5 April 1938, p. 67; Harvey Diaries, 1 April 1938, pp. 125-26. Note the comment of Kvacek (p. 215) on the poor tactics of the Czechoslovak

government. 150. C 2774/1941/18, FO 371/21715. 151. See Creswell’s comment on Newton’s dispatch 119 of 20 April 1938 forwarding a record of a meeting between Henlein and Captain Victor Cazalet, M.P., on 19 April, C 3316/1941/18, FO 371/21716.

152. See the comments by Sargent (30 April), Cadogan (3 May), Halifax (3 May), and Vansittart (5 May) on the same document. 153. Henderson to Halifax, 21 April 1938, C 3445/1941/18, FO 371/21716. See also the comment’s enderson’s letter of 20 April (B.D., 3d, 1, No. 152) in A 4384/55/45, FO 371/21521.

on

154. Neville Chamberlain, The Struggle for Peace (London: Hutchinson, 1939), p- 171, In the meeting of 29 April,

Chamberlain added to this comment on the gamble with lives rather obvious reasons he preferred not to state publicly, that it was necessary “were sufficiently powerful to make victory certain. Frankly, he did not 155. Thete is a good account in Celovsky, pp. 176-81. Only sources

than money the further one, which for to consider whether Britain and France think we wete” (B.D., 3d, 1:221). not listed in his footnotes will be cited

hete. See Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 449; 2, No. 131; New Documents on the History ofMunich, Nos. 5, 9.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

553

by that power, correctly as is now known, of having designs on portions of Romania,!5 6 in practice because the actual system of communication and transportation that would have had to be utilized for any Soviet assistance to Czechoslovakia via Romania was so complicated and primitive as to be almost useless.'5’ These obstacles, which were as well known to the Soviets as to the Romanians, may well have had something to do with the failure of the Russian government even to ask the Romanians for permission for transit to assist Czechoslovakia, which was, after all, the Little Entente ally of Romania.!58 It is, however, most unlikely that anything would have come of such a request, had

it been made. The Romanian government was fat too aftaid of Germany to make any commitment prior to the outbreak of war—in the event of which they would first see whether anyone else came to Czechoslovakia’s aid. On 9 May the Romanian foreign minister told Bonnet that even recognition of the existing Romanian-Russian bordet would not purchase a transit agreement; his simultaneous promise to be on the side of France in a war involving the latter left open the possibility of a later change in this policy but hardly provided any basis for serious contingency planning.'5? Certainly few at the time anticipated that the Soviet government coveted a piece of Czechoslovakia and would proceed to annex it just as soon as a common RussianCzechoslovak border, which did not exist in 1938, came into being at the end of World

War II. In any assessment of Soviet foreign policy in the era of Joseph Stalin, however, one cannot simply ignore the fact that the two countries of East Central Europe with which the Soviet Union ever had good relations during the interwar years were Lithuania and Czechoslovakia, the two with which she had no common boundary; and that as soon as this fact changed, Stalin arranged for the annexation of all of one and part of the other into the U.S.S.R.1 If the Soviet Union had an interest in Czechoslovakia in 1938 it was not in the territorial integrity of that country but rather in its role as a possible barrier to the expansion of Germany, unless the latter were involved in a war with the Western Powers. If that happened, the resulting war could only weaken any potential enemies of the Soviet Union without substantial involvement or danger to herself and regardless of the fate of Czechoslovakia. Litvinov appears to have expected little from his proposal; he thought that the French had no confidence in the Soviet Union just as the latter had no confidence in France, and thought it likely that the Czechs would cave in.’*! He expected Italy to turn away from Germany as she had abandoned her allies in World War I; and he responded 156. The possibility of Soviet recognition of Romania’s possession of Bessarabia in exchange for the right to move troops across Romania to assist Czechoslovakia was discussed in the spring of 1938, but nothing came of

it D.D.F.,, 2d, 9, Nos. 112, 199). 157. Prague had promised financial assistance for improvements

Romania was to make in the railway connecting the U.S.S.R. with Czechoslovakia, but little actual work had been done (ibid., Nos. 57, 19D). 158. Note, e.g., the comment of the Russian chargé in Berlin cited in U.S. 1938, 1:492. See also Krofta to

Koreé (Bucharest), 8 April 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412305—6. 159. D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 306; see also ibid., Nos. 225, 467.

160. It should be noted that Soviet inability to translate her good relations with Lithuania into support for that country at the time of the Polish-Lithuanian crisis of March 1938 was hardly a sign of strength that might reassure Czechoslovakia, which was

also on the other side of Poland

from the Soviet Union; note Kral,

Miinchen, No. 51, and the report of Dr. Krno on a conversation with the Lithuanian minister on 22 June 1938,

Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/412737-38. There is a good defense of Soviet policy in this

crisis in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 110. 161. Litvinov’s comments to Davies, the U.S. ambassador (Davies, p. 290; U.S. 1938, 1:41-42) are in part the basis of the long and thoughtful letter Davies wrote to Marvin H. McIntyre, the secretary to the president, on 4 if things in April, stressing that the Soviet Union was not that concerned about its isolation and asserting that be glad of Europe did not work out as Chamberlain hoped, the day would come when the democracies would life” (Hyde Park, Russian help in spite of that country’s “terrible tyranny over the human spirit and human RPE. 138i):

554

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

to detailed questions from the Hungarian minister about the intent of his 17 March proposal to the effect that he had only wanted to sound things out, had expected little, had no great hopes for a favorable British response, had had no specific plan in mind, but had been primarily concerned to absolve the Soviet Union of any responsibility. These comments,

made on 23 March when the negative response of the British as well as

others was already evident, if not yet officially communicated, might be taken as a form of “sour grapes.” There is, however, another way to interpret his comments, namely, that he really had expected little, did want a cheap alibi, but would have been quite happy to be pleasantly surprised by a greater willingness of Britain to assume new commitments in Europe.'® He could hardly be expected to anticipate that, as the following year showed, any such willingness of London to commit herself in Central or Eastern Europe would cost him his own position.'®4 The basic approach of the British and French governments was coordinated at their meeting in London on 28 and 29 April. In their preparations, the French expected a review of the Spanish situation, consideration of the relations of England and France

with Italy, and an extensive discussion of Czechoslovakia. They correctly anticipated that the possibility of a general settlement with Germany—which had been a key subject of the last such British-French meeting, that of November 1937—would hardly come up.!® It was a measure of the change in the international situation caused by the German rejection of the British approach to Berlin and by the Azschluss that what had only recently been viewed as the major topic for immediate consideration was now perceived as indefinitely postponed.'® In their own preparations for the meeting, the British Foreign Office had written up a review of the developments on the colonial question since the Anglo-French meeting of 29-30 November;!®” the London cabinet, however,

drew from recent developments the conclusion for future relations with Germany that

162. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 450 (German text in Kerekes, No. 15); cf. Kral, Miinchen, No. 49.

163. The official negative response of the Rritish government was communicated on 24 March (B.D., 3d, 1, No. 116). Note Halifax’s comments to the French ambassador and the latter’s similar views on 22 March (ibid., No. 109). Cf. Hungarian Documents, 1, No. 430. On the Soviet position, see also Celovsky, pp. 203-8. It is very difficult to estimate the influence that Soviet Ambassador Maisky’s vehemently anti-Chamberlain attitude had on assessments in Moscow; see D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 254, and, for 1939, Soviet Documents (hereafter cited as S.U.), Nos. 217, 218, 284, 301. See also his memoirs, Ivan M. Maisky, Who Helped Hitler? (London:

Hutchinson, 1964). 164. For a summary listing sources for the general belief at the time that the Soviet Union would not move militarily except in self-defense, see Braddick, p. 12, n. 73. For a number of differing French assessments of Soviet military power at this time, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 361; 9, Nos. 192, 228. Note the concern in the British

Foreign Office in May 1938 over the Times stories about the Comintern which pictured the Soviet as greater than the German

and Italian danger; like the spectacular “leader” on Czechoslovakia of 7 September, this

opinion was an initiative of Geoffrey Dawson, objected to rather than sponsored by the Chamberlain government; N 2197, N 2495/97/38, FO 371/22288. 165. U.S. 1938, 1:44-46, French memoranda prepared in anticipation of the talks are in D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 231, 237, 239, 246, and the memorandum on the Cameroons cited in the next note. It was also at this time, in part as preparation for the meeting, that Léon Noél, the former French minister in Prague, then accredited to Warsaw, traveled in Czechoslovakia to prepare a report on the situation for his government (ibid., No. 256; Noél, L ‘aggression allemande contre la Pologne (Paris: Flammarion, 1946], pp. 198-202). Before the fall of the Blum government, Foreign Minister Paul-Boncour had summoned the French ambassadors in Moscow and Warsaw

and the ministers in Prague and Bucharest to canvass the situation (D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 112). 166. It is indicative of the reversal of the diplomatic priorities that the U.S. chargé in Paris would repeatedly ask about the topic when none of the French officials mentioned it, only to be told each time that nothing was in prospect (Wilson’s tels. 656, 658, and 694 in U.S. 1938, 1:44-53). The French memorandum on the Cameroons (D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 229) was clearly prepared with a view to the possibility of the return of that colony to Germany being discussed in London. For prior British-French contacts on this question on 12 March, suggesting that there was now no prospect of a colonial settlement, see ibid., 8, No. 407; cf. ibid., No. 35, pp.

68-69, and No. 53. 167. C 3775/184/18, FO 371/21680.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 1

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they were “anxious to pursue the interrupted negotiations but that the ptesent moment did not appear opportune.”!68 The emphasis of this meetin g as contrasted with the preceding one would be on whether and how to fight Germa ny rather than on how to come to a general settlement with her.!% French Prime Minister Daladier had asked Gamelin for a statement of the steps France could take militarily against Germany in favor of Czechoslovakia. Gamelin’s written response adds up to practically nothing and is hedged about with such qualifications as to offer little hope.!” The line Daladier would take in the London conversations was, accordingly, one of attempting to intimidate and restrain German y by threats rather than any project of concrete military action. The British had been discussing the idea of themselves urging Czechoslovakia to make the utmost possible concess ions and securing the support of the French in urging Prague to an accommodation. They were also considering informing the Germans of these measures in the hope of getting Berlin to be patient for a while as the Czechoslovak authorities tried to develop a new approach to the Sudeten question.!7! What the British did not understand, of course, was that this

procedure fitted in perfectly with Hitler’s own preference for the immediate future. It was important to him that the exuberance induced among the Sudeten Germans by the Anschluss be dampened a bit for now so that pressure could be built up over time. Precipitate action so soon after the Anschluss might bring on the general war Hitler wanted to avoid, while a slow but steadily increased drumbeat of propaganda and pressure, with all world attention centered on the real and imagined grievances of the Sudeten Germans, could lead up to a crisis in which quick and drastic German action against Czechoslovakia might be successfully isolated.!7 If the British were developing this approach for the meeting with the French, it was in part because their earlier doubts about French military strength and the prospects of effective assistance for Czechoslovakia were being reinforced by the comments of Daladier and Gamelin to the British secretary of state for war in the very days of April that Henlein was moving publicly from a moderate line to the demands, previously concerted with Berlin, of his speech at Karlovy Vary on 24 April.!73 That speech and the attendant publicity served in an almost ideal fashion to focus interest on the Sudeten—as opposed to the Czech—question as the British cabinet discussed and approved on 27 April the line Chamberlain and Halifax were to take with the French.!4 The British would ask the French to join in pressure on Czechoslovakia for con168. Cabinet 21 (38) of 27 April 1938, C 3641/42/18, FO 371/21657. 169. Note the pessimistic tone of the French general staff preparations and notes; D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 230, 237. 170. The text is in his memoirs (2:318-19); see above n. 117, also D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 238.

171. 29th meeting of the cabinet Committee

on Foreign Policy, 7 April 1938, C -2770/

1941/18, FO

371/21715; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 148; G.D., D, 1, No. 750; U.S. 1938, 1:486-87. 172. See the discussion of the Hitler-Keitel meeting of 20 April on pp. 541-42, above.

173. It was on his return from this trip that Hore-Belisha at a luncheon of the American Correspondents’ Association in London on 27 April said that he expected Germany to take over all of Central Europe and parts of the Balkans and then attack England and France. He expressed the view that France would not honor het obligations to Czechoslovakia and that Italy (which he had just visited on the same trip) would in the end side

with the Western Powers rather than Germany. London manager of the United Press to the UP vice-president for South America, 28 April 1938, attached to Weddell (Buenos Aires) to Hull, 7 June 1938, Cordel! Hull Papers, folder 106. The Czechoslovak minister in London reported on this luncheon on the same day, Kral, Ménchen,

No. 66 (excerpt in Berber, p. 108). On Henlein’s speech, see “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 23 and 25 April 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, ff.311, 313; Kral, Minchen, Nos. 64, 69. British advice to him C 3510/1941/18, FO

371/21716. 174. On the British cabinet meeting 21 (38) of 27 April 1938, see C 3642/1941/18,

FO S77 ZATAG-AG

4049/1941/18, FO 371/21718; C 3561/37/18, FO 371/21653. Cf. Harvey Diaries, 25-27 April 1938, pp. 132— 35;

556

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cessions. If it came to war, there would be a long struggle and “even after a long war, it would be very difficult to re-establish Czechoslovakia in her old position.” Germany should not be allowed to think she could do anything she liked; Bene’ could not be left with the thought that he need make no great effort; and Britain and France should push for concessions without sponsoring any specific Czechoslovak proposals. Some middle way was to be found between what the Germans wanted and what Prague was offering; the Germans would thereby avoid the risk of a European war and the Czechs save at least something of their independence. As for the French, they would be told that the British would make their main contribution if it came to war in the air and at sea. No land expeditionary force could be promised; but if one were sent, it could not exceed two divisions at the beginning of hostilities. On the assumption that this last was not a binding commitment, Anglo-French staff conversations about their possible deployment could be undertaken. The lengthy canvassing of this last topic, its obvious sensitivity, and

the decision to inform the Germans and Italians of such staff talks if they did take place can be understood only in the context of the lengthy discussion in public and in print about the real or imagined role of Anglo-French military contacts in committing England to one side in the diplomatic background of World War I.! Hitler’s suggestion to Henlein that he ask for separate regiments with German as the language of command in the Czechoslovak army reflects his memory of the great internal crisis of the Dual Monarchy in the years before the war and his desire that Henlein use that demand to obstruct any negotiated settlement of the Sudeten question; the willingness of the British government to brave the reopening of the staff talks controversy shows that there was a recognition, reluctant to be sure, that war was a real possibility.!”°

At the Anglo-French meeting of 28-29 April the two governments discussed the issues of the moment and eventually agreed upon a policy to which they adhered during the subsequent months.'”” After considerable argument over details, there was agreement on the subject of air, naval, and army staff talks; it was understood that the Germans and

Italians would be informed of these. It was recognized by the French that the British promise to send two divisions to the continent in the first two weeks of war was on the one hand not a firm commitment but purely a possibility to be considered in staff planning but decided only by the British government of the day, while on the other hand it was, of coutse, entirely possible that in case of war larger forces would subsequently be sent.!’8 There was, moreover, a recognition of the fact that the supplies from the United

States which had been so important an element in sustaining the military effort of the Entente in the World War could not be taken for granted in any future war because of 175. The most comprehensive treatment of prewar staff contacts is Samuel R. Williamson, The Politics of Grand Strategy: Britain and France Prepare for War, 1904-1914 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969). For some historical comparisons by Churchill, see Kral, Manchen, No. 61. On Chamberlain and Halifax “disre-

garding the views of many of their colleagues” in agreeing to staff conversations, see Duff Cooper, p. 220, whose comments are particularly interesting since he was a critic of the prime minister. 176. Note, however, Cardinal Pacelli’s comment, cited in a 22 April 1938 statement of the Hungarian minister to the Vatican, that he expected the allies of Czechoslovakia to abandon her; because of the general fear of war,

they would accept afait accompli (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 157). 177. The discussion is based mainly on the French record in D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. British series have deferred publication volume. See also Hungarian Documents,

the published British record of the meeting in B.D., 3d, 1, No. 164, and 258. The two records ate essentially identical, though the editors of the of the discussion of some issues other than Czechoslovakia to another 2, Nos. 162, 166; U.S. 1938, 1:489-91, 47-53; G.D., D, 1, No. 757;

Cadogan Diary, 28 and 29 April 1938, pp. 71-74; Harvey Diaries, 28 April 1938, pp. 133-34 (parts of this entry wete certainly written on the 29th or 30th). 178. Note Gamelin’s comment at the meeting of the French Permanent Committee of National Defence of 8

December 1937 that he expected at first two and later four British divisions on the continent; the French leaders were, therefore, not surprised (D.D.F., 2d, 7, No. 325); cf. ibid., 9, No. 230). Material on 1938 staff contacts, ibid., Nos. 444, 476, 484; see also No. 508.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Ceechoslovakia, Part 1

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the American neutrality legislation; but both countries would nevertheless continue their attempts to hasten the buildup of their tespective air forces by purchases in America.!79 The critical question was that of Czechoslovakia. Here the approaches were at least superficially different. The French, who were committed to Czechoslovakia by treaty, argued that a strong and explicit promise of Britain and France to defend Czechoslovakia against aggression would rally the dubious countries like Yugosla via and Romania and perhaps even Poland and would thus offer the best hope of forestal ling a war, a war which would surely come sometime under even worse conditions if the Germans were not told to stop now but were instead permitted to destroy the Czechos lovak state— their real aim—and to gain control of the resources of Southea st Europe. On the specifics of a war over Czechoslovakia if it did come in spite of hopes and expectations to the contrary, Daladier was optimistic but not very explicit. He praised the Czechoslovak army, spoke of the strength of the Soviet air force, but mentioned no French plan

to assist the Czechs. Here was the crux of the situation, for Daladier advocat ed in 1938

the policy Chamberlain would adopt in 1939. With no plan to defeat Germany in war, or even to inflict setious damage on her while she destroyed Czechoslovakia, Daladie t “could only profess his profound conviction that... wat could only be avoided if Great Britain and France made their determination quite clear to maintain the peace of Europe by respecting the liberties and the rights of independent people.’”!8? Chamberlain was not yet ready for what he described as a bluff: “Whatever the odds might be in favor of peace or wat, it was not money but men with which we were

gambling,”*! {Themilitary prospects looked grim indeed, and even if Britain and France did win a waf, a subject on which he confessed to having some doubt, it would be a long wat; and even then there would remain the question of whether it would “in fact be

possible

to

re-establish

the

Czechoslovak

State

on

its present

basis.’”!82

Since

Chamberlain still thought that the German government, and Hitler in particular, were not committed to the total destruction of Czechoslovakia, he was suggesting that the main question was to save something for the Czechs, especially the existence of a

Czechoslovak state.'*° To fight a war to keep the Sudetenland within Czechoslovakia hardly looked like a viable risk, especially if, as Chamberlain implied very strongly, you were unlikely to leave the Sudetenland inside Czechoslovakia after winning a war over Germany. War could be contemplated only if there really appeared to be no alternative at all. The compromise which was drawn out of this difference of approach superficially resembles the British more than the French point of view. There would be renewed pressure on Prague to make the utmost concessions to the Sudeten Germans. Berlin would at the appropriate moment be informed by the London government of the efforts being made to settle the Sudeten German question peacefully. If the Germans seemed inclined to go beyond all reasonable bounds, however, the British government would

give them as a formal and direct warning the statement of Chamberlain in the House of Commons to the effect that if Germany marched, France would honor her obligations to 179. In this connection, the influence of the World War experience on the thinking of those at the meeting is especially obvious; among other things, Daladier talked at length about the role of the Fokker planes built in the Netherlands during the war. 180. B.D., 3d, 1:217; cf. D.D.F., 2d, 9:579. 181. B.D., 3d, 1:2 182. Ibid., p. a | 183. In this connection,

the comment

of the Polish ambassador to France on Bonnet’s statement that the

annexation of the whole of Czechoslovakia by Germany would endanger Poland, is worth quoting: “I replied that in my opinion it was absolutely unreasonable to presume that in the twentieth century, after a great war, a result of which was the triumph of the national principle, any state, even one stronger than Germany, could annex territories inhabited by other nations against their will” (Lukasiewicz Papers, p. 96).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Czechoslovakia, and, in the ensuing wat, Germany should not count on England’s staying out. Berlin could thus either accept a reasonable compromise or run the tisk of a general war, a general war which would then clearly grow not out of the problem of the Sudeten Germans but out of Germany’s determination to destroy Czechoslovakia.'™* If this procedure appeared to be closer to the British than the French position at the beginning of the talks, there are good reasons for believing that the French were pleased rather than disappointed by the outcome.'®> The French leaders expressed themselves as most satisfied with the meeting; they had to avow loyalty to their alliance in public while hoping that concessions from Prague would free them from the need to carry it out. But if the need did arise, prior diplomatic negotiations would have so redefined the issues as to assure them with almost complete certainty of the support from Great Britain which they believed necessary in war. The fact that the public show of determination which they had originally requested had been refused would, under these circumstances, make it mote likely that Czechoslovakia would indeed offer concessions extensive enough to avert a conflict. If there was an element of dishonesty in the position of the French government, it was not so much in their accepting, and very willingly at that, the British position in the hope of evading treaty commitments they preferred not to implement, but rather in their unwillingness in the subsequent weeks to be as honest with their Czechoslovak allies as the latter had a right to expect.!®° A carefully phrased communication secretly conveyed to BeneS in early May instead of late July could have alerted him to take in the summer of 1938 the kind of steps he was ready to take in the fall. Only such a procedure might have shifted the initiative to Prague and then left the question of Germany’s teal aims answered in public rather than debated in private.!®’ Instead of such a warning, the Czechs by a supreme irony would receive an exactly contrary impression when the May Crisis interrupted the diplomatic implementation of the procedure agreed to at the allied meeting. By calling forth the warning from England agreed to at the London talks for the contingency of a presumed imminent German attack, the crisis would leave the Czechoslovak government with a completely false impression of the situation. In the weeks after the Anglo-French discussions, the two powers began to implement the policy on which they had agreed. They urged concessions to the Sudeten German party on Prague, while the British informed the German government of the effort being made. The British attempted to draw out the Germans as to the terms they thought appropriate, keeping in reserve the implied threat of war that had been decided upon in the London talks. Since Hitler had already set the policy of constant escalation of demands to preclude agreement, there could be no answer from Berlin to the request 184. This policy was approved at the British Cabinet 22 (38) of 4 May 1938, C 4051/ 1941/18, FO 371/21718. It was explained in special detail to the prime minister of the Union of South Africa, who had complained about the British concessions to the French in almost hysterical terms on 5 May and had warned that the Union would not go to war on Britain’s side under the circumstances (C 3928/1941/18, FO 371/21718; cf. C

6756/42/18, FO 371/21657). 185. A good exposition of this in Celovsky, pp. 188-90. Much of the available evidence has been cited there; I cannot, however, agree with Celovsky’s view that the result of the meeting was a complete abandonment of Czechoslovakia. The threat of war against a German attack on Czechoslovakia as opposed to acting on the Sudeten issue was real—and it would in the end deter Germany in 1938. See also Lukasiewicx Papers, pp. 71-77. 186. Alexis Léger’s urging speed on the Czechoslovak minister in Paris just before the London meeting was phrased in terms of internal French political considerations (Kral, Minchen, No. 63, excerpts in Berber, p. 107).

The comments of Lacroix to Hodza on 22 March and to Benes on 11 April (D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 26, 157) were certainly very different from those of 1937, but hardly particularly explicit. 187. The British minister did repeat to the Czechoslovak foreign minister the British view that the military prospects in a wat were poor: Czechoslovakia would be overrun, there would be a long war, and at the end it was by no means sure that Czechoslovakia would be restored to her former borders; but this did not impress

the Czechoslovak government enough to budge them (B.D., 3d, 1, No. 195; Krofta’s record is in T-120, 1039/1809/412188—94).

War Denied: The Crisis Over Cxechoslovakia, Part 1

Soy)

for specifics; any answer would have risked setting finite limits to what was expected of Prague. Instead, the Germans simply suggested that the demands voiced by Henlein in his Karlovy Vary speech would be a good place to start. Some proposals of Prague which had been transmitted to Paris and London just before the April conference were considered quite inadequate there, and in the weeks immediately after that meeting, there were at first no signs that the Czechoslovak government was prepared to move in any way sufficiently dramatic to make a major impact on the situation within the country or on the attitude of the Western capitals.1®§ The great dangers in this appearance of stubbornness were brought home to the Czechoslovak leaders by an urgent warning from Paris and a public report on the views of the British ptime minister. The warning from Paris came from the long-time Czechoslovak minister there who reported that Sir Nevile Henderson was convinced of the sincerity of the Germans and was so reporting to London and that the reports of the French ambassador to Berlin about the situation were extremely upsetting for the French premier and foreign minister. He warned the Czechoslovak president, prime minister, and foreign minister of the absolute necessity for prompt action so that the French would not get the impression that the Czechs were postponing a settlement with the Sudeten Germans because they did not want such a settlement and preferred war.1®° Although reaching the Czechoslovak authorities through newspaper stories rather than diplomatic dispatches, the warning from Britain was in some ways even more dramatic. Speaking to American newspaper correspondents on 10 May, the British prime minister took for “background information” an ever more conciliatory line than he and Lord Halifax had come to advocate in the cabinet. He did not believe that France would take any military action to save Czechoslovakia, nor would Great Britain. As for the Sudeten German question, he said that since the cantonal system (on the Swiss model) would be very difficult to apply because of the Sudeten settlements being in a long, thin fringe along the frontier, the solution might be to move the frontier. If war did develop, over Czechoslovakia and the allies defeated Germany, the Czechoslovak state would still not be re-created along its present lines.!° When stories about this gathering and Chamberlain’s comments appeared in the newspapers, questions were raised in Parliament;

and the prime minister refused to issue a denial. It is difficult to believe that

Chamberlain would give a briefing of this sort to correspondents at Cliveden, the Astor country home, and not anticipate that his startling comments would come out in some

form. Certainly his refusal to deny such views in the House of Commons, even if the whole episode was not so intended, must be seen as a form of pressure on Czechoslovakia to make the utmost concessions to the Sudeten Germans. 188. Here and throughout the balance of this chapter, the tedious diplomatic steps which have been explained

by many authors will not be retraced. The accounts of Celovsky, Eubank, Wheeler-Bennet, and Laffan cover the issues. For internal British discussion of these moves, see C 3837/1941/18, FO 371/21717; R 4494/1737/ 67, FO 371/22348. See also Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 189, 190, 194, 204; Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 108, 112; Kral, Minchen, Nos. 73, 78; Mastny telegram, 18 May 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/

412150-51. in 189. Osusky telegram of 14 May 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/ 412013-15 (parts Berber, pp. 108-9). The Czechoslovak foreign minister was sufficiently alarmed to respond the same day with

of the instructions to reply with a denial to Daladier, ibid., frames 412341—42; Kral, Méinchen, No. 74. Because

of Francoisfragmentary state of the surviving French record, there is some uncertainty about the reports

Poncet referred to. It is possible that D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 273 and 338 belong in this category.

1938, enclosure to 190. London manager of United Press to the UP vice-president for South America, 11 May

alluded to a plan Weddell (Buenos Aires) to Hull, 7 June 1938, Cordell Hull Papers, folder 106. Chamberlain also Celovsky, p. 199; for a colonial settlement in exchange for a disarmament agreement. Cf. Gedye, pp. 391-95; of Paul Macleod, pp. 231-32; and note that very similar views—suitably phrased—appeat in the comments Paris on 10 May (G.D., D, Reynaud, then French Minister of Justice, in a talk with the German ambassador in

2, No, 152).

560

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The British inclination in this direction was, if anything, strengthened further in those days by four factors. In the first place, the Czechoslovak minister in London had told Lord Halifax on 2 May that he thought Bene§ “not only now fully realized the need of going to the very limit of reconciliation as regards the Sudeten but was even in fact prepared for a ‘Swiss solution.””!9! The belief that there was a real possibility of a Czechoslovak offer that would dramatically change the situation certainly provided an incentive for the London government to feel that a hard push from Britain and France might lead to such an offer’s actually being made.'*? A second element of reinforcement came from a report of the British military attaché in Berlin, Frank Mason-Macfarlane, of 9 May which expressed itself in very dubious terms about the ability of the Czechoslovak army to hold up a German invasion for any length of time.!?? Comments on this document made within the Foreign Office indicate that the negative assessment was shared there.!94 Whether or not correct, those views would discourage the taking of risks. In the third place, in these very days Henlein himself was in London again. He had taken the initiative for this visit, presumably in accordance with Hitlet’s instructions that he was to continue his efforts at keeping England neutral.!°° With the approval of Chamberlain and Halifax, Vansittart met with him as did a number of others, including

Churchill.1°° The Sudeten leader claimed to be moderate and independent and asserted that autonomy and a fair deal for the German minority was all he wanted; indications are

that his comments were discounted somewhat but generally believed. The implication was that the possibility of agreement did exist, especially since Henlein was also impressed by the general comments that if war did break out—with the initial fighting certain to take place in the Sudeten area itself—Britain would surely join in. There was also the thought that the recent experience of the Austrian National Socialists, who

found themselves promptly superseded by National Socialists from Germany, would lead Henlein to prefer being important within Czechoslovakia to being shunted aside in the Reicht? 191. Harvey Diaries, 2 May 1938, p. 136; this is a summary of B.D., 3d, 1, No. 166, a full account of the conver-

sation in which Halifax gave Masaryk a report on the Anglo-French talks. Masaryk’s own full report on this meeting is not available; a short telegram in T-120, 1039/1809/412128 (part in Berber, p. 108) gives a different view of the meeting and attributes such a comment to the British foreign secretary. The author is inclined to accept the British account as accurate, as does Celoysky, p. 195, n. 1. See, on the other hand, Cadogan Diary, 6 May 1938, p. 75. 192. There is absolutely no evidence to this effect, but I cannot avoid stating my own belief that the comments of Lord Halifax after his 2 May meeting with Masaryk—of which the entry in the diary of his principal private sectetary is a good reflection—led Chamberlain at the 10 May luncheon to go beyond what he had previously said with the intention of having a leak show the Czechoslovak government that if they thought major concessions znside Czechoslovakia were bad, things could get much wotse. 193. B.D., 3d, 1, No. 196. For diverging views of Czechoslovakia’s military posture and the strength of her defenses, see H. C. T. Strong, “The Czechoslovak Army and the Munich Crisis:

A Personal Memorandum,”

War and Society:A Yearbook ofMilitary History, 1975, 162-77; Jonathan Zorach, “Czechoslovakia’s Fortifications: Their Development and Role in the Munich Crisis,” Mlitargeschichtliche Mitteilungen, 17, No. 2 (1976), 81-94. The latter piece contains

references

to the relevant documents

and literature; the former

hardly accords with

Strong’s recommendations of 1938 as reported in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 411. 194. These comments are in C 4220/1941/18, FO 371/21719.

195. Cadogan Diary, 12 May 1938, p. 76. : 196. On this visit, see ibid., 13 and 16 May 1938, pp. 76-77; Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 208-9; Nicolson, pp.

340-41; B.D., 3d, 1, No. 219 and appendix 2; C 4510/1941/18, FO 371/21719; Gilbert, Churchill, 5:940—41; Czechoslovak

Foreign Ministry to Mastny tel. 561 of 20 May 1938, Czechoslovak

document

in T-120,

1039/1809/412345; Kennedy to Moffat, 17 May 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 13; U.S. 1938, 1:498-500; Hungarian

Documents, 2, Nos. 203, 205, 216; D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 328, 350, 352, 356, 358, 363, 377, 441, 518, 535. 197. Note Masaryk’s telegram of 14 May on the Henlein visit which, after recounting the details of the trip, concludes with: “All urge that our government take advantage of the favorable psychological moment [to come to an agreement]. I fully concur in this” (Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412185—86). Similarly Masaryk’s report on his own talk with Henlein in Kral, Miinchen, No. 75, and his comments to the American

War Denied: The Crisis Over Cxechoslovakia, Part 1

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The fourth, and in some ways perhaps most critical, element was the reinforcement the British received from the French. Soon after the French minister s had returned to Paris, the French foreign minister met Lord Halifax again at and after the 9-14 May meeting of the League Council in Geneva. Daladier had already told the American ambassador to Paris that “it was impossible for France to go to war to protect Czechoslovakia,” and that the reorganization of Czechoslovakia along Swiss lines might well be a step on the road to partition of the country.!°8 Bonnet’s views were even more defeatist; he had tried unsuccessfully to draw out Litvinov in Geneva! and had been told by both the Poles and Romanians that they would fight rather than allow Russian troops across their borders to assist Czechoslovakia. A frontal attack on Germany would mean “the almost immediate death of the whole French youth.” In all these discussions, there is a despairing sense that in case of a clear and open German attack on Czechoslovakia, France would have to fight after all, but out of a fatalistic sense of obligation and with little prospect of receiving assistance ot obtaining victory. No wonder Bonnet urged Lord Halifax when they talked in Paris after the Council meeting to “work as hard as he could for a settlement in Czechoslovakia so that the French would not be faced with a crisis which they definitely did not want to face.”20! As Lord Halifax reported to the cabinet, Bonnet “wanted His Majesty’s Government to put as much pressure as possible on Dr. Bene§ to reach a settlement with the SudetenDeutsch in order to save France from the cruel dilemma between dishonoring her agreement or becoming involved in war.””20 At a time when the British and French thought that there was some real chance of a settlement being reached—though we now know that what would really have happened would have been a clear revelation of Germany’s true aims—the May Crisis intervened. The warning that would be conveyed during that hectic weekend by the British to Hitler was preceded by an astonishingly similar warning to him from the chief of staff of his own army. The first days of May 1938 were obviously a time when in German government circles the question of the destruction of Czechoslovakia was widely discussed. Keitel and Jodl might work on their draft of an order for the attack secretly, not even telling the army high command about it for fear of arousing the expected objections there;?% but there is ample evidence of various other high military, diplomatic, and party officials discussing the likelihood of action against Czechoslovakia.2"* For the army’s chief of staff, ambassador cited in the preceding note. 198. U.S. 1938, 1:494. For discussion of the possibility of Czechoslovakia’s surviving the amputation of the Sudeten areas, see B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 218 and 221, and the Foreign Office comments

on these in C 4601, C

4614/1941/18, FO 371/21720. 199. For Litvinov’s very different account of this conversation with Bonnet, see Fierlinget’s report No. 4 of 28 May 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412444-59, and Litvinov’s letter to the Soviet minister in Prague of 25 May 1938, New Documents on the History of Munich, No. 14. It should be remembered

that the French merely said they would mobilize if Czechoslovakia were attacked; as we now know, they had no more intention of attacking Germany than the Soviet Union. For earlier arguments between French Foreign Minister Delbos and Litvinov, in this case about French Communist party attacks on the French government, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 19, 32, 60. 200. U.S. 1938, 1:500—504. Cf. ibid., pp. 507-8; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 306. On the effort to rally Poland after the London meeting, see Kral, Minchen, No. 76 (part in Berber, p. 126); D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 285, 302, 307, 418, 495;

cf. ibid., No. 130. 201. U.S. 1938, 1:504. Bonnet may also have been affected by reports from Frangois-Poncet that Mastny did not think Bene’ was moving fast enough (D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 273; see also No. 338). 202. Cabinet 24 (38) of 18 May 1938, C 5115/1941/18, FO 371/21722; cf. Harvey Diaries, p. 142. 203. Note Keitel’s comments, Keite/ Papers, p. 183, and Klaus-Jtirgen Miller’s discussion of this, p. 300.

204. Miller, p. 301, cites several examples; the Hungarian minister in Berlin reported on such comments of Wilhelm Frick, the minister of the interior, on 6 May (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 178); a planning study of the organization section of the High Command of the air force (OKL) of 2 May is clearly attuned to a war against England and refers to an interim planning date of 1 October 1938 (TM WC, 37:443—-60); Gauleiter Rover of

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

who had heavily criticized the views Hitler had expressed on 5 November 1937, who had seen and participated in the implementation of the first move called for in that meeting—the Anschluss—who had seen the commander-in-chief of the army dismissed in a disgraceful farce and replaced by a compromised second-rater, the indications that Hitler was now moving toward the next objective—an attack on Czechoslovakia— aroused the greatest concern. On 5 May he prepared a warning memorandum which he submitted to the commander-in-chief of the army on 7 May. In it Beck argued that Germany could get a teat deal peacefully, in part because of the aversion to war in England and France; but if Germany did launch a military attack on Czechoslovakia, France would decide, how-

ever reluctantly, to honor her treaty obligation to go to wat and that England, equally reluctantly, would join France out of her own interests either immediately or soon after.

Equally correctly, he expected that the Western Powers would draw on American supplies and possibly intervention. He suggested that the Soviet Union would be hostile and Poland and Romania might be also. In examining the military prospects, he again saw the French and British positions quite correctly: they might very well vo¢ launch an immediate attack in the west and see Czechoslovakia overrun, “leaving her reconstitution, like Serbia’s earlier, to the general settlement at the end of a long war.” Since he did

not believe Germany could win such a war, he argued that Germany must not start a in which England would be among Germany’s enemies, a contingency he believed tain to arise if Germany attempted to force a solution of the Czechoslovak question manner contrary to Britain’s preferences, i.e., by a military attack. The new commander-in-chief of the army, General von Brauchitsch, took up memorandum

with Keitel before showing it to Hitler. Keitel—who

war cerin a the

was, it must be

remembered, working under Hitler’s instructions on a draft order for an attack on Czechoslovakia—urged von Brauchitsch not to show Hitler the portion of Beck’s memorandum covering the international situation since he would get so angry that he would not even read the analysis of the military prospects in case of war. When von Brauchitsch followed this advice, Hitler still became angry and rejected Beck’s views. The Fihrer’s attitude at this time between the trip to Rome and the May Crisis was already set: the period of waiting for the international uproar over the Azmschluss to die down was over. He would now prepare for the attack on Czechoslovakia, still in 1938, though as yet with no date specified.”°’ Britain and France would not intervene, and Oldenburg is quoted in the diary of the German minister to Norway as telling him in May that new space must be found in the east for the Germans, extending as-far as the Caucasus, and that Czechoslovakia would have to

disappear (Heinrich Sprenger, Heinrich Sahm (Cologne: Grote, 1969], p. 291); on 11 May the German press was directed to hold back a bit on attacks on Czechoslovakia, instructions for greater noise would come later (‘Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.359). These and other such

developments point to the assumptions of those in the upper reaches of the German government in the first weeks of May. 205. Text in Gert Buchheit, Ludwig Beck ein preussischer General (Munich: List, 1964), pp. 133-38; see Miller, pp. 302-5; Foerster, pp. 81-87. A copy of Beck’s memorandum was apparently transmitted to someone in the German Foreign Ministry; portions of it under the date of 7 May 1938 from the German Foreign Ministry files in the Deutsches Zentralarchiv Potsdam ate printed in Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 138.

206. The only account of this is in Keitel’s memoirs, p. 184. The account appeats creditworthy and is accepted by Miiller (p. 305). Hitler’s own subsequent references are to memoranda in the plural, presumably including Beck’s later papers of the summer;

see Wilhelm Treue (ed.), “Rede Hitlers vor der deutschen Presse (10.

November 1938),” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 6, No. 2 (April 1958), 187; Helmut Heiber (ed.), Hitlers Lagebespreuchungen (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962), p. 786. The date of the Hitler-Brauchitsch meeting must have been about 12 May after Hitler returned from Italy to Berlin and before his departure for Berchtesgaden. 207. Note the comment of von Weizsacker to the Hungarian minister reported in the latter’s dispatch of 20 May that the timing for the settlement of the Czechoslovak question would be decided by Hitler, but it would take place no later than the following spring (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 210). By that time Hitler had been

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Beck’s views to the contrary were angrily rejected and would contribute to his further fall from grace as von Fritsch’s objections at the meeting of 5 November 1937 had had a share in his dismissal. The evidence on Hitler’s working on the details of plans for an attack as soon as he arrived back at the Obersalzberg after the Italian trip confirms this. The questions which his new armed forces adjutant Schmundt transmitted to the staffs in Berlin on 16 and 17 May? and the pressure of Schmundt on Keitel to send to Hitler in Berchtesgaden the draft order he was working on in accordance with Hitler’s instructions,” must be seen as part of Hitler’s preoccupation with the military details of the forthcoming operation. Those who attribute the wording of Hitler’s 30 May revision of the draft Keitel sent to him to his anger over the May Crisis fail to take into account that the draft was based on a discussion of 20 April, and that Hitler’s reaction to Beck’s

warning, as well as his work on the military details of an attack right after his return from Italy, shows very clearly that rightly or wrongly Hitler believed that the time to have the first of his short wars had arrived. The solidarity with Italy, which Beck questioned, was strong enough in Hitler’s eyes to ward off any danger of a general war; and there was, therefore, no reason to postpone the action against Czechoslovakia which Hitler perceived as a military attack later in 1938 following a lengthy propaganda campaign.?!° In the middle of May 1938, therefore, the Western Powers were hopeful that an

agreement could be reached without war, an agreement that would leave a Czechoslovak state, even if perhaps a truncated one. Hitler, on the other hand, thought that he had the Opportunity to launch the first of his wars under circumstances where the strength of Germany, the weaknesses and reluctance of France and England, the military and political vulnerability of Czechoslovakia, and his alignment with Italy could assure him a short, isolated, and victorious war at the end of a period of German political and military preparations. He was busy working on the details of those preparations when the May Crisis produced developments which led to refinements in his planning, The rumors of German troop movements which precipitated the war scare on the weekend of 19-22 May have given rise to vast speculation. Were they based on leaks about real intentions of the Germans for a coup? Were they based on minor German military moves designed to influence the elections in Czechoslovakia scheduled for that weekend? Were they planted on the British by the Czechs as a deliberate means at the

away from Berlin for several days, working in Berchtesgaden on the plans for the attack. Von Weizsacker was evidently conveying to the Hungarian minister an interpretation of what he had recorded in his own diary on 13 May (see above, n. 101). 208. Schmundt’s questions of 16 May and the answers of Zeitzler (the later army chief of staff, then a Lt. Col. in the OKW) are in TMWC, 25:418-20; for 17 May, only Zeitzlet’s answer has been printed in ibid., pp. 420— 21. 209. Keitel Papers, p. 183.

210. The 12 May memorandum of von Weizsacker quoted by Watt in his “Hitler’s Visit to Rome and the May Weekend Crisis” (p. 30) to support a contrary interpretation simply does not do so. Since Hitler neither wanted nor requested Italian military assistance, the Italian expectation that Germany could “solve the Czechoslovak question without a European conflict” confirmed rather than contradicted Hitler’s opinion. Watt asserts that Hitler was undecided before the May Crisis (p. 25), using as evidence the Hitler-Keitel meeting of 21 April and then attributes the indecision to Hitler’s experience in Italy in early May. This not only inverts the chronology but ignores the fact that the evidence on Hitler’s views and actions in the period between his Italian journey and the May Crisis shows him very much decided on the next move. Before the trip, Hitler had put the alternatives as an immediate move against Czechoslovakia or, if the Italians were hesitant in their diplomatic move within support, a substantial postponement. The 16 May question about which German divisions could twelve hours of mobilization hardly points to plans for the indefinite future—when German troop dispositions fitted in might be very different. Schmundt’s repeated urgings that Keitel send the draft order also cannot be him last—for this for source the is himself Keitel that true is It Hitler. undecided an of view with Watt’s his own potentially exculpatory—detail, but it is to be found in his memoirs (p. 183), not in his testimony in defense at his trial (TMWC, 15:508-9).

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least of clarifying the British position and at most to precipitate a war??!! With the evidence now available, I still adhere to the view that “at a time of great international tension, reports of really routine German troop movements were mistaken as presaging an immediate attack on Czechoslovakia. When the times ate appropriate for them, many omens ot flying saucers will be seen.”?!? The fact that the British were so alarmed at what looked like an imminent German action should not be surprising: Henlein had just been in London, now on 19 May he broke off negotiations with the Czechoslovak government. Troop movements had been denied in the Anschluss crisis, as had the delivery of several German ultimatums to von Schuschnigg; that all those denials had been lies was both known in London at the time

and recalled in May. At a time of great tension and repeated surprise moves there were several

instances

of erroneous

anticipation;

sometimes

German

moves

were

not

expected, at other times they were mistakenly thought imminent. The alarms over alleged German troop landings in Morocco in January 1937 and supposed German plans for an invasion of Holland in January 1939 show that the May Crisis was neither the first nor the last instance of the latter type. Given the German habit of striking without warning,

such scares were only to be expected. Certainly all the British records and materials currently available show that there was a genuine belief that Germany was about to move and that wat was imminent. Furthermore, it was the bellicose statements of von Ribbentrop to the British and Czechoslovak representatives in Berlin which, when

relayed to London, served to confirm and even heighten the fears there. It looked as if the withdrawal of Henlein from Czechoslovakia to Germany marked the end of what had looked like promising negotiations, which would now be replaced by a German military advance. Under these circumstances, the British government decided to warn the Germans on 21 May and again the next day of the dangers inherent in any German attack. The French, who were also so informing Berlin, would honor their obligation under the alliance treaty, and under those circumstances Britain might well be forced to become

involved also as the prime minister had warned on 24 March.?!> The angry tone with 211. These theories are examined in Braddick’s study. He leans to the last answer, but on very thin evidence. As the text shows, I do not agree with Braddick’s conclusions. 212. Weinberg, “May Crisis,” p. 224. The sources and details provided in that article will not generally be repeated here. See now also Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 207, 209, 211, 213, 214, 229; Lipski Papers, pp. 367-68; D.D.F., 2d, 9, 378-459, passim, 494, 502, 507; 10, Nos. 77, 228; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 21 May, 24 May, 28 May, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, f.379, 383, 391; “Informationsbericht Nr. 38,”

23 May, Nr. 40, 28 May 1938, ibid., 101/32, f£347—-51, 361-67; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 79 (Berber, No. 127), 80, 81 (part in Berber, No. 130), 82, 83; Osusky tel. of 22 May 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412195—96; Masaryk tels. of 22 and 24 May, ibid., frames 412017—18; Gajan and Kvacek, No. 41;

Harvey Diaries, 21 May 1938, pp. 142-43; Cadogan Diary, 19-22 May 1938, pp. 78-79; Transcript of FeisMorgenthau

telephone

conversation,

23

May

1938,

Morgenthau

Papers,

Vol.

125:393-97,

Hyde

Park;

Trauttmannsdorff to Albrecht Haushofer, 23 May 1938, Haushofer Papers, Library of Congress Manuscripts Division Acc. No. 11249; Australian Documents, No. 209. 213. On the British warnings, see now also, in addition to the sources cited in the preceding note, Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 215, 218. Note the contrast between Deputy State Secretary Woermann’s view on 14 May

that Britain would not fight over Czechoslovakia (ibid., No. 196) and von Weizsacker’s on 20 May that prolonged Czechoslovak resistance in case of wat could lead to English intervention (ibid., No. 210). On the

French warning, see also Frangois-Poncet’s account to the American ambassador, Hugh Wilson, relayed by the latter in a personal letter to Pierrepont Moffat of 24 May 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 14. An important document on Czechoslovak ideas about the need to mobilize quickly if war appeared

imminent—in order to avoid having to complete mobilization while under German attack—is the note of the chief of the Czechoslovak general staff to General Gamelin of 7 April 1938, D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 128. This docu-

ment provides a good clue to Czechoslovak general staff thinking during the May Crisis and in September; it also reveals the dilemma the Poles were pushed into by Germany’s “silent mobilization” in 1939 as Czechoslovakia had been in 1938. A country could either await attack and be grievously hurt by Blitzkrieg tactics. or, as would be necessary in an open society, announce mobilization measures in a period of crisis and thus appear to

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which von Ribbentrop greeted these warnings, his refusal to utge Henlein to resume negotiations, the generally threatening tone he assumed, and his professed indifference to a new world war all pointed toward future German policy, since no German action was planned for that weekend; but they did nothing to calm the situation. What did lead to temporary quiet was the fact that the Germans wete not yet ready to move and therefore did not do so, in spite of the fact that the Czechoslovak government called up one class of reservists and some specialists and moved these into the border areas to help assure calm during the elections. The effect on Hitler of hearing first the warnings from London relayed to him in Berchtesgaden and subsequently the comments in the press that he had backed down before western pressure has often been described by others as pushing him into a decision to attack Czechoslovakia that fall.2!4 Hitler himself—who knew of doubts and even opposition to his plans among the generals—at times used this explanation. It is, however,

false. He had already decided before the weekend

crisis, and he was quite

capable of getting himself into a rage (which then became quite genuine) whenever it suited his purposes. This incident must not be examined in isolation. Hitler was pictured as backing down before Mussolini’s movement of troops to the Brenner in July 1934— and not only postponed action against Austria for years but continued to woo the Italian dictator. Although he made angry comments to the French ambassador and others about the January 1937 stories concerning German troop shipments to Spanish Morocco, he never considered taking such action to spite the French, who had at first believed the reports. If he issued new orders on the Czechoslovak question after the May Crisis, it was because he was already working on them; some of the technical aspects, not the general thrust, were affected by developments in that crisis. Hitler’s work on the planned attack in which Schmundt gathered information for him was what had led to the urgings by Schmundt to Keitel to forward his draft to Berchtesgaden. Keitel did send this on 20 May with a covering letter explaining its role as a transitional text for the period until the new mobilization year began on 1 October. Reflecting the conversation of Hitler with Keitel a month earlier, the introductory statement on timing of course mirrors Hitler’s comments of that time. In detail, the draft otder merely amplifies the general plan for an attack designed to break Czechoslovak resistance quickly so that no one would come to the victim’s help while Poland and Hungary might well join in on Germany’s side. A long war could lead to international complications, and so all should be attuned to a speedy victory.*!° The general introductory statement which left the timing somewhat indefinite was by now out of date and would be replaced by one asserting that it was Hitler’s “unalterable decision to destroy Czechoslovakia by military action in the foreseeable future.”*! In the details of implementing procedures, some changes were also made. When it was suggested, presumably by Keitel, that Hitler should brief the commanders in chief of the branches of the armed forces about his intentions,2!7 the response characterized what the new orders would provide and the impact of the May Crisis on Hitler’s thinking precisely enough to deserve quoting: “The Fithrer is engrossed with the Green [Czechoslovak plan]. The Se ne lt 7 be provocative, especially in view of the debate about the sequence of mobilizations in the discussion of iat responsibility for the outbreak of war in 1914. 214. A good example of this sort is the story Karl Bémer of the Propaganda Ministry told a correspondent of 14). the Chicago Daily News in the fall of 1938 (Wilson to Moffat, 22 October 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol.

22

215. The text is in TMWC, 25:421-27. 216. Text of 30 May, ibid., p. 434 (full text on pp. 433-39). of 22 or 23 217. Item 19 in the Green File, ibid., p. 432, is in my judgment a telegram from Keitel to Schmundt May 1938.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

basic considerations are unaltered.218 Surprise even more heavily emphasized. Con-

ference with those concerned will take place after return [to Berlin] at the latest.” After reporting that Hitler thought September too late a date for the army to hold exercises on the surprise capture of fortifications, the report concludes: “The Fuhrer repeatedly emphasized the necessity of rapidly pushing ahead the construction of fortifications in the West.’’!? Hitler’s strategic concept had not changed, but the orderly calling up of Czechoslovak reserves and their smooth movement into the border areas, combined with the

Western show of solidarity reinforced the need for speed in breaching the Czechoslovak fortifications22° as well as hurrying up the building of Germany’s own fortifications in the west to deter, or if need be delay, the French. Even before Hitler met with his military leaders to explain his plans, he had seen Henlein on the Obersalzberg to give him further instructions. It would appear that Hitler told Henlein to hold to the Karlovy Vary program but not to let developments in Czechoslovakia get out of hand because Germany first had to fill gaps in the fortifications on her western border. By the end of the summer of in the fall, the French would not be able to help Czechoslovakia and Hitler could then do as he wished.”?! In this fashion Hitler provided Henlein with a general idea of his schedule without being as specific on dates as he safely felt he could be with his own military. Since Hitler was now setting his military timetable for an operation starting 1 October, with a complete breakthrough to be accomplished by 4 October, he had to

return to Berlin, however briefly, to explain his offensive plans to the highest military leaders and to give a major push to the construction of the Westwall.222 On 28 May Hitler spoke at length to a number of the highest military and political leaders, repeating much of what he had said on 5 November 1937 but pointing it more to the current situation. He pictured the planned attack on Czechoslovakia as preliminary to a later attack on the Western Powers to expand Germany to the English Channel, and he repeated his expectation that France and Britain would not intervene in a quick German wat against Czechoslovakia. The Germans would have to figure out ways to break the Czechoslovak fortifications, and they would have to prepare the German public psycho218. The German text reads “Grundgedanken unverandert,” hardly the way Schmundt would have described Hitler’s views to Keitel in response to a question about the Fihrer’s intentions (“Absichten’”) if there had been any truth to the subsequent pretense that Hitler changed his intentions because of the events of the weekend. 219. Item 17, ibid., pp. 431-32. I believe this to be the document referred to in Jodl’s diary under 23 May 1938 as follows: “Major Schmundt transmits views of the Fiihrer (Appendix), further discussions which slowly develop the precise intentions of the Fuhrer are held with the Chief of the OKW on May 28, June 3 and June 9. See Annexes (War Diary L)” (ibid., 28:373). This section of the diary, with its references to specific dates only in those cases where Jodl had documents in the OKW files, mostly referred to as annexes (which do not appear to have survived), is clearly a part of Jodl’s subsequent reconstruction of events as discussed in note 87, above. The only contemporary entry Jodl made in his diary between March and August 1938 is the one of 20 May about a meeting he and Keitel had with Goring (ibid.), and this entry appears on a subsequent page of the original where it is followed by a reference to his own leave from 21 June to 24 July and then a reference to a meeting of 10 August. The discussion about the alleged relationship between the May Crisis and the decision to attack in this part of the diary dates to the time Jodl prepared his reconstruction, either just before going on leave, between 13 June (latest date in the reconstruction) and 21 June or, more likely after 24 July. 220. There was another aspect to timing in regard to the Czechoslovak border defenses: the longer Hitler waited to start an attack, the mote likely it was that the Czechs would fortify the newly opened border with Austria (cf. B.D., 3d, 1, No. 253). Note Hitler’s comment in November 1938 that every postponement would merely have made an attack more difficult and more bloody (Treue, “Rede Hitlers,” p. 183). 221. Somewhat confused accounts of this conversation are reflected in Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 151, and Florence Crane to Roosevelt, 5 July 1938, P.S.F. Cordell Hull, Hyde Park. In the reconstructed part of Jodl’s

diary, this is referred to as a basic (“Grundlegende Besprechung”) meeting of 22 May on which Jodl saw a memorandum that, like the other annexes (see n, 219, above) is apparently lost (TMWC, 28:373). 222. Green File, item 20, TMWC, 25:433. These are notes of Schmundt, apparently written between 23 and 27 May. On the Westwall, see also Miller, p. 307.

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logically for war. At the same time, responsibility for construction of the Westwall was transferred from the military to Minister Todt, the man who had made his mark in the construction of the Autobahnen, Germany’s superhighways.223 The speech of 28 May and the official revised directive for the attack on Czechoslovakia issued on 30 May would precipitate a new crisis in the relations between Hitler and the army leadership, especially General Beck, but this will be discussed later. The point to be noted here is that by the end of May the top leaders of the German government and army were on notice that at the beginning of October Hitler expected to launch a short, successful, and isolated war against Czechoslovakia. It has sometimes been asserted in the literature on the origins and course of World War IT that the German navy was not designed for a war with England until after the May Crisis. This line was especially popular with the naval defendants at Nuremberg as well as apologists for them.” It has already been shown that this was decidedly not the case, and that although some in the Naval High Command may have deluded themselves at the time, Admiral Raeder knew what was intended long before and acted accordingly (though not always informing his associates of Hitler’s real intentions). Although the decision of 5 November allocated additional raw materials to the navy, in practice, shortages of labor, raw materials, and shipyard capacity as well as frequent changes of plans and the fact that even by the extravagant standards of the Third Reich the naval bureaucracy was incredibly overorganized and inefficient all combined to keep many of the projected warships from ever being constructed. The clues to policy, however, must be found in plans and projections, in naval matters more than others because of the

longer lead time required for shipbuilding even under the best of circumstances. It was because he knew this that Raeder translated Hitler’s November comments that war with England was possible as early as 1938 into an immediate effort to speed up the construction of submarines—the one type of vessel useful for such a war that could conceivably be constructed quickly.??5 Whatever the difficulties in implementing the new scheme, Raeder received Hitler’s agreement for expanding the required shipbuilding capacity when the two reviewed the question before Raeder’s order to this effect on 24 February 1938.26 Although the expansion of the German navy in regard to larger ships would obviously take longer, the fact that war with England was anticipated was stressed by Raeder when the navy’s war games for 1937 were discussed in a concluding conference on 12 April.22” The impact of the May Crisis on the navy, therefore, was not to turn that branch of the German armed forces toward planning for a war with England” but rather to refine and accelerate the existing plans as well as to make the realities clear to those in the High Command of the German navy hitherto in the dark.?”° If the impact of the May Crisis on Germany was to influence the refinement of 223. See Celovsky, pp. 216-17; Foerster, pp. 88-90; Miiller, pp. 307-8; Wiedemann, pp. 127-28; Dilffer, pp.

466-68.

224. For deliberate efforts within the German navy to “cook” the record in this regard one can see not only

Raeder’s own wartime papers written as alibis but also such selective destruction of records as that noted in Differ, p. 439, n. 24. Cf. ibid., p. 463, n. 40. A good example of wartime alibi preparation is the memorandum on German submarine construction from Admiral Assmann’s papers in TMIVC, 35:561—62; on this document,

see Bracher, Machtergreifung, p. 803, n. 267. 225. Differ, pp. 451-52. 226. Ibid., p. 454. 227. Ibid., pp. 461-62; Gemzell, pp. 63-66.

Rep

228. Watt in “Hitler’s Visit to Rome and the May Weekend Crisis” attempts to maintain this thesis by quoting one document from the German naval archives.

ae

German navy at 229. Diilffer, pp. 466-70. The analysis of the meaning of Hitler’s technical directives to the

warrants. this time appears to be carried into greater refinement and precision than the evidence

568

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

military preparations already ordered or under way, the impact on the governments in London and Paris was to accentuate the predisposition to urge Czechoslovakia to make concessions quickly and on a generous scale.*° The belief that an imminent German invasion had barely been averted itself served td-reinforce the urgency of the situation, and the remedy seemed to be not more warnings to Berlin but some added military preparations?3! and heavier pressure on Pragud. Chamberlain wrote at the time: “I cannot doubt in my own mind (1) that the German government made all preparations for a coup, (2) that in the end they decided after getting our warnings that the risks were too great, (3) that the general view that this was just what had happened made them conscious that they had lost prestige, and (4) that they are venting their spite on us because they feel that we have got the credit for giving them a check.”?°2 The belief that Hitler might well react to any repetition of the warnings he had received during the May Crisis by taking immediate action against Czechoslovakia would restrain the British government from that course throughout the summer and until the very last moment when, after the Godesberg meeting, wart was again seen as immediately

imminent (and again in August 1939). The first of many suggestions from Germany urging a firm British stand to hold back Hitler, who wanted to obliterate Czechoslovakia rather than help the Sudeten Germans, was forwarded to Lord Halifax by Wickham Steed at this time,” but this was perceived as too risky a route.4 Instead, the French

were cautioned not to take the British warnings to Germany as anything more than an emergency measure to save the situation, while Czechoslovakia would be urged most strongly to make some really major concessions.?*° The permanent undersecretary in the Foreign Office went so far as to tell the Hungarian chargé in London on 24 May that the German demands—which at this point meant Henlein’s Karlovy Vary speech—were justified and should be granted practically in toto.7*° On the, following day, Lord Halifax discussed the problem first in the cabinet and later with representatives of several of the Dominions.”?7 He was clearly casting about for a way to find a solution that would deal with the Sudeten German problem preferably within Czechoslovakia but if necessary 230. None of this was due to any pro-German attitude in the government; the cabinet protocols and Foreign Office documents make this most obvious. When Henderson quoted von Neurath as saying the Communists controlled the Czechoslovak generals and had led them to start the May Crisis, no one in the Foreign Office believed it and Henderson

was

so informed

(C 5063/1941/18,

FO

371/21722;

cf. C 5425/1941/18,

FO

371/21723). The strength of anti-German feelings in England at this time is commented on in a letter from Gerl to Hess, 1 May 1938, Nuremberg document 3752-PS, pp. 21-22, National Archives. (Note the 31 August 1936 statement of Hess that Dr. Franz Gerl’s trips to and contacts in England were authorized by him and known to Hitler, ibid., p. 77).

~C 5222/1941/18, FO 371/21722. 3% 28 cabinet 128-30, impress critical.

May 1938, Feiling, p. 354. Cf. Harvey Diaries, 24 and 26 May 1938, p. 144. The discussion of the British meeting of Sunday, 22 May, in Ian Colvin, The Chamberlain Cabinet (New York: Taplinger, 1971), pp. which concludes with the suggestion that the emergency meeting was perhaps a formality designed to the Germans, overlooks the fact that the meeting was called on 21 May when the situation looked very

233. Henry Wickham Steed to Halifax, 23 May 1938, C 5117/1941/18, FO 371/21722. 234, At the time of the weekend crisis, the famous American flyer Charles Lindbergh was in London spreading tales about the German air force being ten times as strong as the British, French, and Soviet air forces put together (Nicolson, 22 May 1938, p. 343; the account in Lindbergh, p. 28, is not very useful).

235. An account in Celovsky, pp. 223-26. On the warning to the French, see also Harvey Diaries, 22 May 1938, p. 144. For the utter confusion in British military planning for the contingency of France coming to the aid of Czechoslovakia, see the War Office memorandum of 7 June 1938, C 5491/1941/18, FO 371/21723. 236. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 222. There is no reference to this in the Cadogan diary, but it is entirely consistent with its general tenor. For 24 May it records: ““H[alifax] wants to sever French-Czech and Czech-Soviet

connections. He is quite right, but I tell him this can only be done by some form of ‘neutralization.’ We'll examine it” (p. 80). 237. The cabinet record 26 (38) is in C 5155/1941/18, representatives in C 5209/4815/18, FO 371/21770.

FO 371/21722; the meeting with the Dominions

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outside, one that would be accepted by the Czechs—under French pressure which he was certain would be forthcoming—and that would then lead to a situation in which the settlement of the Sudeten question would bring about a neutral status for Czechoslovakia, like that of Switzerland, in which Czechoslovakia would neither need nor want

alliances with France and the Soviet Union. This would in turn both telieve France of a burden and Germany of an alleged grievance. There was some optimism in London in view of a renewed contact between Henlein and the Czechoslovak authorities and considerable discussion of various possible schemes for bringing about a lasting settlement.258 It must be added that at the same time that the British were trying very hard to have Prague move to a major offer, they were also using the channel between Sir Robert Vansittart and Henlein to urge restraint on the Sudeten Germans. Since Henlein claimed to be still willing to settle for what he had demanded when in London, and since the British had been given to understand by the Czechoslovak minister that these demands could be accepted, it is understandable that Sir Robert with the approval of Lord Halifax counseled Henlein to try to reach agreement, while the foreign secretary encouraged Prague to meet those demands. While the British returned to their effort to secure a Czechoslovak-German agteement with greater urgency but some confidence that agreement was possible, the French reacted to the weekend crisis with nothing less than panic.” They proclaimed fidelity to the alliance with Czechoslovakia in public while privately castigating the Prague government for calling up reserves without prior consultation.**! Bonnet even appears to have deliberately read an at least slightly cooperative Polish attitude during the crisis as completely negative.”4* As soon as the immediate crisis of the weekend was over, the French government seconded the British efforts to pressure Czechoslovakia and took the lead in urging the prompt demobilization of those called up during the emergency.** The French government from this time on became even more insistent than the British, thus reversing the situation of 1937; but the collapse of French support was either not recog-

nized or understood in Prague, or the authorities there believed that it could or should be 238. Note that the Foreign Office memorandum on the possibility of neutralizing Czechoslovakia printed in B.D., 3d, 1, Appendix IV, was prepared at this time, see C 6039/1941/18, FO 371/21725. An earlier draft began with the statement, subsequently dropped, that in any European war over Czechoslovakia, “the outcome

. in present circumstances would be at best doubtful and might be disastrous.” Though sent to Phipps, Henderson, and Newton on 9 June, it had been drafted earlier. The comment on it by Vansittart, warning that

Russia must be included among the guarantors of any status for Czechoslovakia lest the Soviet Union feel isolated as Germany wished, is dated 26 May (C 5235/1941/18, FO 371/21723). It was at this time that Sir William Strang, then head of the Central Department of the Foreign Office, was sent to Prague and Berlin to explore the situation; there is a brief reference in his memoirs, Home and Abroad (London: André Deutsch,

1956), p. 133, n. 2. 239. Sir Robert’s minute of 26 May and Halifax’s telegram to Newton

No. 125 of 27 May are in C

5260/1941/18, FO 371/21723. This telegram, like a number of documents on Vansittart’s role in the Sudeten question in 1938, does not appear in the published British documents, but see B.D., 3d, 1, No. 320. For

Sudeten German party efforts through Colonel Christie and Vansittart to secure greater British pressure on

Czechoslovakia at this time, see Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 145—47. 240. Celovsky, pp. 223-24; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 225; Osusky tel. of 22 May 1938, Czechoslovak role in document in T-120, 1039/1809/412195—96. There is a useful account of Bonnet’s general

Adamthwaite, pp. 98-106.

241. D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 402, 414, 432, 439. 81-99, 105— 242. Lewis Namier, In the Nazi Era (London: Macmillan, 1952), pp. 183-86; Lukasiewicx Papers, pp. on 28 May 6. The seventh paragraph of Lukasiewicz’s summary of the whole episode sent to Colonel Beck is followed which Namiet of interpretation the to justification contemporary give to (ibid., pp. 99-104) appears

here; but see Celovsky, p. 235, n. 3, and D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 418, 458.

:

Bullitt; see his appeal of 22 243. The panic in Paris appears to have infected the American ambassador, William

ibid., pp. May to Roosevelt in U.S. 1938, 1:509-12; a subsequent report on French pressure on Czechoslovakia, indeed would France that conviction his of out grew concern Bullitt’s that 517-19. It must be noted, however, declare war on Germany if the Germans attacked Czechoslovakia.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

disregarded. It is not entirely clear whether the May Crisis did or did not give the Czechoslovak government a false sense of security. They most assuredly missed what turned out to be the last opportunity to seize the initiative.?244 The immediate aftermath of the show of internal unity and external support could be utilized by the government of Czechoslovakia in one of two ways: One was to see it as a chance to make a major offer from a position of strength in the hope that this would either settle the question or, if refused by Henlein, reveal to all beyond a doubt that Germany wanted the destruction of Czechoslovakia, not the welfare of the Sudeten Germans. The other route was to negotiate but

with minor concessions, using the example of the weekend crisis as a sample to show how Germany could be made to back down if it came to a crunch. Evidence is not available as to whether both these alternatives were seriously considered in Prague;?*° all we know is that whether because of preference, fear of domestic opposition, or belief that once major concessions were made, the whole state might well disintegrate, the

Czechoslovak government in practice adopted the latter course.7#° In spite of urgings from London and Paris, the Czechoslovak authorities made no immediate offer at all, using as explanation that they had not been given the formal demands of the Sudeten Germans in a written request, and thereby implicitly yielding the initiative to the Germans.?4”7 When the Sudeten German party handed in its demands on 8 June, the Czechoslovak government analyzed these and began lengthy negotiations about the details.748 Actually submitting a formal set of demands was, of course, a very risky step for the Sudeten German party; there was always the danger that the Prague government would demolish the whole German strategy by simply saying yes to all or most of them.”4? After all, the Czechoslovak documents show that the Prague authorities

believed the Sudeten German party’s thought Germany not yet ready to feared that Prague might be tempted himself went to Germany again on

strategy to be one of ever increasing demands and move militarily. The Sudeten leadership certainly to take the risk of exposing their strategy. Henlein 3 June, before taking the chance of having his

demands granted, in order to ask What could be done to avoid agreement in that con-

tingency.**° His own proposal was that the Sudeten German party would then turn to a demand that Czechoslovakia’s foreign policy be changed, in the anticipation that this 244. See Hodza’s meeting with Henlein and Karl Hermann Frank on 23 May 1938, Kral, Die Deutschen, No.

140. 245. The long letter of Osusky to Krofta of 1 August 1938 (Kral, Minchen, No. 123; a snippet in Berber, No.

146) reviewing developments since March leaves one with the impression that there was no such consideration. 246. Perhaps the Czechoslovak record of Benes’s conversation with Hisenlohr of 16 February 1938 is important evidence on the attitude of the president. At that time he said that he would never negotiate with Germany about the German minority, that he would not negotiate with Henlein or the Sudeten German party, nor would he negotiate about it with England and France. He would never agree to national autonomy nor would he negotiate about it with anyone (Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 89; Eisenloht’s report in G.D., D, 2, No. 57,

does not make Bene& out to be quite so negative). The text does not sound as if this was simply a position assumed for negotiating purposes. 247. Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 88, 90 (part in Berber, No. 139), 92. In the last of these documents, a report by

Osusky of 13 June, Bonnet appears much mote favorable suggests he was. Celovsky, pp. 226-27, 252-54, gives an that the Prague government let the Sudeten Germans take 248. No useful purpose would be served by recounting

to the Czechoslovak position than all other evidence account of the developments but overlooks the fact the lead. these here; Czechoslovak documents on them are

published in Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 91, 93, 96.

249. Note the evasive responses to Czechoslovak Prime Minister HodZa on 6 April in this regard (Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 113). Although the analogy to Serbia’s fate during and after the World War often appears in the record, in no instance is the great diplomatic advantage accruing to Belgrade from its conciliatory response to the Austrian ultimatum mentioned. 250. G.D., D, 2, No. 237. For earlier internal Sudeten German party discussion, see Kral, Die Deutschen, No.

144.

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would be refused, but no decision on that question was made at the time.25!

Henlein could have spared himself this anxiety; the Czechoslovak government did not say yes to his written demands. It was not until September that Bene’ produced a program, referred to generally as the “Fourth Plan,” which even at that late date threw the Sudeten German party into turmoil and which, if offered in some form in late May or eatly June, would have dramatically exposed Hitler’s intentions at a time of Czechoslovakia’s rather than Germany’s choosing. Instead of taking such a route, if it was evet seriously considered, Prague trod the path of detailed negotiations on specific portions of the Sudeten German party’s demands, thus unintentionally falling in with the strategy Hitler had prescribed.

that the 251. The demands then being prepared all dealt with internal affairs. Von Weizsacker commented answer to this puzzle had best be given when the situation actually occurred.

Chapter 25

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia

Part 2

he three months following the May Crisis saw a continuation of anxious diplomatic concern with Czechoslovakia. What was the policy of Germany during this period? To the external world, Germany presented a picture of pacific assurances mixed with bellicose propaganda. On 12 June Rudolf Hess combined the two in a speech at Stettin that included both themes: a vehement denunciation of Czechoslovakia was accompanied by an equally vehement denial of warlike intentions.’ Such tones did not convince everyone in the British Foreign Office, but the speech conformed so closely to the personal impressions and beliefs of Sir Nevile Henderson that he assured Lord Halifax he thought it “accurately represented Hitler’s own views.”? The German propaganda campaign against Czechoslovakia moved forward with constant emphasis on the question of the Sudeten Germans.> The acceleration of work on the German fortifications in the west, however, provides a better clue to Hitler’s real intentions.

On 31 May the commander-in-chief of the German

army transmitted

to the

German commandet-in-chief in the west, General Wilhelm Adam, Hitler’s instructions

to get 12,000 additional field fortifications built by the fall of the same year, a project Adam called impossible in spite of the promised support of the Todt organization and the National Labor Service (Reichsarbeitsdiensi).4 Hitler, however, pursued the subject personally and with great energy. On 14 June Hitler reviewed the subject at length with Goring, who had just spent several days touring the western fortifications.» When 1. The text is in Dokumente der deutschen Politik, 6:289—92. Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 39. 2. Henderson’s letter to Halifax, 16 June 1938, B.D., 3d, 1, No. 419. In all fairness, it should be added that

Henderson also relied on the fact that Getmany was not yet ready for the major war that he himself believed would result from a German attack on Czechoslovakia. The ambassador’s miscalculation was that he thought unnamed extremists rather than Hitler himself might engineer an incident that would precipitate a conflict. For a report on the negative reaction of the Foreign Office to the Hess speech, see the report from London, possibly by Karl Heinz Abshagen, of 18June 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £.407. 3. Accounts in Hagemann, pp. 348-77; Joachim Leuschner, Volk and Raum: Zum Stil der nationalsozialistischen

Aussenpolitik, (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1958), pp. 51-54. 4. Adam’s report in Munich, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 6, p. 1.

5. Sekretar des Fihrers, “Daten aus alten Notizbiichern”: “14.6. [1938] Grosse Besprechung mit Goring tiber

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General Adam reported on 30 June about the impossibility of the rapid progtess demanded, Hitler insisted, gave a greater role—and subsequently greater credit—to Todt, and was moved to write his memorandum of 1 July on the fortification system.¢ Though it was of course designed to provide a real defensive cover for the attack on Czechoslovakia if a general war did take place, there was a substantial and deliberate element of bluff in this program: the hope that knowledge of the fortifications would discourage French intervention altogether.’ The information on the extension of the German construction program in the west to include the Belgian and Dutch borders, officially given to the Belgians on 10 June, must surely be seen as a part of the general effort to give the impression of an invincible barrier which could no more be pierced there than any other portion of the border.’ There is no need to trace this element in Hitler’s strategy in detail; its culmination came at the Nuremberg party rally in September when Hitler boasted publicly and extensively about the enormous strength of the great barrier in the west—when he had just been told privately that it could not withstand a determined attack.? Hitler’s absolute conviction in the summer of 1938 that he could attack Czechoslovakia without precipitating a general war can be seen in his reaction to the reports of two close associates who went to London in July 1938. Albert Forster, the Gauleiter of the Danzig National Socialists, spent 8 to 15 July in England. Since he was known to be a personal associate of Hitler, the authorities in London made every effort to show him something of British industrial and naval strength and to point out to him the bad impression German persecution of the Jews and the Christian churches made in England. As for international affairs, he was told not only that Britain would prefer a quiet evolution of the Danzig issue but that the Sudeten German question would also have to be settled peacefully.'!° The German ambassador to London, Herbert von Dirksen, tried to impress the ardent National Socialist with the same general warning, namely, that England wanted peace but would fight if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia. Forster was impressed by what he saw and heard; he returned to Germany determined to tell Hitler that Britain was not bluffing and would indeed go to war if Germany insisted on an invasion of Czechoslovakia—only to be confronted by Hitler’s certainty that this was not so. Forster himself was converted back to Hitler’s perception by 22 July, a few days after his return from England." Ironically, Forster’s initial worries about the likelihood of British intervention in any war initiated by a German invasion of die West-Befestigung” (p. 24), Library of Congress, Manuscripts Division. On Goring’s trip, see Lipski Papers, p. 370. Cf. Engel Diary, 25 June 1938, p. 26, 14 August 1938, p. 32; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 97. 6. For the meeting of 30 June, see Adam’s report cited in n. 4, above. For Hitler’s attention to the details of Westwall construction, see the material prepared in response to his questions of 9 June 1938 in 388-PS, TMWC, 25:443. For the memorandum of 1 July, see above, pp. 526-27. Cf. Engel Diary, pp. 27-29. 7. Cf. Keitel Papers, pp. 193-94. 8. D.D.B., 5, No. 18. See also ibid., No. 21.

seats

9. Speech of 12 September 1938 in Domains, 1:904; on Adam’s prior warning, see his statement cited in n. 4, above, and Keitel Papers, pp. 194-95; G.D., D, 7:552-55. 10. B.D., 3d, 1:653-55; U.S.S.R., Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Documents and Materials Relating to the Exve of the Second World War (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1948) (hereafter cited as D.M.), 1, No. 13;

Cadogan Diary, 14 July 1938, p. 86; C 6317/197/55, FO 371/21801; C 7024, C 7313/197/55, FO 371/21802.

The Labor leader, Hugh Dalton, also saw Forster at Vansittart’s request and warned the Germans not to repeat

the mistake of 1914 (Dalton Diary, 13 July 1938). For Churchill’s meeting with Forster, see Gilbert, Churchill, 5:955-57.

July 1938, ae 11. Dirksen, pp. 217-18; Burckhardt, pp. 169-73; G.D., D, 2, No. 307; Dirksen report 2901 of15 in London, Fitz 120, 1315/2371/0496052-53 (cited in G.D., D, 5, No. 49, n. 1). The German press attaché

in his Randolph, attended some of the functions arranged for Forster. While he does not mention this (Fitz memoirs, he does report on his own efforts to convince Goebbels that the British were not bluffing

Randolph, pp. 200-208).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Czechoslovakia induced Hitler to exert himself specially in order to persuade his friend of the opposite view. Hitler was so successful with his admirer that the Danzig party leader thereafter became an outspoken advocate of Hitler’s view. In fact, he became so vehement in his assertions that Hitler was correct in his belief that England was bluffing that reports of Forstet’s assessment served to redouble British attempts in September to convince Hitler otherwise, while they alarmed those within the German government who were concerned over the imminent danger of a general war.’ If Forster was thus quickly reconverted to Hitler’s belief that England could be disregarded as she was only bluffing, another close associate was not so readily influenced, but his failure to convert Hitler testifies to the constancy of the Fuhrer’s beliefs. Fritz Wiedemann, who had been Hitler’s superior in the war, was appointed adjutant on Hitler’s immediate staff in 1934. Interested in foreign affairs, he had been in London

several times, most recently in May, when he had observed the May Crisis in the British capital, and again in June.!3 In June the idea of a visit by Goring to London was being advanced; it is not clear whether the idea originated in private British circles or with

Goring himself. It is also not possible to reconstruct the relationship of the idea of a G6ting visit to Forster’s trip.!4 There is, however, no doubt that from the beginning a key figure in making arrangements for the trip by Wiedemann to explore the possibility of a visit by Géring to London was the Princess Stephanie Hohenlohe. A friend of Wiedemann who had contacts in London and was known to Hitler, the Princess was able to have the issue placed before Lord Halifax in such a fashion that Wiedemann could

count on being received by the British foreign secretary.!° The British reserved comment on any visit by Goring, but they were willing to engage in a canvassing of the possibility in a manner that did not commit them. Every12. B.D., 3d, 2:689-92, and No. 775; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 410, 416; 7:546; Weizsacker, Erinnerungen, p. 179;

Burckhatdt, pp. 176-87. It should be noted that the report on Forster’s recital of Hitler’s opinion to Burckhardt was confirmed to the latter by von Weizsacker, who urged him to have the British warn Hitler by a letter from Chamberlain, an idea discussedsin London at a meeting on 9 September of Chamberlain, Halifax, Simon, Vansittart, Hoare, Wilson, and Cadogan. See the cover note to the first document cited in this footnote in C 9525/1941/18, FO 371/21737. The meeting is summarized in Harvey Diaries, 8-9 September 1938, pp.

171-73. In a letter from Hugo Neumann to the magazine Der Monat of April 1953 (5:102-4), there is a report on a trip of Albert Forster and Ludwig Noé of the Danzig Shipbuilding Company to England on Hitler’s behalf to assess whether or not the British were bluffing in their guarantee of Poland. I am inclined to think there is a confusion here with the 1938 trip. 13, See Wiedemann, p. 126; Cadogan Diary, p. 87, n. 42; and Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 220. There are also some incidental references to these earlier trips in Wiedemann’s own documents on his July 1938 visit. I found these documents in 1951 among Wiedemann’s papers in the Manuscripts Division of the Library of Congress; they were then—since the appropriate volume of G.D. had already appeared—included in D, 7, as Appendix

Ill, H. 14, Wiedemann’s assertion in his memoirs (p. 158) that Forster brought the idea back from his London journey cannot be correct because Forster was still in England on the day Wiedemann asked Hitler for permission to go to England to check out the possibility of Géring’s going. The suggestion of Wilhelm H6ttl (under the pseudonym Walter Hagen), Die geheime Front (Linz: Niebelungen-Verlag, 1950), pp. 148-49, that Hitler took the initiative and that the purpose was to cut off Henlein’s contacts in London by developing a private line of his own flies in the face of all the evidence. The suggestion of Helmuth K. G. Rénnefarth, Die Sudetenkrise in der Internationalen Politik (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1961), 1:362-63, that Géring may have taken the initiative after reading a detailed report by Helmuth Wohlthat on his conversations in London during June (G.D., D, 2, No.

279) is conceivably correct. 15. The fairest account of the background of the former wife of Prince Friedrich Franz HohenloheWaldenburg-Schillingsfiirst is in Celovsky, p. 277, n. 1. For the Czechoslovak minister’s view of the princess, see Kral, Minchen, No. 110. Lord Halifax’s accounts of his conversations with Lady Snowden on 6 July, with

Oliver Hoare (brother of Samuel Hoare) on 8 July, and with Princess Hohenlohe on 14 July 1938, together with comments by Samuel Hoate, Sargent, and Cadogan in C 7344/7262/18, FO 371/21781. The notes of

Halifax for Chamberlain on the atrangements for Wiedemann’s visit are in PREM 1/330, ff.60—62. See also Harvey Diaries, 11-16 July 1938, pp. 161-62.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

SS

thing points to the conclusion that Chamberlain, Halifax, and their advisers were willing to explore any avenue of approach but considered a peaceful settlement of the Czechoslovak question a prerequisite to any setious resumption of the Anglo-German negotiations that had been broken off by Hitler’s rejection of the British approach in March." It was in the context of such a possible resumption that the British leaders looked at the whole question of a Goring visit; von Neurath’s planned trip to London had been canceled on a pretext, and the British had seen all they ever wanted of von Ribbentrop. The possibility of reopening contact with the German government through another route thus had some attraction, but much can be learned about the evolution of

British policy by contrasting the extraordinary eagerness of Eden to have von Neurath visit London and the determination of Chamberlain to have Halifax see Hitler in LOS

with the cautious reaction to the 1938 soundings from Germany.!7 The intervening annexation of Austria and the contemporary dispute over Czechoslovakia now made the leadership in London quite insistent that any new visit must be carefully prepared. The vatious accounts of Wiedemann’s conversation differ somewhat in detail, but they uniformly stress the importance attached by Lord Halifax to a pledge from Germany that there would be no precipitate action against Czechoslovakia. The implication was obvious and fully understood by Wiedemann: there could be no accommodation between England and Germany, and there was no point to trying to arrange one, if Germany launched a military attack on the Czechoslovak state. It was, of course, at precisely this point that there was a great dilemma for the German emissary. Wiedemann had received Hitler’s approval to go to London to sound out British attitudes, but he had himself been present at the meeting of 28 May at which Hitler had announced his determination to attack Czechoslovakia.'® Wiedemann’s rather tortuous effort in his memoirs to cover his duplicity in assuring the British that there was time for a peaceful settlement and that only outside and unforeseen developments could induce Germany to resort to force, must be understood as a reflection of his unwillingness to admit he deliberately misled the British on what they considered the key issue—a negotiated settlement of the Czechoslovak question—in what appears to have been his own as well as Géring’s hope at the time that the resumption of Anglo-German negotiations would in turn bring about a dropping of Hitler’s aggressive intentions. Wiedemann’s and Goring’s deliberate effort to avoid informing von Ribbentrop of the whole project would appear to be largely due to their recognition of von Ribbentrop’s opposition to any agreement with England as well as their hope of moving Hitler in that direction by short-circuiting the key foreign policy adviser known to have other views. The outcome of Wiedemann’s conversation with Lord Halifax and Sir Alexander Cadogan was, however, quite different from what might have been expected.'? The 16. Note the response of Lord Halifax on 23 June 1938 to Viscount Astor, who had cited von Dirksen’s comment that Chamberlain’s speech after the Azschluss closed the door to further negotiations: “German

action itself closed it for the time being, and it will only be possible to open it again as the effect of that action

wears off, and if there is some confidence that such methods Waldorf Astor, 23 June 1938, Halifax Papers, FO 800/309.

will not be repeated.” Halifax to Viscount

17. It must be remembered that whatever the actual origins of the idea of a Goring visit, within the British government of the time it was thought that the approach originated from the German side. 18. Wiedemann’s account of the 28 May meeting is in Nuremberg document 3037-PS, National Archives.

No. iv; Wiedemann, 19. In addition to the sources previously cited, see B.D., 3d, 1, Nos. 510, 511; 7, Annex IV, Das Spiel um Deutschland pp. 158-67; Dirksen, pp. 215-17; G.D., D, 2:439, 445, 450; Feiling, p. 356; Fritz Hesse,

Diaries, 11— (Munich: List, 1953), p. 125; D.M., 2:155-56; Cadogan Diary, 17 and 18 July 1938, pp. 86-88; Harvey 21 July Henderson, to Cadogan and 1938, July 20 of (38) 33 Conclusion Cabinet 161-64; pp. 1938, July 18

Strategy ofAppeasement 1938, in C 7344/7262/18, FO 371/21781, The account in Keith Middlemas, The not correct in its general (Chicago: Quadrangle, 1972), pp. 264-66, provides some additional evidence but is

the latter on 28 July, outlines. General Beck’s review of the Wiedemann mission, based on a conversation with

on the visit received by the is discussed below; it is in Bundesarchiv, Nachlass Beck, H 08-28/4. Information

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

British were

somewhat

reassured

by Wiedemann’s

protestations

of German

pacific

intent; in spite of his refusal to give the British any hope that there would be a German

renunciation of the use of force against Czechoslovakia, his own preferences and hopes deluded the British on the one point on which Wiedemann was lying. When Lord Halifax was in Paris—for the occasion of a royal visit to France—on the day after his meeting with Wiedemann, he and the French foreign minister could only contrast Wiedemann’s assurances with the warnings they were all getting about German military activities.?° As for the possibility of any follow up in the diplomatic sphere, the various procedures for future Anglo-German negotiations that had been discussed in London by Wiedemann and Lord Halifax were quickly terminated by Hitler’s total disinterest. In recollections written after Hitler had “exiled” him to the post of consul general in San Francisco, Wiedemann referred to this episode as a sign of the Fuhrer’s unwillingness to reach any agreement with England; Hitler had allowed Wiedemann only five minutes to report on his trip and had refused any visit by Goring as out of the question.?! Those recollections were penned over a year after the event; when Wiedemann talked with the chief of staff of the German army, General Ludwig Beck, a few days after he had been in London and Berchtesgaden, he told Beck of Hitler’s brusque rejection of any negotiations and confirmed the general’s recognition that “the Fuhrer remains of the opinion that a wart must be conducted against Czechoslovakia, even if France and England intervene, something which he [Hitler] does not believe [will happen].”?? The very mission that had been initiated with the hope of arranging negotiations for a settlement led to confusion on the side of the Western Powers, revealed Hitler’s determination to go to war regardless of any danger of British and French intervention, and spurred on those inside the German government opposed to the risks Hitler was prepared to incur. General Beck’s warning of early May and Hitler’s rejection of it have already been

mentioned. Hitler’s address of 28 May in which he expressed his determination to attack Czechoslovakia had been heard by Beck, who promptly responded in a detailed memorandum in which he expressed his basic agreement with Germany’s need for space and the desirability of a forceful solution of the Czechoslovak question, but insisted that Germany was not ready for war, that the conflict would be general, and that the whole German military planning mechanism was faulty.7? The anxiety of the chief-of-staff was heightened further when, almost in response to these warnings, Hitler’s immediate staff—the High Command of the Armed Forces (OKW)—issued the revised version of the plan for the attack on Czechoslovakia on the following day.** Again Beck penned a critique of the proposed operation, now more vehement than earlier, and rejected both the general estimate of the political situation and the details of military planning contained in the order. In denouncing the directive to von Brauchitsch, the commander-inchief of the army, Beck asserted that the whole scheme was so poorly conceived and developed that the general staff of the army would have to reject any and all

Czechoslovak government is in a short memorandum

of 21 July 1938, T-120, 1041/1809/413989; cf. Kral,

Miinchen, No. 109.

20, B.D.. 3d, 1, No. 523. Cf. G.D., D, 2, No. 308; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 237. 21. G.D., D, 7:545; cf. Wiedemann, p. 166.

22. Emphasis in the original, see above, n. 19. The text of this document in Foerster, pp. 106-8, has been rearranged; in the original, the passage quoted here is the second sentence. See also Wiedemann’s comments to von Weizsacker on 22 August cited in Wergsacker-Papiere, p. 137. 23. The memorandum of 29 May is in Bundesarchiv, H 08-28/3. Parts have been published in Foerster, pp. 90-94; there is a good summary and discussion in Miller, pp. 309-12; cf. Engel Diary, pp. 22-25.

24. This is the new version of “Operation Green” of 30 May 1938, text in TMWC, 25:433-39. The opening lines of Beck’s memorandum of 3 June, cited below, refer explicitly to this document.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

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responsibility for it.° Beck wanted von Brauchitsch to work for changes in both the military command structure as it was evolving in 1938 and the intention of attacking Czechoslovakia; and he attempted to reinforce these views by staging a general staff exercise which showed that the intended operation would entail disaster for Germany.”6 There was, however, no prospect of rallying von Brauchitsch to any clear position that might thwart Hitler’s policy. Beck had tried before, he would try again; and his successor as well as others inside and outside the German army would try to move von Brauchitsch. But the man without a backbone could not be provided with one by his associates. When taking over his position in February from the besmitched von Pritsch, the new commander-in-chief had sold himself and sold out the army to Hitler. Von Brauchitsch was accepting financial assistance from Hitler so he could divorce his wife and matty a woman whose past was hardly better than that of the woman whose marriage to von Blomberg had led to the latter’s disgrace.2” That event had provided the occasion for the dismissal of von Fritsch and von Brauchitsch’s own appointment; he was therefore hardly the one to stand up to Hitler. It was accordingly quite in character for von Brauchitsch to assist Hitler in surmounting the crisis of confidence in the German army over the disgraceful treatment of von Fritsch at a special meeting held at Barth in Pomerania on 13 June. Following the complete exoneration of von Fritsch, there were serious rumblings in the German officer corps about the shabby treatment accorded a man who was generally revered; and in late May and early June reports of such disaffection and the possibility of collective resignations by high level commanders reached Hitler. The Fihrer carefully used the international danger he was himself creating to head off disaffection.”8 First von Brauchitsch told the assembled high ranking officers that war with Czechoslovakia would soon come and that a vast program of building fortifications in the west would shield Germany in that operation. Under these circumstances no one should leave his post, and any who might be thinking of it should reconsider. After this shocker—for many of those present had not hitherto been given any such explicit indication that war was ahead—Hitler regaled the audience with a carefully contrived set of fairy tales about the von Fritsch case which appears to have gone over rather well. As Harold Deutsch has put it: “Hitler had again shown his exceptional insight into the tendency of men torn between conscience and self-interest to welcome what made it easier to opt for the Late eee, Once von Brauchitsch had totally identified himself in front of the officer corps with Hitler’s handling of the two crises, one internal and the other external, and with this

joining of the two, it is hardly surprising that he would not agree to Beck’s logically opposite conclusions from the same junction. Von Brauchitsch, like Hitler, saw the imminent war against Czechoslovakia as a fine pretext for not reopening the messy scandal which he had ridden to the highest position in the army. Beck—who had not been present at Barth—was all the more alarmed about Hitler’s insistence on going to 25. The full text has been published in Miiller, pp. 651-54.

26. Ibid., pp. 313-14.

27. The fact that von Brauchitsch was tied to Hitler by a private scandal was known to at least some people at the time. Vansittart noted on 9 August 1938: “Hitler has a stranglehold on Brauchitsch of some private and dis-

creditable kind; whether it is connected with the fact that Brauchitsch is billed for divorce, or with something

army dirtier and rifer still, I am at present unable to say.” The conclusion Sir Robert drew, that the German 9591/1941/18, FO would do whatever it was told without resistance, was not entitely correct, however (C

poe that the 371/21737). For a subsequent reference to the matter by Hitler himself—clear evidence of the him, even in Fiihrer was both aware of the situation of von Brauchitsch and quite willing to throw it up to front of subordinate officers—see the entry under 20 August 1941 in Engel Diary, pp. 109-10. 28. An excellent account of the meeting is in Deutsch, pp. 401-6.

29. Ibid., p. 406.

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wat, and coupled this alarm with an increasing concern about the unscrupulous procedures and policies of the regime’s domestic institutions. Beck’s more vehement formulations of July stand as a memorial to his own courage and judgment, but they could not move von Brauchitsch. Beck’s temonstrances culminated in the recommendation of 16 July that pressure be applied by a sort of general strike of the generals if Hitler persisted in his course; this may well have reminded von Brauchitsch of the mass resignation threats he had just warded off and led only to Beck’s resignation.*° As Sir Lewis Namier commented on Beck’s effort to inspire von Brauchitsch to a more responsible role: “Sense, courage, and character cannot be transmitted from him who has them to him

who has not.””?! Neither Beck’s appeal and warning against the dangers of a world war seen as the unavoidable by-product of a German attack on Czechoslovakia nor similar warnings by Admiral Guse, the chief of staff of the German navy, and by Ernst von Weizsacker, now

the secretary of state in the German Foreign Ministry, altered the course Hitler was determined to follow.32 Beck was allowed to resign; Guse was transferred by Raeder to an unimportant position? Only von Weizsacker remained at his post, encouraged by von Ribbentrop to have greater faith in Hitler’s assessment of the situation but actually retaining his doubts. The state secretary as well as some of the other military opponents of Hitler’s risky schemes would resort to other means of attempting to avert war, but in the meantime the military preparations moved forward. Beck’s opposition to the proposed attack on Czechoslovakia had not led to a refusal to participate in the needed preparatory work. On the contrary, the army was indeed going ahead with its preparations.** While at Hitler’s headquarters the general problems of a wart against Czechoslovakia with or without intervention of other powers were being examined,*> German society as a whole was affected by the necessary acceleration of military preparations. A series of measures in June and July was designed to improve the utilization of German manpower resources, but such steps were only a portion of the broader reorganization necessitated by the impact of speeded up armaments programs on an economy already at full employment and one in which the government was reluctant to cut too deeply into civilian consumption and prestige projects. It is no coincidence that the months of June, July, and August 1938 saw a substantial redirection and reorganization of the structure of G6ring’s Four-Year Plan with a shift of emphasis from long-term plans for autarchy to more immediate concerns of economic mobilization.*® The fact that Goring himself would as soon have seen Czechoslovakia succumb to Germany without war, or if by war, then only by a carefully isolated campaign, certainly did not mean that he was in any way holding back the preparations for a conflict. On the 30. On the developments of 13-29 July 1938, see Miller, pp. 317-33; cf. Engel Diary, 18 and 24 July 1938, pp. 27-28. 31. In the Nazi Era, p. 32. 32. Guse’s memorandum of 17 July 1938 is quoted extensively by Helmut Krausnick in Vol/macht des Gewissens (Munich: Rinn, 1956), 1:311-13. Guse’s operations officer, Helmut Heye, expressed similar doubts in even stronger language. Von Weizsacker’s memoranda of early June, 12 July, and 21 July, in G.D., D, 2, Nos. 259 (cf. IMWC, 39:98), 288, 304, 374 (see also Namier, In the Nazi Era, pp. 72-74). For a contemporary appreciation by the French ambassador in Berlin, see U.S. 7938, 1:61—62.

33. Diulffer’s speculation (p. 476, n. 18) that there was a connection between the effective end of Guse’s naval career and his views on the implications of Hitler’s plans is probably correct. The account in Salewski, 1:44-45, is rather weak. Cf. Walter Baum, “Marine, Nationalsozialismus und Widerstand,” Verteliahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte,

11, No. 1 (Jan. 1963), 22-23, 34. Beck alludes to this in his own memorandum

of 16 July; the staff exercise he conducted shows, on the

other hand, that he fervently hoped no such attack would actually be launched (cf. Miiller, p. 313). Note the French strategic appreciation of 13 July 1938 in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 202. 35. TMWC, 25:445-60. 36. A useful account in Petzina, pp. 116-21.

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contrary, the German air force was carrying forward its own planning in the summer of 1938 on the assumption that a war over Czechoslovakia would entail war with England and France.*’ The record of Géring’s own analysis of the situation on 8 July cannot be taken literally in all respects as he was speaking to a large group of aircraft industry leaders, but other evidence suggests that his comments generally reflected both his views at the time and his aspirations for the future.28 Goring expressed the opinion that Germany had attained and could maintain superiority in airpower development and looked forward to the day when Germany had the kind of bombers that could fly to New York and return, Production had to be speeded up, and the aircraft industry would have to subordinate professional and commercial rivalry to the common endeavor.? As for the immediate future, Goring thought that there was a slight possibility of isolating a wat against Czechoslovakia. He knew that France and Britain were reluctant to fight, but he recognized that attitudes in England were hardening, especially since the Anschluss and in anticipation of further German moves if Czechoslovakia were once destroyed. Goring,

therefore, summarized both the short-run and long-term prospects of having the isolated small wars Hitler preferred at 10-15 percent as compared with an 80-90 percent chance of a world war.#? In such a war, Germany could triumph and be the world’s leading power, or lose and be crushed forever. Goring thought that Germany had a chance to win, or at least he claimed to have that belief. Certainly the German air force would be a major factor in any hope of victory the country might have, and he was not about to forgo any measure that could strengthen it.41 Géring appears to have had reservations about the risk of war with England,” but the preparations of the Luftwaffe went forward. The basic plan of the air force would be a surprise attack on Czechoslovak aitfields combined with a massive bombing of Prague.*? The fate intended for Prague would befall Belgrade in 1941, but the Germans were certainly not bluffing in 1938. The plans and construction programs of the German navy were also affected by the anticipation of an early war against Czechoslovakia that could precipitate a war with England. What Raeder really thought is not likely ever to be known; but he was quite willing to go along with whatever Hitler wanted, and the replacement of the doubting Guse by the unquestioning Schniewind as chief of the naval staff during 1938 cannot be interpreted in any way other than as a sign of Raeder’s approval of Hitler’s intentions as opposed to the doubts of Beck and Guse. It should be noted that Hitler appears not to have been aware of Guse’s views; he certainly knew Beck’s. If von Brauchitsch was hesi37. The “Fall Rot” study of 2 June 1938 of a section of the German air force (Luftwaffengruppenkommando 3) is clearly based on this view, see TMWC, 38:412-19.

38. The text of the stenographic record is in ibid., pp. 376-401. No record of Goring’s 14 June meeting with Hitler about the Westwall has come to light, and it is therefore impossible to determine to what extent that conversation influenced Géring’s remarks on 8 July. See also D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 97, 270. 39. This point reflects the problem of competition within the German aircraft industry, a competition that was extraordinarily bitter at times, and of which Géring was very much aware in the years when he was quite actively involved in the building up of the Luftwaffe. The memoirs of Heinkel are one long refrain on the competition theme. 40. Géring refers to it as “einen grdsseren Kladderadatsch” (a bigger mess); the context leaves no doubt as to ys his meaning. 41. The fragmentary character of the surviving record of the German air force has had a retarding influence on scholarly study of its history. Some information on 1938 developments may be found in Volcker, pp. 159-61, and in Karl Gundelach, “Gedanken iiber die Fiihrung eines Luftkrieges gegen England bei der Luftflotte 2 in e den Jahren 1938/39: Ein Beitrag zur Vorgeschichte der Luftschlacht um England,’ Wehbrwissenschaftlich we Rundschau, 10, No. 1 (Jan. 1960), 33-46. There is a useful survey in Homze, chap. 7. Goring was 42. Beck’s report on his conversation with Wiedemann on 27 July cites the latter as asserting that not one of those pushing for war, something Wiedemann had been able to confitm recently. the German 43. This emerges from the review of 24 August of the timing of the “incident” which would herald attack, TMWC, 25:460-61.

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tant about passing on the opinions of his chief of staff and did so only in a modified form, Raeder never even transmitted those of his chief of staff.

When Hitler was developing the specifics of the planned attack on Czechoslovakia and reviewing Keitel’s draft revision in May, the naval role in that operation was seen as

rather small. This did not preclude Hitler from giving detailed attention to the naval construction implications of a wat or the danget of a wat with England.* Hitler was apparently thinking of using an accelerated submarine construction program against England somewhat the way the construction of the Westwall was to be used against France:

as a means

of discouraging intervention if possible, and as a useful tool of

warfare if intervention took place after all.46 In addition, the battleships Bismarck and Tirpitz, which were designed in part as oceanic shipping raiders, were to be finished earlier than originally scheduled and the six superbattleships of 56,000 tons originally planned for construction in sequence—with the keels of the last two laid in the stocks previously used for the first two—wete now to be constructed simultaneously (with more presumably to be built thereafter). The details of the revised naval construction planning and of the strategic thinking within the naval staff need not be reviewed here.4”7 Two points only should be included in a discussion of developments during the summer of 1938. In the first place, the dis-

cussions within the navy of various alternative construction programs and related strategies for battleships and possibly also battle cruisers all revolved around ships that could not be ready for a long time; only submarines and small surface vessels could be constructed in a short time span. In the second place, it was determined that the con-

struction of large ships already under way was more likely to be delayed by shortages of men and materials rather than speeded up; in reality as opposed to planning, the big ships would be ready behind, not ahead of, schedule. This was due in part to overly optimistic estimates, but even more to the competition of other projects for manpower and other resources. The very same impulse which was driving the naval program forward was also responsible for the massive construction program on the Westwall with its insatiable demands for cement, steel, and labor, as well as the continued expansion of the

ait force. If the more ambitious projects of the navy were not moving forward as rapidly as Hitler and Raeder both wanted, competing demands for resources, not restraint or reluctance, were responsible.*® Hitler’s insistence on going forward can only be taken as a measure of his self-confidence, a self-confidence that was combined with a great sense of urgency.‘4? This per44. There is now general agreement, which I share, that Kurt Assmann’s assertion in Deutsche Schicksalsjahre (Wiesbaden: Brockhaus, 1950), p. 45, that a naval memorandum along the lines of Guse’s was shown to Hitler

is incorrect. Assmann worked on the naval archives and may have seen Guse’s and Heye’s warnings—which nevet went outside the High Command of the navy. Speculation in the navy that England might enter a war started by a German attack on Czechoslovakia was expressly prohibited in the summer of 1938 (Munich, Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S/Nr. 1809).

45. The most important source is a telegram from Hitlet’s naval adjutant, Jesko von Puttkammer, of 24 May 1938, containing both questions and wishes of Hitler concerning the naval construction program. See Gemzell,

pp. 79-82; Differ, pp. 468-70. This document is the naval equivalent of the questions Hitler was simultaneously asking of the army. 46. This deterrent idea of massive submarine construction had already been a part of Hitler’s projections in November 1937, see above p. 317. 47, Details in Dilffer, pp. 471-89. 48. I cannot omit recording my view that an extraordinary profusion of naval staff offices of diverse imaginable and unimaginable complexity contributed to delay. This was a disease that had afflicted the German navy as eatly as the Wilhelminian period. The problem of too many staffs for too few ships continued into the war. 49. Note that he was no more interested in talking to von Dirksen when the latter returned from London early in August than he had been in hearing out Wiedemann two weeks earlier (Dirksen, pp. 229-31). On 27 June he had done his best to assure French General Henri LeRond that France had nothing to worry about (D.D.F,, 2d,

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sonal element, the belief that only he could accomplish what he had in mind for Germany, that he must therefore move quickly using the generals now available for the

first blows and a new set for the next ones,°? and that all other considerations would

have to be thrust aside in the rush to world power status, simply cannot be overlooked in any analysis of the extraordinary race for world empire as Hitler saw it, or to total disaster as others warned. By the time the agitated discussions of June and July showed Hitler the discrepancy between his views and those of Beck and others—Jodl characterized them as between “the recognition of the Fuhrer that we must still [move] this year and the view of the army that we cannot yet do it because the Western Powers will certainly intervene and we cannot yet stand up to them”5!—the Fiihrer must have had the medical opinion reassuring him that his fear of early May that he was suffering from cancer was groundless. Nevertheless, one may be permitted to speculate that such a reminder of mortality had some effect on an impatient man not too different from the one that would be produced by his fiftieth birthday in 1939.%2 The summer of 1938 accordingly saw the military preparations of Germany pushed forward as rapidly as the country’s resources, internal organizational rivalries and confusions, and reluctance to impose serious restrictions on civilian life allowed. These

preparations were accompanied by a continuing propaganda campaign designed to isolate Czechoslovakia from external support. There were, in reality, relatively few incidents in the Sudeten area at the time, but as one contemporary German observer explained: “The tactics of the government of the Reich have hitherto provided for the utilization of the least significant incident in order to shake the conscience of the world.”53 The great concern of the British government over the possibility of German military action that would precipitate a world war has been mentioned in connection with the Wiedemann mission. Throughout June and July the London authorities tried to urge a settlement. Their approach to the problem might fairly be described as consisting of four parallel lines pursued simultaneously.*4 The first of these, appearing with great frequency and ever increasing vigor, was pressure on the Czechoslovak government to make extensive concessions to the Sudeten

10, No. 131; Adamthwaite, pp. 195-96). On 15 August, on the other hand, Hitler told the army commanders:

“J am very much afraid that something could happen to me before I can catty out the necessary decisions. ‘The most necessary decision: expanding living space.” (Diary of Keitel’s adjutant, Wolf Eberhard, Munich, Institut fur Zeitgeschichte). 50. A comment of Hitler’s quoted by Beck in his memorandum of 16 July. 51. The entry is part of the subsequently inserted sheet in Jodl’s diary; internal evidence suggests that it was written between 24 July and 10 August 1938 (TMWC, 28:373). A striking contemporary reflection of the confusion over fundamental responsibilities, the organization of the German military command structure, and the

plans and risks of an attack on Czechoslovakia, may be found in General Erich von Manstein’s letter of 21 July 1938 to Beck, urging the latter not to resign (full text in Miller, pp. 656-65). 52. The evidence is fragmentary but suggests that the decision to speed up the timetable on the Czechoslovak operation, which in the preceding chapter has been shown to antedate the May Crisis—and hence cannot be attributed to it—is quite possibly related to this health question, which at least coincides in time with the shift of eatly May. If this is so, it would also explain why Hitler found it convenient to refer to the May Crisis as an explanation. His own first recorded mention of the health problem of early May 1938 is dated from 29 March Atlas, 1942 (Weinberg, “Hitler’s Private Testament,” p. 415; cf. Otto Dietrich, 12 Jabre mit Hitler (Cologne:

belong in this 1955], p. 227). Perhaps the comments of Dr. Theodor Morell cited in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 149

context.

53. “Informationsbericht Nr. 43,” 14 June 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

report of 18 July in ibid., 101/33, 54. The diplomacy of the summer Kvaéek. Only the main outlines cabinet by Lord Halifax on 22 6272/1941/18, FO 371/21725).

Z.Sg. 101/32, ££.395—97; cf. the

; , £.41. of 1938 has been covered extensively by Celovsky, Eubank, Rénnefarth, and and additional information will be reviewed here. The account given the June provides a good summary of the situation as seen in London (C

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Germans.55 One subsidiary aspect of this line was the tepeated—and usually successful—effort to have the French, as allies of Czechoslovakia, assume a position of almost

blackmailing the Czechs by threatening a rupture of the alliance if Prague failed to comply. A second aspect of this approach was the attempt to take account of what was believed to be a difference of opinion within the Czechoslovak government where the prime minister, Milan Hodza, was reputed to be more amenable to concessions than President Benes.*° The second major theme was to utilize the contact with Henlein to restrain him and his followers and to secure some insight into the conduct and prospects of the negotiations.57 It is by no means very clear in this who was using whom, but on balance it must be said that Sir Robert Vansittart, who played the key role in these contacts, was misled by Henlein, who, it should be added, had also kept some of his own closest associates

from knowledge of his real intentions and instructions.*® If these two lines dealt with the continuing negotiations between Czechoslovakia and the Sudeten Germans, the other two dealt with the contingency of these negotiations being broken off. On the one hand, the London government had once before, during the May Crisis, taken Henlein’s breaking off talks with Prague as an occasion to warn

Berlin that German military action could lead to a general war; and it found ways to get this same message explicitly and implicitly to the German government through Forster, Wiedemann, von Dirksen, and even Henderson.5? On the other hand, if direct talks

between Czechoslovak and Sudeten leaders were interrupted, the only possible alternative to a German invasion was seen in some other, indirect, form of German-Czecho-

slovak negotiations. For this purpose, the British government had at one point thought of some sort of commission but turned increasingly to the idea of a British intermediary who would talk with both sides, examine the situation, and, it was hoped, provide a

mechanism for a peaceful solution. It was in this context, of course, that the origins of the Runciman

mission must be found; and it was for this reason—that

in case of a

rupture in the talks London saw such a mission as the only alternative to war—that such great efforts were made to have both the Czechoslovak government and Henlein agree 55. See C 5985/1941/18, FO 371/21724; C 6037, C 6055 (comment on B.D., 3d, 1, No. 426)/1941/18, FO 371/21725; Cabinet 32 (38) of 13 July 1938, C 7072/1941/18, FO 371/21727; Cadogan Diary, 8 and 17 June 1938, pp. 82, 83. That there were limits to the pressure the British government was willing to apply on

Czechoslovakia in the summer of 1938 can be seen in the Foreign Office’s negative comments on Henderson’s proposals of 30 June in B.D., D, 1, No. 458 under C 6600/1941/18, FO 371/21726, and again his proposals of 21 July in B.D., 3d, 1, No. 532 under C 7375/1941/18, FO 371/21729. For French complaints about Henderson’s comments in Berlin, see D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 130, 336, 338, 359.

56. C 5424/1941/18, FO 371/21723; C 5807/1941/18, FO 371/21724; C 7591/1941/18, FO 371/21729; Celovsky, pp. 257-61, 293. It is worth noting that Churchill privately expressed himself to Hubert Ripka in June in London along very similar lines, urging agreement with Henlein, referring to differences between Bene’ and Hodza, and saying that while a critic of Chamberlain, he might himself act in the same way if he had the responsibility. Churchill also raised the question of a guaranteed neutral status for Czechoslovakia (Kral, Munchen, No. 94). 57. Vansittart’s minute of 14 June, C 6643/1941/18, FO 371/21726; V.’s minute of 16 June, C 5989/1941/18, FO 371/21724; V.’s note of 21 June, C 6236/1941/18, FO 371/21725; Vs minute of 27 June, C

6644/1941/18, FO 371/21726; V.’s memorandum of 12 July, C 7009/1941/18, FO 371/21727; V.’s minute of 22 July, C 7512/1941/18, FO 371/21729; V.’s minute of 26 July, C 7591/1941/18, ibid.; V.’s minute of 27 July, C 7634/1941/18, ibid.; V.’s minute of 3 August, C 7877/1941/18, FO 371/21730; Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 172. Sir Robert’s own very large role in unintentionally facilitating Henlein’s deception of the British government may have had considerable influence on the violence of his subsequent anti-German attitude. Note his

comments on Henlein in an essay on the Munich crisis in Bones of Contention (New York: Knopf, 1945), p. 122. 58. Celovsky, p. 289. 59. The meetings with Forster and Wiedemann have been discussed. On von Dirksen, see his report of 10 July in G.D., D, 1, No. 793 (with a wrong date, see D.M., 1:123). On Henderson, see Hungarian Documents, 2, No.

270.

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to his coming in the role of mediator, If one asks, just what did the British have in mind as a possible format for a settlement, it is by no means easy to give an answer. The mass of evidence, both published and unpublished, indicates that the British leaders thought that some form of autonomy would have to be accorded to the Sudeten Germans and that this might lead to their secession from Czechoslovakia. It would also appear that Chamberlain and Halifax believed a new international status would have to be found for Czechoslovakia at the same time, a belief that, of course, assumes the continued existence of an independent

Czechoslovak state.‘! That status would take some neutralized form, possibly similar to that of Belgium since 1937, in which Czechoslovakia would not have alliances (except possibly the Little Entente) but instead would receive guarantees of her independence from other powers, including Great Britain.‘? It appears to have been thought in London that Czechoslovakia might be nudged in this direction over a period of time, with the Germans finding themselves having to agree to such an arrangement with a general war as the alternative if they insisted on more. That they wanted more was indeed suspected,®? but whether they would insist on it with all the risks involved was the big question. It was on this last question, whether Hitler was determined on an attack on Czechoslovakia under any and all circumstances that London faced the gravest dilemma. It was ptecisely on this subject that a variety of sources from inside Germany were directing warnings to London, often with the implication or explicit assertion that a firm and clear warning to Hitler from the British government would lead the Fuhrer to desist. The concept of the British warning as a key to peace and the great role it played in the discussions in London as well as among some elements in Germany can be understood only with reference to the widely discussed opinion in government circles in both Britain and Germany that if the British foreign secretary had clearly and emphatically told the German government in 1914 that Great Britain would join France and Russia if Germany went to war, the German government would have pressured Austria into moderating its demands on Serbia or into accepting the Serb reply to their ultimatum, with war being averted as a result. More recent analyses of 1914 show, to my satisfaction, that the situation within the British cabinet made such a step by Sir Edward Grey impossible, and that even if he had made it, he would subsequently only have been accused 60. A note by Sargent of 30 April first suggested a British mediator; see it and comments on it in C 3316/ 1941/18, FO 371/21716; for subsequent developments, see the Foreign Office comments on B.D., 3d, 1, No. 359 in C 5297/1941/18, FO 371/21723; 31st meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy of 16 June

1938, CAB 27/624; Cabinet 29 (38) of 22 June 1938, C 6272/1941/18, FO 371/21725; Cabinet 31 (38) of 6 July 1938, C 6868/1941/18, FO 371/21727; C 7249/1941/18, FO 371/21728; Cabinet 33 (38) of 20 July 1938, C 7406/1941/18, FO 371/21729; Vansittart’s minute of 25 July, C 7560/1941/18, ibid.; V.’s minute of 26 July, C 7591/1941/18, ibid.; Cabinet 35 (38) of 27 July 1938, C 7707/1941/18, FO 371/21730; D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 237, 261, 266, 268, 276, 278. 61. There appears also to have been some thought given to the possible need for a politically less charged name for the country, but that presupposed the maintenance of its territorial integrity; see C 6600/1941/18, FO , 371/21726, £.202. 62. Cabinet 27 (38) of 1 June 1938, C 5424/1941/18, FO 371/21723; C 5870/1941/18, FO 371/21724 (which should be compared with the less thoughtful earlier memorandum printed in B.D., 3d, 1, Appendix I); Cabinet 28 (38) of 15 June 1938, C 5980/1941/18, ibid.; C 6009, C 6010, C 6039/1941/18, FO 371/21725; 31st 1938, pp. meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, CAB 27/624; Harvey Diaries, 8 and 18 June (D.D.F., 2d, 151-52, 154. French criticism of the British ideas revolved around their disadvantages for France 10, No. 170). to the effect that the 63. See the Foreign Office comments on Newton’s 204 of 27 May (B.D., 3d, 1, No. 327) there appeared whenever conditions new add to Berlin from orders received doubt no Sudeten German party

of 1 June (B.D., to be the possibility of agreement (C 5083/1941/18, FO 371/21722), and on Henderson’s 254 (C 5297/1941/18, FO 371/ 3d, 1, No. 359) that Hitler would not like the removal “of a valuable grievance”

21723).

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of encouraging Russia and France to go to war since Germany’s military plans and policies already assumed British intervention—though abstention would naturally have been preferred. But the leaders of governments act on their perceptions of the past, not the later arguments of scholars; and the belief in the importance and assumed efficacy of a formal British watning stands at the center of much of the debate in London as well as the unofficial contacts from Germans anxious to avert war. The assumption, held especially in England by Chamberlain as well as others, that the British warning in May had stopped the Germans from moving at that time served to reinforce belief in the significance of such a step; but the teal or feigned annoyance of Hitler at the subsequent public emphasis on his having backed down in the face of external threats was believed in London to make a repetition of such a warning dangerous because it was feared that Hitler’s concern for prestige would lead him to take in defiance the very step that the warning was supposed to avert. It was out of this mixture of historical analogies and correct as well as incorrect assessments of the current situation that there emerged, first, the reluctance of the British to send a formal warning with its threat of general wat and, second, the decision at the last minute to send such a warning

after all but in what was thought to be a format least likely to provoke a negative reaction on Hitler’s part, concern for which had contributed to the delay in sending it. As will be seen in the discussion of the final crisis in 1939, the written warning to Hitler then included specific reference to the allegation that if the British “had made their position more clear in 1914, the great catastrophe would have been avoided,’ though in the event, Hitler was to disregard it for reasons that will be reviewed later—but one was his

regret at having backed off in the face of such a warning in 1938. The suggestions from some in Germany, telling the London government that Hitler intended an invasion of Czechoslovakia and that he could be deterred from this step only by a firm warning of British intervention, were by no means unanimous. The German state secretary, Ernst von Weizsacker, would eventually come to that point of view, but

during July he was in fact urging the British to reduce the appearance of commitment to fight if Czechoslovakia were attacked for fear that Bene’ would not make great concessions unless left in doubt. Von Weizsacker’s preference was clearly for the disintegration of Czechoslovakia under pressure rather than war, what he called a chemical rather than a mechanical solution.®* During July, however, the London government

began to hear from its intelligence sources that Germany would go to war in the fall.67 Chamberlain’s initial reaction was one of skepticism;°* but later in July, as new and more specific information about a likely German attack reached London, frequently through Vansittart’s sources, the threat began to be taken more seriously, though the planned German action was generally reported as scheduled from any time after the end of August, when it was actually planned for a month later. Early in August, London received two sepatate reports on a meeting of Hitler, Goring, and others at Berchtesgaden which in spite of some inaccuracies of detail reflected the realities of the situation rather precisely: the German determination to attack after the harvest, the insistence on moving forward regardless of risks and obstacles, and the doubts of the German military about the Westwall.” At the same time, 64, Chamberlain to Hitler, 22 August 1939, B.D., 3d, 7, No. 145,

65. U.S. 1938, 1:528-29, and again ibid., p. 566. 66. G.D., D, 1, No. 586; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 260. Similar views appear in von Weizsacker’s memoits

and in many other published documents. 67. C 7009/1941/18, FO 371/21727; C 7512/1941/18, FO 371/21729. 68. Note his comments at the cabinet meeting of 13 July, C 7072/1941/18, FO 371/21727. 69. C 7591, 7614, C 7634/1941/18, FO 371/21729: cf. C 7461/42/18, FO 371/21657.

70. The meeting is dated to 4 July in one report and to 14 July in another (C 7871/1941/18, FO 371/21730; C

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that is, in the first days of August, the British began to get serious and specific warnings concerning Hitler’s intentions from the opposition to Hitler inside Germany. The civilian opposition around Carl Goerdeler sent some details;7! while the military opposition, centered in the Abwehr, the armed forces intelligence agency, warned of the attack scheduled for 28 September and announced the intention of sending a special emissary, Ewald von Kleist-Schmenzin, to London.” By 9 August Sir Robert Vansittart had become convinced that Hitler did intend to move, thought that the army would follow orders regardless of the doubts of many of its leaders, and urged a program of warnings to the German government.’ Earlier in the summer, the authorities in London had been quite willing to use threats as a means of securing a policy change by the German government. As previously mentioned, after the Germans

annexed Austria, they announced that they would no

longer pay interest due on Austria’s indebtedness abroad, an action that would leave the British government, which had guaranteed some of the bonds, with the obligation of paying the bondholders. Since Great Britain bought more ftom than she sold to Germany, the threat of imposing a clearing system on Anglo-German trade would force Germany to choose between paying the interest or losing foreign exchange earnings. At cabinet meetings on 1 and 15 June, the London government decided unanimously to use the threat. As Chamberlain said when the Germans responded by a conciliatory move: “This confirmed previous experience of the need of great firmness in negotiations with Germany.””4 An accommodation was reached in the signing of two agreements on 1 July; though some concessions were made by the British negotiator, the major ones came from the German side. The idea that only a firm stand might influence Hitler was, thus, by no means un-

known to those in charge in London; if they were reluctant to utilize this approach in spite of ever more insistent warnings about German intentions, it was due to an unwillingness to go that route until there was clearly no alternative; lives, not money, were at stake. This can be seen in the reaction to the warnings of early August. A fairly accurate report on Hitler’s intention of attacking at the end of September, received by Lord Lloyd from a confidant in Germany, was transmitted to the Foreign Office, where it was seen as a confirmation of the comments of Ewald von Kleist-Schmenzin and transmitted to 10 Downing Street for that reason.”> Von Kleist had been seen in London by Vansittart and Churchill with the approval of Chamberlain and Halifax.’° The conser8189/1941/18, FO 371/21731). The report was thought plausible and seen by both Halifax and Chamberlain.

Mastny reported on the meeting “around July 14” in his report 153 of 6 August 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412161-63. Whether or not such a meeting took place and on which date is unclear. If it did occur, the most likely original source of the leak would be General Karl Bodenschatz, who had a habit of

telling all he knew to all he met. 71. C 8088/62/18, FO 371/21664. 72. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 218-21

(Colvin to Lord Lloyd, 3 August 1938). Note, however, that some

skepticism remained in the Foreign Office, see the comments of Victor Mallet on the report printed as B.D.,

3d, 2, No. 595 under C 8173/65/18, FO 371/21668, a document seen by Halifax and Chamberlain.

73. C 9591/1941/18, FO 371/21737. 74. Cabinet 27 (38) of 1 June 1938, C 5414/30/18, FO 371/21644. The appropriate extract from Cabinet 28

of 29 (38) of 15 June 1938 is in C 5992/30/18, FO 371/21645, and an important note by Ashton-Gwatkin

10, No. 144. June on the negotiations is in C 6579/30/48, FO 371/21646. See also Dirksen, p. 214; D.D.F., 2d,

‘A detailed account that rather overemphasizes the importance of the matter is in Wendt, Economic Appeasement, pp. 465-80, with references to Board of Trade and Treasury as well as Foreign Office records.

371/21731. Lord Lloyd 75. Lord Lloyd to Halifax, 10 August 1938, and related papers, in C 8189/1941/18, FO also informed the French (D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 352). , FO 371/21731. 76, The background summary in B.D., 3d, 2:683 is based on documents in C 8391/1941/18

be received but also in Henderson’s skepticism is reflected not only in his recommendation that von Kleist not

3d, 2, No. 658). his telegram about another similarly inclined informant a few days later (B.D.,

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vative opponent of Hitler accurately described the situation in Germany where Hitler was absolutely determined to attack Czechoslovakia, where the generals, including even von Reichenau, wete opposed to such an adventure, and where a firm warning from Britain would lead either to a backdown by Hitler or a coup against him by the generals.”” Opinion on the accuracy of von Kleist’s assertion that war would start on or after 28 September as well as on his recommendations for avoiding it was divided. Even those who accepted and understood the accuracy of von Kleist’s description of Hitlet’s plans had doubts about the proposed remedy. The idea that Hitler’s opponents might act seemed very doubtful; as one official put it, “We have had similar visits from other emissaties

of the Reichsheer,

such

as Dr.

Goerdeler,

but those

for whom

these

emissaries claim to speak have never given us any reason to suppose that they would be able or willing to take action such as would lead to the overthrow of the regime. The events of June 1934 and February 1938 do not lead one to attach much hope to energetic action by the Army against the regime.’”’® More is now known about the planning of the German opposition for a coup against Hitler in the fall of 1938,” but it is difficult to

blame the British government for its skepticism at the time about the military leaders whose obedience to Hitler might be reluctant but had hitherto been unvarying. The British could not know of the internal confusion of those in Germany who were considering acting against the regime, but the very fact that von Kleist was followed a few days later by another emissary, Hans Boehm-Tettelbach,*° and still a week later by Theo Kordt, all urging a firm stand, all promising a coup in Germany—but all apparently unaware of the others—was not likely to impress anyone in London with the conspiratorial skills of those opposed to Hitler inside the Third Reich. It was at a discussion at the Foreign Office on 24 August that Chamberlain explained his identification of the opposition with the Jacobites which had first appeared in his letter of 19 August about von Kleist: “The arguments of the moderate elements in Germany resemble the arguments of the Jacobites at the Court of Louis XIV, who claimed that they would be able to overthrow William III if Louis ‘was sufficiently threatening.’’®! All in London knew that William III had not been overthrown. The recent tacit acceptance by the German army of the disgrace of its leaders did not inspire much confidence in the steadfastness of their successors. The idea of some sort of further warning to the German government was, nevertheless, canvassed again; and it was decided to recall Henderson for consultations that were publicly announced as connected with the Czechoslovak crisis. It was also obviously necessary to consult more closely with the French government in the face of what looked like an imminent possibility of war, for by 24 August Chamberlain himself

77. The reports of Vansittart and Churchill are in B.D., 3d, 2, Appendix IV. See also Bodo Scheurig, Ewald von

Kleist-Schmenzin: Ein Konservativer gegen Hitler (Oldenburg: Stalling, 1968). 78. Mallet comment

of 22 August in C 8520/1941/18, FO 371/21732, £.174. Other comments

on the von

Kleist record are in the same file, which was used at the 24 August meeting referred to below. Francois-Poncet similarly thought the German army would m arch as ordered (D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 456, 459),

79. A forthcoming book by Harold C. Deutsch covering the period between his Hitler and His Generals and The

Conspiracy Against Hitler in the Twilight War will prove most helpful. For the time being, the best account is in

Miller, chap. 8. For skepticism about the prospects and seriousness of a coup in 1938 from the German side,

see Edgar Rohricht, Pflicht und Genissen: Erinnerungen eines deutschen Generals, 1932-1944 (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1965), p. 114; Otto John, Twzce Through the Lines (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), pp. 32-33. For news about

an emissary to London reaching the Czechoslovak government, see Kral, Miinchen, No. 135. 80. On Boehm-Tettelbach, see Miller, pp. 207, 350-51. 81. The quotation is from Sargent’s memorandum of 30 August 1938, C 9041/1941/18, FO 371/21734, £.263.

Chamberlain’s letter to Halifax is in B.D., 3d, 2:686-87. For another warning to Chamberlain from a German

industrialist via Robert Boothby, see C 9270/62/18, FO 371/21664. See also Wendt, Miinchen, pp. 32-35.

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appears to have become convinced that Hitler had decided to attack Czechoslovakia probably tight after the September National Socialist party rally.®* The British therefore decided to approach the French at the very time that the French, equally alarmed, wanted to consult with London.* The results of deliberations in London will be reviewed in connection with the Runciman mission and the discussions of early September, but first the position of France and a number of other countries during the developing crisis must be examined. Paris had also been receiving warnings that Germany was about to move. In fact,

the French ambassador in Berlin had been given warnings by members of the opposition to Hitler urging a firm French stand similar to those given the British; but as Francois-

Poncet told Sir Eric Phipps, the British ambassador to Paris, on 30 October, he had

deliberately refrained from informing his government of these messages, partly because he thought them suspect, and partly because he feared they would strengthen the hands

of the warmongers in France and of Bene$!§* In spite of this dubious action of FrancoisPoncet, the Paris government was quite well informed about the situation; the puzzle was what to do about it. There were some signs of a stiffening French attitude, but Paris simultaneously warned the Czechoslovak government to shift from arguing over details to making major concessions. At first, the pressure on Prague was still accompanied by a reluctance to threaten an end of the alliance.*> With the continuing delays in the summer, however, French Foreign Minister Bonnet became increasingly exasperated. The French minister to Prague was recalled to Paris, where he was instructed on 17 July to warn Benes that Czechoslovakia could not count on French military support if she became involved in war over the Sudeten question; and a few days later the Czechoslovak minister in Paris was told on behalf of the French cabinet that France could absolutely wot go to war on this issue.*° The Czechoslovak minister was insistent that this French position be kept absolutely secret; only French public assurances of loyalty to the alliance would enable the Prague government to secure a satisfactory settlement. Benes was understandably upset when told by Lacroix in person and Osusky by tele82. Sargent’s memorandum of 30 August cited in the preceding footnote at f.261. 83. Foreign Office Memorandum, “Proposed Communication to the French Government,” 24 August 1938, C

8718/1941/18, FO 371/21732. The record of the resulting meeting of Lord Halifax with the French chargé is in B.D., 3d, 2, No. 691. See also D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 166, 188, 392. 84. Phipps to Halifax, 31 October 1938, Halifax Papers, FO 800/311. This is the section of the Phipps letter omitted from the published version in B.D., 3d, 3:620. The full text of the omitted section is: “Fran¢gois-Poncet

told me under the seal of secrecy that during August and part of September he received constant messages from emissaries of the Army, and even from officers, urging France to be firm and unyielding and declaring that in case of war the Nazi regime would collapse. Frangois-Poncet never informed his Government of these messages. He felt that their origin made them suspect and that they might unduly strengthen the hands of the warmongers in France and of Bene’ & Co. He admitted, however, that this action, or rather non-action, of his had since

formed a ‘cas de conscience’. But he assured me solemnly that he would do the same again, for he is convinced that it would have been criminal folly to attach undue importance to messages from enemies of the régime.

Moreover, whatever truth there might have been in them, once war was started all differences would have been

of swept away and all Germans would have united against the foreign enemy.” The French ambassador did, attack and course, report quite accurately on the general situation as he saw it, including Hitler’s desire for an

38; U.S. 7938, 1:61— the reluctance of the generals (see D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 23, 150, 246, 312, 346; 11, Nos. 20,

62). A version of the warnings from Germany was given by Lord Lloyd to Gamelin on 16 September

Moscow, see (Gamelin, 2:348-49). For a warning coming apparently from inside the German embassy in

D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 449.

to threaten a breach of 85. On French pressure, see D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 107, 115, 119, 121, 129. Reluctance

163). For public signs of the alliance is in the reply (ibid., No. 221) to a further British request (ibid., No.

Lindbergh, the famous aviator, French firmness, see U.S. 1938, 1:526-28, 529-30. A summer visit by Charles

would return with even who touted the strength of the German air force, hardly encouraged the French; he 35). p. 1938, June 22 gloomier messages in the fall (Lindbergh, 86. D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 218, 222, 238, 266 n. 2; Adamthwaite, pp. 197-99.

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gram that France would not fight.8’ He asserted that Czechoslovakia could not agree to all the demands of the Sudeten Germans; visibly shaken, he too was absolutely insistent that the German government must under no circumstances be allowed to know the real French position as there would otherwise be even greater ptessure and a total collapse of Czechoslovakia, a development that would have implications for French security as well. The Paris government indeed followed this advice and continued to maintain a public posture of fidelity to their treaty obligation; but the Czechoslovak government, which may have thought that the third French government of 1938 might well be succeeded by a less pacifistic fourth, proceeded with its leisurely reactions to Sudeten German demands.*® During August, however, the development of the crisis and the information received

by Paris led the French government, like the British, to believe that war was likely to break out in September.®? The chief of staff of the French air force, General Vuillemin, was in Germany from 16 to 20 August, where he astonished Goring by assuring him that the French would indeed fight if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia and was himself impressed by the German air force. Every effort was made to intimidate Vuillemin and those with him, but though worried by what they saw, the French officers recognized that there was an element of bluff in what they were shown. Nevertheless, the very fact that the Germans had gone to such lengths to frighten off France only reinforced the belief of the French that Germany was indeed preparing to attack.°? It was, of course, too late to do anything about the deplorable condition of the French air force, incapable of effective action of either a defensive or an offensive character. The results of neglect, confusion as to mission, and mass production of obsolescent equipment could not be remedied in short order; and the knowledge by both French and British governments of this terribly weak state of the French air force had a major effect on their worries in the crisis.?! With their thinking attuned more

to the problems of land fighting, the French

leaders were more likely to pay attention to the predictions of their army leaders. After the French cabinet had approved some minor steps designed to put the French army in a better state of readiness, Daladier asked once again, on 12 September, the question that

had been put earlier in the year: what can France do on the ground to assist Czecho-

87. Lacroix’s report on his 19 July meeting with Benes is in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 235 (see also B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1); their meeting of 21 July, by which time Bene’ had heard from Osusky, is in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 242. Lacroix

after this second meeting warned of the implications for French security of a collapse of Czechoslovakia; the Czechs might well submit to the Germans in view of their having survived under German domination for centuries, but what would happen to France (ibid., No. 245)? 88. A Czechoslovak compilation, dated 14 August, of French and other assurances is in Kral, Miinchen, No. 133.

There is other evidence that assessments made in Prague in the summer of 1938 were overly optimistic, see D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 161. The Belgian ambassador in Paris, on the other hand, thought the French affirmations

of loyalty were for political effect only, and that in a crisis the French would find a way to duck out (D.D.B., 5, No. 17). Le Tellier also reported on French attempts at a rapprochement with Italy (cf. U.S. 1938, 1:216). 89. D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 458, 506. Note Bonnet’s comments on 12 August, U.S. 1938, 1:62-63. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 303. 90. On Vuillemin’s visit, see G.D., D, 2, No. 385; Stehlin, pp. 86-93; Heinkel, pp. 401-4; Celovsky, p. 307, n. 4;

Irving, Milch, p. 63; U.S. 1938, 1:70; C 8693, C 8787/1425/18, FO 371/21710; D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 135, 203, 401, 402, 429, 440, 444, 537; Adamthwaite, pp. 238-40.

91. There is a useful summary, based partly on access to French archives, in Robert J. Young, “The Strategic Dream: French Air Doctrine in the Inter-War Period, 1919-39,” Journal of Contemporary History, 9, No. 4 (Oct. 1974), 72-74. For a devastating comparison of the Luftwaffe with the British and French air forces which alarmed all in the Foreign Office, including Lord Halifax, see the memorandum of 26 August 1938, “Comparative Strength of the British and German Air Forces,” C 9304/1425/18, FO 371/21710; cf. C 8950/

1425/18, ibid. Vuillemin’s own desolate report on the state of the French air force as of 26 September 1938 is

in D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 377. See also Haight, chap. 1; Sholto Douglas, pp. 353-59, 364-65.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

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slovakia?” The answer of Gamelin and his top commanders was simple and devastating. Practically nothing could be done to help Czechoslovakia, which would have to await tecovery until the peace treaty, as Serbia and other countries had had to do in the last war. It was not practical to cross the Rhine River at the southern half of the FrancoGerman border, and the Belgians would not allow the French to move across their countty to attack the only portion of Germany with attractive objectives close to the border. Since the French were not willing to enter Belgium against that country’s objections, the only alternative was an attack on the section of the Franco-German border dividing Lorraine from the Rhineland and Palatinate. How did the French military assess this, the only real avenue of offensive operations against Germany? The record shows that the French general staff believed: (1) that this frontal assault on the Westwall would be a “modernized battle of the Somme,” in other

words, a bloody slogging operation not unlike the great engagement of 1916; (2) that this would be the case because even with German forces engaged in an attack on Czechoslovakia, the ground forces on the critical front in the west would be numerically approximately equal with fifty divisions on each side; and (3) that once the Germans had destroyed Czechoslovakia they could move the forces which had been engaged in that operation plus at least an additional fifteen newly formed divisions to the west. Once the main French army was already engaged in the attack on the Saar and Palatinate between the Mosel and the Rhine, the German reinforcement could be used for a thrust through Belgium to which no effective resistance could be offered. These perspectives were based either on a subjectively honest or a deliberately extreme overestimation of the value of the German defenses in the west as well as the size of the German army, which in 1938 did not have fifty divisions altogether and was planning to use the bulk of its forces for the attack on Czechoslovakia. It is entirely possible that Gamelin believed the nonsense he was telling Daladier;* for himself as well as the French government it pointed to the absolute need for a defensive posture in the west, while only a long war in which Germany was somehow eventually throttled by her enemies offered hope of victory to France and of redemption to Czechoslovakia.” All 92. Gamelin, 2:344—47. In this very important document, the prime minister is referred to as “ministre” because Daladier was also minister of national defense. On this subject, see also Gauché, pp. 133-35. 93. The French generals had used the same terminology to Ambassador Bullitt, see Bullitt to Roosevelt, 13

June 1938, Bullitt Letters, pp. 267-68. 94. Note that in his memoirs Gamelin argues (p. 345, n. 3, and pp. 347-48) that the events of 1944-45 when American and British forces attacked Germany from the west bore out his assessments of 1938. Regardless of the validity of the argument, the mere fact that Gamelin made it suggests that he may well have made his ridiculous predictions and analyses in 1938 in good faith, that he was stupid rather than devious. On Gamelin’s contemporary reaction to a report by the French assistant air attaché in Germany on a conversation about the Westwall with General Bodenschatz at the end of June, see Stehlin, pp. 81-86, 94. The often lauded British military expert Sir Basil Liddell Hart was so opposed to a French attack on Germany in case of wart that he

thought the British should make the French promise not to launch one as a condition for sending an underexpeditionary force! (Harvey Diaries, 21 June 1938, p. 156). Possibly the terrible results of French

estimation of German army strength in 1914 had an effect on the calculations of later years. But by November 1938 the French assessment of German strength was more realistic (D.D.F., 2d, 12, No. 461).

any fully 95. See the evidence on the overassessment of Getmany’s western defenses and the absence of

Tournoux, Haute developed program for an attack in the west in French mobilization plans, in Paul-Emile

Editions Latines, Commandement: Gouvernement et défense des frontitres du nord et de l'est, 1919-1939 (Patis: Nouvelles

No. 138). The director of 1960), pp. 281-82, 298, 339-41. See also Kral, Miinchen, No. 100 (parts in Berber,

on 25 September that military operations and intelligence on the British General Staff noted in his diary facing France; on the according to British intelligence, the Germans had only nine divisions and two in reserve the Siegfried line and then following day Gamelin told him that the French plan was “merely on advance to military assessment, see withdrawal to the Maginot” (Pownall, 1:159, 163). For background on the British a conversation with one of the Patton (Consul General Singapore) dispatch 494 of 21 September 1939 on British officers on duty in the War Office in September 1938, State 760F.62/1969.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the evidence shows that Bonnet at no time thought this a reasonable risk to run; Daladier

appears to have contemplated it seriously but with great reservations in the last week of the crisis. One can, however, sympathize with his doubts about a course of action of such little promise if there were any way to avoid it; and as will become clear subsequently, Bene’ himself would suggest though very late that the Czechoslovak government might be amenable to an alternative procedure. In any case, the French would under no circumstances move without British support, and the fact that there appeared to be little hope of securing substantial assistance from anybody else only redoubled French dependence on England. An immediate problem for France in providing support for Czechoslovakia was the policy of Poland. The role of Poland as the eastern shield of Germany’s policy toward Czechoslovakia in 1938 has already been discussed. Separating both Germany and Czechoslovakia from the Soviet Union, Poland was unwilling to allow Russian troops to cross her territory to assist a neighbor upon whom Poland herself had demands, and because of the fear of herself becoming a victim of Soviet designs. The Warsaw government, on the other hand, faced a peculiar dilemma in its relations with France. Poland’s

leaders were skeptical about the resolution of France;?’ it seemed likely to them that the French would find a way to avoid helping Czechoslovakia if the latter were attacked, in part because they thought it unlikely that Czechoslovakia would fight.°® Accordingly, if Czechoslovakia were abandoned, there was the possibility of Polish territorial gain by the annexation of Tésin and of Polish political gain by the expansion of Hungary to a common Polish-Hungarian border. The diplomatic steps Poland took in the summer of 1938 to further these aims, however, tended to accentuate the weaknesses on which they

were predicated; for they encouraged the concenttic pressure of Germany, Poland, and Hungary for the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, which looked all the more difficult to thwart because of its overwhelming nature. And Poland’s ties to Romania could be, and were, used to isolate Czechoslovakia from any possible Soviet aid on the one sector, however short, where Czechoslovakia bordered on an allied country.” If Poland’s role thus increased ‘the likelihood of a peaceful settlement that was really a cold-blooded dismemberment of Czechoslovakia,!° there was always the possibility, which Warsaw could not ignore, that the development of the crisis might take an entirely

different turn and lead to war. In that contingency, the Polish leaders would not wish to find themselves on Germany’s side if they could possibly help it. In cooperating with the hunters, they encouraged the hunt and discouraged prospective supporters of the victim;!°! at the same time they had to be ready to change sides and turn on their German fellow hunter if the victim wete, at the last moment, forcibly assisted by the countries to which Poland herself had to look for support if and when Germany turned 96. For aspects of this in eatly 1938, see D.D.F., 2d, 8, Nos. 152, 163, 298, 305, 331. Many additional docu-

ments ate in vols. 9 and 10, 97. For material on the French difficulties in supplying Poland with weapons, see ibid., 8, Nos. 11, 77, 162, 190,

205; 10, Nos. 12, 15, 48, 69; 11, No. 274. 98. See U.S. 1938, 1:495—98; G.D., D, 2, No. 228. 99. Cf. Lipski Papers, p. 373 and No. 88.

100. In a conversation with the leader of the Hungarian minority in Czechoslovakia in June 1938, Beck expressed himself as expecting a peaceful solution, with Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine falling to Hungary, the former but not the latter hopefully receiving some autonomy. Beck professed to be worried that the Germans would move beyond the ethnographic line and occupy all of Bohemia and Moravia; he would prefer some independent residual Czech state which would be dependent upon the Berlin-Rome-Warsaw circle

(Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 250). As the Canadian high commissioner in London had written on 26 May 1938: ““Partition’ is a word with tragic associations for Poland. When applied to a neighboring state, however, the

idea behind it seems to have some attractive features!” Documents on Canadian External Relations, 6, No. 883, p.

1084.

101. Note the Lipski-Goring conversation of 17 June, Lipski Papers, No. 87.

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on her. 10? The French and British governments, on the other hand, were interested in having Poland refrain from a policy which they believed encouraged Germany to attack Czechoslovakia by giving her the prospect of an isolated victory;!% but at the same time they themselves were hoping for a peaceful settlement that in their opinion could come about only if Czechoslovakia made substantial concessions. At the time of the May Crisis and thereafter, the Warsaw government followed a kind of double policy toward Paris. The Poles insisted that Czechoslovakia make concessions to them equivalent to those made to the Germans by implying that they might join in a German attack,'"* while trying to maintain their ties to France by implying that they would side with her—or at least stay neutral—if it came to a general war over Czechoslovakia.!°5 That such a policy only half pleased the Germans should be evident; at all times complications with Poland in case a German attack on Czechoslovakia did not produce a prompt victory remained a real possibility in German thinking.!°° On the other hand, as the Poles could excuse their own doubts by the weakness of France, so the French could and did see in the attitude of Poland still another obstacle to effective help for the isolated Czechoslovak state.” Relations between Poland and Germany in the summer of 1938 were accordingly characterized by continuing contact on current minor problems accompanied by mutual reassurances of common views toward Czechoslovakia. Both powers believed, or professed to believe, in the wicked character of Czechoslovak policy, the necessity for a peaceful disintegration of the Czechoslovak state, the great benefits to be derived by all from such a happy development, and the need to keep all outsiders—the Soviet Union in particular—from interfering with it.\°° The efforts of the Western Powers to enroll Poland in defense of Czechoslovakia could be and were used by Warsaw with the Germans as a reminder of Poland’s importance to the Third Reich and of the need for the latter to be careful in Danzig.!°° The Germans, on the other hand, went to considerable lengths to reassure the Poles that once the question of Czechoslovakia was

102. The element of duplicity inherent in this policy may or may not have been necessary, but it was not likely to make friends for Poland either among contemporary leaders or subsequent analysts. See the Foreign Office comments

on Kennard’s

report of 4 June from Warsaw

(B.D., 3d, 2, No. 375) in C 5394/1941/18, FO

371/21723. A memorandum by Vansittart of 31 August according to which a member of Smigly-Rydz’s entourage asserted that Poland’s policy would depend on that of the Western Powers—if they aided Czechoslovakia Poland would fight alongside them, but if not, she would seize her share of Czechoslovakia—was con-

sidered as confirming previous estimates by most Foreign Office officials (C 9072/1941 /18, FO 371/21734). 103. Cf. Cienciala, pp. 69-73; Slavik report 23 of 9 May 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/ 413034-37. 104, It seems to me that this is the only reasonable way to interpret Beck’s instructions to the Polish ambassador in Paris. Asked to confirm that Beck had told the French ambassador in Warsaw “that in any event the Polish government does not anticipate Poland’s aggression against Czechoslovakia,” Beck responded that “T only told Ambassador Noél that Poland would certainly not be the factor on whose initiative the final crisis

in the Czechoslovak situation would occur” (Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 108, 110).

83 of 29 105. The Poles were responding to the threat of an end of the Franco-Polish alliance, Osusky report No. 136); but see June 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/412942-43 (portion in Berber, PDE 2de9) Nowsits for the attack on 106. This contingency has been discussed in connection with German military planning

Note Biddle’s tel. 168 of 5 Czechoslovakia; see also G.D., D, 2, Nos. 259, 277, 282; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 95.

(portion omitted September 1938 on German suspicions of closer British-Polish relations, State 760F.62/660

from U.S. 1938, 1:577).

the extent to which Polish 107. The account in Cienciala, chaps. 2 and 3, is very useful but tends to ovetlook documents from the Polish policy contributed to the strength of Germany’s diplomatic position. Important 158, side in D.D.F.,, 2d, 10, Nos. 12, 15, 48, side are printed in Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 108-26; from the French

219. See also the account in Wojciechowski, pp. 431-50. cf. ibid., No. 91; G.D., D, 2, No. 255. 108. Note Lipski’s report to Beck of 11 August in Lipski Papers, No. 89; 109. Lipski Papers, Nos. 90-92.

592

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

settled, Poland would zot be next on the list of German targets.'!° In a suggestion similar to the one he appears to have made to the Italians about transferring the Germans of South Tyrol to Germany as a means of reassuring Rome about the annexation of Austria, Géring suggested to Polish Ambassador Lipski on 24 August 1938 that perhaps the best thing would be “if German minorities in Poland were to return to Germany, and vice versa,’40 Such words were as cheap as those asserting that Germany had no designs on Polish territory, but there appears to have been no real German willingness to give more formal assurances to Poland.'!? Forster was once again summoned to Germany and told to restrain his activities in Danzig in the light of Germany’s desire for good relations with Poland during the crisis over Czechoslovakia, but Berlin would go no further in substantive concessions.!!> In public, however, the wonderful state of German-Polish relations

was stressed by Hitler in his 12 September speech at the Nuremberg party rally as an obvious contrast to the terrible suffering allegedly inflicted on the poor Sudeten Germans by the government of the incorrigible Czechoslovakia: “Because a great patriot and statesman in Poland [Pilsudski] was willing to make an accord with Germany, we immediately proceeded to follow up on it and arrived at an agreement which means more for peace in Europe than all the jabbering in the temple of the League in Geneva.”!!4 Ambassador Lipski expressed his satisfaction with these remarks, but also voiced the opinion that some formal acknowledgment of the frontier with Poland— analogous to the one Hitler had made in his speech in Florence near the end of his Italian journey in May—would be most desirable.!!5 Berlin did not follow up on this suggestion, and the course of German-Polish relations after the Czechoslovak crisis of 1938 would take a very different turn from that suggested by the Polish ambassador on 13 September. For a few critical weeks, however, Germany and Poland would continue

their informal collaboration in the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia.!!¢ During the summer of 1938, the Polish government did what it could to coordinate its policy with Hungary in the hope that the active revisionist policy of the latter would serve three purposes. The encouragement of Hungarian demands would emphasize the grievances of minorities inside Czechoslovakia other than the Germans, thereby lending

credibility to Poland’s interest in the Polish minority in Czechoslovakia without raising embarrassing questions about national minorities within Poland. In the second place, now that Austria had been annexed by Germany, the whole southern border of Czechoslovakia would be menaced by Hungary’s role, thus making it all the less likely that the 110. It was precisely on this score that the French had warned Warsaw; the Poles claimed to be realists, but what would they do when Getmany appeared on their southern as well as their western and northern border and when Getmany demanded the return of Germans in Poland after those in Austria and Czechoslovakia?

D.D.F., 2d, 8, No. 314.

111. Lipski Papers, p. 386; Cienciala, pp. 96-99. Goring repeated this suggestion on 16 September, Lipski Papers, pp. 404-5. 112. These were discussed by Lipski and Géring, see Lipski Papers, Nos. 91-93; cf. G.D., D, 2, No. 271. At this time, the “German-Polish Society” was activated, see Groscurth Diary, 29 August 1938, p. 101; Kleist, p. 14.

Those who assert that the German claims on Poland raised in October 1938 were reasonable conveniently overlook the fact that the Germans only a few weeks before had solemnly promised the Poles not to make

these claims. 113. On Forster, see Lipski Papers, p. 394; Levine, pp. 138-39. On Danzig in general and other specific issues in German-Polish relations, see Cienciala, pp. 62, 94-95. 114. Domarus, 1:902.

115. Lipski-von Moltke talk of 13 September 1938, Lipski Papers, pp. 399-400. Note that von Ribbentrop, during Hitler’s Italian journey, explained that Hitler’s recognition of Germany’s borders applied to all of them except that with Czechoslovakia, but he made this statement to the Hungarian minister in Rome (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 182).

116. Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 76-77, n. 119.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

593

dismemberment of Czechoslovakia would be resisted by force. Finally, the successful detaching of Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine from Prague’s control and their direct or indirect control by Budapest would establish a common Polish-Hungarian border and thus tie together the “Third Europe” of Beck’s dreams.!!7 Given the fact that the elements within Slovakia who wanted greater autonomy from Prague were often no more enthusiastic about Magyar than about Czech domination,!'8 this policy was by no means a simple one to implement, even without the peculiar relationship with France that such an anti-Czechoslovak policy entailed. The Hungarian government was itself torn by conflicting desires, emotions, and ex-

pectations. In the immediate situation, there was the hope that the substantial Magyar minority in Czechoslovakia—about

650,000 in Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine—

would benefit from concessions made to all national minorities. More significant, at a time when the possibility of an attack or the threat of an attack on Czechoslovakia opened up the prospect of that country’s dismemberment, there was the hope that Hungary’s aspirations for territorial revision might be at least partially realized. The resulting common border with Poland looked as welcome from Budapest as it did from Warsaw, but there were, nevertheless, some doubts and reservations. The reluctance of

many Slovaks to return to Magyar control does not appear to have been perceived as a major obstacle; a combination of self-confidence and self-delusion reduced this to a matter for maneuver, bribery, and—if need be—repression.'!? More important was the

fear that the disintegration of Czechoslovakia might not be peaceful.!?° As long as the combined pressure by Czechoslovakia’s neighbors seemed likely to lead to a quiet throttling of the hated state, the Hungarian government was both eager for its portion of the spoils and willing to do its share of saber rattling and diplomatic noise making. If war came, however, there were enormous dangers. In the first place, as previously mentioned, the Hungarian government was worried that Yugoslavia might attack her from the rear if Hungarian troops moved northward in a military campaign; and all Hungarian attempts to secure from Berlin some form of guarantee against that contingency had been rejected.!?! Direct negotiations with Yugoslavia and Romania, which were a possible alternative means of simultaneously improving the lot of Magyar minorities in those two countries and restraining these two Little Entente powers from coming to the aid of their Czechoslovak ally against a Hungarian attack dragged on all through

the

spring and

summer

of 1938.

The

Hungarians,

however,

never

quite

succeeded in excluding Czechoslovakia herself from the purview of these negotiations and eventually arrived at an agreement with all three Little Entente powers that renounced the use of force in their relationship in exchange for recognition of Hungary’s right to rearm and the promise of agreements on the treatment of minorities.!? The fact that this agreement was announced on 22 August 1938, while Hungary’s leaders were on

a state visit in Germany, can only be interpreted as a breach in German-Hungarian joint

or parallel action against Czechoslovakia resulting from Hungary’s fear of a danger even greater than the possible hostility of Yugoslavia and Romania, namely, the outbreak of a LOD S200 W219 5235; 117. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 173, 187, 191 (German text in Zsigmond, pp. 270-71),

237-39, 241, 244, 246.

200, 246, 250, 278, 331. 118. For discussion of this issue between Poland and Hungary, see ibid., Nos.

119. Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 62-63.

Se 120. See Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 171. to a general war, Italy’s main 121. The Hungarians were not reassured by Italian promises of support; if it came lav border offered little forces would be needed on the border with France and in Africa while the Italo-Yugos forward substantially move to unable been had Italy knew, well Hungarians the as where, but steep mountains 402). No. 2, D, in the fighting of 1915-17 (see G.D., 690; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 448. 122. See especially Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 176; B.D., 3d, 2, No.

594

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

general European wat. The leaders of Hungary were willing to concert with Germany in the diplomacy of the spring and summer of 1938, and they listened with pleasure to comments such as those of Goring on 1 June and 5 July urging combined military operations against Czechoslovakia.!*3 To Géring’s comments that Hungary could not count on Germany to handle all the problems for her, the Hungarian minister could only combine his expression of agreement in principle with references to the dangers for Hungary in practice. The more acute the crisis over Czechoslovakia became in August 1938, the mote difficult the dilemma faced by the Hungarian government. If Czechoslovakia made concessions, Hungary wanted her own minority included; if Czechoslovakia were peacefully partitioned, Hungary wanted what she considered her share; but if war broke out, Hungary wanted no part.!*4 Not only was Hungary militarily incapable of standing up to Yugoslavia and Romania if they combined forces against her, but the Hungarian regent, prime minister, and foreign minister were all convinced that in a general war Germany would again be defeated and that Hungary would be crushed beyond all hope of recovery if she were allied with the Third Reich in such a conflict. The German government, on the other hand, wanted to utilize Hungary’s aspirations for territorial revision at the expense of Czechoslovakia as a means of assisting her own strategy of a quick isolated war in which Hungary—as a possible major beneficiary—would just have to shate in the risks incurred for great rewards. From that point of view, the fact that Horthy had accepted an invitation to come to Germany for the christening of the heavy cruiser Priny Eugen scheduled for 22 August would provide an excellent opportunity to see just how closely the two countries could work together.!5 As the Hungarian regent, prime minister, foreign minister, and minister of defense headed for their meetings with Hitler and other German leaders, the negotiations with

the Little Entente had just reached the point of agreement, so that the Hungarians found themselves parties to public announcements about the renunciation of force in the very days when they were expected by the Germans to agree to participate in a war six weeks later.!°° As if this public “distance from Germany’s policy toward Czechoslovakia,” !2’ as von Ribbentrop called it, were not enough, the Hungarians were almost frantic about the

danger of a general war, having been warned by Helmuth Groscurth on behalf of Admiral Canaris of Hitlet’s intention of attacking Czechoslovakia.!28 From this and other warnings, the Hungarians had a clear picture of the dissension within the German leader-

ship, a dissension caused by the belief of many of the generals that the war against Czechoslovakia Hitler was determined to launch would quickly become a general war that Germany would lose.'” In their meetings with Hitler, von Ribbentrop, and the 123. G.D., D, 2, Nos. 232, 248, 284; Adianz, No. 48; but note Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 186, and G.D., D, 2,

No. 296, for pushing from the Hungarian side.

124. Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 73-75. Note Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 289; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 68.

This concern of the Hungarians played a part in their refusal at this time to follow Italian urgings to leave the League (Ciano, Diary, 17 July 1938, p. 147). 125. The cruiser was originally to be named Admiral Teggetthoff in honor of the most famous Austtian naval commander—it was in this connection that the participation of Horthy as an admiral of the former AustroHungarian navy had seemed particularly appropriate—but Italian objections to naming a German cruiser for the man whose laurels had been won at Italy’s expense led to a last-minute substitution of the more “neutral” name (see “Informationsbericht Nr. 55,” 10 August 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £.179). 126. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 295, 296; cf. ibid., Nos. 305-7, 314 (French text in Adam, No. 10).

127. G.D., D, 2, No. 383. The strong German negative reaction is shown in the circular instruction of von Weizsacker about the agreement, especially its “undesirable” renunciation of the use of force (ibid., 5, No. 221). 128. Groscurth Diary, 20 August 1938, p. 102. 129. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 292 (German text in Zsigmond, p. 277, n. 78, together with another similar

warning). This episode is examined in Thomas L. Sakmyster, “The Hungarian State Visit to Germany of August, 1938: Some New Evidence on Hungary in Hitler’s Pre-Munich Policy,” Canadian Slavonic Studies, 3, No.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

595

German military leaders, therefore, the Hungarians stressed that they believed there would indeed be a general war and urged Germany not to start one. Hungary was not yet militarily ready to face her Little Entente neighbors, and she could either herself be ready to join an attack in a year or two—if Germany were willing to postpone action—or would have to wait to see whether an immediate German attack on Czechoslovakia were indeed localized, in which case they could join in after a couple of weeks.129 This position of the Hungarians, voiced repeatedly in conversations with von Ribbentrop, Keitel, and Hitler himself, was, of course, directly contrary to what those

three wanted and expected.'3! While Keitel appears simply to have listened, von Ribbentrop scolded and warned his Hungarian visitors. Hitler made a major effort to persuade the Hungarians to change their minds. In his meeting with Horthy, Hitler explained his plan for an attack on Czechoslovakia and offered to let Hungary have Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine if she joined promptly in the action. Horthy declined participation in a combined attack and maintained his refusal in a subsequent conversation with Hitler. The latter was, however, so interested in the concept of a quick, joint,

concentric attack on Czechoslovakia that he made still another attempt to persuade the Hungarians in a talk with Hungarian Minister of Defense Jeno Ratz.!3? Hitler expressed confidence that the Western Powers would not intervene in the war and that the Little Entente allies of Czechoslovakia would not move either. The one country that would move, he claimed, was Poland; and if Hungary did not participate, the Poles might end up not only with Tésin but with Slovakia as well. Even this possibility did not move the Hungarian minister, though it was a shrewd act on Hitler’s part to remind the Hungarians of a contingency of which they certainly had their suspicions. Hitler told the Hungarian minister that the World War could have been localized if a swift attack on Serbia had been launched; the implication for 1938 was obvious, but no reply to this revelation of Hitler’s perception of the past as a lesson for the future is recorded. Hitler farther assured his guest that “he doesn’t listen to his generals, because they always say they are not ready and they are always worrying, as they did over the proclamation of military sovereignty and the occupation of the Rhineland,”!? an indirect answer to the advice Hitler suspected the Hungarians were getting from some of his generals. All these efforts of the Germans were in vain. Hungary was not ready and was afraid to move. The Magyar leaders regretted the necessity of having to turn the Germans down, since revision of the border with Czechoslovakia was one of their dearest hopes and aims.'!34 The Germans correctly read Hungarian policy as one of waiting in case war did break out to see how things went before committing themselves. They had warned the Hungarians that “those who wished to share in the meal would have to help with the 4.

1.

Sa

ee

) EN

A

ee

ee

4 (Winter 1969), 679. Documents used in this article will generally not be cited again here. and 130. This appears to me to be the fairest reading of the then available evidence summarized by Sakmyster

not cited by S., the new evidence from Hungarian records provided by him. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 297,

the seems to reflect the confusion in German military circles. Important independent evidence confirming account of S. is in the report on the subsequent (6 September) visit of Hungarian Chief of Staff Keresztesinthe High Fischer prepared after World War II by Erich Hansen, who had been present at the meeting

Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Command of the German army (Hansen to Hillgruber, 23 March 1957, Munich, 169; Sakmyster, “Hungary Z.S. 1130, pp. 13-14). Cf. Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 71; Kral, Minchen, No. and Munich,” pp. 734-36; D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 361, 503; 11, No. 1.

about the dangers of war 131. Note that Horthy went so far as to warn the Polish ambassador to Getmany 137-39. pp. iere, Weizsacker-Pap in account the also See (Lipski Papers, p. 381). vigorous efforts to persuade 132. Sakmyster, “Hungarian State Visit,” p. 684, correctly observes that Hitler’s war in 1938; why go to all this the Hungarians contradicts A. J. P. Taylor’s thesis that Hitler did not want trouble to secure Hungarian participation in a war he did not intend to wage? 133. Sakmyster, “Hungarian State Visit,” p. 688. 134. G.D., D, 2, No. 402.

596

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cooking,”!3> but Hitler recognized that Hungary was not prepared to help in the kitchen. He would subsequently often refer back to this refusal to take risks. In the short run, it meant that Hitler could not count on immediate Hungarian participation in war; in the intermediate situation, it meant that Hungary could count on German support only for minor revisions of the Hungarian-Czechoslovak border; with the long-term future of Slovakia left for Germany’s later decisions. Hungary, in any case, had not met Hitler’s test of will.36 A month later, when it looked as if the war Hitler wanted might be obviated by a peaceful settlement on the basis of the cession of the Sudetenland to Germany, Hitler would try to utilize the aspirations of Hungary as well as Poland once more in the hope of bringing on the rupture he wanted, but the fact that he himself had to push the Hungarians forward would reinforce rather than diminish his contempt and distrust of the Hungarians after August 1938. If Poland could serve as a shield and Hungary was but a dubious ally to German policy, what about Italy? Neither Axis partner had fully clarified its own thinking on this point. The Germans had discussed the Czechoslovak question only briefly with their Italian hosts in May. The Italians had declared themselves disinterested in the fate of Czechoslovakia but were left with the impression that the Germans were unlikely to resort to force in the near future, but that if they did, hostilities would be isolated. In

fact, Count Ciano was to note in his diary on 19 August that the Germans had said there would be no war for several years.!57 As the Germans increased the volume of their propaganda campaign, however, the Italians wanted to know more precisely what Germany intended, and starting in late May they repeatedly asked the Germans for specific information about their plan. The responses given by the Germans were vague, stressing the iniquities of the Czechs and the possibility of a German response to Czechoslovak provocation, but without specificity as to plans or timing.!3° Mussolini himself seemed unable to make up his mind what he wanted to do. As one scholar has phrased it, “it is difficult to discover a constructive policy aim seriously pursued in Mussolini’s thinking and will during those weeks and months.”!%9 The Duce may have hoped that the April agreement with England would be followed by even further concessions from London; but as he was himself unwilling to reduce the Italian

involvement in the civil war raging in Spain or to make an agreement with France analogous to that with England, friction between Italy and the Western Powers continued. To reassure the Germans that this was so, the Italian government kept Berlin informed of the stages in the inconclusive and unsuccessful talks with the British;!4° and in the course of these negotiations, Mussolini more and more talked himself into a position of alignment with Germany, in war if necessary, and preferably in alignment with Japan as well.!*! The repercussions of the Azschluss, however, hung over the prospect of a German135. Hitler’s comment to Prime Minister Imrédy, ibid., No. 383; Weizsdcker-Papiere, p. 138. Note that Hitler agreed to general staff contacts (G.D., D, 2, No. 383), but instructed the German chief of staff to give no hints

about the timing of Germany’s planned attack on Czechoslovakia to the Hungarian chief of staff (Jodl diary, 6 September 1938, TMWC, 28:375). 136. Note also Géring’s comments

in Lipski Papers, pp. 384-85, 395-96, and G.D., D, 2, No. 402; Kanya’s comments to the French minister on 8 September 1938 in D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 47.

137. Diary, p. 208. The same divergence in timetable would recur in an even more extreme form after the meetings of May 1939.

138. Ciano, Diary, 27, 28, 31 May, 3, 18 June 1938, pp. 171-72, 175, 177-78, 213; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 220, 223, 229; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 240. 139, Siebert, p. 72.

140. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 777, 782, 788, 792, 799; Ciano, Diary, 22 June, 2, 12 July 1938, pp. 184, 191, 194. 141. Ciano, Diary, 12, 26 May 1938, pp. 161, 170-71; Magistrati’s information for Wiskemann in Wiskernann,

pp. 152-53. On the possible tie to Japan, see Ciano, Diary, 6, 21 June 1938, pp. 178, 184.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

597

Italian alliance. The economic and financial problems arising out of the German annexation of Austria were settled to Italy’s satisfaction by an agreement reached on 28 May,'** and the time when Germany was using the Sudeten Germans as a pretext for the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia was not the time to make much noise about the Germans in South Tyrol.!# Nevertheless, Mussolini realized that it would take the Italian public a good deal of time and propagandistic preparation to warm up to the idea of a firm military alliance with Germany.'#4 The discussion of that subject in the summer of 1938 accordingly would see some exchanges of drafts and comments; but although Mussolini was very much interested, he was also sure that the subject would have to be approached slowly and carefully.'#5 All the same, the hardening of Italian resolve in the summer of 1938 to annex Albania at an opportune moment as well as the initiation of a major anti-Semitic campaign in mid-July both had the real effect of pushing the Axis partners closer together.!4¢ From the German point of view, there were equivalent hesitations but still a real concern for closer relations with Italy. The Germans and Italians not only kept each other informed of relevant diplomatic developments!4’ but on 19 June von Ribbentrop, who had had prior conversations about the subject with Italian Ambassador Bernardo Attolico, proposed a formal and public military alliance.'4* The German foreign minister had been the architect of the Anti-Comintern Pact, had proposed some public treaty action during the May visit, and favored agreements of great propaganda value; now he wanted an alliance worked out in meetings with Ciano, involving the Japanese but excluding the problem of war arising out of the Czechoslovak crisis. Presumably he thought that the Italians would find the scheme more attractive if they were free but not obligated to intervene in that contingency. Subsequent negotiations in late June and early July revealed the Italians to be interested in principle but desirous of moving carefully and slowly. They felt that the Italian public would have to be prepared and they were as yet not informed of any German timetable.'#? This last was evidently very much a matter of concern to Rome; the Italians discussed with their new-found Yugoslav and their old Hungarian friends the proper sequence of events by which Hungary, if she attacked Czechoslovakia a bit after rather than before the Germans, could assure Yugoslavia’s remaining neutral.!5° There is, nevertheless, a curious ambiguity in the Italian position, and there is evidence that the Germans were aware of it. When the Italian chief of staff, General

Alberto Pariani, was in Germany in July, he was given a frank exposition of the situation by Géring and was enormously impressed by the great strides German reatmament had

142. G.D., D, 1, No. 773; Ciano, Diary, 28 May 1938, p. 173. D, 1, No. 780; 143. The subject almost disappeared from view between May and September 1938. See G.D., Latour, p. 27.

after the removal 144. It must be noted that there were still obstacles in the field of diplomatic personnel even was really more pro-French of Cerrutti and von Hassell. The Italian military attaché in Berlin, General Marras, than pro-German. See D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 181.

145. G.D., D, 1, Nos. 774, 781.

pp. 192-93, 195. The Albanian issue 146. Ibid., No. 778; U.S. 1938, 2:583ff.; Ciano, Diary, 10, 14 July 1938,

drive her to Germany's side. illustrates the accuracy of Hitlet’s belief that Italian territorial aspirations would

on 21 June, but there is no evidence of 147. G.D., D, 2, No. 260. Hans Frank was in Rome for a public address

any diplomatic conversations (Ciano, Diary, p. 184).

Origins, pp. 27-32; cf. Ge 148. The Italian records provide the main source on this; see Toscano,

DME Not

784.

G.D., D, 1, No. 786; Toscano, Origins, pp. 32= 149, Ciano, Diary, 27 June, 11, 12 July 1938, pp. 187, 193, 194;

resulted in the discovery that in that quarter For Attolico’s arrangements to sound out the Japanese—which

35. in Toscano, Origins, pp. 34-35. all was as yet open—see the documents from the Italian archives cited Diary, 24 June 1938, pp. 186-87. 150. Note Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 247, 257, 284; Ciano,

598 made.'5!

Hitler’s Foreign Polity, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II Right after the return of Pariani, however, Mussolini—who

as minister of

defense had presumably heard from his chief of staff—told the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister that he did not expect a European war over the Czechoslovak question, but that Italy would support Germany if one broke out and that he had so informed the Germans.'52 Two comments by Mussolini recorded by Ciano in his diary may provide a clue to the Duce’s conflicting emotions. On 17 July Mussolini insisted that there be no Italian measures the Germans might think questionable; if it ever came to it,

he wanted to be able to accuse the Germans of deserting him rather than the other way atound—a sure reflection of his sensitivity to German charges that Italy had betrayed her Triple Alliance partners in the war.'®3 A few days later, on 21 July, on the other hand, he was angry on learning from the newspapers about the Wiedemann mission to London and wondered what the Germans would say if he sent his secretary to Paris for conversations with the French foreign minister.!*4 The Italian leader might incline more and more to a definite alignment with Germany; but the idea of serving as junior partner to a great power that would not even take him into its confidence and was likely to confront him with unpleasant surprises left a tesidue of reluctance, symbolized by Ciano’s declining an invitation by von Ribbentrop to the September National Socialist party rally in Nuremberg when progress might be made on the alliance negotiations.!°> The wildly enthusiastic report of Marshal Italo Balbo on his trip to Germany of 9-14 August during which Goring had urged the conversion of the Axis into a formal alliance appears to have alarmed rather than pleased.'*° Attolico and von Weizsacker had already discussed the possible imminence of general war in mid-July; a few days after Balbo’s return the Italians received from within the German general staff a warning analogous to that provided the Hungarians to the effect that a German attack on Czechoslovakia had been decided upon, that it would take place at the end of September, and that all was ready for war.'5’ The Italians preferred to have things develop along the lines of their interpretation of the May conversations that war was some years off and immediately instructed Attolico to ask the Germans for precise information. Having decided to join Germany if a general war took place, they felt entitled to know whether and when it was to occur; but von Ribbentrop, who must have sensed the uneasiness of his prospective ally and who may well have had instructions from Hitler not to reveal exact details, merely assured Attolico that no decisions had been reached and that the Italians would be the first to know.!58 It should be easy to understand that Mussolini and Ciano found this situation both extraordinary and alarming. Substantial Italian forces in Spain might be immediately affected by the outbreak of a general war even if Italy did not join in right away, while if she did, all sorts of problems would arise. There is a certain frantic quality to the subse151. The most complete account appears to be that in the memoirs of Rintelen (pp. 48-50), who accompanied Pariani. See also Ciano, Diary, 15 July 1938, p. 195; and the intercepted instruction of Mussolini of 8 July 1938,

in Moffat Papers, Vol. 13. 152. Ciano Diplomatic Papers, p. 228; Ciano, Diary, 18, 20 July 1938, pp. 197-99. Attolico told von Ribbentrop about the conversation and the Duce’s position on 26 July when the two again discussed the proposed alliance (GD., D, 2, No. 334; Toscano, Origins, pp. 37-38). 153. Diary, p. 197. Ironically, Hitler himself thought Italy’s conduct in 1914-15 had been very sensible and that

the view of Italy as disloyal was a characteristic stupidity of his own domestic opponents (Hitlers zweites Buch,

pp. 93ff.).

154. Diary, pp. 199-200. 155. G.D., D, 1, No. 797; Toscano, Origins, pp. 38-40. 156. Magistrati, pp. 212-14; Ciano, Diary, 16 August 1938, p. 206; cf. G.D., D, 1, No. 798; D.D.F.,, 2d, 10, Nos.

360, 364, 391. 157. G.D., D, 2, No. 295; Ciano, Diary, 19 August 1938, p. 208. 158. Ciano, Diary, 20, 21, 26 August 1938, pp. 208-9, 212; G.D., D, 2, No. 384; cf. Ciano, Diary, 25 August 1938, pp. 211-12; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 302.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Cxechoslovakia, Part 2

599

quent repeated Italian requests for information from the Germans, requests that received no clear answer but were interpreted in Berlin as reflecting doubts in Rome.'5? The

Prince of Hessen was once again called in, this time by the Italians, to find out from

Hitler directly what was going on lest there be another surprise like the Anschluss. The ptince brought back a lengthy memorandum Hitler had dictated to him on 4 or 5 September, but in this the Fuhrer only reiterated his general views and provided no clue to his actual plans.'*! Ciano correctly deduced that Hitler was simply unwilling to give precise information to the Italians, a fact that left Italy free to make its own decisions.!© Hitler may well have thought it best to leave some uncertainty about Italy’s position. He wanted and expected a short, isolated war in which there would be no need for Italian intervention, and uncertainty as to Italy’s role might help restrain prospective supporters of Czechoslovakia. A visit to Italy by Admiral Canaris at the same time in early September that the Prince of Hessen was in Germany convinced the German chief of intelligence that the Italians were dubious about war and planned to stay out if one started, a view that impressed so ardent an admirer of Hitler’s as Alfred Jodl.!® Hitler would claim that Italy was in fact going to come in—the Duce only suffered from generals as obstinate as his own—but whether or not he was quite as certain as he claimed is a little doubtful; Mussolini’s

first encouraging and then discouraging him

would affect the final denouement of the Czechoslovak crisis. If Hitler was even the least bit unsure of Italy, he was correct in his doubts. Like the Hungarians who were eager to talk about revision at Czechoslovakia’s expense but dubious when they saw the Germans not just shouting and waving their arms on the brink but definitely about to go over, the leader of Italy was all for public pronouncements about the virtues of the Axis and private declarations of the need for war and the inevitability of the dictators crushing the democracies, but very hard of hearing when the trumpet sounded for battle. On 12 September the Germans finally gave the Italians the information they claimed to want: Géring told them in Hitler’s behalf that the Fuhrer wanted to have a secret meeting with the Duce at the Brenner pass at any time that was convenient—but Lefore 25 September. With Europe on the brink of war, and with Italy pressing for details of Germany’s intentions, here was both a clue to Germany’s timetable and an opportunity to find out more. The Italians, however, either failed or deliberately refused to grasp the implications of this message. Ciano offered to make more propaganda for the Germans—an offer they happily accepted—but Mussolini coupled a polite expression of interest with a comment that he had planned a trip into some Italian provinces and would prefer an October meeting!'* Ciano’s statement to the Yugoslav minister on 13 September that “it was premature” to speak of Italy going to war but that Italy maintained her solidarity with Germany, shows that as the crisis reached its height, the government in Rome was a reluctant dragon, useful to Germany for frightening potential enemies with its shadow but not to be relied on for breathing fire.'° If the role of Poland was to be one of diplomatic assistance to Germany combined 159. See G.D., D, 2, Nos. 401, 409, 414; Ciano, Diary, 29, 30 August 1938, pp. 213-14.

Eberhard, Munich, Institut fur 160. Ciano, Diary, 2 September 1938, pp. 215-16; the diary of Wolf and the prince on 3 September at 10:15. Zeitgeschichte, mentions a meeting of Hitler, von Brauchitsch, Keitel, Diary, 6, 7 September 1938, p. 222. 161. Hitler’s memorandum for Mussolini is G.D., D, 2, No. 415. See Ciano, 2d, 11, Nos. 63, 77. D.D.F., also See 222. 218, 217, pp. 1938, September 10 5, 3, 162. Ciano, Diary,

TMWC, 28:376. Cf. Hungarian 163. Groscurth Diary, 6 September 1938, p. 113; Jodl diary, 8 September 1938,

embassy in Washington that Italy Documents, 2, No. 324. The report of indications from a member of the Italian by von Ribbentrop and von Weizsacker initialed was 421, No. 2, D, G.D., in war major a in neutral stay might (T-120, 1321/2410/511044). Cf. G.D., D, 2, No. 436. (p. 329, n. 5) misunderstood the evidence 164. Ciano, Diary, 12, 13 September 1938, pp. 222-23, 224. Celovsky when he asserted that Mussolini accepted the invitation.

165. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 233.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

with possible Polish seizure of portions of Czechoslovakia—but only if there were no general war—and if Berlin had good reason to be skeptical about the immediate military participation of Hungary and to have some residual doubts about that of Italy, how was the German government to assess the possible role of the Soviet Union? In the period June to September 1938, as the crisis over Czechoslovakia mounted, the role or possible role of Russia in case of a German attack on Czechoslovakia was often the focus of discussion, and the issue has continued to exercise a fascination for historians and those

who wish to argue the meritorious or sinister character of Soviet policy. Since the Soviet government has yet to allow open access to scholars to Russian diplomatic records of the eighteenth century, it is not likely that some of the critical questions can be answered with any assurance in the lifetime of our contemporaries. That need not mean, however, that the evidence from a variety of available sources does not allow us to state with considerable confidence what other governments believed to be the intent and policy of Russia; and these beliefs, correct or mistaken, are themselves important since it was they, rather than conclusions that might be drawn on the basis of new evidence centuries hence, which influenced the policies and actions of those governments.!® The dominant element in the assessment of Soviet policy by those who might be on either side of a German-Czechoslovak conflict as well as those who might remain neutral was the geographic reality of Russia’s separation from Czechoslovakia by Poland and Romania. Just what the Soviet Union could or might want to do in the face of this reality was interesting, but not necessarily nearly as important as the voluminous speculation on the subject might lead one to expect. If the Soviet Union did not honor her treaty obligation to assist Czechoslovakia when France had come to the aid of the latter, then there

would clearly be nothing the Western Powers could do about a situation in which they were left to fight Germany by themselves—just as they had been in 1918, though now without the American help that had been so important then. If, on the other hand, the

Soviet government did declare war, the situation would be little different. The Russians might send some planes by flying them over Romania, and much of the diplomatic documentation deals with this subject.1°’ Such action, if carried out, would be helpful to

Czechoslovakia—assuming the Germans did not succeed in destroying the Czechoslovak airfields in the first stages of a conflict—but was not likely to keep the country from being overrun by the Germans, who would then turn west on France, since the same area that separated Russia from Czechoslovakia would then separate German-occupied Czechoslovakia from Russia.'° Were the Red Army to move across Romania and 166. There is a good summaty of the evidence available by 1957 in Celovsky, pp. 311-26. An eatlier, but useful, survey is in John A. Lukacs, The Great Powers and Eastern Europe (New York: American Book Co., 1953), pp. 172-89; see also Cienciala, pp. 116-17. Documents cited by Celovsky will generally not be cited here. There are additional details in Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 231, 233, 258, 290, 304, 313; New Documents on the History of

Munich (Prague: Orbis, 1958), and a useful critique of the latter publication by Frantisek Vnuk, “Munich and the Soviet Union,” Journal of Central European Affairs, 21, No. 3 (Oct. 1961), 285-304. 167. The material on this subject and on any Romanian offer to look the other way if Russian planes flew over her territory (perhaps because there was nothing Romania could do about them anyway) can be read in several ways. Litvinov stressed the importance of obtaining transit rights for troops in spite of the knowledge of both the physical inadequacy of the route and the opposition of Bucharest; when the French relayed Romanian tacit agreement to overflight, the Russian response always coupled air with land transit rights. This can be read as a means of insisting on land transit rights—or as a means of avoiding any aid to Czechoslovakia even by air. See D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 199; 10, Nos. 6, 182, 511, 534; 11, Nos. 17, 29, 38, 95, 96, 165; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos.

330, 336. See also the detailed discussion of the problems in Fierlinger’s report No. 5 of 18 June 1938, Czecho-

slovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412508—15; and Coulondre’s complaint about the French breaking off a

project to purchase planes in the Soviet Union (D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 18). 168. Note the comments by British Foreign Office officials on a claim by Fierlinger that he had assurances of Soviet aid. Not only was Lord Chilston doubtful, but in London it was recalled that the Chinese had hoped for

extensive Soviet aid in their conflict with Japan only to receive little help in fact (C 9186/1941/18, FO

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

601

Poland, however, and no one detected signs of this being intended, both countries were

practically certain to declare war on Russia; and France and Czechoslovakia would then find themselves fighting alongside one ally and against another.!% From the perspective of the Western Powers and Czechoslovakia, therefore, Soviet intervention, even if it occurred, was unlikely to be particularly helpful in the immediate situation and was likely to produce more problems rather than to help in the long run. On the other hand, from the point of view of the Soviet government, there was much

advantage to a war that broke out in the west. If the French and British fought the Germans, that could be all to Russia’s advantage whether or not she joined in. If she joined in, there was the possibility of gains in Eastern Europe, but there was also the risk that the French would not fight offensively and leave Germany the option of turning eastward for further expansion. If, however, she stayed out and France and Britain did

fight and crush Germany, there was still the possibility that the resulting upheaval would open up the possibility for Soviet territorial gain at least in the Baltic area and possibly elsewhere. From Moscow’s point of view, therefore, there was a premium on keeping options open, and the repeated emphasis in Soviet statements as the crisis became more urgent on the role of the League in securing cooperative action against Germany is certainly open to the interpretation that this complicated route was thought of as a means of making it possible to postpone a decision as long as possible.!”° It is worthy of note that the one area of armaments policy in which there is a record of Stalin’s taking a personal interest during the summer of 1938 concerns the Russian desire to order a battleship to be built in the United States.'7! In his meeting with U.S. Ambassador Davies, his first ever with a foreign diplomat, Stalin predicted that Chamberlain’s policy would fail because “the fascist dictators would drive too hard a bargain” and that “the Soviet Union had every confidence that it could defend itself.” A major investment in the construction of a modern battleship which would not be available for three or four years at the earliest, however, hardly suggests that the need for Russia to defend herself in a major war against Germany or Japan was considered a contingency of the immediate future. It was accordingly simple enough for the Russians to 371/21734, commenting on B.D., 3d, 2, No. 761). 169. Note Osusky’s comment

to this effect on 30 May 1938, U.S. 1938, 2:523. The French, British, and

Czechoslovak representatives in Poland all agreed that if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia and there was no wat, Poland would

seize Té∈ if there were a general war, Poland would stay out unless Russian troops

entered Polish territory in which case she would fight the Soviet Union. If Soviet troops did not enter, then there was the prospect of Poland’s later coming in on the allied side (Noél report of 11 September 1938,

to allow the D.D.F, 2d, 11, No. 90). The Polish ambassador in Paris asserts that Bonnet never asked the Poles

foreign Russians to send their armies across Poland (Lukasiewicz Papers, p. 107); and Comnen, the Romanian but this is surely a minister, insists in his memoirs (p. 31) that he was never asked for troop transit rights either; of course, that formality as in both cases it was known that the answer would be no. It might be argued, but given the Russia, against war a pursue to Romania and Poland of objections the Germany would disregard by a much closer France, distance at which Germany would then have to operate from home bases threatened in military planning in a return to the west first was surely more likely—and so the Germans themselves figured

1938 as Hitler had anticipated in Mein Kampf.

ak documents in T-120, 1039/1809/412149, 170. See also Fierlinger’s telegrams of 9, 10 June 1938, Czechoslov

reports duting September 412152-53, and Krofta to Osusky, 15 June 1938, ibid., frame 412364, Fierlinger’s but when the prospect of wat was reflect his belief in Soviet adherence to her alliance with Czechoslovakia;

ak effort to secure Polish neutrality or most imminent, on 27 September, he cautioned about any Czechoslov in case of a favorable development the Soviets would try to

assistance because he had “the impression that 1938, 13:50 p.m., Czechoslovak docusecure a common border with us” (Fierlinger tel. 961 of 27 September be secured only by Soviet seizure of course, of could, border common a Such 412088). frame ibid., ment,

Galicia from Poland.

Ms,

Union, 1933-1939, pp. 572-73; cf. ibid., pp. 694ft. 171. Stalin-Davies meeting of 5 June 1938, U.S., The Soviet Zeit des Hitler-Stalin Pakts, 1939-1941 (Tibingen: See also Franz Knipping, Die Amerikanische Russlandpolitik. in der

Mohr, 1974), pp. 16-17.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

blame others for not standing up to the Germans under circumstances in which there was no danger of having to do so on a major scale themselves.'” When that danger arose in the following year, Stalin preferred alignment with Hitler to either neutrality or alliance with Hitler’s enemies; nevertheless, whether it was wise for Britain and France to treat the Soviet Union as coolly as they did in 1938 is another matter. Such treatment might easily be explained by the fears—treal or unreal—of the leaders of the Western Powers; but it was also likely to reinforce the fears—treal or unteal—of Russia’s leaders as well. The former were afraid of Soviet expansion and subversion, the latter of some great hostile coalition. Looking backward from 1938, the latter fear had some justification; looking forwatd from 1938, it is the former fears that have

been validated by events.!73 The situation in 1938 would only play into the hands of a Germany which had imagined and convinced herself and many others that the European settlement of 1919 was terribly harmful to her, when the situation of that year ought to have demonstrated the exact opposite. Germany was, in fact, facing a Czechoslovakia that had no common border with Russia and in her calculations took advantage of this situation. German military planning reckoned with the possibility of some Soviet air support for Czechoslovakia, but was in general based on the assumption that Russia would do very little in a military way, whether or not she formally entered hostilities. German diplomatic reports from Moscow confirmed the absence of major military preparations during the summer and early fall of 1938; and, after the crisis was over, noted:that the Soviet Union had not even

undertaken the limited mobilization precautions thought necessary by such countries as Holland, Belgium, and Switzerland.'* From the perspective of Berlin, it made little difference whether the Soviet Union did or did not intervene. Under these circumstances, Hitler’s plans could be implemented, or at least so it appeared. The massive construction projects on the Westwall went forward; and Hitler, who toured the fortifications 26—29 August, expressed himself as highly pleased with the situation and utilized the opportunity for nasty comments to and about those of his generals, especially Adam and von Wietersheim, who had expressed skepticism about the

strength of the fortified zone.'”> The desire not only to have the harvest completed but to have as much time as possible for the construction program—while still leaving a short campaign season in 1938—had induced Hitler to order the preparations for the attack on Czechoslovakia completed by the end of September 1938.7 The initiation of a war against Czechoslovakia would, as Hitler perceived it, come during a period of constant incidents within Czechoslovakia, with one at a time previously picked for the attack being utilized as the official pretext. This, of course, was all something that could not— as in 1914—hbe left to chance.'”” On 26 August Hitler passed instructions to the Sudeten 172. Cf. Maisky’s comment on 17 August that he did not think the French would fight for Czechoslovakia, U.S. 1938, 1:548; see also ibid., pp. 65-68, 68-69; D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 474.

173. I am dubious about the alleged importance of an anti-Bolshevik regard. See the extensive discussion of the issue in Gottfried Niedhart, 1939 (Munich: Fink, 1972). Collier's memorandum of 16 August 1938 National Socialist, Fascist, and Communist systems were different in National Socialist Germany was the immediate danger to Britain (N

line in British and French policy in this Grossbritannien und die Soujetunion, 1934— appears to summarize the British view: theory but similar in practice; however, 4071/97/38, FO 371/21659). See also

Donald Lammers, “Fascism, Communism, and the Foreign Office, 1937-39,” Journal of Contemporary History, 6 2

No. 3 (1971), 66-86; D.D.F., 2d, 9, No. 347. 174. G.D., D, 4, No. 477. Cf. U.S. 1938, 1:557-58.

175. Jodl diary, 10, 26-29 August 1938, TMWC,

28:374, 375; Munich, Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Z.S. 6

(Adam), pp. 2-4. Note also D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 456. 176, Note Jodl’s comment of 15 September that the attack could not be launched any earlier than originally intended; the original timetable and the railway schedule attached to it had been set “by the Fiihrer with reference to the longest possible continuation of [fortification] work in the West” (Jodl diary, TMWC, 28:380). 177. According to later testimony by Keitel, Hitler had himself referred to the Sarajevo assassination (ibid.,

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

603

German party through Karl Hermann Frank calling for the provocation of incidents in Czechoslovakia.'78 These incidents would, it was hoped, isolate Czechosl ovakia diplomatically and subsequently provide the excuse for wat; orders actually to start the incidents on 4 September were given the day before, the assumption presumably being that ten days would have sufficed for any needed preparations.!79 The German need for provocation inside Czechoslovakia was underlined a few days later by the first challenge to Hitlet’s scenario: the Czechoslovak “Fourth Plan” of 5 September which threatened to deprive Hitler of his pretext for wat by granting all the essentials of Henlein’s demands in his Karlovy Vary speech. Before the origins and setting of this step by Bene are discussed, it might be best to note that the Sudeten German party was up to the challenge. New incidents were immediately staged at Moravska Ostrava; and the Czechoslovak reaction to these, however restrained, could

then provide the excuse for breaking off negotiations between the Sudeten German party and the Czechoslovak government.'®? It was almost certainly the success of the Sudeten German party in enthusiastically following Hitler’s instructions to create incidents at a time when his generals were continually sounding warnings against war that led Hitler to drop his original intention of having the final incidents staged by the armed forces in favor of the establishment of the Sudeten German Free Corps tight after his first meeting with Chamberlain. The Fihrer retained his desperate desire for war—Long Live War (“Es lebe der Krieg”) he had said to Henlein—and the Sudeten leaders rather than the cautious and defeatist generals appeared to be the right ones to help get it started, and started at the correct moment.!®! How had it happened that Hitler had had to face the challenge of Beneé’s “Fourth Plan”? This last-minute effort by the Czechoslovak government may have been presented in the belief that it would be rejected by the Germans, thereby unmasking the true strategy of Berlin—in which case it was a belated effort to accomplish what could have been more easily and usefully done earlier. It is also entirely possible that Benes saw this as a final alternative to the two other possibilities: territorial concessions and war. Whatever the motive, and on this there is and will continue to be room for debate, there is

general agreement that the decision to present a plan that conceded the major demands publicly made by the Sudeten German party was largely the result of British and French pressure on Prague.'*? As has been pointed out, the London government was very much worried that direct negotiations between the Sudeten Germans and the Czechoslovak 10:507). 178. Groscurth Diary, 27 August 1938, p. 104 and n. 26. 179. Ibid., 3 September 1938, p. 111. See also Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 211, 212. It will be noted that this procedure obviated any need to take the Sudeten leaders into Hitler’s confidence on the timing of the planned attack. They would start a series of incidents not knowing which one the German government would elevate to the role of casus belli. The advantage of this procedure was that there was no danger of a leak about this critical point; the disadvantage was that the Sudeten leaders might run out of incidents too soon. Hitlet’s procedure for ' dealing with this problem is reviewed later. 180. Groscurth Diary, 8 September 1938, p. 115; Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 215. The literature on the incidents is extensive; it is briefly summarized in Groscurth Diary, p. 115, n. 78. For Groscurth’s statement that the Czechs

were not letting themselves be provoked, see ibid., 11 September 1938, p. 117. Smelser, who thinks that the incident at Moravské Ostrava (Mahrisch-Ostrau) may have been one of a staged series but was actually not designed as a direct response to the “Fourth Plan” says that “the SdP leaders immediately seized upon it as a drowning man seizes a life raft” (p. 237). 181. Groscurth Diary,

4 September 1938, pp. 111-1 2; cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 322. For an analysis of the

critical importance of timing the particular incident that would be utilized to justify an attack not only an the proper day but also at the correct hour, see Jodl’s memorandum of 24 August 1938, TM VC, 25:460-62.

London, 182. Note Krofta’s own interpretation in transmitting the plan to the Czechoslovak legations in Paris, 37, 44. The French, and Moscow on 6 September 1938, Kral, Méinchen, No. 163. See also D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. to like the British, had been very upset when on 29 August Benes had withdrawn concessions he had promised

make on 24 August (ibid., 10, No. 520).

604

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

government might break down, and they had anticipated the possibility of sending some mediator, originally a commission, subsequently an individual, as a focus for continued indirect negotiations should the direct ones be threatened with rupture. It was this concept that gave rise to the famous mission of Lord Runciman to Czechoslovakia and to his efforts to maintain a diplomatic, as opposed to military, method of dealing with the dispute over the Sudeten Germans. By mid-July London had come to the conclusion that some such mission would be needed, lest negotiations be broken off, and was encouraged by the discussions with

Wiedemann that there was hope of accomplishing something useful. The reluctant lord was, therefore, sent to the equally reluctant Czechs to examine the situation, talk with them and the Sudeten leaders, and attempt to facilitate a negotiated solution. The details of the Runciman mission need not be recounted here. They ate in any case not as important as the fact that the mission itself in one way played into Hitler’s hands by focusing public attention on the real and imagined grievances of the Sudeten Germans, but on the other hand also paved the way toward diverting Hitler’s policy by securing a peaceful settlement—the purpose of the mission, but the last thing Hitler wanted.'*? Even after

the incidents utilized to break off negotiations following the Czechoslovak “Fourth Plan,” the members of the Runciman mission were trying hard to get Henlein’s representatives to keep negotiating, and the supposedly required presence of the Sudeten leaders at the Nuremberg party rally had to serve as an alternative excuse for leaving Prague. Most would not return until the following year. Henlein himself had been warned by the British that a general war would follow a German invasion of Czechoslovakia—and that the Sudeten Germans were the surest first victims of any hostilittes— but the man who once imagined he was leading was now only following events.'*4 If the Czechoslovak offer of the “Fourth Plan” sent the Sudeten Germans into a panicky search for excuses to break off negotiations, it confronted the British government with the question of whether or not to put pressure on the German government to accept what they had previously pressured the Prague government into offering.'®° Such pressure could take the form of a new warning along the lines of that delivered during the May Crisis and now being urged by some in the British government as well as by those of the German opposition who thought that a firm British stand would either deter Hitler or encourage the generals to action if an attack on Czechoslovakia were actually ordered. But this was not so simple a matter. As Lord Halifax commented on 29 August, “The difficulty does not arise from doubt as to whether or not H.|[itler] has made up his mind [to go to war] but as to whether the only thing that might be an effective deterrent

183. The account in Celovsky, pp. 278ff. is helpful. Other accounts of the Runciman mission in Eubank, Smelser, R6nnefarth, and Thompson. Thete is additional information in Harvey Diaries, 11-16 July, p. 162;

Cadogan Diary, pp. 87, 89; C 8431/1941/18, FO 371/21731; C 8918/1941/18, FO 371/21733 (refers to B.D., 3d, 2, No. 711); C 8949/1941/18, FO 371/21733; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 272, 273, 275, 283, 291, 299; Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 168, 173, 174, 176, 184, 187, 188, 196, 200, 203, 217; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 111, 112

(part in Berber, No. 143), 113 (Berber, No. 144), 114-19, 122 (a bit in Berber, No. 145), 123 (a bit in Berber, No. 146), 125 (part in Berber, No. 147), 128, 129, 130 (part in Berber, No. 149), 134; 136, 138 (part in Berber,

No. 150), 140, 141, 145 (part in Berber, No. 152), 148, 150-55, 156 (part in Berber, No. 154), 157, 159-61, 165, 181; Krofta

tel. 777

to London,

26 July 1938, Czechoslovak

document

in T-120,

1039/1809/412074;

Memorandum of 18 August 1938, “Das Wochenende bei Kinsky,” ibid., frame 412147; Memorandum on a conference with a member of the Runciman mission, 22 August 1938, ibid., frame 412158 (distorted part in Berber, No. 151); Krofta to Masaryk, No. 884 of 25 August 1938, ibid., frames 412038-39; Masaryk tel. 713 of

31 August 1938, ibid., frames 412022—23 (part in Berber, No. 153); Osusky tel. 788 of 15 September 1938, ibid., frames 411971—72; D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 297ff., passim.

184. C 8118/1941/18, FO 371/21731. See also C 8949/1941/18, FO 371/21733. 185. The point was made—in anticipation—in a plea by Vansittart to Lord Halifax on 25 August 1938, C 9608/1941/18, FO 371/21737. See also C 9004/1941/18, FO 371/21734; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 167, 168.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Cxechoslovakia, Part 2

605

should be employed.”"1%° With Henderson recalled to London to participate in the discussions, the question of a formal warning was again canvassed in the British government and the subject of a special meeting of the cabinet on 30 August. The advocates of a warning received an unexpected assist from Professor Philip Conwell-Evans, a key figure in the Anglo-German Society, and a leading exponent of concessions to Germany. Having just returned from Germany where he had seen von Ribbentrop and others, he was now certain that Hitler had decided to attack Czechoslovakia and occupy the main parts of that country, starting between the end of September and mid-October, in spite of the doubts of his generals but in expectation of British and French neutrality. Only a formal warning would restrain him.'87 The British ambassador to Berlin, however, argued most vehemently against any formal warning, fearing that it would produce the opposite reaction from that hoped for; it would infuriate rather than inhibit the German leader whom Hendetson thought undecided and influenced by divergent views among his associates.!88 In the lengthy cabinet review, the danger of dividing the British public, the unlikelihood of influencing Hitler,

and the attitude of several of the Dominions were argued in opposition as well, and it

was decided for the time being not to add to Sit John Simon’s reiteration, in his speech at Lanark on 27 August, of Chamberlain’s statement of 24 March in Parliament.'8? It was

thought best to await the results of the new plan Bene’ was expected to present, while

urging him to make it as generous as possible, and to maintain the regular diplomatic route until after the Nuremberg party rally.!%° Whatever effect Simon’s speech and a subsequent amplification in a press statement might have had was quickly obliterated by the famous Times leader of 7 September suggesting in an analysis of the Czechoslovak “Fourth Plan” which had just been offered that it might be well for the Czechoslovak government to consider the advantages of becoming a more homogeneous state by the secession of the fringe areas.'?! The article, and especially the implication that the editor, Geoffrey Dawson, had put into it by suggesting British government approval of territorial cession—he had written that the project “has found favor in some quarters’”—was promptly repudiated by the British government. Although there was certainly a willingness by both Chamberlain and Halifax to consider the possibility of territorial concessions as a part of a negotiated settlement, 186. C 9005/1941/18, FO 371/21734, £.227. Note that Lord Halifax learned of another German call for a

warning, this one by Karl Heinz Abshagen, on the same day that he made the foregoing response to a memorandum by Vansittart,

C 9271/1941/18,

FO 371/21735. Cf. Colvin, None So Bind, pp. 233-34;

U.S. 1938,

1:549-51. 187. Vansittart’s minute, 30 August 1938, C 9377/1941/18, FO 371/21735. 188. Within the Foreign Office Henderson’s view that Hitler had not made up his mind was not accepted. It

was generally believed that Hitler had decided on war—and that the great problem in getting big Czechoslovak concessions

was

the

resulting

need

for

a British

guarantee

of Czechoslovakia

(C 9023/1941/18,

FO

371/21734). Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 524. 189. Celovsky, pp. 302-3. The record of the cabinet meeting is in C 9192/1941/18, FO 371/21735. Duff Cooper, who alone advocated a formal warning, gives his impressions in his memoits, pp. 224-25; Hore-

Belisha, who opposed a warning, on p. 138 of his papers. A useful summary by Sargent in C 9041/1941/18, FO 371/21734; cf. Hoate, p. 299. A good report on Chamberlain’s views at the time is in U.S. 7938, 1:560-61.

A report on the impact of Simon’s speech in Germany is in D.D.F., 2d, 10, No. 484.

;

190. This meant having Henderson tell von Ribbentrop that Britain would fight, though von Ribbentrop con36:492— tinued not to believe it (see U.S. 1938, 1:570). The German minister of finance did believe it (IMIWC, ' 98). early clue in 191. Celovsky, pp. 305-6, has an interpretation which can no longer be accepted and missed the Beyond, part 2, 1941Jones, p. 407. There is a full account in The History of the Times, 4, The 150th Anniversary and

A scholarly study placing the 1948 (London, 1952; Nendeln/Lichtenstein: Kraus Reprint, 1971), pp. 929-37.

other British piece in its setting on the basis of substantial research in the archives of The Times and several

Clarendon Press, 1971), pp. newspapers is Franklin Gannon, The British Press and Germany, 1936-1939 (Oxford: 59. No. 11, 2d, D.D.F., in is French the by secured Information 176-83.

606

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

as Chamberlain had himself indicated in May, the public ventilation of the concept at this time was believed singularly inopportune in that it might serve to encourage Hitler to rash action at the very time when the British government, in the interval between a

generous Czechoslovak offer and Hitlet’s forthcoming speech at Nuremberg, was primarily interested in restraining his exuberance.!?? Both Simon’s speech and the press statement amplifying it had been in part a response to the urgings for a firm British warning that so many had mentioned as necessary. One great problem kept concealed at the time but potentially even more likely to encourage Hitler than the Times leader was the attitude of France. Although the French government repeatedly urged a new British warning to Germany, the London government could not be certain that this was really what Paris wanted.'?° As soon as Chamberlain briefed the press, and Lord Halifax in statements on 11 and 12 September

repeated the likelihood of British intervention in a war started by a German invasion of Czechoslovakia, French Foreign Minister Bonnet became hysterical and told off the British ambassador with the reproach that such announcements increased the risk of a war that must be avoided.!% The collapse of the French position as reported to London after this conversation will be examined later; the point that must be noted is that the

French strategy of urging firmness on the British, while using the alleged unwillingness of Britain to be firm as an argument with Prague, was most risky. The British might be persuaded to issue the formal warnings to Germany that the French ostensibly wanted— and thereby make more difficult the French idea that Czechoslovakia would have to make the concessions needed for a peaceful settlement at almost any cost. This convoluted version of London’s strategy for pushing Berlin and Prague toward a settlement was not without its own danger. Since the French government, in response to the request

of the Czechoslovak government,

had never told the British about their threat to

abandon Czechoslovakia, there was the possibility, realized in September, that revelation

of the true French position might serve not only to bring on greater German demands or a sudden Czechoslovak collapse—as Prague had feared—but also a reorientation of British policy. All these contradictory currents were coming together in the second week of September, but new assessments had to be made not only in London but in Berlin as well. Hitler was receiving alarming reports from his diplomats in the days before his speech scheduled for 12 September. These reports from both London and Paris suggested that an open German attack on Czechoslovakia would force a most reluctant France to honor her obligation to come to the assistance of Czechoslovakia, and that

Britain would then be drawn in, a view that correctly reflects what we now know to have been the French and British attitude at the time. As Helmut Groscurth noted in his diary, Hitler had pushed aside Ambassador Welczek’s report to this effect—he was not interested.'”? On 30 August Hitler had asserted that the British were merely bluffing to 192. See U.S. 1938, 1:545, 549-51, for accurate reports on British views as passed on to the United States in

August. Chamberlain’s statement to the press that the German government should be under no illusion that there could be a brief war against Czechoslovakia without the danger of French and British intervention is printed in B.D., 3d, 2, Appendix III. In telling Bullitt on 8 September of Halifax’s repudiation of The Times leader, Bonnet explained that he himself thought the Sudeten area should be transferred to Germany but peacefully and claimed that both the French and British governments wanted this done peacefully but that both would fight if Germany resorted to force (Bullitt tel. 1415 of 8 September 1938, State 760F.62/702). 193. On the French requests to London, see D.D.F., 2d, 10, Nos. 432, 454, 455, 526; 11, Nos. 33, 34, 41, 42,

55:

194, Ibid., 11, Nos. 88, 112, 125. This confirms the account in John W. Wheeler-Bennett, Munich: Prologue to Tragedy (New York: Viking, 1964), p. 97, n. 1, while contradicting the version in the text, p. 98.

195. Groscurth Diary, 4 September 1938, p. 112. Note that this action of Hitler’s was reported to Conwell-Evans by his German sources and repeated by him to Lord Halifax, who recounted it to the British cabinet on 12

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gain time, but if they and the French came in, Germany was ready. The best time for an

attack on Czechoslovakia had artived.!% It was a few days after this that Hitler said to Henlein “Long Live War” and expressed readiness for one lasting two to eight years, thus obviously implying the possibility of British and French intervention, He preferred not to give the British and French time until the spring,'?” a dim echo of the later date for an attack on Czechoslovakia that he had once contemplated. Discouraging reports were simply not to be circulated, and Hitler asserted his belief that the negative reports on the prospects of Italian intervention were untrue and the result of a conflict of views between Mussolini and the Italian generals similar to his own quarrel with his generals.198 It is worth noting the views within the Hitler-adoration society of Keitel and Jodl: Keitel was as sure of the Fuhret’s inspiration as ever; Jodl entrusted the first slight worry to his diary on 8 September. Jodl considered the fact that the original basis for the German plan had been that the Western Powers would take no decisive action. Now it appeared that Hitler was holding to his intention although he was no longer sute of that point. Jodl confessed to being “not without worry” but insisted that it was essential to maintain one’s nerves and firmness in the face of pressure from abroad.'” Hitler’s speech on 12 September was certainly firm enough; he denounced the Czechs in the most violent possible language.20 If he did not burn all his bridges at this point it was not because he was averse to war2%! but because he was still arguing with his military advisers over the details of the opetational plans for the attack which could not, in any case, be launched for another two and a half weeks. The final German military preparations and the stepped up propaganda campaign mounted in the days right after 12 September must be seen as integral parts of the same scheme: there would indeed be an attack on Czechoslovakia, and the propaganda cam-

paign might yet isolate the prospective victim from assistance by the West.2 If, however, it did not accomplish the latter purpose, there was still another function to which

Hitler would refer after the crisis and which was clearly of great importance to him in 1938 as it would be in 1939. The propaganda campaign was directed to the home front as well as abroad; should there be a general war, the German public with its memories of

the last war must be convinced of the absolute necessity of another general war if the sacrifices such a wat would entail were to be shouldered willingly.2° The days immediately after Hitler’s speech saw further troubles in the Sudeten area which were utilized by the leaders of the Sudeten German party for a final rupture of September as part of the evidence that “Herr Hitler was possibly or even probably mad,” meaning that he had made up his mind to go to war regardless of any warnings from France, Britain, or anyone else, C

9818/1941/18, FO 371/21736, £397. 196. Groscurth Diary, 2 September 1938, p. 109. See also D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 22. 197. Groscurth Diary, 4 September 1938, pp. 111-12, 5 September 1938, p. 1135

198. Ibid., 8 September 1938, pp. 114-15. 199. TMWC,

28:376. For Keitel’sviews, see ibid., 13 September 1938, p. 378, and Ulrich von Hassell, Vom

anderen Deutschland (Zurich: Atlantis, 1946), p. 18. 200. Text in Domarus, 1:897—906.

201. Note Groscurth’s summary of Halder’s comment on his return from the first part of the Nuremberg party meeting: “One insists on wat... The next step—Romania, Ukraine, etc.—is already being considered” (11

September 1938, p. 117). 202. Should one not place into this context Frank’s account in his memoirs that at the end of the party he congress in Nuremberg Hitler mentioned that he might use him in Prague (p. 320)—presumably the way than the later used Frank in Poland? Frank claims to have been astonished by the reference to Prague rather regime Sudetenland; whether this assertion is true or not, the reference to Hitlet’s thinking about an occupation j ' ; of some sort is surely illuminating. campaign of 203. Hitler’s 10 November speech to the German press is discussed below. For the hysterical September 1938, see Celovsky, pp. 335-38; Groscurth, 17 September 1938, pp. 120-21.

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negotiations followed by the dissolution of the party by Henlein’s orders. It is quite possible that Laurence Thompson is correct in rejecting the idea that Hitler’s speech was a signal to insurrection, an otherwise widely held view, but that does not lead to the con-

clusion that perhaps Bene§ precipitated the breach by stampeding the Sudeten German party.20¢ Bene’ had every incentive to maintain the process of negotiations as long as possible; it was the Sudeten German party that was in the highly embarrassing position of having run out of demands—Prague had just granted their major ones—before Hitler’s timetable called for an attack. The Sudeten leaders had not been given the precise date any more than the Hungarians or Italians, presumably for fear of a leak, and they had for obvious reasons not been secretly warned by opponents of Hitler’s project as the two prospective allies had been cautioned. They therefore had to find a way to bridge the time to that point “still in September” by which Hitler had told Henlein he would act.” That Hitler himself fully approved the actions of the Sudeten leaders can be seen from the fact, already mentioned,

that immediately after the first visit of Chamberlain

to

Germany, Hitler would entrust the creation of a new set of incidents within Czechoslovakia to them rather than the military, whom he had originally assigned that task. In this fashion, they would be used to help him out of the difficulty that had been produced in part by their own prior activities, namely, the danger posed by Chamberlain’s visit that a negotiated rather than a military settlement might evolve. The idea of a visit by Chamberlain was one that had developed in London in the days at the end of August when alarming news of Hitler’s decision to attack Czechoslovakia in late September was coming in from all quarters and the possibility of a formal warning was discussed as one means of deterring him from such a course. Chamberlain thought of it as a last-minute move designed for a contingency when German military action was immediately imminent, so that war would not break out, as it had in 1914, without a last personal contact. In an age of perpetual summitry and constantly airborne government leaders, the novelty of the approach is not so easy to appreciate. There had, of course, been personal meetings of European leaders both under the auspices of the League and at such special gatherings as Locarno{ Nevertheless, one cannot deny a certain shrewdly calculated daring quality in Chamberlain’s idea that by offering to board a plane for the first time in his life at the age of sixty-nine to see Hitler, he would impress on the Germans the gravity of the situation and would surely make Hitler postpone an attack on Czechoslovakia until he had at least found out what the prime minister of Great Britain had to say. Success of such a venture would depend on two factors, surptise and timing; surprise so that the shock effect would deter immediate hostilities, timing so that the effort would not be wasted. Surprise was to be achieved by keeping the whole scheme secret from all but a tiny number. The details of the project were

worked out after the cabinet meeting of 30 August with only Chamberlain, Halifax, Simon, Henderson, and Sit Horace Wilson present. The belief that secrecy was the key to surprise, which in turn was seen as the key to holding Hitler back, led to serious consideration of not telling the Germans that the prime minister was coming until after his

plane had left London, but this idea was dropped. The timing of Plan Z, as it was called, would depend on Chamberlain’s assessment of the urgency of the situation.207 204. Thompson, pp. 140-45.

205. Groscurth Diary, 4 September 1938, p 112. The inadvertent discrepancy in the timetable was recognized by Francois-Poncet (D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 151).

206. Note by Horace Wilson of 30 August 1938 in PREM 1/266A, £.363. Cf. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 231-32; Feiling, p. 357. Chamberlain told Samuel Hoare, the other ex-foreign secretary in the cabinet, about the plan on

10 September (Hoate, p. 300). [2 Chamberlain explained the background to the cabinet on 14 September after he had notified Hitler but before Hitler accepted. His account in C 9950/1941/18, FO 371/21738 appears to be full and frank. See also

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In the first week of September, discussion in London continued to revolve around the idea of a formal warning to Hitler. The suggestion that this be done was reinforced by Theo Kordt, counsellor of the German embassy in London, who was acting secretly for State Secretary von Weizsacker and the German opposition to Hitler.2° The continuing discussion was also affected by a message from Burckhardt reporting Forstet’s repetition of Hitler’s decision for war; von Weizsacker had asked Burckhardt to relay this message to London with a request that the British send a warning letter to Hitler.20 All this led to the decision to add to prior public comments a further statement Henderson was instructed to make about the fact that Britain would be drawn in by French intervention. In the event, however, this was made only to von Ribbentrop and not to Hitler,2!9 While Chamberlain was still dubious about a formal warning to Hitler, something he

clearly thought of as a last resort to be used after and not before a trip of his own to

Hitler, but on which he could not explain his full reasoning to the cabinet without risking

the secrecy of Plan Z, the prime minister was certainly not blind to the need for some military preparation. Anglo-French staff talks for cooperation in case of war had been

going on since mid-June, and by 6 September

atrangements

for the transfer of an

advance air striking force to France were complete.2!! The available material on the initial orders of the British bomber command shows, on the whole, both that the possibility of wat was seen as real and that anticipation of a likely shift of targets from narrowly denned military to more broadly denned industrial ones was rather realistic.2!2 On 8 September, the same day on which a new warning was discussed, there also began a series of special meetings of ministers and others on defense measures, authorized by the ptime minister to act on certain matters without reference to the cabinet. These gatherings, held from that date until 29 September, reflect a pattern of getting the British

navy, ait force, and army ready both in actuality and to impress the British public as well as the Germans, but without alarming everyone.?! The announcement of the first steps concerning the navy at least served to alarm the German naval attaché when he learned to what he claimed was great surprise that such preparations were being made on the assumption which was taken for granted in England that if France were involved in war,

Britain would be also.?!4 Conflicting pressures were bearing in on the prime minister. There was a certain hardening of public opinion in England, especially after the Czechoslovak “Fourth Plan” B.D., 3d, 2:647—49. 208. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 235-36. Kordt saw Wilson and Halifax on 5 and 7 September. 209. See above, pp. 573-74; Harvey Diaries, 8 September 1938, pp. 171-72; C 9525/1941/18, FO 371/21737; B.D., 3d, 2, Appendix IV, iv. Soon after, the British learned of an unofficial feeler by Helmuth Wohlthat to the

United States raising the question of protecting Germany against a peace even harsher than that of Versailles if a European war led to an overthrow of the German government and the defeat of Germany (C 9934/1941/18, FO 371/21738). 210. C 9378, C 9384/1941/18, FO 371/21735; C 9818/1941/18, FO 371/21736, f£.393-95; Harvey Diaries, 9 September 1938, pp. 172-73; Cadogan Diary, 4-8 September 1938, pp. 94-96; B.D., 3d, 2, No. 765 and comments in C 9182/1941/18, FO 371/21734. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 321; Colvin, None So Blind, pp.

237-38; U.S. 1938, 1:584-86.

211. C 9407/37/18, FO 371/21654. Background documents in D.D.F., 2d, 9, Nos. 444, 476, 484, 508; 10, Nos.

73, 86, 409.

212. Air Ministry to Foreign Office, 14 September 1938, with comments and enclosure, C 9753/1941/18, FO

1/21736.

Czechoslovak ee See the file “Committee of Imperial Defence, Measures Taken in Connection with the 8 September the Ctisis—Record of Ministerial Conferences, September-October 1938,” CAB 16/189. On

British embassy in Berlin asked for advice on procedures for destroying its archives practically all its records for 1933-36 (L 6487/453/402, FO 370/564; L 7380/453/402, 214, C 9818/1941/18, FO 371/21736, ££.395-96; Cadogan Diary, 10 September 1938, September 1938, p. 175; U.S. Naval Attaché London No. 890 of 20 September Probability of War H. But compare the report of the German naval attaché in G.D., D,

and proceeded to burn FO 370/565). ie p. 96; Harvey Diaries, 11 1938, Hyde Park, PSF 2, No. 451.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

became known.?!5 There was on the other hand strong pressure for concessions to avoid wat coming from the British Commonwealth. The South Africans had insisted they would not join in any war over Czechoslovakia. Similar views were voiced by the Australian government, and the Canadian government was consistent in its opposition to any position that might lead to war. In a variety of ways, these points of view were put to the London government during the first two weeks of September; and although one might argue that this was as much an excuse as a reason for British policy, there was cettainly a case to be made for extreme care lest the Commonwealth be divided if war came?!6 During the days from 9 to 13 September, London hoped to restrain the Germans by the appearance of resolution without further official warning.*!’ When the cabinet met on 12 September, the developments since 30 August were reviewed and there was agreement that no further steps should be taken until after Hitler’s speech that evening. The cabinet was informed about consultations with the Labor party as well as with Eden and Churchill, but no reference was made to Plan Z.?!8 It was at that time thought that if Hitler had decided to move, it would be between 18 and 29 September, so that London’s planning was, in a sense, ten days out of phase with what is known of German inten-

tions—the various warnings from Germany had in the end confused more than enlightened London. This mistaken sense of the time element helps explain the decision to move late in the evening of the following day (13th) when news of further incidents in Czechoslovakia suggested that if the step were not taken at once, it would be too late because Hitler might have given the order to march. The British prime minister was confirmed in his choice of timing by what sounded to London like panic in the French government on 12 and 13 September. One could argue that the French collapse was itself influenced by earlier British reluctance to promise to assist France if war started, but a more searching reading of the evidence suggests that the key element was the reality—as opposed to the theory—of the imminence of a great war that reinforced not only the inclinations of Bonnet, who had long

favored maximum concessions, but also of Daladier to call frantically for steps to avert a situation where France would have to choose between dishonoring herself and fighting a war she had no confidence of winning. Certainly the anguished cries of the French prime minister on 13 September for some sort of action to avert war were due in part to a closer look at what now loomed ahead, a look influenced by Lindbergh’s gloomy predictions concerning the defeat about to be inflicted on France by the German air force, and the publicly and privately announced determination of the Belgians not to allow French troops to march through the countty.?!° 215. Note the firm position advocated by Lord Astor—host of Cliveden—on 11 September as recorded in C

9916/5302/18, FO 371/21776, £.30. 216. The subject was first reviewed in some detail by Donald C. Watt in an essay that appeared in 1958 in the Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte and in a revised version in 1965 as essay 8 in Personalities and Policies. For British documents on this, see especially C 10023/1941/18, FO 371/21738; C 9916/5302/18, FO 371/21776. See

also Eric M. Andrews, Isolationism and Appeasement in Australia: Reactions to the European Crises, 1935-1939 (Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1970), pp. 138-40; James Eayrs, In Defence of Canada: Appeasement and Rearmament (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1965), pp. 63-65; Documents on Canadian External Relations, 6, Nos. 881-86; Australian Documents, Nos. 242, 245, 246, 253, 256, 276-79.

217. See Feiling, p. 360, quoting Chamberlain’s letter to his sister of 11 September 1938. 218. Cabinet minutes in C 9818/1941/18, FO 371/21736; cf. Duff Cooper, p. 227.

219. On Lindbergh’s stay in France on 9 September see his Joumal, pp. 69-70 (Thompson, pp. 109-10, confuses this with the August visit); Harvey Diaries, 15 September 1938, p. 180; U.S. 1938, 1:581-83; B.D., 3d, 2;

Nos. 814, 855; 5, No. 1; cf. Jones, p. 411; Adamthwaite, pp. 240-42. For a critical review of Lindbergh’s report, which turned out to be based on information he had gathered on a trip two years before, and for the British

effort to restore French self-confidence in view of that fact, see the material filed under C 10025/1425/ 18, FO 371/21710 and subsequent documents on Lindbergh’s distortions in C 10674 and C 13079; cf. Lindbergh, pp.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

is

Among the ideas Daladier suggested at the last minute was a joint British-French appeal to Hitler, which Chamberlain obviated by a direct telegram to Hitler from himself,

and the idea of a three- or fout-power conference of France, Britain, Germany

=

possibly Italy, which had also been canvassed in London before 13 September but dropped, in part because of objections to the exclusion of the Soviet Union. ‘220 The ideas Chamberlain took with him to Germany can be seen in the briefing paper ptepared for his trip and the discussion in the British cabinet on the morning of 14 September when Chamberlain told his colleagues that he had sent a telegram the night before offering to go to Germany but had not yet received an answer from Hitler22! Chamberlain had originally thought of using the Czechoslovak “Fourth Plan” as a basis, keeping Czechoslovakia within its old borders, and substituting a guarantee by France and the Soviet Union for the existing mutual assistance treaties, so that Czechoslovakia, like Belgium, would be assisted if attacked but not obligated to aid others herself. By 14 September the prime minister thought it more likely that instead of either such a scheme or agreement on Lord Runciman as arbitrator, Hitler would now demand a plebiscite. This was a demand which would in practice be extremely difficult to implement, but it would be even more difficult for a democracy to go to war to prevent the holding of one. Perhaps a period of autonomy could be followed by a plebiscite in a calmer atmosphere, perhaps in mixed areas a population transfer would prove the only safe approach; and if the plebiscite did eventually lead to a territorial change, Czechoslovakia could be

persuaded to agree on the promise of a guarantee by Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and Germany with no obligation on her part to assist the guarantors.222 This would be a 72-713; U.S. 1938, 1:72—73. On the French military assessment of 12 September, see above, pp. 588-590, and

Lukasiewicz Papers, p. 120. On the attitude of Belgium (and other neutrals) in early September, see D.D.B., 5, Nos. 24-27; G.D., D, 2,

No. 454. The big worry of King Leopold during the Czechoslovak crisis was that the French might move on Brussels (Overstraeten, pp. 294-97)! A British survey of 13 September of the attitudes of various countries if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia is in R 7671/106/67, FO 371/22353.

The evidence on the collapse of the French position as reported to London is now fully confirmed from the French documents; see D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 125 (reported in B.D., 3d, 2, No. 855), 129, 131, 168. It should be

noted that Gamelin had prepared a memorandum on the military situation of a smaller and reorganized Czechoslovakia by 9 September (ibid., No. 65). French fears that war was imminent were doubtless reinforced by accurate reports from Frangois-Poncet; predicting an attack order around 25 to 27 September, they showed how serious the situation was (ibid., Nos. 114, 115). On the general impact of French actions on Chamberlain’s decision, see B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 852, 855-58, 861; Cabinet 38 (38) of 14 September 1938, C 9950/1941/18, FO 371/21738, ££.87-89; Cadogan Diary, 13 September 1938, pp. 97-98; Harvey Diaries, 13-14 September 1938, pp. 177-79; Feiling, pp. 363-64; Thompson, pp. 147-49; U.S. 1938, 1:594-96. The record of Bullitt’s telephone

message for Roosevelt dated as “probably May 9, 1938” in Bullitt Letters, pp. 260-61, should be dated 13 September and belongs in this context. The Czechoslovak government learned about the French collapse, see Masaryk tel. 785 of 14 September 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412032-33 (excerpt in Berber, No. 160); Osusky tel. 788 of 15 September 1938, ibid., frames 411971—72; Kral, Minchen, Nos. 180, 185; D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 166. Having been warned in July, Prague could hardly claim surprise.

220. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 248-49; C 9966/1941/18, FO 371/21738 (note that this document was tead at a meeting of Chamberlain, Halifax, Simon, Hoare, and Cadogan on 13 Septembet); Harvey Diaries, 11 and 12 September 1938, p. 176; Osusky tel. 793 of 15 September 1938, Czechoslovak document in =120; 1039/1809/412131.

For military preparations ordered on 13 September, see Hore-Belisha, p. 139; C 9779/

429/62, FO 371/21632.

the cabinet 221. The briefing paper and comments on it are in R 8044/113/67, FO 371/22344. The minutes of

Hore-Belisha, meeting of 14 September are in C 9950/1941/18, FO 371/21738 (cf. Duff Cooper, pp. 228-29; and was filed pp. 139-40). Material on the planning for sending the telegram to Hitler was turned up in 1950 Cadogan Diary, with the document published as B.D., 3d, 2, No. 866, in C 9708/1941/18, FO 371/21736; cf.

7-8 September, 10-11 September 1938, p. 96. An earlier draft, apparently prepared on 7 and 8 September (ibid. p. 95), has not been found. been canvassed 222. The idea of a British guarantee as the concomitant of pressure on Czechoslovakia had Appendix IV, discussion 2, 3d, (B.D., August late in Kleist von of visit the of discussion the in e.g., repeatedly,

a neutralized Czechoslovakia had, in C 8520/1941/18, FO 371/21732); cf. Kral, Miinchen, No. 177. The idea of

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

new liability which he realized would not save Czechoslovakia if Germany decided to attack, but would have value as a deterrent. If Germany was

seriously interested in

friendship with Britain, here would be a chance to work for it. Although the prime minister did not explicitly say so at the cabinet meeting, he obviously believed, and so told the American ambassador right after the meeting, that at least this effort would

show that everything had been done to avoid war and that if Hitler insisted on hostilities in the face of a possible peaceful settlement, the British would tell him that they would fight alongside France.?” With differing degrees of enthusiasm and reluctance, the members

of the cabinet

except for the first lord of the admiralty, Duff Cooper, approved Chamberlain’s line of thinking, but all were strongly in favor of the trip and hoped that the prime minister’s step would be met by an invitation from Germany. Fear of a war for which the country was not prepared on an issue of dubious merit in the eyes of the public at home and in the Commonwealth clearly gave a major impetus to the strength of feeling with which those present looked upon this venture.?44 It would take extra hours to obtain a reply from Germany, in patt because of the large number of high officials absent from Berlin.2?° How did the idea of a visit by Chamberlain strike Hitler? In the German government, preparations for war against Czechoslovakia and also against England and France if necessary were going forward in those days.?*° Still another attempt was being made to persuade Hungary that it would be safe to join in the attack, but the efforts of von Weizsacker, von Ribbentrop, and Goring were thwarted by

another warning reaching the Hungarians from German military leaders which confirmed the Budapest government in its doubts about Germany’s fate in a long war.??’ Hitler, however, was not worried; he approved Henlein’s step of 13 September in breaking off negotiations with Prague and dissolving his negotiating team.278 Hitler was certainly completely surprised by Chamberlain’s approach. He was apparently prepared to hear a warning of British intervention if war came and was then quite willing to contemplate that possibility.2” A telegram indicating a willingness to meet the British prime minister was sent, but there is no contemporary evidence for any discussion by Hitler of what he himself planned to say or why he agreed to the trip. Hitler did, however, approve Henlein’s proclamation calling for the Sudetenland to be annexed by Germany—the slogan “Home to the Reich” (Heim ins Reich) was to be fulfilled in a manner few contemporaries anticipated. The decision of Hitler to push on this point simultaneously with the conversation with Chamberlain surely indicates a determination on the other hand, always worried the French because of its military implications for them.

223. Kennedy tel. 923 of 14 September 1938, State 760F.62/797. 224, The Chiefs of Staff Committee had been asked on 12 September for their appreciation of the situation in case of war; their response of 14 September was gloomy and asserted that Czechoslovakia could be restored only at the end of a long war (C 9776/1941/18, FO 371/21736). For British deficiencies in the air arm and in

anti-aircraft protection in September 1938 see Meyers, pp. 302-3; Sholto Douglas, pp. 353-59, 364-65. The Statistics are summarized in Homze, p. 241.

225. Hugh R. Wilson to Moffat, 19 September 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 14. 226. IMWC, 25:462—-64; 28:337; 29:319-27,; 33:190. Note the discussions between Hitler, von Brauchitsch, and Halder on 9 and 10 September 1938, ibid., 28:378, and 25:464—69; and the last-minute German efforts to pur-

chase trucks (C 9434/1425/18, FO 371/21710) and to secute oil from the Western Hemisphere (Nuremberg document 983-PS, National Archives). 227. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 327 (von Weizsacket), 328 (Bodenschatz for Goring), 329 (von Ribbentrop), 310 (warning of German army leaders), 338 (Kanya does not share Polish optimism, Germany cannot win a long wat, push for a plebiscite; German text in Zsigmond, p. 278, n. 79). 228. Gajan and Kvacek, No. 44, p. 136.

229. See Lipski’s account of his conversation with Hitler on 20 September, quoting the latter “that he was taken

aback to a certain extent by Chamberlain’s proposition to come to Berchtesgaden” (Lipski Papers, No. 99, p. 408).

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to proceed under any circumstance.23° He obviously felt, nevertheless, that his whole propaganda line both at home and abroad would collapse unless he at least agreed to meet the British leader. Given the sensitivity of the issue of responsibility for the outbreak of war, constantly debated since 1914, Chamberlain had calculated correctly on this point, even if he had been misled on the issue of timing. the meeting of Hitler and Chamberlain at Berchtesgaden on 15 September, the 2— British prime minister argued that a way should be found to settle the outstanding issues peacefully, while Hitler repeatedly insisted that he intended to solve the Sudeten problem forthwith, by military attack if necessary, and without regard to the possibility of such action leading to a world war. \\ British warning, he said, could not deter him from acting; and when reminded that the London government had been reproached for not making its position clear in 1914, Hitler asserted his belief that even then things had Challe gone too far toward war for anything Britain might say to hold up development Challenged by an angry Chamberlain over why he had let him come to Germany when | he was determined on war in any case, the Fiihrer responded that war could be averted if

the principle of self-determination were recognized. Chamberlain responded that while he could agree to that personally, he would have to secure the agreement of his government as well as that of the French and of Czechoslovakia; he argued that Hitler would need to take measures to calm the situation while he himself tried to secure approval of a scheme of territorial cession and until he could meet Hitler once more to report on these efforts. Since Chamberlain had been led to believe that Germany was about to march into Czechoslovakia, a belief reinforced by Hitler’s demeanor in their meeting, while Hitler in reality did not intend to move for another two weeks, it was easy enough for the latter to make what looked like a concession by promising not to launch an attack right am “Sy returned to England to see whether he could secure agreement to a peaceful cession of the Sudeten area as the only possible alternative to war, Hitler having been obliged to his own great regret to confine himself to a demand for the German areas. op days immediately following the Berchtesgaden meeting, accordingly, saw the two participants moving in diametrically opposite directions. Chamberlain was convinced that he had halted at least temporarily the outbreak of war, which he assumed would be a world war, and which he thought might be averted entirely if he could get the British, French, and Czechoslovak governments to agree to a territorial transfer of the Sudeten atea to eaten

{Baling at this point in Hitler’s good faith on this issue, he would

i work energetically to secure such agreement. Hitler was confident that Cham meeting the after right Weizsacker von and Ribbentrop von told he As it. get could not “by his brutally announced intention to solve the Czech [si] question now even at the risk of a European war, as well as by the promise that he would be satisfied in Europe, Chamberlain had been induced to make the promise that he would work for the cession of the Sudetenland. He [Hitler] would not refuse a plebiscite. If the Czechs refused, the road would be clear for the German invasion.’””?5? If by any chance Czechoslovakia gave in on the Sudeten areas, the main portion of Czechoslovakia would be taken over later, perhaps the following spring. Somehow, however, there would have to be a wat, and

during his own lifetime.” % ' 230. G.D., D, 2, Nos. 489, 490. 2, No. 350; Feiling, pp. 366— 231. For the Berchtesgaden meeting, see G.D., D, 2, No. 487; Hungarian Documents, interest is Hitlet’s assertion, 67; Schmidt, pp. 394-98; Groscurth Diary, 17 September 1938, pp. 119-20. Of great

were coming he preferred reported by Lord Halifax to the French but not otherwise in the record, that if war

to fight it at age forty-nine rather than when older (D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 188).

own contemporary notes. 232. Von Weizsicker, Erinnerungen, p. 184. Von Weizsacker here quotes his

233. Weizsdicker-Papiere, p. 143; this section was omitted from the memoirs.

“~T)

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler’s determination to go ahead with the conquest of Czechoslovakia, even at the tisk of a general war, was noted by others in the German government at the time.*** If he still willing to run the risk of a general war, he was certainly going to do what he could to minimize the chances of being cheated out of at least a little war. Though expecting the negotiations to fail over the demands he had already made, Hitler wanted to be as safe as possible from the “danger” of having them met. The first and simplest step he took to protect himself from the danger that the Berchtesgaden meeting might make war politically impossible was to deny the British government a record of the eeting; they might have tricked him by making it (nl for him-to agteéto meet with Chamberlain, but he had a few tricks of his own.(Only the famous German interpreter Paul Schmidt had been present; and when, the British who had known Schmidt as a dependable interpreter for years asked for their/copy of the record, they were informed that it would not be given to them! There is no need to go into the ensuing tempest in this particular teapot; but although an abbreviated version was finally handed over after a

great deal of agitated—and from the British side annoyed—discussion had taken place, the fact that Hitler personally ordered this extraordinary action makes it important as a clue to his thinking and policy right after the meeting. Far from being eager to nail down the commitment of Chamberlain, he was fearful of recording his own, thinking perhaps that he could subsequently claim to have asked for more or promised less.??° The second step Hitler took to make sure there would be a war as soon as his military preparations were completed was to arrange for the incidents within Czechoslovakia that would provide the needed pretext, thus doing the precise opposite of what Chamberlain had asked. While Hitler repeatedly asserted to foreign statesmen and diplomats that some incident provoked by the Czechs might touch off German intervention at any moment, no one has yet located a shred of evidence in the voluminous German record suggesting that the slightest consideration was actually ever given to planning for such a contingency. On the contrary, the Germans were vety conscious of the fact that timing was a key factor in their war plans, and since April 1938 it had always been clear to them that only a staged incident or a specific one in a series of staged incidents could guarantee them the choice of date, hour, and minute for the initiation of

hostilities. The calmness which prevailed in the Sudeten areas after Henlein and some of his associates left the country for Germany, therefore, threatened to undermine the general political pretext of disorder in the Sudeten areas at the very time when the constant warnings and objections of the generals appear to have raised doubts in Hitler’s mind about the reliability of the military in staging the specific incidents that he needed as the properly timed excuse for invasion.?°6 Since Henlein’s proclamation had not produced any spontaneous upheaval, something else was needed to create the continued uproar which would provide the general political excuse as well as the specifically timed incident. On 16 September, therefore, Hitler ordered the establishment of the Sudeten German Free Corps, and he confirmed

234. Contemporary evidence to this effect from the days right after Berchtesgaden is in the Groscurth diary for 17 September, p. 120; Erich Kordt, Nicht aus den Akten (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1950), p. 259. The French ambassador in London noted that Hitler had rejected Chamberlain’s effort at the beginning of their meeting to discuss Anglo-German relations in general (D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 460). 235. See Erich Kordt’s comment in Nicht aus den Akten, p. 259. Schmidt himself (pp. 398-99) claims to have thought that this was von Ribbentrop’s way of taking revenge for his own exclusion from the meeting, but the evidence of the German documents is explicit on Hitler’s personal decision (G.D., D, 2, Nos. 522, 532, 537,

544). See also B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 895-97, 930, 931, 949, 983, 985. 236. The calm situation in the Sudeten area on 15-17 September, as well as the sense of the Germans thete of

being deserted by Henlein, is evident from the published German and British documents; e.g., G.D., D, 2, Nos.

516, 518; B.D., 3d, 2, No. 916.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

615

this by having it formally organized on the following day.237 The task assigned by Hitler to this collection of Sudeten German men who had fled to Germany was the “maintenance” (Aafrechterhaltung) of disorder, the atranging of clashes, and the mounting of terrorist attacks on Czechoslovak border posts and other installations. Terrorist activities were to be conducted along the whole length of the German-Czechoslovak frontier, The Operation was designed to fit into the pattern of pretense that the situation in Czechoslovakia—instead of the policy and plans of Hitler—was responsible for the danger and eventual outbreak of war. Just before Chamberlain was scheduled to return to Germany, and when the Czechoslovak acceptance of Hitlet’s ostensible demands was known in Germany, the Free Corps units were instructed to conduct at least ten forays in each district. The details of the attempts to meet the quota of incidents assigned to the Free Corps are not of special importance; the critical point is that this represented the applica-

tion by Hitler of a device which could assure him of the needed pretext for war without dependence on the army, which was most unenthusiastic about the Free Corps. The incidents provoked by this special collection of cutthroats in the meantime provided Hitler with plenty of stimulus for all sorts of imaginary Czechoslovak atrocities with which he unsuccessfully regaled Chamberlain at their meeting at Bad Godesberg and which formed an important element in his public speeches and the German press campaign.238 The third measure Hitler took to avoid any risk of what he called “the danger that the Czechs might accept everything” was to try to activate Hungary and Poland against Czechoslovakia to the point of extreme demands at the very least and hopefully to parallel military action.78° Neither Poland nor Hungary needed much encouragement as long as it was simply a matter of making demands on Czechoslovakia. Both powers had been demanding for some time that their respective minorities within Czechoslovakia be accorded whatever concessions were allowed the Sudeten Germans.*4° Whether or not this was an intelligent policy on the part of Poland, in which the percentage of Poles was about the same as the percentage of Czechs and Slovaks in Czechoslovakia, does not

appear to have worried the Polish leaders at this time. They raised their own demands in a manner parallel to the Germans, insisted after the Berchtesgaden meeting on a plebiscite for the Poles if there was to be one for the Germans, denounced their arbitra-

tion treaty with Czechoslovakia, and in general needed very little nudging from Berlin in order to fall in with Hitler’s strategy. There is no doubt that they were ready to move militarily into TéSin if the occasion arose; whether or not they would have attacked Czechoslovakia as an associate of Germany without first awaiting the reaction of France and Britain to the German invasion of Czechoslovakia is not entirely certain.”*! From the point of view of Germany, the important thing is that Poland was fully

playing her part, not only by warding off Russia, urging Romania not to allow transit aid

237. The best account is Martin Broszat, “Das Sudetendeutsche Freikorps,” Véerteliahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 9, No. 1 (Jan. 1961), 30-49. There is considerable additional information in the Groscurth diary, pp. 1206f.; the material supports Broszat’s account. See also the important documents of the Sudetendeutsche Freikorps published in Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 227, 229, 238; and Standartenfihrer Altenburg, “Aufzeichnungen tiber die Tatigkeit der Wasset-Fahr-Abteilung des Freikorps Konrad Henlein,” 14 September—11 October 1938,

Nos. 203, 278, 279; Library of Congress, Manuscripts Division, Acc. No. 9918. In addition, see D.D.F., 2d, 11, Diary of Wolf Eberhard, 16 and 20 Sept. 1938, Munich, Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte.

that the 238. For examples of instructions to the German press on 19 and 20 September designed to show conferences in Czechoslovak state should disappear from the map of Europe, see the reports on the press

, Bundesarchiv, Sammlung Traub, Z.Sg. 110/9, f£.200-203. Adam, Nos. 12-16; U.S. 1938, 361; No. 2, Documents, Hungarian also See 689. p. 554, No. 2, D, G.D., 239.

1:614.

i ; 318, 326. 240. Cienciala, pp. 92ff.; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 308, 309, 312, 315, have moved only in a wat limited to 241. See above, n. 169. Cienciala (p. 118, n. 35) argues that Poland would

Powers were certain that this Germany and Czechoslovakia. She may well be correct, but since the Western important. that not is matter the occur, not was the one contingency that would

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

to Czechoslovakia, and herself increasing demands for concessions from Prague, but also was falling in with Hitlet’s desire for a more insistent and rapid escalation of pressure right after the Berchtesgaden meeting. From Hitler’s perspective, the question of whether Beck was doing this on his own and without needing any German urging was entirely subordinate to the fact that Poland was helping to provide a basis for him to taise new demands and resort to a military solution even if his Berchtesgaden demands were by some mischance to be met.742 To the extent that the Poles were eager on their own even without German urging, they merely relieved the Germans of any need to consider making concessions on the Danzig and German-Polish frontier confirmation issues that the Poles would have liked to obtain in return for falling in with German policy.” When Hitler personally talked with the Polish ambassador to Germany on 20 September, Hitler, like Goring a few days earlier, warded off Polish requests for concessions on Danzig and the recognition of the frontier by alluding to such German demands as the superhighway across the Corridor; but the two could agree that Polish demands would enable Hitler to reject agreement with Chamberlain on the Czechoslovak question by raising new obstacles involving Poland and Hungary. If the Germans found the Poles enthusiastic about the strategy of increasing the pressure on Czechoslovakia, they found the Hungarians willing in theory but still reluctant in practice, something the Poles had also discovered.” The vastly greater territorial interest Hungary might have in a dissolution of Czechoslovakia whetted their appetite and had given urgency to their expressions of interest in the extension to the Magyar minority of whatever might be conceded to the Sudeten Germans. The very fact, however, that Hungarian aspirations extended to all of Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine and hence involved the complete destruction of Czechoslovakia made them more awate of the danger of a general war, something for which they were not only unprepared but which they thought Germany would lose.**° The Germans did their best, or worst, to move them. Hitler complained on 20 September to the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister, whom

he had summoned

to Berchtesgaden,

about

the indecisive

attitude of Hungary. Asserting that ‘war was the best solution, he urged them to demand a plebiscite right away. If they raised such demands and agreed with the Germans not to guarantee Czechoslovakia until everyone’s demands had been met, Hitler could use that point with Chamberlain at their next meeting. There remained the danger that the Czechoslovak government might accept whatever was asked of them, but the Hungarian 242. The literature on Poland’s role in the period 12-22 September is immense. A defense of Polish policy may be found in Cienciala (pp. 102ff.), where Beck’s interest in German concessions on the Danzig issue is given gteater prominence than his interest in the Tésin question. See also, in addition to the material cited by Cienciala, the English translations of relevant documents from Lipski (pp. 401-12) and Lukasiewicz (pp. 127— 36) papers; Wojciechowski, pp. 429-31, 451-80; Roos, pp. 344-49; Krofta circular tel. 1170-71 of 22 September 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/412588 (Berber, No. 169).

243. There can be no doubt in view of the current available evidence that Cienciala is correct in asserting that Beck’s instruction to Lipski which included a demand for a plebiscite came before and independently of Goring’s suggestion that the Poles make that demand. She has, however, failed to note that this independently raised demand also reduced Poland’s ability to secure concessions from Berlin. For Polish pressure on Hungary to move fast, see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 316, 343, 348, 354.

244. The record of the Hitler-Lipski talk is in Lipski Papers, No. 99 (the copy of this document published in D.M., 1, No. 23, is the one circulated in the Polish Foreign Ministry). There appears to be no full German record, G.D., D, 2, No. 555. Cf. Hangarian Documents, 2, No. 377. 245. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 355, 357.

246. It is not clear whether the Hungarian government was influenced in these critical days by obvious signs that neither the Slovak autonomists nor the leaders of local movements in the Carpatho-Ukraine were particularly enthusiastic about the prospect of incorporation in Hungary, preferring at least at that time a future within a less centralized Czechoslovakia to a return to rule from Budapest. The evidence is ably summarized in Jorg K. Hoensch, Die Slowakei in Hitlers Ostpolitik (Cologne: Béhlau, 1965), pp. 83-98, and Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 86.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

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visitors could certainly read between the lines that Hitler would find a road to war out of that dilemma.?47 While it was precisely this that alarmed the Hungarians—unlike Hitler, they did not want to run the risk of a general war—they also did not want to lose out on any gains that might be made by pressure and bluster alone. They would, accordingly, proclaim to all and sundry that Hungary expected concessions on a par with those accorded Getmany and Poland, and in this fashion fitted their approach somewhat to Hitler’s immediate plan.** There was, nevertheless, an undertone of worry in the Hungarian reaction to Hitler’s presentation which the latter correctly read as a sign of their fear of wart. He would use their demands to get out of his commitment to Chamberlain, but

when it came time to divide the meal, he would remember that once again Hungary had been a reluctant assistant in the cooking process.249 Whereas Hitler had not known what to expect from Chamberlain when the two were first to meet, he did know what the alternatives might be when the prime minister

returned. If the answer was no, Hitler had his excuse to march. If the answer was yes, he

would be ready to use the troubles created by his Sudeten German Free Corps to demand immediate transfer of the Sudeten areas and he would use the demands of Poland and Hungary to insist on their immediate settlement as well. Surely these new demands would not all be granted, and henge he could go to war. If they were all granted, the Fuhrer no doubt trusted in his own ingenuity for a way to escape the danger

of a peaceful settlement.25° Chamberlain in the meantime was trying to secure agreement to the idea of a plebiscite for the Germans in Czechoslovakia from his own colleagues, the French, and Czechoslovakia. At an informal meeting immediately after his return to London on 16 September, the prime minister discussed the talk with Hitler with some of his colleagues. There was informal agreement that it would be necessary to support self-determination, ptobably via a plebiscite. Runciman, who had just returned from Czechoslovakia, expressed the view that Benes’ would very likely agree.%! On the following day, Chamberlain gave a detailed and accurate report on his meeting with Hitler to the full cabinet.252 He reported himself as persuaded that Hitler had intended to march into Czechoslovakia momentarily but had held his hand for a short time.”°? As for his own reaction to the likelihood of war, he explained that he had told Hitler that Britain did not 247. G.D., D, 2, No. 554;-5, No. 272. See also Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 334, 341, 342, 346, 347, 349, 368, EN ones ter Adam, No. 11; Sakmyster, “Hungary and the Munich Crisis,” pp. 737-38; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 227,

238, 256.

248. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 351, 352, 358, 359 (Horthy Papers, No. 25), 362 (French text in Adam, No. 15),

363; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 8Iff.; Krofta Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1040/1809/412587.

circular

tel.

1172-75

of 22

September

1938,

249. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 345; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 90-91; Sakmyster, “Hungary and the Munich Crisis,” p. 738. There was a Polish-Hungarian “gentlemen’s agreement” to coordinate their 317, respective anti-Czech policies, but this had no substantial effect in practice (Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos.

ae, 319, 320, 325). for the 250. It is worth noting that on 20 September the pocket battleship Deutschland \eft Spanish waters scheduled to \ Atlantic, equipped to carry out cruiser warfare for several months, with a second pocket battleship be directed against follow in October (Diilffer, p. 489). The cruiser warfare was presumably not to Godesberg were Czechoslovak shipping. Hitler’s projects to escalate the crisis between Berchtesgaden and summarized by Frangois-Poncet in D.D.F., Dd tisINen291: were Chamberlain, Halifax, 251. Minutes of this meeting at 6:30 p.m. on 16 September in CAB 27/646. Present account is in his diary, p. 99. Cadogan’s Runciman. and Wilson, Horace Cadogan, Vansittart, Hoare, Simon,

also Duff Cooper, pp. 229252. Cabinet 39 (38) of 17 September 1938, C 9956/1941/18, FO 371/21738. See 1:607—14. 1938, U.S. 182-84; pp. 1938, September 17 30; Hore-Belisha, pp. 140-42; Harvey Diaries, oncet.

attack was held by Frangois-P 253. A very similar view that Hitler had postponed an already ordered been catefully omitted from Berber, No. has phrase key (the 178 No. Ménchen, Kral, 151; No. 11, 2d, D.D.F,

161).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

wish to be open to the reproach, leveled after 1914, of not having made her own situation clear if war did come, and that he had tried to make Hitler recognize that this was

not a threat but simply a way of avoiding any misunderstanding of the situatio§. If war were now averted, however, the road to better Anglo-German relations might

pen.

The prime minister concluded that Hitler would indeed limit himself to the demand for self-determination for the Sudeten Germans; this was to be the end, not the beginning,

of German demands on Czechoslovakia. Hitler’s aims, the prime minister believed, were “strictly limited.” This view, it would appear, had combined with the apparent urgency of the situation to lead him to omit discussion of any details or conditions with regard to the application of the principle of selfdetermination. He had simply agreed for himself and suggested a second meeting after he had had an opportunity to consult others. As for the Poles and Hungarians, Chamberlain and Halifax both recognized that there were problems in that regard; but believing as they did that a German invasion was imminent, they appear to have been of the opinion that those questions could be left for later settlement. There was agreement that a final British position should not be formally arrived at until after conversations with the French, but the record shows the cabinet in general agreement with the prime minister. Duff Cooper, the first lord of the admiralty, expressed his concern over a slide to sutrender in a situation where more demands would doubtless follow agreement to those currently before them.**4 He added, however, that war was a terrible option and that no one could predict the future with certainty; he was therefore prepared to agree to

the principle of self-determination as a basis for negotiations but would insist on careful conditions for its application. Lord Halifax took an essentially similar view, though he was both a bit more optimistic about the future and more obviously convinced that some permanent settlement of the conflict between Czechs and Germans in Bohemia had to be found, hardly a surprising view for one who had spent the last few months concentrating on this problem. There was in the cabinet something of a reluctant consensus that a guarantee would have to be given to Czechoslovakia to make the acceptance of selfdetermination acceptable to her, and there was an equally reluctant consensus that while Britain could not go to wat to oppose self-determination, it was entirely possible that she would have to anyway if unacceptable implementing procedures were insisted on by the Germans.”°> But first there had to be consultations with the French. For some thirteen hours, interrupted only for meals and for discussions within each delegation, the British and French leaders met in London on 18 September.25° The British gave a full account of the Berchtesgaden meeting, told the French of their own

belief that only agreement to self-determination would avert war, and argued that the French and British jointly would have to urge the Czechoslovak government to 254. The same issue arose that evening at a meeting of Chamberlain, Halifax, and Wilson with leaders of the

Labor party. When Hugh Dalton suggested that it would be best to hold firm now since otherwise one would constantly have to yield to new threats and would finally be left alone to fight or give in, the prime minister admitted to being “often haunted by fears like this” but would not agree to war being inevitable. If war were avoided now, it might be avoided altogether (Dalton Diary, 17 September 1938). This, of course, was the point on which Chamberlain would change his views in 1939. 255. On 16 September, General Ironside had noted in his diary: “It would be madness to expose ourselves to annihilation for the sake of the Czechs” (p. 61). The Foreign Office’s assessment of Soviet actions in case of a German attack on Czechoslovakia was equally discouraging. On 17 September it was believed that there would be no extensive help at the outset, that no decisive action could be taken because of the recent purges, and that the Soviet Union would wait on the war weatiness of others. On the other hand, thete appeared to be no signs of a German-Soviet rapprochement. Cadogan commented on 21 September: “Yes, Pray God we shall never

have to depend on the Soviet, or Poland or the U.S.” (N 4601/533/63, FO 371/22276).

256. The British record is in B.D., 3d, 2, No. 928; the French record is in D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 212; see also

Hoare, pp. 304-7; Thompson, pp. 165-67.

War Denied: The Crisis Over C rechoslovakia, Part 2

ee

619

ly ent ui . To their reminiscences of past promises by Hitler to limit his demands, the British could counter with reminiscences about past opportunities Benes had had to make concessions when the situation was not so critical. The point if it came to war was that Czechoslovakia would be overrun in the early stages, and that once victorious, the allies were unlikely to reconstitute Czechoslovakia in her present borders anyway. French Prime Minister Edouard Daladier was firm in the assertion that if Germany attacked, Czechoslovakia would fight and France would fight with her.258 He was also very much opposed to a plebiscite, as that would open up all sorts of other dangers; but he was equally explicit on his own desire to find a peaceful solution “other than a plebiscite” and on his preference for peace “without destroying the existence of Czechoslovakia.” What was the origin of this stress on opposition to a plebiscite, combined with a willingness to contemplate alternative solutions as long as they preserved the “existence” of Czechoslovakia, a phraseology open to the interpretation that this was not necessarily the same as preserving her territorial integrity?25° The origin of the French view is to be found in the fact that a way out of their desperate dilemma of choosing between dishonoring their obligation and becoming involved in war had been suggested to them by Bene§ himself. In the days after putting forward the “Fourth Plan” the Czechoslovak president evidently considered other possible alternatives. On the afternoon of 14 September, he reviewed with the British

minister the general situation in the negotiations with the Sudeten Germans, asserted that he was prepared to continue talks, insisted on opposition to plebiscites, but instead alluded to the possibility of small territorial concessions, although he ruled these out under the existing circumstances.? It is important to note that this conversation preceded Benes’s learning of Chamberlain’s forthcoming visit to Berchtesgaden and thus reflects his thinking before the pressures generated by that development.*°! The Czechoslovak president was considerably more explicit with the French. Having stressed repeatedly the danger of any plebiscites, which would disrupt the whole country, Bene’ appealed to the French government on 15 September, the day of the Hitler-Chamberlain meeting, to remain loyal to her alliance. He was, however, by now most doubtful that the response would be positive; even while receiving a reply from 257. U.S. 1938, 1:600-602. 258. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 353, 360. Daladier had been given a very shrewd analysis of Hitler’s policy on 15 September; see D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 169.

259. Cadogan’s account in his diary (p. 100) calls attention to this aspect of Daladiet’s choice of words; the passage itselfisin B.D., 3d, 2:387. 260. B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 884, 888. Hodza made an even more explicit statement on the possibility of a limited

territorial cession, ibid., No. 902. Cf. David Vital, “Czechoslovakia and the Powers, September 1938,” Journal of Contemporary History, 1, No. 4 (1966), 40-41. 261. Celovsky (p. 347), who reviewed this incident with great care on the basis of the evidence available when he wrote, mistakenly dated the conversation to 15 September. Newton’s telegram 583 of 14 September (B.D., 3d, 2, No. 884), however, refers to the conversation as having taken place “this afternoon.” minister Bene learned about Chambetlain’s forthcoming trip from a telephone call from the Czechoslovak by in London at 9:49 p.m. on the 14th. The transcript of this telephone conversation, which was intercepted by General handed Forschungsamt the from intercepts of batch a in ff.221-22 at included is the Getmans, forwarded that day Bodenschatz, Géring’s adjutant, to the British embassy in Berlin on 27 September 1938 and as a group to the Foreign Office. They were filed under C 11002/1941/18, FO 371/21742. These transcripts documents and contain sound authentic on the basis of internal and external evidence—they fit with other the telephone lines from many unflattering comments about the Germans. It should be remembered that course, have been other conLondon and Paris to Czechoslovakia went through Germany. There may well, of those handed to the versations either not intercepted by the Germans or intercepted but not included among Masaryk’s telegram reporting before place took noted, be also must it conversation, Benes-Newton The British. in Prague. on the French collapse (No. 785 of 14 September cited in n. 219, above) arrived

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Paris that referred back to the warning of July, he worked on a project for territorial concessions which he sent (along with relevant maps) to Paris by the hand of a Social Democratic member of the cabinet, Jaromir Ne¢as, who was to give it to Léon Blum for Daladier.22 As he discussed that proposal with the French minister on 16 September when the latter brought the formal French answer to Benes’s appeal, it provided for a cession of land outside the ring of fortifications with about a third of German population; the transfer to Germany of another third; and for the remaining third to stay inside Czechoslovakia as a far less dangerous minority since a high proportion of these would be people politically opposed to National Socialism and Jews.7°? Ne¢as took the project to Paris where he was to repeat Bene$’s insistence that a plebiscite meant disaster—and that the origin of the proposal was never to be revealed. By the time it was given to Daladiet as he was about to leave for London, the French Foreign Ministry had already prepared briefs for the French ministers which dealt with the details of such a project.2 Benes’s concept, which harked back to suggestions he had made at the peace conference in 1919 and to which certainly Hodza and possibly other members of the government were privy, was a cession of the Sudeten area outside the belt of fortifications on the condition that much of the balance of the Sudeten German population be transferred out of the remaining parts of Czechoslovakia. A plebiscite would disrupt the whole country, whereas a redrawn frontier accompanied by a large population transfer could leave a defensible and more homogeneous state. Far from being the warmonger of German propaganda, Benés was trying to find a way that might preserve independence within defensible borders for Czechoslovakia without war—and without most of its Germans—while providing some territorial cession to Germany. The project itself makes a good deal of sense if one accepts any massive population transfer to accompany a tertitorial cession; and it would have left a far stronger and more unified Czechoslovakia than

the “Fourth Plan,” had the latter been accepted and implemented. Advanced by Prague as a means of seizing the diplomatic initiative after the May Crisis or the French warning of July, it might conceivably have changed the situation considerably, but in September the project played a very different role. The French leaders were careful not to tell the British about the approach Benes had

262. On opposition to a plebiscite, see D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 87, 103. The appeal of Bene’ is ibid., No. 150.

Bonnet’s reply is No. 157; his comments to Osusky to the effect that a territorial transfer would be necessary are in No. 177 (see also No. 166). In the afternoon of the 15th, Benes was told by René Brunet, a Socialist deputy who acted as an unofficial French emissary in Czechoslovakia in 1938, that the French would not fight even if the British were willing, Bene§ responded that then Germany would dominate Central Europe, ally herself with the Soviet Union, and then fight England and France (ibid., No. 178). On Brunet, see ibid., p. 166, n. 2; Thompson, p. 117; G.D., D,

2, Nos. 340, 493. 263. The details as given by Bene§ to Lacroix mention a larger territorial and a smaller population change than the written text given to Necas. Compare D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 180 with No. 192. See also ibid., No. 175;

Adamthwaite, pp. 212-13; Celovsky, pp. 345-47. 264. D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 195; Adamthwaite, p. 213. See also D.D.F.,, 2d, 11, No. 196; Celovsky, pp. 347-49;

Thompson, pp. 164-65; Luza, Transfer of the Sudeten Germans, p. 141, n. 146; Bruegel, p..623, n. 82; Cienciala, p. 114, n. 23; U.S. 1938, 1:686. The instructions of Benes for Necas were first published in Mnichov » dokumentech [Munich in documents] (Prague: Orbis, 1958), 2:209-10. In London, where he went from Paris, Necas took a very belligerent line with Labor party officials, see Dalton Diary, 18 September 1938. There is a cryptic reference

to Necas going to see only Attlee in the Masaryk-Bene’ telephone conversation of 19 September, FO 371/21742, £.227. Neéas may have been instructed to make in London a communication similar to that made

in Paris (D.D.F., 2d, 11:288, n. 1), but unless further evidence is found, he either did the opposite on his own—

or had a very different set of instructions for the British capital. There may have been a plan of Bene’ to make with Hungary an arrangement analogous to that he was proposing to make with Germany (Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 102, n. 87); but Bene’ told Lacroix that even President Masaryk had been unable to obtain approval of a cession to Hungary (D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 180).

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

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made,*°° but their confidence that the Czechoslovak government would accept a cession

of territory as long as there was no plebiscite and their insistence on this approach was surely a reflection of their knowledge of Bene’’s views. During the break for lunch, furthermore, Daladier assured Chamberlain that “while he saw the most serious objections to recognizing the general principle of self-determination, which would involve other minorities, he thought that he could get M. Bene§ to agree to a cession of territory in the particular case of the Sudeten Germans.”26° The French went further concerning tertitory to be ceded than Bene had indicated because they shared the opinion of the British that there was no alternative, but they insisted on a British guarantee of what would be left of Czechoslovakia once the areas with the belt of fortifications had been turned over to the Germans, a danger for Czechoslovakia being implicit in any such drastic change of the border. Since Daladier did not wish to reveal the fact that he had maps showing what Benes felt he could safely yield and what would be likely to happen if majority decisions were arrived at by plebiscites, the French prime minister brought forth some extraordinarily feeble and unconvincing arguments for a British guarantee with which he could then feel justified in shifting from the map Bene§ had favored to one very like the map Bene’ feared and rejected. The British waved aside the spurious arguments but recognizing the strength of French opinion in the matter, and in line with their own prior discussion of the issue, agreed to the guarantee. Subject only to the approval of his colleagues in Paris—which he secured with little difficulty on the following day—Daladier concurred in a joint approach to Prague. The Czechoslovak government would be told that they could have a plebiscite, but as it was believed that they preferred simply to cede specific areas, they would be called upon to yield those with a majority of Germans in them. This drastic change entitled them to “some assurance of their future security” and this would take the form of Great Britain joining in an international guarantee against unprovoked aggression and the substitution of a general guarantee for the existing treaties with their obligations for mutual assistance.?°7 Daladier had, as already mentioned, little trouble persuading the French cabinet to concur in the joint approach to Czechoslovakia—after some discussion, the members agreed unanimously.7°° Chamberlain was still faced with serious reservations in his cabinet about the wisdom and efficacy of the guarantee he had offered on behalf of England, but there also unanimity was eventually secured.’ There were two issues open: 265. The British record is in B.D., 3d, 2, No. 928; the French in D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 212. Daladier, who knew

Bonnet to be very much inclined to concessions, may not have informed his foreign minister about the written Neéas proposal; but the latter was thinking along similar lines (see the important letter of Osusky to Benes of 17 September, Kral, Miinchen, No. 185), and so interpreted the remarks of Benes to Lacroix (see Osusky tels. 839 and 845 of 19 September, Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1039/1809/412124—25 and 412121—23; also

Kral, Manchen, No. 255). Daladier claims to have mentioned the Czechoslovak message of a willingness to concede territory in a private talk with Chamberlain before the formal Anglo-French session (Les Evénements survenues en France de 1933 a 1945, Annexes 1:33-34), but unlike Vital (p. 41, n. 6) and Adamthwaite (p. 214), I

am doubtful about this assertion. It does not fit together with the things Daladier said at the meeting, but it

; does fit with his strategy before the Parliamentary Commission. in FO 266. The quotation is from Chamberlain’s account of the meeting to the cabinet on 19 September 371/21744, £.114. 267. The text is in B.C, 3d, 2, No. 937. Cf. U.S. 1938, 1:618-19. that the opponents of con268. Celovsky, p. 351. This writer does not share Celovsky’s belief (pp. 352-53) rejection of the proposal; cessions to Hitler in the French cabinet agreed in anticipation of Czechoslovakia’s was hardly the way to government French divided) a to opposed (as unanimous a with Bene$ confronting 1:620-21. 1938, U.S. Cf. encourage him to turn down the proposal!

371/ 21744, ff.171-93. Chamberlain had 269, The record of the cabinet meeting of 19 September is in FO

delegation, who had been very much given a report on the talks with the French in a meeting with a Labor and the intention of the Soviet situation military French the of hearing by depressed, impressed, or rather to go to wat. See also U.S. 7938, 1:621—22; Union to take the issue to Geneva if France honored her obligation

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Hitler's Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

would the implied decision to ignore the demands of Poland and Hungary for the time being work out in practice, and would Czechoslovakia agree to turn over the border ateas including both the Germans and the fortifications to Germany? As for Poland and Hungary, the days after the Anglo-French conversations of 18 September, especially as word leaked out that territorial cessions were under consideration, saw those countries energetically pushing for concessions to themselves, immediately and on the same basis as those being contemplated for Germany. In this regard, the two were doing exactly what Hitler hoped they would, and what Czechoslovakia’s

leaders had feared they might. Both the British and French governments were aware the problem and were forcefully reminded of it by the diplomatic representatives Poland and Hungary. If there was reluctance to agree to such proposals as well as expectation that the demands might be worked out over a period of time as opposed those few days, three reasons

of of an to

appeat to have been important. In the first place, the

repeated references in the documents to speed regarding Germany and delay regarding the others surely reflects a perception in London and Paris that the Sudeten question could touch off a world war at any moment while the other issues were of a sort susceptible to solution in a calmer atmosphere. Although unmentioned, there may well have been a reluctance to ask too much of Czechoslovakia at one time. Finally, there is a third

aspect to which no one appears to have referred at the time, partly no doubt out of politeness, but partly because everyone knew it, took it for granted, and therefore saw no reason

to discuss it. Surely Poland with her German,

Lithuanian,

Belorussian,

and

Ukrainian minorities was not the country to argue seriously that the boundaries of East Central Europe should be redrawn. As for the Magyars, they were notorious in Europe for having achieved the dubious distinction of treating national minorities worse than anyone else. They might also be expected to anticipate that any insistence on their part on the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia would surely return Yugoslavia to her Little Entente obligations.?”° Under these circumstances, London and Paris hoped that the Polish and Hungarian issues could be postponed, and Chamberlain agreed with his colleagues that if Hitler used these problems to make new demands the prime minister would refuse to discuss them without consulting his cabinet.27! The Czechoslovak government now faced the difficult choice between agreement to the cession of the Sudeten areas in exchange for a dubious guarantee and the doubtful hope of being left alone by Germany on the one hand, and defiance and war on the other. During the period from noon on 19 September to the early hours of the twentyfirst the Czechoslovak government examined the problem. The French and British ministers insistently urged prompt acceptance and predicted that it would be forthcoming. Bene§ and Hodza apparently both thought it best to agree to the Anglo-French plan. There was no doubt about the reality of German plans to attack; there was no doubt that Czechoslovakia would be battered and overrun in the early stages of any conflict. If the Western Powers did not move, all of Czechoslovakia would remain the spoil of her enemies. If they did move, and if the Soviet Union joined in, the allies of Czecho-

slovakia would win after a long war, but they would hardly thank Czechoslovakia for appearing to have involved them in it by her obstinacy, and they were very likely to have Hore-Belisha, pp. 142-43. 270. See Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 366, 375, 385; Hoptner, pp. 116-18; D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 335. 271. The cabinet meeting record is in C 10711/1841/18, FO 371/21741; cf. Duff Cooper, p. 231. On Polish

and Hungarian representations and activities during the days from 18 to 22 September, see Hungarian Documents,

2, Nos. 364, 365, 367, 369-74, 376-81, 383, 384, 387, 388; B.D., 3d, 3, chap. 1. For later actions, see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 391, 392, 394, 398, 399, 405; U.S. 1938, 1:650-54. For a Yugoslav effort to mediate the Hungarian Czechoslovak conflict, see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 396, 407; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 101. Cf. D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 137.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

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her emerge at the end of such a war with borders much like those implied in the proposal now before the Prague government. Neither the Czechoslovak public nor the members of the coalition government had, however, been prepared for the possibility of extensive territorial concessions, so that the government felt it could signalize its agreement only following a great show of French and British pressure. This pressure was provided by Paris and London, but it is ironic that after months—in

the case of London

even years—of pressure for concessions that had been resented in Prague, the final installment of that pressure was to all intents and purposes solicited by the Czechoslovak leaders themselves.?”? The only hope that may have held Bene back in those critical days was the possibility of new currents coming to the fore in the Western capitals; but as it became obvious that in spite of reservations and objections and even shame in London and Paris there would be no reversal of policy, there was no alternative to surrender.273 Chamberlain could return to Germany for his second meeting with Hitler bringing British, French,

and Czechoslovak

agreement

to the demands

Hitler had voiced at

Berchtesgaden. As those demands and the agreement to them became known, there was a hardening of public opinion in England and France, a hardening reflected in the dis-

cussion in the cabinet in London on 21 September. There was some anticipation that further demands would be made. The day before, Sir Orme Sargent had noted in the Foreign Office: If Hitler is true to form, we must be prepared at his forthcoming meeting with the Prime Minister for him to make further demands under threat of war. On the last occasion he invented a massacre of 300 Sudeten to justify his abandonment of autonomy, which he had previously demanded, and its replacement by his present claim for annexation. If he wishes now to make further demands, he will no doubt be able to invent a

state of affairs which will enable him to maintain that the situation has deteriorated since the Berchtesgaden meeting in such a way that he is no longer able to accept as a settlement what he had then demanded.”

272. Daladier put this point frankly to objecting French cabinet members, who informed Osusky. The latter asked Bene§ to deny this assertion (Osusky tel. 882 of 22 September 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412118-19), which Benes promptly did (Benes to Osusky, 23 September 1938, ibid., frames

412132-33). 273. The summary in L. Thompson, chap. 18, is excellent. There is also a good account—though somewhat

exaggerating Czechoslovak military strength—in Vital, pp. 41-57. See also the evidence collated in Celovsky, pp. 356-74, which, though very helpful, is much influenced by the arguments over the post-World War II validity of the territorial cession. In addition, see Chvalkovsky’s comments to Phillips on 22 September 1938, Phillips diary, pp. 2745-47, Philips Papers, vol. 17; intercepted telephone conversations

in FO 371/21742,

postff.231—-43 (see esp. Osusky-Bene’, 21 September 1938, 10:32 a.m. in which Osusky wants acceptance 19 and 20 poned as long as possible in hopes of a change in Paris, and Bene’ is doubtful); Cadogan Diary,

826 of September 1938, pp. 101-2; Harvey Diaries, 19-21 September 1938, pp. 187-91; Heidrich (Geneva) tel. of 18 September 18 September 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412093; Osusky tel. 827 21 5-17; Gilbert, Churchill, 1938, ibid., frame 412126; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 217-52, passim; Adamthwaite, pp.

5:977-78. efforts to assist in the There was a good deal of discussion and denial at the time about alleged Czechoslovak the Anglo-French plan for a overthrow of the French and British governments with the purpose of displacing that they had cession of the Sudeten territories. The Germans at the time claimed to the British and French and Paris and transcripts of telephone conver sations of Czechoslovak diplomats talking between London of transcripts handed by the Prague to prove this point. It is, therefore, of special interest that in the collection by verbatim transcripts but by a Germans to the British it is precisely this critical point which is covered not all the other conversations in the summary in paragraph form (FO 371/21742, ff,233-34), although almost collection are in transcript format. FO 371/21739. 274. Memorandum by Sargent, 20 September 1938, C 10329/1941/18,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Such possibilities were canvassed in the cabinet, where Hitler’s adherence to his own prior position as set forth at Berchtesgaden was seen as a test of his sincerity. There would be no further concessions. Discussion revolved primarily around the new status of Czechoslovakia: there should be a German-Czechoslovak nonaggression treaty accompanied by British, French, and Soviet guarantees of Czechoslovakia against aggression.?”° There was, or at least appeared to be, a clear sense that everything possible and reasonable had been done; if the Germans were not willing to settle peacefully under e conditions, wat would come, but of Germany’s choosing.*’¢ When Chamberlain met Hitler again at Bad Godesberg on 22 September, he reviewed recent developments, explained that he had secured approval for territorial transfer, and proceeded to elucidate some suggestions and conditions under which such territorial cessions might be worked out.JPresumably to retain some leeway in the negotiations, he suggested that the figure of 65 percent German population provide the basis for a commission to draw the new border rather than the 75 percent Lord Runciman had originally, recommended or the bare majority that was provided by the Anglo-French plan.?’’ [He also explained to Hitler the idea of new guarantees for Czechoslovakia to replace its current security system. _ Hitler’s response was based on the strategy he had developed after the Berchtesgaden meeting. He professed—perhaps genuine—astonishment at what Chamberlain had managed to do, but he used the conditions he himself had created in the meantime to justify rejection of a settlement on the basis of his prior demands.]The activities of the Free Corps provided the pretext for asserting that things were sO bad inside Czechoslovakia that he had to move in right away, there could and would be no discussion about properties, commissions, refugees, and such. Huge stretches would be occupied forthwith, and plebiscites—presumably on the recent Austrian model—would be held in them after German

occupation, with several additional areas subject to plebiscites as

well. In regard to the German-Czechoslovak nonaggression pact Chamberlain had suggested, nothing like that was feasible even after Germany’s territorial demands had been met until after the Polish and Hungarian demands Hitler had been stimulating had |also been accommodated.?”8 The new demands were obviously designed to prevent the peaceful agreement Owatd which Chamberlain was pushing. Hitler had previously expressed to the Hungarians his own fear that the Czechs might accept everything, 4nd von Ribbentrop told Schmundt after the Bad Godesberg meeting that acceptance“Of the memorandum 275. The minutes

are in C 10711/1941/18,

FO 371/21741.

On the stiffening of the British and. French

positions on 20 and 21 September, see U.S. 1938, 1:631-32, 636; 8th and 9th informal meetings of British ministers, 21 and 22 September 1938, CAB 27/646; Cadogan Diary, 21 September 1938, p. 102; Harvey Diaries, 22 September 1938, p. 191; B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1009, 1010, 1015, 1016, 1026; D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 277. 276. The British and French reaction to reports of the Sudeten German Free Corps occupying some Czechoslovak territory on 22 September, which included the decision to withdraw their earlier caution against Czechoslovak mobilization (though temporarily again suspended), must be seen in this context; Celovsky, pp. 401-8;

Kral, Méinchen, Nos. 215 (part in Berber, No. 170), 216, 218, 219 (part in Berber, No. 219); D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 308, 313, 134. Hugh Dalton, one of the leaders of the Labor party, was in Paris on 23 September and was told

by Phipps about the difficult situation where in the early stages of war all would go in favor of Germany and only in the long run would this be reversed (Da/ton Diary, 23 September 1938). 277. In the telephone conversation Masaryk-Bene’ of 19 September, 7:00 p.m., Masaryk said with reference to the original Anglo-French plan after Berchtesgaden: “If it only said 75%, but 50%, that is impossible.” Bene’’s

response was “terrible.” FO 371/21742, f.229. On Runciman’s reaction to the 50 percent figure, see the Masaryk-Benes conversation of 23 September, 10:05 a.m., ibid., £.246. 278. The British record is in B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1033; the German in G.D., D, 2, No. 562. Chamberlain had taken

along his own interpreter to avoid a repetition of the fiasco about the Berchtesgaden record. Also important is

Lipski Papers, No. 107 (D.M., 1, No. 32). For further details, see Celovsky, pp. 393-98; Thompson, pp. 186-96; Haney Diaries, 22 and 24 September 1938, pp. 191-95.

War Denied: The Crisis Over C rechoslovakia, Part 2

625

containing the German demands was the most painful thing that could happen to the German government.’ One official in the British Foreign Office was to suggest that since the Germans would doubtless invent new demands as soon as this list was accepted, it might be as well to show them up by agreeing now, thereby exposing Hitler’s tactics all the more effectively.78° Such an approach did not occur ot appeal to the British prime minister. He was obviously shocked and upset} Rather than simply break off talks and return to England, he did get into some discussion of the new German ultimatum. Under the impression of Chamberlain’s firmness and the news of the Czechoslovak mobilization—which artived during the later stages of the Bad Godesberg talks after Britain and France had withdrawn their objections to such a step as a result of learning Hitler’s newest demands—the Fuhrer changed the timetable for the occupation by a few days and some other minor modifications-were also made, but the substantive situation remained unchanged.[Dictation was to replace negotiation, and Czechoslovakia was to be

punished rather thant rewarded for agreeing to the cession of the Sudeten areas. : Chamberlain merely agreed to pass on to the Czechoslovak government the new German demands.”*! As he returned to England disappointed at what certainly looked like the failure of his efforts, he appears to have clutched at the minor concessions that Hitler had made during the Bad Godesberg talks as a possible route to further concessions leading to an agreement after all Only in this way can one understand the slow but continuous hardening of his attitude after Godesberg.”®? In his first meeting with __ministers right after returning and in the following cabinet meeting, the prime minister inclined to the view that some way might be found to work on the basis of the new terms, though his own words show him doubtful about that, while many in the cabinet

were convinced it was impossible. It was in this regard that there was an advantage in the ptime minister and foreign secretary not having both participated in the sessions in Germany; the prime minister remembered the discussion after Hitler’s original rejection, while the foreign secretary was naturally most impressed by the outcome of the Godesberg meeting as a whole. That was unacceptable, and he so explained his view at the cabinet meeting on 25 September. Chamberlain fell in with this judgment and so did the whole cabinet with those most dubious about firmness and those equally dubious about concessions for once in agreement.”* If the hardening of public opinion in England contributed to this view, so did the 279. Groscurth Diary, 27 September 1938, p. 125; cf. Dirksen, pp. 232-33.

280. Sargent’s memorandum of 28 September 1938 in C 11294/1941/18, FO 371/21744. Cadogan noted that

the cabinet on the 27th (meeting 46) had definitely decided against such a line.

281. A detailed Czechoslovak “Analyse du mémorandum allemand de Godesberg” prepared on or about 25 September 1938, and showing the impossibility of Czechoslovak acceptance is in T-120, 1039/1809/412519—

52. The analysis is summarized in Kral, Miinchen, No. 229. The full text was presumably the material Prague at

one point thought of sending Masaryk by airplane (Kral, Ménchen, Nos. 225, 226, 228). For a Czechoslovak

explanation of the problems of the Godesbetg terms for the French, see ibid., No. 231. Similar analyses by the

French themselves in D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 350, 354, 355.

on 26 282. Interesting on this is the report of the Canadian high commissioner on a talk with Chamberlain Minister’s September between the two meetings of Horace Wilson with Hitler: “Was struck by point in Prime German proposals statement when he said although he had been inclined at first to be impressed by view that that there was conviction the to come had he method, of matter a largely was Sudetenland of for occupation terms? modify to not determined so Hitler was why method, of one merely more to it than that. If matter was has been prepared to Prime Minister is convinced that proposals reveal ambitions more far-reaching than Hitler

pp. 67-69, which reflects the admit” (Documents on Canadian External Relations, 6, No. 897, p. 1097). See Eayrs, Nos. 283, 304. Documents, Australian also See further. compromise to England on Dominion pressure

see Birkenhead, pp. 398— 283. For the repott of Chamberlain and the subsequent internal British discussions,

24 and 25 September 1938, pp. 103-6; 401; Hore-Belisha, pp. 144-46; Nicolson, pp. 366-68; Cadogan Diary, Cabinet 42 (38), 24 September, 5:30 27/646; CAB p.m., 3:30 September, 24 ministers, of meeting informal 13th

10:30 a.m., C 10929/1941/ p.m., C 11441/1941/18, FO 371/21744, ££.145—67; Cabinet 43 (38), 25 September, 18, FO 371/21742; U.S. 1938, 1:652.

' aia

626

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

similar process in France which was reflected in the attitude of the French ministers, who again came to London to confer with their British counterparts. The English ministers put them through a difficult few hours as they inquired about the military measures which the French proposed to back up their proclaimed support of Czechoslovakia; but after reading these tough exchanges one can also see that they represent the canvassing of last doubts before firm resolution is arrived at. The Czechoslovak government would not be urged to accept the new terms; and in the hope of deterring Hitler from taking the plunge, Sir Horace Wilson would be sent first to suggest a supervised territorial transfer, but also to warn Hitler that if Germany marched, France would honor

her alliance and England would fight on her side.”*4 One of the advocates of a firm line, Duff Cooper, who had not participated in the talks with the French or the informal meeting of ministers, commented in his diary about Chamberlain’s statement at the subsequent cabinet meeting that England would fight with France that “the Prime Minister made this announcement casually and I could hardly believe my ears.” Chamberlain was not the fist-pounding type, but his quiet shift from doubt to resolution was therefore all the more convincing to his colleagues and to the French. They now set about getting ready for war in earnest. The French were beginning to mobilize their army, and Great Britain announced the mobilization of the fleet at the very time on 27 September when Sir Horace was in Germany.*° The British warned the Dominions that war was practically certain. Whatever the grimness of the predictions made by French and British military leaders, the political leaders in both countries were ready—treluctantly ready, but ready nevertheless—to go to war if Czechoslovakia as expected rejected the new German demands and Germany attacked.28’ The repeated statements of the Russian government asserting loyalty to their treaty commitments and the agreement reached at the Anglo-French meeting in London formed the basis of the British public statement on the evening of the 26th that France, Britain, and

the Soviet Union would all be involved in a war initiated by Germany.288 The French plan in case of war appears to have been to make a token advance into Germany, then withdraw to the Maginot Line forthe winter and devastate the area evacuated the way the Germans had done in their 1917 planned retreat to the Hindenburg Line. For 1939, a combined French and British attack on Italy was intended. Gamelin assumed that Czechoslovakia could hold out for a few weeks and that the Soviet Union would provide air assistance.?°9 284. On the Anglo-French meetings and the decision to send Horace Wilson to Germany, see B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1093, 1096; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 356, 375; Birkenhead, pp. 401-3; Hore-Belisha, pp. 146-48; Cadogan Diary, 26-27 September 1938, pp. 106-7; Harvey Diaries, 25 September 1938, pp. 196-98; Thompson, chap. 20; Celovsky, pp. 412-17; Cabinet 44 (38), 25 September, 12:00 p.m., C 10930/1941/18, FO 371/21742; Cabinet 45 (38), 26 September, noon, C 10931/1941/18, ibid.; U.S. 1938, 1:641—-50; Hull-Kennedy telephone conversa-

tion, 26 September, 9:30 a.m., State 760F.62/1362. For efforts of some French Daladier’s firm position, see D.D.B., 5, No. 35, but cf. U.S. 1938, 1:656-57, 666-69.

officials to undermine

285, Old Men Forget, p. 237. 286. On the military preparations at this stage, see Hore-Belisha, pp. 148-51; Ismay, pp. 92-93; John WheelerBennett, John Anderson, Viscount Waverly (New York: St. Martin’s, 1962), pp. 205-7; Cadogan Diary, 27 September

1938, p. 107; Pownall, pp. 160-63; B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1075; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 293, 294, 343, 458; G.D., D, 2,

No. 604; C 10607/1941/18, FO 371/21740. For other indications that Britain and France were set to go to war, see U.S. 1938, 1:659-60, 662; R 7762/899/22, FO 371/22438 (blockade of Italy in event of war).

287. For gloomy military comments, see Ironside, pp. 61-62; parison of French and German air forces in C 10163/36/17, No. 1143. For evidence that the Belgians preferred giving up French army through in any attack on Germany as well as on they tried to push through, see Overstraeten, p. 298.

D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 377; the devastating comFO 371/21596; Gamelin’s views in B.D., 3d, 2,

the British and French guarantee to letting the Belgian determination to shoot at the French if

288. Celovsky, pp. 421-22; D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 484; Adamthwaite, p. 151.

289. C 10722/10722/18, FO 371/21782 (this was a meeting chaired by Inskip on 26 September with Gamelin

explaining his views; cf. Gamelin, 2:351—52); D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 376, 405; Adamthwaite, pp. 231-32; Pownall,

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

627

Along with these military plans and preparations, there was a critical diplomatic one. As war appeared practically certain, the Czechoslovak government, which was now convinced that it could count on British and French aid if Germany attacked, offered territorial concessions to Poland, an offer which Britain and France tried to use to secure

Poland’s neutrality of even assistance against Germany if war came.2” This effort proved unavailing, but it shows how the prospective allies perceived the coming of war and attempted to place themselves in the best possible position for what they recognized would be a long and difficult struggle. As these military and diplomatic preparations went forward, Sir Horace Wilson was in Germany on the mission assigned him as a result of the Anglo-French talks. On 27 September Hitler received the news of the British public announcement of the likelihood of general war and, in a second meeting with Wilson, the warning in formal terms that Britain and France would stand by Czechoslovakia. The day before he had been so set on his plan for attacking Czechoslovakia that he had almost walked out on Sir Horace in the middle of their first conversation and had been only with difficulty recalled to the fact that as host he really had to hear out his visitor.2?! Having worked himself into a frenzy for the speech he was to deliver that night, Hitler was not about to engage in diplomatic niceties. The speech itself must be read in terms of Hitler’s own purposes. Having decided to order mobilization at 2:00 p.m. on 28 September and to attack on the 30th, Hitler now wanted to isolate Czechoslovakia from potential allies and to rally the German public for war, limited if possible, worldwide if necessary. The violent and even hysterical attacks on Benes covered the latter point; the insistence that Germany did not want any Czechs and that this was Germany’s last territorial demand was to assist with the former.??? The warning that on instructions from London Sit Horace gave Hitler on the 27th produced an unpleasant scene but still did not shake the

p. 163; Thompson, pp. 206-8. For a Franco-Soviet military contact on 26 September, see D.D.F., 2d, 11, No.

380. 290. B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1096, 1102; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 606, 629, 639, 652; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 402, 412;

Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 138-39; Wojciechowski, pp. 486-88; Roos, pp. 350-52; Cienciala, pp. 125-33, 198-210; D.D.F, 2d, 11, Nos. 328, 344, 346, 351, 357, 371, 395; Namier, Ewrope in Decay, pp. 284ff.; Slavik tel. 906, 24

September 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412089; Krofta circular 1356-57, 26 September 1938, T-120, 1040/1809/412608 (Berber, No. 178); Kral, Manchen, No. 222; Harvey Diaries, 26 September 1938, p. 198. The Polish attitude and actions as well as their results will be further examined in the

following chapter. The evidence of Slavik’s detailed report on the circumstances surrounding the Czechoslovak

effort to transmit the offer of territorial concessions to Poland (and also the French diplomatic documents) certainly supports the suspicion voiced by several scholars that Beck deliberately accentuated the crisis. Slavik report 57 of 26 September 1938, T-120, 1040/1809/412981—91 (one sentence in Berber, No. 178).

The indirect effort made through Sir Thomas Hohler to get Hungary to stand aside on the basis of a British promise to champion her cause belongs in this context, see the material under C 11418/2319/12, FO 2d, 11, No. 371/21569. Romania was prepared to join the allies if Hungary attacked Czechoslovakia (D.D.F.,

457). ; = the 27th the British relayed to the French information contradicting some of Lindbergh’s pessimistic , FO 371/21710. statistics after deciding that they did indeed wish to encourage the French, C 10025/1425/18

considered a cerThe U.S. naval attaché in London reported that “on the afternoon of 28 September [war] was for the dispatch tainty” (No. 947 of 8 October 1938, Hyde Park, PSF Probability of War H). The preparations out of the grew transfer territorial the in assist to a Czechoslovaki to Legion British of members of the sctapped as it became clear that Berchtesgaden meeting, and though continuing in the subsequent days, were the original transfer concept was being abandoned (Wootton, pp. 230-42, 330-31). D, 2, No. 634. On the background, see 291. Schmidt, pp. 407-8; B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1115, 1116, 1118; G.D.,

D.D.F.,, 2d, 11, No. 349. on its hysterical tone by the 292. Text of the speech of 26 September in Domartus, 1:923-33. Comments Groscurth, in his diary, p. 124, On the Prussian minister of finance Johannes Popitz in von Hassell, p. 21; by g the remainder of Czechoslovakia, reference in the speech to not wanting any Czechs and possibly guaranteein see B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1162, n. 2, and Celovsky, p. 419.

628

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

German leader out of his decision to move.?3 The fact that on the 27th and after the second meeting with Wilson Hitler decided to write an answer to the letter from Chamberlain the reading of which he had almost walked out on the day before can be seen either as the first sign of a shift away from his determination to go to war or, more likely, as a maneuver designed to try to split Britain and France from Czechoslovakia in war.24 A development of the 27th that would contribute to Hitler’s change of mind on the following day was the reception accorded by the Berlin crowds to a military demonstration on the late afternoon of that day. Motorized units moved through the capital at Hitler’s orders, but this grim sign of the imminence of war produced just the opposite reaction from the one Hitler expected after his rousing speech of the night before and the crescendo of press and radio propaganda.”° The viewing public was anything but enthusiastic, and the propaganda minister himself would remind Hitler of the public’s attitude on the following day.?%° All the same, throughout the 27th of September, in spite of the disappointing public response, the warning of Sir Horace Wilson, and the renewed refusal of Hungary to join immediately in war on Czechoslovakia,?”” Hitler was still resolute in his determination to Ribbentrop and von Weizsacker military action, that he would now bluff—there was surely no point would continue to argue for war

go to war. His comments late that evening to von of whom the former favored and the latter opposed destroy Czechoslovakia by war cannot be dismissed as in bluffing his own immediate advisers of whom one after Hitler had changed his mind and the other had argued against it and continued to do so. On 28 September Hitler did change his mind.?°? The events of the preceding day now had some new elements added to them. In the morning the news of the mobilization of the British fleet reached Berlin. Such signs of the reality of an imminent world war went along with reports on Chamberlain’s speech of the preceding evening, which had on the one hand talked of war as an immediately imminent contingency but on the other hand pointed out how minor the ostensible issue was: a short time difference .

293. B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1128, 1129; G.D., D, 2, No. 634; Lipski Papers, No. 109. The reports of Sit Horace on his

meetings with Hitler were discussed at the 15th informal meeting of ministers on 27 September, 4:30 p.m.

(CAB 27/646) and at the cabinet meeting 46 (38) at 9:30 p.m. (C 11443/1941/18, FO 371/21744). 294. The letter is in B.D. 3d, 2, No. 1144 and G.D., D, 2, No. 635. The timing shows that the decision to send

the letter and the drafting preceded the military demonstration of 27 September. It should be noted that Goring, who was opposed to wat at this time, is recorded in the Jodl diary on 28 September as still thinking it

could hardly be avoided (TMWC, 28:389). 295. On the propaganda of the last days of the crisis, see the reports on the press conferences of 24 and 27 September 1938, Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/9, f£.204-5, 209. On the troop movement through central Berlin and Hitler’s reaction to the attitude of the public, the account and sources cited in Celovsky, pp. 425-26,

can now be supplemented by Engel Diary, pp. 39-40; Weizsdcker-Papiere, p. 145. See also the report on a conversation with Canaris on 28 September 1938 in the diary of Wolf Eberhard, Munich, Institut fii Zeitgeschichte. 296. On Goebbels, see also the incident mentioned in Fitz Randolph, pp. 230-31, 257-58, which appears to refer to the transmittal by Goebbels of a warning to Hitler based on a report from the propaganda minister’s representative in London. 297. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 397, 401, 411, 413; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p 100; DDE

y2d) 17,

No. 364; cf. Groscurth Diary, 30 September 1938, p. 129. Note also von Ribbentrop’s asking Lipski on the 26th whether Poland would join in war immediately and Lipski’s evasive reply (Lipski Papers, No. 107, p. 421; cf.

ibid., pp. 426-27; there appears to be no German record). 298. Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 145, 170. For von Ribbentrop’s views, see also G.D., D, 2, No. 374, and his comment in June that Albrecht Haushofer’s warning that Britain and France would fight if Germany attacked was British Secret Service propaganda (ibid., No. 270); Groscurth Diary, 29 September 1938, p. 128, n. 142. It is not certain whether the entry of Groscurth that Hitler wanted any general who did not reach his objective shot

reflects a comment made on the 28th (when he entered it in his diary) or earlier (Groscurth Diary, p. 127). 299. Groscurth’s diary entry: “It is hard to grasp this change. The Fiihrer has finally given in (nachgegeben), and thoroughly” (p. 128).

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

629

in carrying out a territorial cession already agreed to. Combined with the evident lack of enthusiasm in Germany and the concurrence of Goring and Goebbels with the arguments of the generals this appears to have given Hitler some pause. The British government had been putting forward some new compromise ideas to bridge the gap between the Berchtesgaden and Godesberg terms,3 and the French were even more inventive in trying to get some immediate concessions that would satisfy Hitler without quite accepting the Godesberg demands. In the late morning of the 28th the French ambassador saw Hitler for the first time in several weeks and presented these ideas to him. A message from Mussolini, appealing to Hitler to postpone the mobilization scheduled for that afternoon, interrupted the meeting with Francois-Poncet; and soon

after the resumed meeting was concluded, Mussolini urged on Hitler Chamberlain’s idea of a conference to work out the details of territorial cession instead of resorting to war.°"! This sign that Mussolini himself really preferred peace and would not go to wat alongside Germany appears to have been the final factor tipping Hitler in the direction of peace. How had this development come about? As previously shown, German-Italian cooperation in the Czechoslovak crisis had been considerable but not complete. The Italian government had provided propaganda support for the German cause. They were also happy to push Hungary forward, though remaining cautious enough to warn the Magyars that Yugoslavia could be neutralized only if Hungary waited for some time after Germany attacked Czechoslovakia before joining in.” After the Berchtesgaden meeting, when Hitler was eager to stir up more trouble to avoid a settlement on the basis he and Chamberlain had discussed, the Italians

readily fell in with German requests for further propaganda support and some additional pushing of the Hungarians.>” In these matters there was continued cooperation between Germany and Italy, but there was, nevertheless, a most important point on which the policies of Hitler and Mussolini diverged; and after the Godesberg meeting this

difference would become crucial. While Hitler was generally reassuring in public in the first years after 1933, he planned and hoped for war and fashioned his preparations and policies accordingly. Mussolini tended to do the reverse: he was always speaking publicly and privately about the virtues of war and the need to fight Britain and France, but his plans and policies were geared to postponing such heroics, quite possibly to the Greek calends. When the reality—as opposed to the theoretical possibility—of the immediate outbreak of world war stared Italy in the face after Godesberg, Mussolini was not willing to fight for

Germany’s aims in Czechoslovakia, especially at a time when Italy had given a hostage to fate in Spain that would surely be an early casualty of any wider war. He was still

300. The British cabinet, led on this issue by Lord Halifax, had, however, at its meeting of 27 September

refused to urge the Czechoslovak government to withdraw tacitly to the line demanded by the Germans (C

11443/1941/18, FO 371/21744).

301. The sequence of events on the morning of the 28th is most accurately stated in the account Attolico gave

reconstruction by American Ambassador Hugh Wilson on 21 October 1938, U.S. 1938, 1:727-29. See also the Francois-Poncet, D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 450. 2, No. 627; Celovsky, pp. 302. Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 368, 374, 380, 382, 389, 413, 417, 419; G.D., D,

384 ff.

Miinchen, No. 213; G.D., 303. See Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 234-36; Ciano, Diary, pp. 226, 227, 229, 230; Kral,

D, 2, Nos. 571, 577; Lipski Papers, No. 103. Vargas that Italy would 304. Note that in mid-September Mussolini had informed Brazilian President Getulio ; 1938, 1:600). This was join on Germany’s side in war only if Russia came in or France moved in Spain (US but it does give a reflecnot necessarily either a truthful or an accurate statement of Mussolini’s true intentions, such rumination is recorded in tion of the Italian leader’s weighing of war possibilities and alternatives. Another response to a question from Lord Ciano’s diary for 17 September (pp. 227-28). The British chiefs of staff in in any war, even if this damaged neutral remained Italy if better be Halifax had expressed the view that it would 371/22438). the blockade system, and the Foreign Office concurred (R 7762/899/22, FO

630

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

reluctant to make this point clear to the Germans, perhaps because he was worried about being thought cowardly, perhaps because he still could not believe that the “decadent democracies” would take the plunge. On the contrary, when the Prince of Hessen was sent to Mussolini after the Godesberg meeting to enlighten the Duce about the stalemate in the negotiations, the imminence of war, and Germany’s willingness to risk a general war, Mussolini expressed doubt that Britain and France would move but promised that Italy would come into the war as soon as England did.*% Ciano’s comment that this statement urged Germany neither toward war nor away from it is surely inaccurate; Hitler could only take it as encouragement. That such assurances of support would, at the critical moment a few days later, be followed by urgent telephoned requests first to postpone mobilization, and second to agree to a conference must have been read as a last minute reversal by Hitler, who had every reason to think up to this moment that he had Mussolini at his side. During

the hours

of the greatest

international

tension,

when

on

27 and

28

September it looked to governments and public alike that war would start in a few days, the idea of an appeal for peace was widely canvassed. President Roosevelt had launched one and was thinking of another. The president was sympathetic to the Western Powers and willing to let them know that they would have American political support, but he was very much opposed to any war and still hopeful one could be avoided.*% Since Hitler was generally assumed to be the one who would start hostilities, and since it was believed that Mussolini might have some influence with him, the concept of asking Mussolini to urge Hitler to postpone action and participate in a conference appeared to be an obvious avenue of approach.*°’ This was the route Roosevelt took, urging Hitler to agree to working out the details of transfer by conference instead of war and calling on Mussolini to use his influence with Hitler in favor of that approach. The appeal of the American president arrived in Rome about the same time as an essentially similar appeal from the British prime minister. The British, like the French, government had beén casting about for a way out of what indeed would look like a tidiculous situation if one took Hitler’s ostensible demands for his real aims. A world war in which many millions would surely lose their lives was to start over the timetable for implementing a previously agreed plan of territorial transfer; it was under these circumstances that the British Dominions were doing

their best to get London to change its position of supporting Czechoslovak rejection of the Godesberg terms.°” It was, on the other hand, precisely the fixed determination to 305. Ciano, Diary, 25 September 1938, pp. 233-34. French assessments of Italy’s position in D.D.F., 2d, 11,

Nos. 120, 163, 164, 337, 373, 374, 454.

306. On United States policy, see U.S. 1938, 1:565-66, 568, 657-58; 2:56-57; Moffat Papers, pp. 196-97; Morgenthau Diary, 19 September 1938, Vol. 141, p. 115, Hyde Park; Robert A. Divine, Roosevelt and World War II (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1969), pp. 20-23; G.D., D, 1, No. 462; D.D.F,, 2d, 11, Nos. 523, 529, 436.

The special message from Roosevelt via Lindsay printed in B.D., 3d, 7:627—28 was circulated at the end of the 8th informal meeting of ministers on the morning of 21 September (CAB 27/646). 307. An official in the Foreign Office on 27 September suggested that Chamberlain appeal to Roosevelt to urge Mussolini to summon a peace conference in Rome; now that all other hopes for peace were gone, this looked like the only route (C 11130/1941/18, FO 371/21744).

308. See U.S. 1938, 1:675—-80, 684-85, 689, 699; Bullitt Papers, pp. 287-300; Berle Papers, pp. 186-88; Phillips to Roosevelt, 29 September 1938, Hyde Park, PSF Phillips; Phillips to Roosevelt, 6 October 1938, State

760F.62/1462'/2. The argument over whether Mussolini received the British or the American appeal first does

not appear significant to me; he called Attolico after receiving both. Celovsky, p. 455, n. 2, summarizes the evi-

dence, but with an interpretation (also given on p. 449) that I consider incorrect. My reading of the evidence is that Roosevelt acted because he believed war imminent and hoped to contribute to averting it, not, as Celovsky suggests, because he feared to be left out of the picture when the turn to peace was already evident. 309.

On

the

last-minute

pressure

from

the

Dominions,

see

C

11443/1941/ 18, FO.

371/21744;

GC

10298/4770/18, FO 371/21766; C 10938/5302/18, FO 371/21777; C 12029/5302/18, FO 371/21778; Harvey

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

631

go to wat if Germany moved militarily that made both Chamberlain and Daladier hopeful that a negotiated settlement could still be worked out, but the poor state of FrancoItalian relations made it impossible for the French to appeal to Mussolini.3!0 Chamberlain therefore asked Mussolini to intervene with Hitler, something the Italian dictator did immediately, first to obtain a twenty-four-hour postponement of mobilization and then to secure agreement to a conference at Munich in which Mussolini himself promised to participate.*!! Ciano was in favor of a peaceful solution and Mussolini also appears to have fallen in with Chamberlain’s request quickly and willingly.3!2 If Ciano claimed that it was impossible to refuse Chamberlain’s appeal because Hitler would otherwise draw upon himself the hatred of the whole world and the whole responsibility for war, this hardly explains Mussolini’s sudden reversal. We cannot know the teason for Mussolini’s action with certainty, but it is difficult to avoid the conclusion

that in 1938—as

in

1939—his realism triumphed ovet his preferences, but on both occasions his pride restrained him from counsels of prudence until the very last moment.3!3 One must look at this procedure from Hitler’s point of view to understand the impact of what had to look to him like a last-minute Italian change of heatt. Although we do not possess a record of the Prince of Hessen’s report to Hitler on the results of his conference with Mussolini and Ciano on 25 September, it can surely be assumed that having been sent by Hitler on this urgent trip, the prince reported to the Puhrer on 26 or 27 September.4!* Furthermore,

on the 27th the Italians themselves

suggested that the Germans and Italians coordinate their political strategy for war by having Ciano and von Ribbentrop meet immediately, to which the Germans added the idea of military consultations, so that Keitel, Pariani, and Valle were added to a gathering that was, ironically enough, scheduled for Munich at noon on the 29th.*!> Certainly the exchanges concerning this meeting left Hitler, through the evening of 27 September, with the impression of an Italy ready to move. It is with this background of a renewed belief by Hitler that if it did come to a general war, Italy would be at his side—and what this meant for the policies of YugoDiaries, 27 September 1938, pp. 199-200.

oy

;“

310. Daladiet’s views on what he was himself sure was the eve of war late on 27 September 1938 is best and most accurately reflected in Bullitt’s telegram of 11:00 p.m. in U.S. 1938, 1:686-88. On Franco-Italian relations at this point, see B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1168; Ciano, Diary, 27 September 1938, p. 239. On the last-minute French efforts to maintain peace, see D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 385, 388, 390, 393, 400, 401, 403, 404, 415, 422, 464. The

final French offer is ibid., No. 413; Francois-Poncet’s reports on 28 September ibid., Nos. 420, 421.

311. B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1125 and n. 2 with its instructions of 27 September 1938, 11:00 p.m., which Perth carried

out early on the 28th (ibid., Nos. 1161, 1192, 1231; G.D., D, 2, No. 661; U.S. 1938, 1:693—94). A further British

appeal to Mussolini was sent on the morning of the 28th (B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1159) even before London had heard the results of the prior demarche. The combination of certainty that general war would ensue if Germany is reflected in moved militarily and the desperate hope that surely some way to obviate that could be found Horace Wilson’s comments on the morning of 28 September cited in G.D., D, 2, No. 657. 312. See B.D., 3d, 2, Nos. 1187, 1192; Ciano, Diary, 28 September 1938, pp. 238-39.

public role. He was 313. One cannot in this instance use the argument that Mussolini wanted to play a great conversations happy to do so, but the idea of Mussolini’s personal participation was not included in the otiginal first request of about the conference and was injected as a requirement by Hitler. It is possible that the misunderstood the Mussolini—the one for a twenty-four-hour postponement—was the result of his having German timetable (see G.D., D, 2, No. 611).

on 22 September (Ciano, The mission of the prince had been announced to the Italians by von Mackensen

314. that the prince was flying to meet Diplomatic Papers, p. 234); Berlin had telephoned on the aftetnoon of the 24th the

contain material on the trip reflects the Duce (Ciano, Diary, p. 233). The fact that the German files do not

diplomatic historian must always peculiarity of the procedure, not any lack of importance in the mission. The safe indication of the significance of an be cautious not to assume that the volume of surviving evidence is a *

; issue to the participants. to this meeting’s being canceled, ibid., 28 315. Ciano, Diary, 27 September 1938, p. 237 (note the reference 28 September 1938, p. 127, where Innsbruck is given as the

September, p. 239). See also Groscurth Diary, Papers, No. 127, pp. 466-67. proposed meeting place. Cf. Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 410; Lipski

632

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

slavia and Hungary as well—that the impact of Mussolini’s requests to postpone mobilization and to agree to a conference must be considered.*!\In the face of dubious generals, warning diplomats, hesitant allies, and a gloomy public, Hitler changed his policy. He would not risk a general war for what he really wanted, the destruction of Czechoslovakia, but would settle for what he had said he wanted and what everyone now assured, promised, even guaranteed he would get. In a way, he was trapped by his own propaganda strategy, and the attempt to escape the route of peaceful settlement by the policies he had followed after the Berchtesgaden meeting had failed. The determination of the Western Powers to fight if he went after his real aims and their eagerness to accommodate the ostensible ones had created a situation in which Hitler decided not to fight:He would afterwards regret his retreateds we shall see, and he would even pretend to others and perhaps persuade himself that he had simply bullied concessions out of others; but he had also made concessions himself. He would not test the warnings against military action by Germany, at least not in 1938.9!” Hitler’s acceptance of the conference idea in reality ended the danger of war because, whatever

the details of the settlement,

there could be no

doubt

that the

Czechoslovak government would have to accept the terms agreed to by Britain, France, Germany, and Italy; and the differences between the various schemes then under discussion for the transfer of the Sudeten areas were not sufficient to cause any serious difficulty in arriving at an agreement. Now that Hitler had reversed himself on the issue of war, he was no longer interested, as he had been after Berchtesgaden, in using the

Polish and Magyar minorities as obstacles to a settlement, and it was left to Mussolini to put in a word for them. Hitler and Mussolini met beforehand, and Hitler discoursed at some length on the need for a general war against Britain and France at an appropriate time when the two of them were still alive, a message which in this context was surely Hitler’s way of answering whatever arguments had led Mussolini to change his mind and of inoculating him against a repetition the next time. Mussolini already had a set of demands for the Munich

Conference,

limited to the German

areas, which

he presented

as his own

although it had been drafted by Goring, von Neurath, and von Weizsacker and transmitted to Rome via Attolico.*!§ After several hours of discussion, in which the British

ptime minister brought forward the largest number of objections and reservations on details,*!9 agreement was reached on a series of texts that provided for cession of tertitory in stages, an international commission to arrange the implementation and related details, the dropping of all plebiscite projects and special areas, a time limit for settlement of Polish and Hungarian territorial claims (with a new four-power conference if the time expired without agreement), and British and French guarantees of Czechoslovakia against unprovoked aggression immediately, to be followed later by German and Italian guarantees when the Polish and Hungarian border issues had been settled. All this was 316. Note also Attolico’s report on Mussolini’s views to von Ribbentrop at the end of July in G.D., D, 2, No. 334. 317. See von Weizsacker’s comments of 9 October 1938 in his diary, Weixsacker-Papiere, pp. 145, 171; Harvey

Dianes, 29 September 1938, pp. 201-2. 318. There are accounts of the Mussolini-Hitler meeting in Anfuso, pp. 75-79, and Ciano, Diary, 29-30 September 1938, p. 240. On the origins of the text produced by Mussolini at the meeting, see Celovsky, p. 462, n. 1, though I have followed the interpretation of Leonidas Hill, “Three Crises, 1938-39,” Journal of Contemporary History, 3, No. 1 (Jan. 1968), 119-20, which is confirmed by D.D.F., 2d, 12, No. 19. 319, On the 29th Vansittart received information from Goerdeler via Christie that British mobilization was

having an effect on the German public which was turning against Hitler (C 11164/62/18, FO 371/21664). Halifax relayed this information to Chamberlain at Munich as it might help him hold a firmer line in the

negotiations (B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1216). The British had also received appeals for firmness from Prague (D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 430, 431, 435).

War Denied: The Crisis Over Czechoslovakia, Part 2

633

done without the participation of any Czechoslovak representative; the Prague government could accept or take the consequences.32° War had been averted to the universal relief of vast numbers. The very way in which the crisis had built up into a deadlock from which a new world war appeared to be the most likely issue had brought the niemory of 1914, and of what followed, vividly to the minds of people-for whom that war was the greatest horror of their lives. The signs of this were numerous.\ The extraordinary scene in the House of Commons when Chamberlain was handed Hitlet’s invitation to Munich in the middle of his speech on 28 September and the membets and gallery alike stood and cheered;32! the telegram from Roosevelt as Chamberlain departed for Munich: “Good Man”; |the crowds of Germans cheering Chamberlain and Daladier in obvious contrast to tHe glum crowds that had watched the military demonstration in Berlin; the euphoric crowd that greeted the shame-faced Daladier on his return to Paris; all'show a burst of feeling of relief that war had been averted.*? Having in resignation steeled themselves to do for Czechoslovakia in 1938 what no one even suggested thinking about thirty years later, the population in England and France reacted to the situation in a way that is surely easy to understand. For the German people, the peaceful settlement also meant something they could not know at the time. The plan of some of those opposed to the regime to overthrow Hitler had been geared to his willingness to risk a world war to get his way, and the peaceful settlement of the Sudeten question thus removed the basis for the intended action. The plot was called off at the last moment, and whether or not it would have succeeded, most of those involved were not to pull themselves together again for another attempt for a long time. By his last-minute change of policy, Hitler averted an internal crisis; by their willingness to work out a peaceful settlement with Hitler—which was what made Hitlet’s change of policy possible—the Western Powers removed the basis on which Hitler’s internal opponents planned to try to take action.>* As Sir Nevile Henderson, who could fairly claim to be one of the architects of the settlement, wrote Lord Halifax on 6 October after some very anxious moments in the International Commission: I never want to work with Germans again— For some days last week I believed wat to be inevitable . . . In my blackest pessimism I tried to console myself with two thoughts (a) that war w’ld rid Germany of Hitler and (6) that it [would] temove me 320. The discussions and agreements are summarized by Celovsky. See also “Informationsbeticht Nr. 65,” 4

October 1938, Bundesarchiy, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, ff.191-207. An analysis of the relative advantages of the the agreement for Czechoslovakia by Francois-Poncet is in D.D.F., 2d, 11, No. 485. For the attempts of

2, Hungarians to influence the discussions by calling attention to their own demands, see Hungarian Documents,

Nos. 415, 420, 422, 423, 428; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 103-5.

pp. 231-32, 321. The earlier accounts are now supplemented (and partially corrected) by the one in Thompson,

speech, which and Cadogan Diary, 28 September 1938, p. 109; Harvey Diaries, 28 September 1938, p. 201. The the night cabinet the in discussed been had passage, concluding its in war of threat a was to have included ql before (C 11443/1941/18, FO 371/21744). Earl of Perth wrote Lord Halifax 322. In reviewing his actions in Rome on the morning of 28 September, the

Grey in the critical days on 30 September: “. . . there came vividly to my mind the efforts made by Sir Edward the statesmen ofthe assemble failed—to unhappily which 1914—efforts in war the of preceding the outbreak For the happy greeting of Great Powers directly interested round a table” (B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1231, p. 644).

Mussolini as the peacemaker in Rome, see Anfuso, pp. 87-88.

2

may be found in Miller, pp: 374— 323. An excellent account of the last stages of the conspiracy in September an opposition perceived as being against as Hitler for choice British a of ion 77. I believe Wendt’s interpretat Office about encouraging a last-minute “Prussian” to be mistaken. There were, however, doubts in the Foreign

coup and perhaps making some caseemsesl coup by German generals by promising not to take advantage of a up

on 4 Octaber was: “Bring (C 11614/62/18, FO 371/21664; Sargent’s concluding comment on the matter on Hitler’s side at the critical down coming invariably Brauchitsch von next time”). It is my opinion that with moment, the attempted coup would probably have failed.

634

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II from Berlin. As it is by keeping the peace we have saved Hitler and his regime and I am still in Berlin. Perhaps both objectives can be attained by other means. You can move me from Berlin and the Germans themselves can get rid of Hitler.>*

Another side of the issue may be found in the observation of a Foreign Office official on the complaint of a German consul in Yugoslavia against Munich as giving Hitler a new lease on life: “It is really intolerable that anti-Nazi Germans should make a reproach to His Majesty’s Government out of the fact that they have not been rescued from the oppression of their own Government—at the cost of a world watr—when they themselves lack the courage to raise a finger.”325 For Czechoslovakia, agreement first to the Anglo-French plan after Berchtesgaden and submission later to the imposition of the Munich agreement meant the loss of the Sudeten areas, soon followed by the loss of land to Poland and Hungary, under the most humiliating circumstances. These circumstances, combined with the shame and regret they inspired in the Western Powers, led the latter to resent and turn away from those they had treated rather shabbily—a not uncommon reaction—and to refuse to make any real effort to assist Czechoslovakia in its desperate attempt under new leaders and new policies to work out a new life for its people within the new boundaries.>*° The international political repercussions of this, surely the most avoidable, failure of Britain and

France will be reviewed in their diplomatic context; but the immediate repercussion for the Czechs and Slovaks was to make the adjustment for them even more difficult than it would have been under the best of circumstances; and, eventually it left them completely at the mercy of the Germans. This last, however, would, for some time at least, have

been their fate in any case. Barring a successful revolt inside Germany—and this writer at least remains skeptical of the success of what some would have tried but to little avail— there was no serious doubt that Czechoslovakia would have been overrun in the initial German onslaught, as Poland would be in the following year, and that liberation would come only at the end of a long and bitter war. Benes’s recognition of this fact was a major element in his agreement to the territorial cessions. Another factor had been the certainty that at the end of such a war—in which Czechoslovakia would surely suffer much—the Sudeten areas would be lost anyway. The Western Powers had repeatedly made this point clear; there could not in any future peace settlement be a return to the borders of 1919, with the prospect of still another war against Germany to maintain that border later. At the height of the crisis, even as they agreed with the Czechoslovak government’s rejection of the Godesberg terms, the British urged Prague to accept an alternative procedure for implementing the agreed territorial cession on the basis that if Germany invaded and a general war ensued, “there is no possibility that at the end of that conflict, whatever the result, Czechoslovakia could be restored to her frontiers of

today.”327 324, B.D., 3d, 3:615, Others who subsequently claimed parentage of the Munich solution appear to me to have had an entirely peripheral role; Lord Allen of Hurtwood belongs in this category (Arthur Marwick, Clifford Allen: The Open Conspirator (Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1964], pp. 178-79, 183-86; B.D., 3d, 2:647; G.D., D, 2, Nos. 351, 366, annex 3; Kral, Manchen, Nos. 138 [p. 195], 139). 325. C 12287/184/18, FO 371/21681.

326. The Hodza government had resigned during the crisis and been replaced by one led by the old military hero Jan Syrovy. Bene resigned and left the country soon after Munich. A new arrangement was also made for the relationship of Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine to the central government. 327. B.D., 3d, 2, No. 1138. There is not the slightest evidence that if a German invasion had touched off a coup

inside Germany and that coup had been successful, the outcome would have been very different for Czechoslovakia. Britain and France would still have insisted on the cession of the Sudeten area; only the details would have been different. Both the London and the Paris governments were determined not to be placed in the position of having to fight against as opposed to for self-determination in the future.

War Denied: The Crisis Over Crechoslovakia, Part 2

635 Had there been no agreement for the cession of the land with over three million Germans to Germany, an agreement which the German government itself later tote up to reveal its real ambitions, there would cettainly not have been the subsequent agreement of the Allies that Czechoslovakia should receive back the territory she had yielded along with permission to expel the Germans who had lived there for centuries. It was, after all, the Germans who had proclaimed to the world that they could not live in the same country with Czechs. By a tragic irony, it was by giving up the Sudeten areas to a Germany governed by Hitler that Czechoslovakia came to be in a position to reclaim them permanently and with universal agreement. The Soviet Union, the one major power to denounce the Munich agreement, would be the one to insist in 1945 that Czechoslovakia yield to her that portion of the country now adjace nt to herself in which the population could be claimed to have a greater affinity to that on the Soviet side of the border—precisely the basis of the Munich settlement. The British and French governments were immensely relieved by the avoidance of war. There was a sense of the need to remedy some of the military weaknesses that had contributed to their reluctance to fight and their doubts about the outcome of war. But there was also, at least for a short time, a sense of hope that with this great crisis resolved, there could be a new beginning in Europe.*”8 Although these hopes would soon be dashed, the policies of Britain and France in the months after Munich were certainly influenced by the view that, war having been averted when it had appeared unavoidable, it should surely be possible to arrive at peaceful solutions of other issues. This expectation was symbolized by the Anglo-German declaration that Chamberlain and Hitler signed right after the Munich agreement”? and the Franco-German declaration issued when von Ribbentrop visited Paris in December 1938; and it should not be surprising that Neville Chamberlain, who had so personally and dramatically identified himself with the peaceful resolution of the Czechoslovak crisis, should long remain the most persistently and stubbornly optimistic of the participants. e The Soviet Union was offended by its exclusion from the Munich Conference and could draw comfort from its ability to denounce the weakness of others in not standing up to the dictators under circumstances where its own risks had been minimal.33° The question of what to do in the new situation created by the Munich agreement was an open one, and there is considerable evidence that in the weeks after Munich the subject was reviewed from a variety of angles in Moscow.**! It was assumed that Germany would continue on her aggressive course, but Soviet concern continued to be focused

primarily on domestic affairs. The international situation would be watched with care, but the most recent developments reinforced the tendency to concentrate on internal problems. The situation in Southeast Europe was indeed altered by the diplomatic triumph of Germany. To the smaller nations of the area, Munich symbolized the ascending powet of Germany and the declining role of France. In one way or another, these countries had best find a way to get along with the new colossus; they would be well advised not to 328. Surely the quixotic scheme for the French to buy German engines for French air force planes in the winter of 1938-39 belongs in this framework. See Lindbergh, pp. 119-48, passim; Haight, pp. 110-11; Stehlin, pp.

129-32; Bullitt Papers, pp. 312-15. 329. On this development, see now Enge/ Diary, 1 October 1938, p. 40. J 330. The exclusion of the Soviet Union had been at the insistence of Germany. Whether or not Benes was correct in asserting, as he did in February 1938, that the Germans were doing this to isolate the Soviet Union so that they themselves could make an agreement with her and then end the independence of the smaller countries of East Central Europe and threaten Britain and France is not clear from the available evidence (U.S. 1938, 1:410-14). 331. See the evidence summarized in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 6-7. Note also D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 184, 201; 12, No. 17.

636

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

count on outside support except in the most extraordinary circumstances. Poland and Hungary, of course, believed that they had a green light for their demands on Czechoslovakia, and they would try, each country in its own way, to take advantage of the situation. The repercussions of their policies would play a major part in the international situation during the winter of 1938-39. In the United States, the initial sense of relief would give way to a sense of unease and disapproval even greater than among the opponents of Munich in Britain and France.332 Not having faced the danger of war themselves, it was much easier for Americans to be indignant about concessions made to Germany. For Americans perhaps more than any others Munich came to be a symbol of surrender to pressure, of capitulation before threats. The idea that it was Hitler who had backed down was and remained inconceivable to Ametican observers then and subsequently. Instead, the supposed lesson of Munich was that firmness at the risk of wat was the only reasonable policy in the face of a threatening situation; a view which came to be known as a domino theory of international relations where one concession necessarily led to another and the fall of one barrier necessarily promoted the fall of the next.3% For Hitler himself, and hence for the Germany he continued to direct, the Munich

agreement was a flawed triumph. It was a triumph in the sense that Germany had got, or rather would get in the next few days, what she claimed she wanted, and would get it

under circumstances that conspicuously accentuated the leading role of Germany in Europe. The flaw, of course, was that Hitler had been trapped into settling for what he

had publicly claimed rather than what he really wanted and had persistently told his associates he would get. He had had to abandon his plan for a war to destroy Czechoslovakia; and the very fact that his diplomatic triumph was so great could easily lead him to even greater annoyance over having refrained from war, because it suggested that perhaps he had been right after all in insisting that Britain and France would not come to Czechoslovakia’s aid. In fact, many National Socialists so maintained afterwards, and

those in Germany who had warned of a general war were discredited for their warnings, when in reality the accuracy of their predictions had never been put to the test when Hitler himself had dropped his plan to attack.734 Because of this shift of the facts—with the warners weakened and discredited because of their concern over a general war when it was Hitler who had at the last moment balked at running the risk against which they had cautioned him—Hitler was able to gain an even greater ascendancy over the country’s military structure. Since none of the warnets among the military or the diplomatic advisers ever mustered the nerve to point out that their predictions had ot been tested, Hitler could successfully project onto them his own weakness of resolve. The many recorded expressions of Hitler’s dissatisfaction with the Munich agreement not only reflect his regret over having abandoned his original intentions but also reveal an attitude that helped shape his subsequent policies. The next chapter will show that even before the occupation of the ceded territory was completed, Hitler was talking about the total destruction of the rest of Czechoslovakia, and his insistence on giving that project priority over the Polish question can be understood most readily as an indication of the degree of his annoyance at having been thwarted. His denunciations of 332. Note the memorandum

of Messersmith of 29 September 1938, U.S. 1938, 1:704-7; Moffat Papers, pp.

218-19. The most thoughtful analysis of the evidence is in Francis L. Loewenheim, “The Diffidence of Power—Some Notes and Reflections on the American Road to Munich,” Rice University Studies, 58, No. 4 (Fall 1972), 11-79. 333. The logical alternative, that concessions at one point might be compensated for by immediate strengthening either of the country that has been obliged to make concessions and/or adjacent areas, appears not to have occurred to many either then or later. 334. This point is correctly made by von Weizsacker in Weixsdcker-Papiere, pp. 145, 146, 149, 168-69,

War Denied: The Crisis Over Cxechoslovakia, Part 2

637

the Hungarians for having refused to go along with a joint attack on Czechoslovakia would influence his policy toward thgt,country when its appetite proved greater than its readiness to help in the kitchen.33{ Above all, he resented Chamberlain’s success in maneuvering him into a peaceful solu ton 66) : The insistence that he would under no circumstances be cheated out of a wat against Poland in 1939 cannot be understood in any way other than as a determination not to repeat the 1938 experience. The only thing he would then worry about, as he told his generals, was that at the last minute some “Schweinehund,” some S.O.B., would come along with a compromise to prevent war; there can beno doubt that it was the

British prime minister that he had in mind. Hitler would never again make what he came to think of as his greatest mistake: specifying demands that could be propagandistically justified at home and abroad, but which he thereby risked having ered fn 1939 von the German Ribbentrop would be personally and strictly instructed by Hitler not totét' demands on Poland out of his hands; they were written to be used to justify a war, and under no cjeeumstances was anyone to have a chance to accede to them. To the last days of his life(Hitler regretted his change of plan in 1938. Musing in his Berlin bunker in February 1945 about the causes of his failure, he would regret that the Western Powers had made it so difficult for him to begin war as early as 1938. “We ought to have gone to war in 1938 .. . September 1938 would have been the most favorable date.’’?’ In view of the intention of the French in 1938 to follow essentially the same military strategy that they adhered to in 1939, namely, to do next to nothing, it is possible to

argue that even given Hitlet’s erroneous assumption that a war in 1938 would have been an isolated one, his assessment of the military consequences of postponement was correct. A German offensive in the west in 1939 rather than 1940 would hardly have found the French stronger, and it would have met an England without the radar screen and fighter planes so important in the Battle of Britain. Germany, of course, also became militarily stronger in the interval; there is here still another of the many ironies of the time: Germany’s use on a considerable scale of Czechoslovak tanks during World War 11.338 The subject of the military balance of 1938 versus 1939 can be argued indefinitely; the political side is, however, clear-cut. In 1938 whatever might be said about Hitler’s prior actions, the question of whether or not they warranted a world war with all its costs and horrors on the basis of belief—however well founded—concetning his future actions was open to much debate. And in a long war, any democracy would find that debate a very difficult one indeed. After Hitlet’s deliberate destruction of the Munich who was present, in his 335. Note the vehement denunciation of 21 October 1938 reported by Groscurth,

diary (p. 151 and n. 254). p. 55; Keitel Papers, p. 336. For Hitler’s dissatisfied comments on Munich, see Francois-Poncet, p. 334; Dietrich, February 1939, he had had to pull back 195; Frank, p. 353. As he told a group of high-ranking officers on 10

a war in his lifetime (Groscurth the preceding September and had not reached his goal, but he would surely start Diary, p. 166). ann Documents (London: Cassell, 337. Hugh R. Trevor-Roper (ed.), The Testament of Adolf Hitler: The Hitler-Borm the authenticity of these documents.) about raised been have (Questions 84-85. pp. 1945, February 21 1961), VI, 30

office, Chamberlain wrote King George The contrast with his opponent is striking. On resigning from

to preserve peace . . . Yet I do not feel September 1940: “It has been my fate to see the failure of all my efforts avoid the present war, which might well have that I have anything to reproach myself for in my attempts to ambitions of a fanatic” (Feiling, p. 452). succeeded if they had not come up against the insatiate and inhuman

375-77. See Chamberlain’s own account of the final crisis, ibid., pp. of World War TI, trans. J. Lucas (New York: Galahad 338. Fridolin M. von Senger und Etterlin, German Tanks 1945 (Der Spiegel,

situation conference of 27 April Books, 1969), pp. 29-30. Hitler referred to such tanks in the for the famous Bees gee helped finance the fees license British hand, other the On 10 Jan. 1966, p. 41)! rger, “Die Riistungsindustrie der Hummelbe (Walter war the Czechoslovak government-in-exile during 320-21). Tschechoslowakei 1933 bis 1939,” ed. Forstmeier, pp.

638

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

agreement, however, the picture changed.**? Assessments of Hitler’s intentions in inter-

national affairs were now based on solid and sobering experience. As Churchill expressed it during the war when speaking of Chamberlain in the House of Commons after the latter’s death in 1940: “Herr Hitler protests with frantic words and gestures that he has only desired peace. What do these ravings and outpourings count before the silence of Neville Chamberlain’s tomb? Long and hard, hazardous years lie before us, but at least we entered upon them united and with clean hearts.’”340

339. For Hitler’s own later recognition of this, see The Testament ofAdolf Hitler, p. 85. 340. Hansard, 12 November 1940,

Chapter 26

Undoing Munich

October 1938—March 1939

lhe European situation, in fact the world, had been changed by the Munich agreement. War had been averted at the very moment when it appeared inevitable, but the circumstances surrounding the settlement gave a clear appearance of German triumph and of British and French humiliation. The question was whether the agreement would lead to a period of peace during which Germany would enjoy the advantages she had gained and quietly gather the fruits of her recently recognized status as the leading power in Europe, or whether Germany would take such vehement advantage of her enhanced

position as to arouse greater opposition and the risk of wat. In a sense, the question was whether Hitler indeed meant what he promised in signing the Anglo-German declaration on the day after Munich: that there would be no war between those two countries as they consulted together to solve old issues that remained and new ones that might arise. The critical point for the future of Europe and the world was that after Munich to Hitler would move in the direction exactly opposite from that he had indicated what exactly 1939 Chamberlain, repeating in a way between October 1938 and 15 March only now on a he had done between their meetings at Berchtesgaden and Godesberg,

in the destruction of larger scale. Even that, however, was not all. Since Hitler’s interest

road to the larger Czechoslovakia had always been a subsidiary, short-term goal on the aim, namely long-term that toward step next the east, the in aim of securing living space of living conquest subsequent his to west the by resistance the of preparing elimination prelimithe of space, would now have to take place simultaneously with the completion 1939, March to 1938 October from naty action interrupted at Munich. The months s simultaneou the to directed was policy foreign therefore, would be a time when German for staging the and akia Czechoslov of elimination the accomplishment of two objectives: attempt to make a virtue of a wat with England and France. As will be seen, Hitler would the latter. necessity by so arranging the former as to assist with

640

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The Munich agreement had deprived Hitler of the little war he had wanted—and subsequently persuaded himself he might have had—as well as the complete control of the Czech part of Czechoslovakia that he had expected to seize in the first days of hostilities. The little war would obviously have to wait; there was no prospect of trying out the German army on what was left of Czechoslovakia after she had yielded her border fortifications. But the seizure of the rest of the Czech areas might still be attained by other means, and Hitler immediately set out to do so. It was obvious that Czechoslovakia was now at Germany’s mercy, and Hitler insisted that full advantage be taken of this. There was to be no generosity or forbearance shown to the humiliated Czechs; Hitler’s instructions to the German negotiators on the International Commission handling the implementation of the Munich agreement as well as the various subcommittees of the commission were consistently to take the harshest possible line. There were repeated ultimatums, new conditions, and additional demands, all part of a general process of hounding Czechoslovakia in the strongest possible way.! That all this would provide ‘only a temporary respite to Czechoslovakia, even if she agreed to every demand from Berlin, soon became obvious. The plans, for which agreement was also extorted, for superhighways and canals across Czech territory surely point in the direction of intended annexation.” The persistence of German press attacks on the Czechs, the endless reproaches leveled at the conciliatory new Czechoslovak foreign minister, Frantisek Chvalkovsky, and the absolute refusal under various pretexts to give Czechoslovakia the guarantee promised at Munich all indicate Germany’s fixed determination not to allow the Czechoslovak state to consolidate itself within its new boundaries. In the circle of his immediate advisers, Hitler made no secret of his intentions. The

day after the Munich agreement was signed, he revealed his intention to annex the remaining Czech territory at the first opportunity.4 Contemporary evidence shows that as eatly as 3 October the commander of the 10th Army in the occupation of the Sudetenland, General von Reichenau, was repeating Hitler’s decision to occupy the rest of Czechoslovakia to visiting staff Officers, and there is other evidence reporting Hitler’s determination dating from this time.> Hitler now wanted to handle the political preparations for the destruction of Czechoslovakia through internal subversion, in which the Slovaks would play the role that the Sudeten Germans had played earlier. German procedures to activate the Slovaks were well under way by the time that the various 1. Examples in G.D., D, 4, Nos. 12, 17, 53, 108.'On the International Commission, see the documents ibid., chap. 1; B.D., 3d, 3; Erich Hansen’s account in IfZ, ZS 1130, f£.104-7; Stehlin, pp. 112-3; U.S. 1938, 1:721-22. Mastny’s reports are in Kral, Manchen, Nos. 276, 280; see also ibid., Nos. 248, 253, 254, 257, 258, 261; Kral, Die

Deutschen, Nos. 248, 257; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 488, 496; 12, Nos. 12, 14, 21, 25-27, 45, 52, 53, 62, 63, 65, 78, 102, 107, 342, 365, 373. A good sutvey of the activities of the commission is in Theodore Prochazka, “The

Delimitation of the Czechoslovak-German Frontiers after Munich,” Journal of Central European Affairs, 21, No. 2 July 1961), 200-218. The special research office (Forschungsamt) of Géring appears to have concluded on the basis of intercepts that the British were playing an obstructionist role in the commission; it is difficult to assess the import of this erroneous finding; see the text in David Irving (ed.), Breach of Security: The German Secret Intelligence File on Events Leading to the Second World War (London: William Kimber, 1968), p. 49. Von Weizsacker asserts in his memoirs, p. 195, that he was too soft as chaitman of the commission to suit Hitler (see also Weizsdcker-Papiere, p. 146), but I cannot find any trace of the slightest effort on his part to ameliorate the lot of the Czechs; on the contrary, the state secretary appears to have maintained the strong anti-Czech animus so evident in both contemporary documents and his posthumously published papers. 2. See G.D., D, 4, Nos. 103, 108. Note the instruction not to refer to this arrangement as a “corridor” in the press conference of 29 October 1938, Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/10, £.79. 3. German documents on this are in chap. 1 of G.D., D, 4. See also Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 274, 384. 4. Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, p. 137. 5. Groscurth Diary, p. 133. Cf. von Hassell, 10 October 1938 (but referring to 4 or 5 October), p. 25. The Hun-

gatian minister in Berlin had a clear view of Hitler’s intentions by 15 October (Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 539).

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

641

territories ceded under the Munich agreement had been fully occupied by German troops.° As for the details of the military invasion of the rest of Czechoslovakia, these were being worked on as early as 10 and 11 October, it being assumed that the Garnai army would not be resisted.’ There were, however, advocates of alternative courses of action in Germany. One

leading member of the Sudeten German party developed a plan in mid-October leaving the Czechs a state of their own, though one totally dependent on Germany.’ Later on Ernst von Weizsacker suggested that the German claims on Poland should be browghe forward and settled before any final steps were taken against the Czechs.’ There was also a scheme to formalize in treaty form Czechoslovakia’s incorporation into Germany’s sphere as a satellite.!? None of these concepts appealed to a Fihrer who felt he had been cheated and was determined to seize Bohemia and Moravia as he had originally intended. The process of internal dissolution under German pressure took time, and was affected by the interests of other countries as well as by Hitler’s manipulations of those interests for purposes other than the takeover of Czechoslovakia; but there could be no turning back from the main course. The interaction of Hitler’s policy toward Czechoslovakia with these other factors will be reviewed at least in outline, but first it is essential to note

how closely, clearly, and consistently the Fuhrer adhered to his main purpose. In view of the opinion of some that Hitler never knew from one day to the next what he was doing, it may be worth recalling that even before Munich he had specified that if he should be obliged to settle for less than the destruction of Czechoslovakia, he

would complete the process in the following spring. The promise he had reluctantly given that he would guarantee Czechoslovakia after territorial questions with Poland and Hungary had been settled was one he was determined not to keep. His attitude in this was especially obvious in his denial of it to Chvalkovsky, the Czechoslovak foreign minister who did the most to obtain Czech agreement to everything the Germans asked for.!! On 13 February 1939, Hitler informed his associates that he intended to move in

6. See Hoensch, Svowakei, p. 60; Groscurth Diary, pp. 334, n. 42, 345; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 534; Ferdinand Durcansky, “Mit Tiso bei Hitler,” Poltische Studien, 7 (1956), pp. 2, 9; Héttl, pp. 166-78, 180-86; Henry

Delfiner, The Vienna Broadcasts to Slovakia (New York: Columbia University Press, 1974).

7. TMWC, 25:520-22; Miller, p. 387, n. 45; Diary of Wolf Eberhard, 11 Oct. 1938, Munich, IfZ. For the subse-

quent oder of 21 October 1938, see TMWC, 34:477-81. On 4-5 December, Hitler, after an inspection of the Czechoslovak fortifications told some twenty or thirty German military leaders at lunch of his determination to adhere to his original plan of incorporating all of Bohemia and Moravia into Germany. Interrogation of Walter “Daten Warlimont by Harold Deutsch on 22 September 1945; DeWitt Poole Mission (exact date derived from the German aus alien Notizbiichern,” p. 34). Vojtéch Mastny in his “Design or Improvisation? The Origins of Dean's Papers, 1965 Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in 1939,” Columbia Essays in International Affairs: The of breaking problem real the of account take to fails 127-53, pp. 1966), Press, (New York: Columbia University he obviously wanted to the Munich agreement right after it was signed. Hitler was not that crude or careless; prepare the way with careful attention to a pretext. is in Groscurth Diary, pp. 334-40 8. One version of Hans Neuwirth’s memorandum is dated 15 October 1938; it and p. 39, n. 103. Another version is in Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 256.

to in Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, 9, Weizsacker-Papiere, pp. 150-52, 173. This is probably the matter referred

pp. 138-39; cf. G.D., D, 4, No. 83.

‘Freundschaftvertrages’ zwischen dem 10. The details are set forth in Heinrich Bodensieck, “Der Plan eines also Stephan

Ostforschung, 10 (1961), 462-76. See Reich und der Tschecho-Slowakei inJahre 1938,” Zeitschrift fiir

Bosl (ed.), Giichgewicht, Revision, Restauration Dolezel, “Deutschland und die Rest-T’schechoslowakei,” in Karl 253-64. pp. 1976), g, Oldenbour (Munich: Se 1939 1938, p. 248; D, 4, No. 158; cf. Kral, Miinchen, No. 266; Ciano, Diary, 5 October

11. See esp. G.D., nal Commission out of the picture as 1:34.35. Note that while the Germans were eager to get the Internatio bilateral German-Czechoslovak talks in which quickly as possible and to have all questions handled by those direct negotia-

D, 4, No. 53), once it came to Germany could bully unhindered and unobserved (G.D., demands as in speed—the longet the delay, the better the excuse for mote

tions, the Germans lost all interest the rest of Czechoslovakia alone (ibid., No. 166). pterequisites for the never to be granted promise to leave

642

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

mid-March.!2 Under these circumstances, the attempts of the Czechoslovak government to retain some minimal measure of autonomy by offering to convert the country into a German satellite with a representative of Hitler in the cabinet were ingenious but in vain. The German officials would not even discuss such ideas with Hubert Masatik, the special emissary sent for the purpose.!3 The Berlin government was under no circumstances going to risk starting talks which might lead to a settlement. The final stages were to be directed from Berlin with Czechoslovakia responding to German initiatives, not the other way around. Although it took pressure first on the Slovaks and then on the frightened Czechoslovak president, everything was to be managed by German command. Even a request for German troops had been concocted in Berlin as in the Austrian case.'4 In the end German troops were to move in as ordered on 14 March even before the arrangements designed to provide some pseudolegal cover had been completed.'® If one asks the reason for this insistence on humiliating and crushing a people who had already surrendered, there can only be speculative answers. Hitler’s anti-Czech sentiments were strong indeed, and they appear to go back to his early years in Austria, where it was the Czechs who were the immediate butts of Germanic racialism, just as the Poles provided such a target for the Prussians. The fact that Hitler had been thwarted in his plans would appear to be a critical element, in my opinion. Hitler was a vengeful man with a long memory, as Gustav von Kahr would discover: he was murdered in 1934 for his conduct in November 1923. The Czechs were to be made to suffer for their role in upsetting Hitler’s plans; ironically enough, the outbreak of a general rather than a limited wart in 1939 would leave them relatively less molested than other victims of National Socialist domination. As the American consul general in Prague predicted on 23 May 1939, “the Germans will probably hold the upper hand without undue difficulty as long as the broad basis of national-socialist power remains intact. But they will have no happy time of it, and if the tide ever turns, Czech retaliation will be fearful to contemplate.’””!¢

If the Czechoslovakia that remained after Munich was to disappear, and the Czech portions of it were to be taken over by Germany, what did Hitler want to do about the other parts of that state, Slovakia ahd the Carpatho-Ukraine? During the Czechoslovak crisis of 1938, Hitler had perceived this issue in terms of the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia by her three neighbors. Poland would receive her share. To Hitler that meant 12. Weixsacker-Papiere, p. 150. Note the directive issued to the German press two days later banning reports on improved

German-Czechoslovak

relations

(“Bestellungen

aus

der Pressekonferenz,’

15 February

1939,

Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £.48). Other, even earlier, references to the idea of moving in March

will be found in Hitler’s December statement to Neumann and January statement to Csaky cited below. 13. On this episode, see G.D., D, 4, Nos. 177, 178, 185; 5, No. 111; Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, pp. 142-43; Hoettl, pp. 166-69; Hans Schiefer, “Deutschland und die Tschechoslowakei vom September 1938 bis Marz

1939,” Zeztschrift fiir Ostforschung, 4 (1955), 57-58. 14, The German-prepared draft of a Slovak request for protection is in G.D., D, 4, No. 209. An ultimatum had

also been planned (ibid., No. 188) which was to have been handed to a Czechoslovak plenipotentiary whose appearance von Ribbentrop would demand even while German troops occupied the country (text in Kral, Die Deutschen, No. 279). Hacha’s trip kept von Ribbentrop from a full rehearsal of the procedure applied in August to Poland. 15. On the final stages, see esp. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 188, 193; U.S. 1939, 1:60-61; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos.

411, 418; TMWC,

35:173-79; Hagemann, pp. 377-87; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,”

10 and 11

March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, f£.70, 71; “Informationsbericht,” No. 20 of 7 March, No. 23 of 10 March, No. 24 of 13 March 1939, ibid., 101/34, f£.91, 105-7, 109-13. On the early invasion steps, see

Keitel, p. 200; Gajan and Kvacek, pp. 151-52; Wagner, p. 81. A record of the last military steps is in the war diary with annexes of the 5th (Transport) Section of the General Staff of the German Army on the occupation of Bohemia and Moravia, 10 Match-21 April 1939, folders H 25/47 and 48, T-78/269/ 6252043217,

16. U.S. 1939, 1:68. This document is printed as No. 28 in George F. Kennan, From Prague after Munich:

Diplomatic Papers, 1938-1940 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1968). There were, of course, also the economic resources of Bohemia and Moravia; but since these were open to German control in any case, they

do not provide an adequate explanation.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

643

primarily the TéSin area, and he would support Polish demands there because the Polish government followed a procedure toward Czechoslovakia that was sufficiently brutal to fit in with his own, Where German and Polish territorial ambitions conflicted, he would

try to use the issues involved in his effort to harness Poland to the German chariot. But on the whole, he was willing for Poland to secure the land she wanted. Hungary, the third prospective partner in partition, had, however, held back at the critical moment. Hitler’s own unwillingness to risk a general war by a military invasion of Czechoslovakia might have given him at least some basis for understanding the hesitations of a much less powerful associate in such a risky venture, but Hitler saw only the opposite side of this coin. It was Hungary’s diffidence that had contributed to the abandonment of a military solution, and he would not forget or forgive this dereliction. From his point of view, the very fact that Hungary’s appetite had not diminished in proportion to her reluctance to help cook the meal made the conduct of Budapest all the more reprehensible. If he had once been quite willing, even eager, for Hungary to take over both Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine, that was now no longer the case. On 14 October he told the former Hungarian prime minister, Kalman Daranyi, whom Horthy had sent to Germany to ask for support of Hungary’s claims, that” if there had been a war, Hungary would have gotten all of Slovakia.”!7 He had warned the Hungarian leaders in August and September that they would have to move energetically, and that whoever did not do so would come out short. “Poland had recognized the right moment, struck out, and reached her goal.” Hungary had failed to do so, and it was now too late. Through negotiations a new border would have to be found between Hungary on the one hand and Slovakia and the Carpatho-Ukraine on the other; but like the Sudeten German question, this would have to be on a supposedly ethnographic basis. Beyond such temporary expedients and border adjustments, what did Hitler have in mind for the Slovak and Carpatho-Ukrainian portions of the doomed state? In conversations with both Hungarian and Slovak leaders, he would claim to have thought earlier that the Slovaks wanted to return to Hungary, and that his new-found sympathy first for the Slovaks’ autonomy and then for their “independence” under German aegis was the result of his discovery that the Slovaks preferred not to be returned to Magyar rule.'8 One may be permitted some skepticism about this explanation.'? Whether or not Hitler had held the mistaken earlier impression of Slovak preferences, he never considered the views of those Slovaks who preferred to be a part of the Czechoslovak state and who were certainly a very substantial proportion of the population. This preference was symbolized by the fact that in 1938 the prime minister of Czechoslovakia, Milan Hodza, was a Slovak. If that was not to prevent his desire for Slovakia to be annexed by Hungary before Munich, the autonomist preferences Hitler claimed to have discovered thereafter Slovaks to Polish would not keep him, as will be shown, from considering transfer of the

when his control or a partition between Poland and Hungary in the winter of 1938-39 to Warsaw for inducement possible a like policy toward Poland made such a project look the Near 1938. October 14 on Daranyi to much as fall in with his plans. Hitler hinted form a great bloc end of their conversation, the Fuhrer said that “if Germany were to could always still be with Hungary and Poland, nothing was final and border changes and its people Slovakia made.”2° This passage surely indicates that Hitler thought of ought to be wishes inhabitants’ whose purely as an instrument to be used, not as a region Nn

to Germany is in ibid., Nos. 63ff.; Hungarian Documents, 17. G.D., D, 4, No. 62. Other material on Daranyi’s visit pp: 141-46.

Ungarische Revisionismus, 2, Nos. 522 (Horthy Papers, No. 28) and following; Hoensch,

Tuka (ibid., No. 168), and Tiso (ibid., No. 202). 18. Hitler took this line with Daranyi (G.D., D, 4, No. 62), (1:335). it of part good a 19. Macartney, however, accepts 20..G,Ds, D;.4, No: 62h p. 7s

644

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

respected. During the last days before the destruction of Czechoslovakia, the Slovaks were made to assist in the process; in fact Hitler would then threaten a reluctant Josef Tiso, who had been relieved from his position as Slovak prime minister, with Hungarian occupation if he did not fall in with German plans by an immediate declaration of independence.?! In the interim, however, the control that Germany exercised over Prague made it expedient to keep Slovakia at least nominally a part of Czechoslovakia. It could thereby remain temporarily at Berlin’s disposal rather than being handed over free to the Hungarians, who had been so reluctant about paying their share of the costs.” Slovakia, as far as the Germans were concerned, was to have a status independent of

Prague but within Czechoslovakia, and hence available for future disposition by Berlin.” Germany would therefore support only territorial adjustments in favor of Hungary at Slovakia’s expense. During the complicated negotiations over this subject between the Czechoslovak government—which very intelligently let the Slovaks defend their own interests—and the government in Budapest, Berlin urged both sides to accept a prompt compromise. When this proved impossible, Germany insisted on a peaceful solution and arranged for a joint German-Italian arbitration procedure by which an award was made in Vienna on 2 November 1938. This award gave substantial areas to Hungary, but by no means all Budapest had wanted or expected. Italy had been obliged under German pressure to reduce its support for Hungary, and in the settling of details the German government was willing to endorse considerable cessions to Hungary but insisted on Slovakia’s retaining some important areas under dispute.”4 A small but strategically important piece of Slovak territory had been taken by Germany herself, and the Poles—who had hoped to play a part in the settlement— promptly alienated the Slovaks by insisting on a series of territorial concessions to themselves.> When the dust had settled, three things were evident: first, there was an autonomous Slovakia within the nominal bounds of a Czecho-Slovak state (as it now came to be more properly called); second, the Slovaks were not likely to yearn for closer relations with either Hungary or Poland after the experience of territorial mutilation; and third, Germany, by restricting Italy’s role as sponsor of Hungarian revisionism and by entirely excluding the other two Munich powers, Britain and France, as well as Poland,

from any part in arranging the new settlement, had demonstrated for all who cared to look that 4er willwould dominate the fate of those in the area. 21. Ibid., No. 202; Hoensch,

S/owakei, pp. 286-96;

U.S.

1939, 1:60-61. Von

Ribbentrop

threatened

that

Germany would take a part of Slovakia with the-rest being divided between Hungary and Poland. He also handed Tiso the draft text of the Slovak declaration of independence; Fratiek Vnuk, “Slovakia’s Six Eventful Months (October 1938—March 1939),” Slovak Studies, 4, Historica, 2 (1964), 105-20. 22. Hitler in fact used this very terminology to Daranyi, citing what he claimed the Czechoslovak crisis had cost the German budget and asking how much Hungary had paid. See also Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 613. 23. The first version of the memorandum for Hitler of Ernst Woermann, head of the political section of the

German Foreign Ministry, was prepared on 5 October, before the Sillein agreement on Slovak autonomy of 6 October; it is cited in Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 117, and summarized in Wojciechowski, p. 530. A

second version was prepared on 7 October; it is published in G.D., D, 4, No. 45 (Hoensch,

Ungarische

Revisionismus, p. 128). Hitler’s decision is recorded in G.D., D, 4, No. 46; see also ibid., No. 53. 24, On the negotiations culminating in the Vienna award, see Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, Section II, and the sources cited there; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 429-624, passim; Vnuk, pp. 43-51; Cienciala, pp. 149-65; Lipski Papers, No. 125; Kral, Miinchen, Nos. 273, 278; Macartney, 1, chap. 13.

25. The territory annexed by Germany, consisting of the areas of Engerau and Theben, enabled the Germans to dominate the capital of Slovakia, Pressburg-Bratislava. There is an excellent account in Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 211-15; see also Vnuk, pp. 33-38; Proch4zka, pp. 215-16; Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 470; “Informationsbericht Nr. 76,” 9 November 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £.347. On the cession of pieces of Slovak territory to Poland, see Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 198-211; Vnuk, pp. 58-63;

Cienciala, pp. 164-65; Roos, p. 365. The territorial changes are most easily understood by reference to the map included in Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, or the maps in Vnuk between pp. 32 and 33.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939 If the fate of Slovakia, here recounted

in a vety abbreviated

645 form, presented

problems of some complexity, these were charmingly simple compared with those of the easternmost extremity of Czechoslovakia, the Carpatho-Ukraine. This largely mountainous and undeveloped area, sometimes referred to as Ruthenia, had been a patt of Hungary until the end of the World War, when it had been incorporated into the new state of Czechoslovakia. Its special importance, and the attention it would therefore draw, derived from two of its characteristics: geographical location and national composition. Geographically, this territory provided the only direct link between Czechoslovakia and her Little Entente ally, Romania This was Czechoslovakia’s one border with a friendly power. But though the area joined two allies, Czechoslovakia and Romania, it separated two friends, Hungary and Poland. Hungary and Poland, joint enemies of Czechoslovakia, could have a common border only if Hungary regained at least the Carpatho-Ukraine (the regaining of Slovakia, of course, providing for a longer common

border). Such a common border might in theory provide a barrier to German expansion eastwards by shutting her off territorially from Romania—once Germany was in a position to dictate Czecho-Slovak policy—somewhat in the way the common border of Poland and Romania had closed the Soviet Union off from Czechoslovakia. The national composition of the Carpatho-Ukraine was mixed; there were substantial numbers of Magyarts, especially in the lower lying southern portions, and there were some Romanians in the easternmost villages, but the majority of the population, the so-called Ruthenians, were in fact Ukrainians. As such, they were more closely related to

the large Ukrainian minority in the southern part of the revived Poland and to the large population of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic than to the Czechs and Slovaks with whom they were united in one state by the peace settlement.” As long as they were within that state, the various and usually divergent currents of centralist, autonomist, pro-

Magyar, and pro-Russian sentiment within the area could hardly be of wider European

concern, but the moment the Czechoslovak state was likely to fall apart, the nationality

question would be of great importance. Once Slovakia secured autonomy from Prague, the fate of the Carpatho-Ukraine would attract general attention: separated from Prague by the intervening Slovak entity, the Carpatho-Ukraine might disappear within Hungary, or it might provide a convenient and safe focus for the aspirations of the dissident Ukrainians within both Poland and the Soviet Union, among whom there were substantial nationalistic currents in the face of national repression.” The Hungarians wanted to recover the Carpatho-Ukraine and knew that Poland strongly favored such a development. After Munich, the less likely it became that Hungary would be allowed to seize Slovakia, the more eager she became to secure at looked to least this former Hungarian territory, and the more important this annexation

of a focus Warsaw. Even the Soviet Union was moved by concern over the implications raine in Carpatho-Uk the of inclusion the favor to for Ukrainian nationalist agitation of repression the in Poland with shared regime Soviet the Hungary. The interest those between Ukrainian national hopes provided one element in the rapprochement declaration of 27 two powers after Munich which was signalized by the Polish-Soviet calling for better and 1932 of pact November 1938, reaffirming their nonaggression economic relations.2® borders of Slovakia; but this problem, and the 26. There were also some Ruthenians within the administrative in March 1939, cannot be examined here. It telated one of the seizure of parts of eastern Slovakia by Hungary a chapter. following the in on will be touched empire it had been the ungarian Austro-H the within that sense the in r” 27. I have used the term “disappea Hungary, who had defined the issue. The nationality Ruthenians in Galicia, not the much smaller group within toblems of Hungary

i s, Slovaks, Ser bs, 5 and Germans. Croats, Romanian i i as involving i had been perceived

B. Budurowyez, Polish-Soviet Relations, 1932-1939 (New 8, Cienciala, pp. 183-84; Roos, pp. 385-87; Bohdan

646

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

One country that was opposed to the Hungarian annexation of the CarpathoUkraine was Romania. Not only was Bucharest in general apprehensive about anything that enhanced the size and potential power of Hungary—hardly a surprising attitude in view of Romania’s own holdings of vast stretches of territory formerly included in Hungary—her army was also heavily dependent on weapons imported from Czechoslovak factories. These atms would have to move across the territory of a hostile Hungary once the Carpatho-Ukraine had been annexed by Budapest. Although in the end the Vienna arbitration award would give Hungary control of the only east-west tailway on which the products of the Skoda works could reach Romania, during the critical days of October 1938 before that award, Romania opposed the idea of a common Polish-Hungarian border. Even the efforts of her Polish ally to soften this resistance, in part by suggesting that the easternmost part of the Carpatho-Ukraine with its small Romanian population be ceded to Romania, could not persuade Bucharest to drop its objections.2” In the final analysis, however, the determining element in the fate of the Carpatho-Ukraine in 1938-39 was not the preference of Hungary or Poland, of the Soviet Union or of Romania, but the will of Germany. In trying to analyze German policy toward the Carpatho-Ukraine, one must distinguish among those in Germany with sympathies for the Ukrainians or Poles, those who thought they saw real military and political importance in a Polish-Hungarian common border as a possible obstacle to future German expansion eastwards, and the views, preferences, and decisions of Hitler. At times, as will become apparent, these per-

spectives were all temporarily congruent, but on other occasions they diverged, and the key point remains that it was Hitler who decided the course Germany would try to follow. There certainly was an element of concern for Ukrainian aspirations among at least some of those who worked with Ukrainian nationalist organizations in Germany. These contacts, designed primarily for intelligence purposes and hence conducted mainly by German intelligence agencies, could only benefit from a semiautonomous CarpathoUkraine as a basis for intelligence operations against Poland or the Soviet Union, or

both.3° Those elements in the National Socialist party who identified with Alfred Rosenberg’s concept of a “decomposition” of the Soviet Union into its constituent nationalities, and who maintained some contacts with Ukrainians primarily through Rosenberg’s Foreign Policy Office (APA), also had some interest in Ukrainian aspirations.*! The high command of the German armed forces recorded its opposition to a common PolishHungarian border on 5 October, putting forward military and political objections and

York:

Columbia University Press, 1963), pp. 127-33; Wojciechowski, p. 527, and esp. the comments of Soviet

diplomats cited in n. 3; Lipski Papers, No. 123, p. 453; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 535, 553; S.U., Nos. 30, 32, 39, 51, and see also Nos. 61, 85; Fierlinger tel. 1350 of 30 November 1938, Czechoslovak document in T-120,

1039/1809/412231; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 412, 415, 429. 29. On Romania’s interest, and on Beck’s effort to win Romanian support for a common border by territorial cession, see Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 118, 158-59; Henryk Batowski, “Le Voyage de Joseph Beck

en Roumanie en octobre 1938,” Annuaire Polonais des Affaires Internationales 1959-1960, pp. 149-56; Cienciala,

pp. 159-61; Roos, pp. 370-72; Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 147-48; Lipski Papers, Nos. 120: (Batowski, pp. 152-55), 121; Harvey Diaries, 22 October 1938, p. 215; Cadogan Diary, 6 October 1938, p. 114; Hungarian Documents, 2,

Nos. 471, 479, 513, 517, 528, 543, 558, 564, 572; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 39, 178, 182, 201; Les relations francoallemands, 1933-1939, p. 350. 30. On this aspect, see John A. Armstrong, Ukrainian Nationalism, 1939-1945, 2d. ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1963), chap. 1; G.D., D, 5, No. 82; W. Miihlberger, “Zwischenbericht tiber die ukrainischen

Sendungen am Reichssender Wien,” 1 February 1939, T-120, 2621/5482/E 382227-37; and scattered material

in Groscurth Diary and the Lahousen diary (Institut fiir Zeitzeschichte, Munich). 31. An excellent discussion of the “decomposition” theory is to be found in Alexander Dallin, German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1957), pp. 46-49, 51-56. For a discussion of the APA and its Ukrainian contacts, see Jacobsen, NS Avssenpolitik, pp. 87-88, 449ff. See also Lipski Papers, No. 126.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

647

favoring a continued tie of the area to Prague.>2 Géring, on the other hand, had taken a Proptietary interest in German relations with Poland; and since the Poles strongly desired a common border with Hungary, he leaned in the direction of allowing the Hungarians to go ahead and seize the area.*> The German Foreign Ministry’s 7 October brief to Hitler recommended opposition to a common Polish-Hungarian border and favored an autonomous status for the Carpatho-Ukraine.*4 Hitler had assumed that if there were a joint German-Polish-Hungarian campaign against Czechoslovakia, Hungary would receive the Carpatho-Ukraine; there is no evidence pointing to any reluctance or doubts in that regard. When Hitler encouraged the Poles and Hungarians after Berchtesgaden to push demands that he could utilize to prevent a peaceful agreement, the Polish ambassador discussed Poland’s interest in Hungary’s acquiring the Carpatho-Ukraine at great length, but in their conversation of 20 September Hitler appears not to have committed himself on the subject.35 Similarly, the encouragement that Hitler gave the Hungarian prime minister and foreign minister on the same day did not include an explicit reference to the Carpatho-Ukraine.** It is presumably safe to conclude that if the Hungarians had finally abandoned what Hitler considered their timidity and had boldly moved in, he would have happily approved their annexation of the area, it always being clear that Germany had no interest in that portion of the hated Czechoslovak state. It is entirely possible that at the time of Munich he would have been willing to see Hungary move into the Carpatho-Ukraine—the way the Poles seized Tésin—but thereafter he was to change his approach.*’ The fact that the Italians continued to support the Hungarian position and therefore had to be rather dramatically restrained by Hitler only makes his new view of the issue more obvious and distinctive.** By 8 October Hitler had decided that the Carpatho-Ukraine would not be allowed to fall to Hungary just then. It should remain an autonomous part of Czechoslovakia, thereby staying under at least indirect German control.*° There would be no common Hungarian-Polish border for the time being. What did Hitler have in mind? The evidence on the subject is mainly circumstantial, but in my opinion conclusive all the same. Hitler, far from being sympathetic to Ukrainian aspirations, was surely the most dangerous enemy the Ukrainians ever had. The Magyars might wish to Magyarize any Ukrainians they could annex; the Poles wished at least to control and perhaps to Polonize the 32. G.D., D, 4, No. 39. Since this document of 6 October and the one of 5 October to which it refers were chief of armed both drafted in Abteilung Ausland, it is probably safe to assume that it was Admiral Canaris, the

Ministry of forces intelligence, who persuaded Keitel of this view and the advisability of informing the Foreign

it.

Papers, No. 89, p. 33. Goring responded favorably to Lipski’s comments on the subject on 10 August (Lipski 1 October (Lipski’s 378), on 24 August (ibid., No. 91, p. 385), on 16 September (ibid., No. 96, p. 403), and on in Lipski Papers, p. 437, report of 3 October cited in Wojciechowski, p. 528, noted as missing from Lipski’s files represented some expressions Géring’s that cit.) (loc. interpretation i’s Wojciechowsk n. 18). I do not shate similarly favorable view prearranged tactic to encourage the Poles, or Cienciala’s opinion (p. 162) that Géring’s on 21 October was designed to restrain Poland. ) 34. G.D., D, 4, No. 45. 35. Lipski Papers, No. 99.

36. G.D., D, 4, No. 554.

A

have been willing to see Hungary seize 37. Hoensch (Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 116) believes that Hitler would In view of his disgust with the October. of days first the in Ukraine Carpathothe and both Slovakia have looked like a minimum would Ukraine Carpathothe but Slovakia, about Hungarians, I am not so sure of Hitler’s opinion open. reward for last-minute boldness. Macartney (1:276) leaves the question Ukraine, as well as related issues, and the 38. On the Italian support of Hungarian ambitions in the Carpatho456, 461, 480,

, see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. withdrawal of this support in the face of German objections

541, 551, 555, 559, 566, 5339579, 089, 098; 497, 519, 526, 529 (French text in Adam, No. 24), 530, 531, 533, Macartney, 1:288—99. 90, 103; Cienciala, pp. 158-59; 604, 614, 615; 3, Nos. 22, 39, 41, 42, 52, 56, 59, 62, 63, 69, 516. No. 2, Documents, Hungarian Cf. 50. 46, Nos. 4, D, 39. G.D.,

648

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Ukrainians within the borders of Poland; the Soviet leaders wished to impose total control and a measure of Russification on the Ukrainians in the U.S.S.R.; and the Czechs

and Romanians wanted to rule their Ukrainians with a minimum of fuss and bother. Only Hitler conceived of the extension of another people’s living space, that of the Germans, into a Ukrainian area in which German settlers would over time displace the expelled or exterminated Ukrainians. Such schemes, explicated in Mein Kampf and Hitlet’s second book, would not see even the first stages of implementation until after 22 June 1941, but there is no evidence to suggest that in the years between developing and attempting to carry out these horrendous ideas Hitler acquired a temporary affection for Ukrainians. If he allowed his own associates and officials to maintain contacts with Ukrainians and if he tolerated a limited amount of Ukrainian propaganda in the winter of 1938-39, it was surely not because of a suddenly discovered love for the people who occupied the soil his agrarian expansionism craved for his own “aryan’” farmers.*° There is also no evidence that Hitler thought of the Carpatho-Ukraine as some sort of a wedge against the Soviet Union. The speculations to this effect ascribe to Hitler Rosenberg’s ideas that Hitler himself was careful to keep Rosenberg from implementing after June 1941. Disdainful of Soviet power and Slavic peoples, Hitler was not interested

in using the population of the U.S.S.R. against their own government, and the tiny population of the Carpatho-Ukraine could hardly play a role he was unwilling to assign the incomparably greater population of the Soviet Ukraine.*! As for the strategic picture, Hitler knew enough geography to realize that the mountainous terrain of the CarpathoUkraine did not offer an invasion route to the east any more than it had presented a serious threat of Soviet aid across Romania to Czechoslovakia westward. Hitler temporarily preserved the Carpatho-Ukraine’s autonomy, which was a result of the Munich agreement, solely because he saw it as a useful instrument of his diplomacy towatd Poland and Hungary, and he saw no reason to give it away for nothing.‘? He would repeatedly keep the Hungarians from seizing it—both on 20 November 1938 and 12 February 1939 only German vetoes prevented Hungarian military invasions of the Carpatho-Ukraine.* Yet a month after the second veto, on 12 March 1939, Hitler not

only lifted his ban but actually instructed the Hungarians to seize the area, ignoring the appeals of those in the area who preferred German to Magyar overlordship. Surely Hitler’s comment to Daranyi on 14 October 1938, that “nothing was final” and that border changes could be made if Hungary and Poland joined Germany in a bloc, explains his attitude. The Carpatho-Ukraine was a pawn to be utilized in negotiations with Hungary and Poland; the area would be turned over to Hungary, but only when it suited Hitler. Had Poland been willing to pay the right price, she might have secured all or part of Slovakia for herself and succeeded in getting the Carpatho-Uktaine 40. See above, pp. 69-70; Wojciechowski, pp. 533-34; Roos, pp. 369-70; Cienciala, p. 197, n. 77; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 251-52. 41. It is worth noting that those who stress Hitler’s interest in the Soviet Ukraine as a reason for his earlier vetoes of Hungarian occupation do not claim the converse, that his instruction to Hungary to occupy the

Carpatho-Ukraine meant that Hitler had given up his territorial aspirations on Soviet Ukrainian land. Note Kleist’s citing of Hitlers views in S.U., No. 149.

42. Note also von Ribbentrop’s comment on the conversation of 24 November between Hitler and King Carol of Romania, who had expressed the strongest opposition to annexation of the Carpatho-Ukraine by Hungary,

that Hitler had been careful not to commit himself on this issue (G.D., D, 5, No. 254, pp. 284-85). 43, On the German vetoes, see G.D., D, 4, Nos. 128-34, 167; 5, No. 252; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 216-44; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 48, 50 (French text in Adém, No. 27), 57, 58. Germany had allowed

Hungary pieces of the Carpatho-Ukraine with Magyar population (as in the case of Slovakia).

44. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 198, 199, 215, 218, 235-37; Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 413, 458; Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus, pp. 258ff.; Macartney, 1:336-39; Kennan, No. 11. Other documents are summarized in G.D., D,

6:75.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939 under Hungarian control at an Hungary under circumstances and Hungary were more than trol of Bohemia and Moravia

649

earlier date.4> As it was, the area would be turned over to in which the advantages this might have had for Poland offset by Germany’s simultaneously acquiting direct conas well as indirect but fully effective control of Slovakia.

This resolution of the issue, so different from the one Hitler had held before Daranyi,

was the result of developments in Germany’s relations with Poland. The German government had, on the whole, every reason Poland’s conduct in the early stages of the Czechoslovak crisis. reaction of the Polish government to the Munich conference had Berlin. Because of fears that some four power European council

to be pleased with In a way, even the been satisfactory to might someday tell

them what to do to preserve the peace, the Polish government was upset about not being

included among those invited to Munich and was determined to secute its share of the Czechoslovak booty by independent action rather than at the hands of the great powers. Beck arranged for an ultimatum with a very short time limit to be handed to the Prague government. The TéSin territory was to be handed over immediately, and with all sorts of dire consequences threatened, the Czechoslovak government agreed to the Polish demands. By thus abruptly and deliberately seizing a portion of Czechoslovakia, Beck could try to create the appearance of an independent Polish action, secure an area long coveted by Poland, and contribute to the popularity within Poland of a regime whose basis in the country was never especially firm.*° There were, of course, incidental by-products of the Polish action. Poland made her-

self even more unpopular in Britain and France than she already was; stabbing Czechoslovakia in the back and doing so in the most nasty fashion possible was not likely to increase affection for Poland either among the Western Powers or in the United States.” The efforts of Beck to keep his troubles with Germany in October and November 1938 as quiet as possible were probably in part due to a recognition of this western reaction, as was the advice of von Weizsacker that Germany take advantage of the situation by leaving Czechoslovakia autonomous but dependent while concentrating all German pressure on Poland. It was Hitler’s insistence on the total destruction of Czechoslovakia that would largely obliterate the memory of Poland’s actions from the policy formulation process of the Western Powers. From the German point of view, however, the Polish move was welcome. Anything that hastened the process of weakening Czechoslovakia, regardless of whether Poland acted separately or jointly with Germany, had the same effect.48 Because there had been parallel but not coordinated action against Czechoslovakia, Germany and Poland did have to work out their respective territorial demands in the Silesian area where the prohere jected annexations of the two powers could conceivably overlap. The critical point greatly and center railway major a as important was the town of Oderberg (Bohumin), and desired by Poland. There is substantial evidence that among German diplomats Hitler but military leaders there was hope that the area would be annexed by Germany, enthusiastically cooperative, Hitler might 45. It is even possible that if the Slovak autonomists had been more the first draft of his memorandum on in argued had Woermann as have let them have the Carpatho-Ukraine the Slovak and Carpatho-Ukrainian questions (see above, n. 23).

140—45; Roos, pp. 354-57. 46. Accounts in Wojciechowski, pp. 486-513; Cienciala, pp. 3, chap. 1; Cadogan Diary, 1 October 1938, p. 111; 3d, B.D., see moves, Polish 47. For British reaction to the 108, 115. On the French reaction see Lukasiewicz Nos. Papers, Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 435, 478; Lipski 502-7, 510, 512. On the US. reaction, see U.S. 1938, Papers, pp. 142-44; D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 440, 466, 500,

1938 (“It reminded him of a fight between a very 1:708-10; Roosevelt memorandum for Hull, 29 September the ground and a third boy stepped forward and on boy little the had boy big boy and a very little boy. The big 1938. Hull Cordell PSF kicked the little boy in the stomach”), Hyde Park, 48. See Lipski Papers, pp. 437-38.

650

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

overtuled all such attempts and agreed to Poland’s occupying the town.” The Germans living there were out of luck; they were to find the new masters far worse than those they had complained about earlier, and many of them fled to Germany.*? In this case Hitler was quite willing to sactifice mere people to his hope for Polish agreement to his larger objectives; he was unwilling, however, to let Poland have the nearby area of MoravskaOstrava. Its mineral and industrial importance was such that the Germans preferred the Czechs to retain it temporarily, and they were to start their own occupation of Czechoslovakia on 14 March 1939 with this portion.*! Some wider questions of German-Polish relations had arisen in the summer and fall of 1938 in connection with the discussion by the two countries of their policies toward Czechoslovakia. The German ambassador to Warsaw had suggested at the beginning of July that Polish policy in the Czechoslovak crisis might be bent in a direction more favorable to Germany’s aims by such German concessions as an extension of the term of the 1934 German-Polish agreement, a guarantee of Poland’s western border, the promise of Tésin, and possibly agreement on Polish interests in Lithuania or the Soviet Union.°* The Poles themselves had repeatedly brought up their own wishes for steps Germany should consider as part of the coordinated anti-Czechoslovak program. These had included extension of the 1934 agreement, German recognition of the finality of the German-Polish border similar to that which Hitler had extended to the German-Italian

border in May, and a new agreement covering the maintenance of something very like the status quo in Danzig to replace the vanishing role of the League.*> Beck was willing to go to Germany to meet Goring or Hitler to discuss these issues. In making these approaches, the Polish foreign minister hoped to secure what the Polish historian Marian Wojciechowski has aptly called “the freezing of the status quo” in German-Polish relations at the point reached in 1934, even though Beck himself was helping Germany change the European situation in which the 1934 agreement had been signed.6* When the conference at Munich removed the immediate danger of war, Beck found another way to put before the Germans the general question of German-Polish relations, still hoping, it would appear, for a permanent fixation of the status quo.55 As the German reaction to Beck’s approach as well as their own proposals would quickly show, the maintenance of the status quo was the last thing Germany wanted, although it is not known whether German evasion of Beck’s soundings before Munich was in anticipation of future changes in the relationship between the two countries. Iron49. On the Oderberg (Bohumin) issue, see G.D., D, 4, No. 17; 5, Nos. 57, 60-62, 65, 66; Roos, pp. 355—56; Cienciala, pp. 149-52; Lipski Papers, Nos. 101, 108-12, 116-18; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 71, 84, 85, 422. It could be

argued that because the map which accompanied the Godesberg ultimatum included the Oderberg area in the territory to be occupied by Germany, Hitler, who approved that map, originally intended to have Odetberg go to Germany. My reading of the evidence is that those who drafted the map drew the line to include Oderberg without explaining to Hitler that this was an area claimed by Poland. 50. G.D., D, 5, No. 63. See the file on these Germans in T-120, 1321/2391/D 500101—262. Their fate, like that

of the Germans in other parts of Czechoslovakia occupied by Poland, would provide the subject for many German protests to Warsaw. 51. G.D., D, 4, No. 53; 5, No. 58, cf. ibid., Nos. 59, 68, 69; Lipski Papers, p. 438, and No. 119; Cienciala, prls2:

Géring’s suggestion that if the area had to be ceded to Poland, it should be traded for Danzig should, in my opinion, be read as his reaction to talk about recovering Danzig then current among Germany’s leaders and his belief that Hitler was willing to be generous with Poland in the distribution of the spoils of Czechoslovakia. 52. G.D., D, 2, No. 277.

53. See above, pp. 592, 615f. The most recent formulation of the Polish position had been Beck’s instruction of 19 September for Lipski’s meeting with Hitler after Berchtesgaden (Lipski Papers, No. 98). 54. Wojciechowski, p. 471. W. quotes the full text of Beck’s 19 September instruction from the Polish archives and cites some places where it has been published (pp. 468-69). 55. Like Cienciala (pp. 142-43, n. 114), I find Wojciechowski’s interpretation (pp. 505-11) of Beck’s conduct on 30 September along these lines as the one most likely to be cortect,

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

651

ically, the one point on which Beck himself wanted a major change was one that the Germans tried to use to have him fall in with their own plans, and the more Beck emphasized this point, the more it became a useful bargaining counter for the Germans. This was the question of the common Polish-Hungarian border that the Poles had raised with the Germans before Munich and wete to put forward again later. As already mentioned, Poland very much wanted Hungary to annex the Carpatho-Ukraine and to do so on her own without turning to the four Munich powers. In the months after Munich, the War-

saw government repeatedly urged the Hungarians to act; the record is full of attempts by the Poles to push the Magyars forward, now offering assistance and support for a Hungarian advance, now threatening the withdrawal of Polish friendship if Hungary continued to hesitate.*° When the Polish government had raised the Carpatho-Ukraine issue before Munich, Goring had been favorable, but Hitler had been noncommittal. Even Géring had been reluctant about the other aspects of a new German-Polish settlement that the Poles had suggested, and Hitler also had declined any discussion of details. After all, it was unnecessary for the Germans to tie their own hands in this fashion when Poland’s own leaders were already following a policy essentially favorable to Germany. They were also reluctant to run the risk of driving Poland into a possible coalition with Czechoslovakia and the Western Powers by formally rejecting the Polish suggestions and making demands of their own at a time when all German efforts were bent on maintaining the front of Germany,

Poland, and, they hoped, Hungary

against Czechoslovakia.

That

situation had now changed. The near outbreak of war with the Western Powers had, as will be explained in more detail, made Hitler eager to subordinate Poland to Germany in a new settlement, and the

way was now free for demands that had previously only been hinted at, as much to ward off Polish requests as to invite serious negotiations. The eagerness of the Poles to secure a common border with Hungary provided an opportunity for the Germans to present their demands in a context in which Poland might be willing to make a bargain. On 22 October, Polish Ambassador

Lipski reaffirmed Poland’s urgent desire for

a common

border with Hungary.>’ When he was received by German Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop on the 24th, he was to receive the German demands for a return of Danzig to Germany, an extraterritorial road and railway across the Corridor to East Prussia, and Poland’s adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact. In return, Poland was to receive special rights in Danzig, a German guarantee of her western border, and an extension of the 1934 agreement. German approval of a common Polish-Hungarian border was also

hinted at.*8 Before the German

demands, their origin, significance, and repercussions, can be

analyzed in the detail their fateful importance merits, a word must be said about Hitler’s

role in their being put forward at this time. It has sometimes been suggested, and Beck at

first believed, that all this was von Ribbentrop’s own idea and that Hitler was not yet ready to formulate his own position definitively. All the evidence shows the contrary. The Germans realized that negotiations with Poland might well be prolonged and deli-

in56. The Hungarian documents reflect Polish alternation between offers of help and disgust with Hungary’s 475, 499, 501 (French activity very well; see Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 463 (French text in Adam, No. 21),

601, 608, 611; see text in Ad4m, No. 22), 504, 512, 518, 521, 537, 550, 556, 557, 583, 587, 588, 591, 595, 596, the four Munich to appeal Hungarian any to opposition strong Poland’s Note 80. 79, also G.D., D, 5, Nos. 76, powers, Hungarian Documents, 2, Nos. 524, 527, 536. ie 5, No. 80. , 57. On the Lipski-Woermann conversation of 22 October see G.D., D, 81; Lipski Papers, No. ~ No. ibid., see October, 24 of n conversatio Ribbentrop Lipski-von 58. On the pp. 226, 231-32; Roos, pp. 380-82; Cienciala, pp. 162-63, 177-81; Wojciechowski, pp. 542-46; Burckhardt,

371/21804. Biddle tel. 260, 6 December 1938, State 862.4016/1980; C 15393/197/55, FO

652

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

cate, and there might be an advantage to a preliminary stage of talks the details of which would not have to be considered binding on the two parties, but the strategy was Hitler’s

own. In mid-October Hitler had suggested a possible redrawing of the map of Czechoslovakia if Germany, Poland, and Hungary formed a solid block. Just before offering this

proposal to former Hungarian Prime Minister Daranyi, Hitler had ordered that no commentaries or news unfriendly to Poland appear in the German press. On 23 October, the day before the Lipski-von Ribbentrop conversation, Hitler himself discussed the projected road and railway across the Corridor with the man who was expected to build them, Minister Fritz Todt, and explained to him that a guarantee of the Corridor would be a part of the agreement for this project. It is also known that on the 24th Hitler conferred

in Munich

with Albert Forster, his associate

and gauleiter in

Danzig, about the policies to be adopted there in the immediate future.*! Forster, who later referred to von Ribbentrop’s demands as “Hitler’s message,” was trying to get approval for some new anti-Jewish decrees in Danzig that Greiser, the leader of the Danzig senate, and Viktor Bottcher, the foreign affairs specialist of Danzig, were concerned might lead to international complications, and that von Weizsacker had earlier

indicated should be handled in a manner that would not annoy the Poles. Hitler told Forster to go ahead with the decrees; he apparently expected Polish agreement to the

incorporation of Danzig within the Reich and wanted the internal situation there as similar as possible to that in Germany as a whole. Hitler’s conversations with Todt and Forster about German relations with Poland are documented more precisely than his instructions to von Ribbentrop.“ The whole thrust of von Ribbentrop’s demands reflects close instruction by Hitler himself. It has too often been overlooked that during these very days von Ribbentrop was receiving Hitler’s detailed instructions on future policies toward Britain and France for transmittal to the Italians by the foreign minister on Hitler’s behalf.° It is surely safe to assume that when receiving these directives von Ribbentrop was given the guidelines for his conversation with Lipski. If one examines the German demands one must consider first specific details and then the total impact. The return of Danzig must have come as a particularly shocking demand to Lipski because less than a month earlier Hitler had announced in his speech 59, G.D., D, 5, No. 70. 60. Ibid., No. 86. This letter of Todt to von Ribbentrop of 27 October refers to the meeting with Hitler having taken place “last Saturday.” That would have been 23 October. According to the record in “Daten aus alten Notizbichern,” Hitler was in the Munich-Berchtesgaden area from late on 20 October to 24 October. Hitler had himself mentioned the road project to Lipski on 20 September, and Lipski in reporting on that had referred to it as a project with which Beck was familiar (D. ¢ M., 1:183). 61. On Forster’s stay in Berchtesgaden on 24 October, see Kuykendall (Danzig) dispatch 78 of 9 December 1938, State 860K.01/104; C 15393/197/55, FO 371/21804; Burckhardt, pp. 226, 231-32; Wojciechowski, p.

541; G.D., D, 5, No. 672. 62. Biddle tel. 260, 6 December 1938, State 862.4016/1980.

63. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 73, 77, 670-77. The issue of anti-Jewish legislation in Danzig as seen by the high commissioner is recounted in chap. 6 of Burckhardt’s memoirs. There is an excellent account in Ben Elissar,

pp. 323-38. 64. It is worth noting that von Ribbentrop thought Hitler so interested in the details of the negotiations with Poland that he carefully had the relevant documents sent to the Fiihrer, see, e.g., G.D., D, 5, Nos. 113, 115,

131. 65. On these instructions we have the most interesting memorandum by Count Ciano of von Ribbentrop’s recital of them in Rome in his Diplomatic Papers, pp. 242-46. 66. In his generally unreliable memoirs, von Ribbentrop states that Hitler “wanted to reach a formal settlement with Poland, and he instructed me in October, 1938, to negotiate with the Polish Ambassador with a view to

settling all pending questions” (The Ribbentrop Memoirs [London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1954], p. 97). There

is considerable evidence, however, that the Poles originally thought von Ribbentrop was acting on his own without full authorization from Hitler, and perhaps for tactical purposes the German foreign minister may have encouraged this belief.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

653

of 26 September that the Sudetenland was Germany’s last territorial demand in Europe.®” If it was suggested that such speeches were not to be taken literally—whatever Hitler wanted at the moment was always the only and final demand—the fact remained that Hitler himself had formally reaffirmed the status quo in Danzig less than a year before. If both of those assurances, one general and the other made specifically to the Polish government, meant nothing, then what was the value of new German assurances about the

German-Polish border once Poland had agreed to the current set of German demands? The Danzig issue was once again to be a focus of German-Polish relations and would become the subject of considerable discussion.

The idea of what was sometimes referred to as a corridor across the Corridor, the

highway and railway project, was not new. This issue had been raised before in GermanPolish relations, partly because of the convenience it would provide for Germany and partly because it would conserve German foreign exchange by eliminating the transit payments to Poland that had been a complicating factor in German-Polish trade relations. The various prior discussions had not led anywhere, but the Polish government could hardly claim to be surprised. Whether or not such a transportation system would or would not have extraterritorial status would be a particularly important question, but it is not likely that the fact that the negotiations over this issue were contemporaneous with Germany’s insistence on such facilities across Czechoslovakia encouraged Polish enthusiasm for being treated in the same way. The prolongation of the German-Polish agreement of 1934 was something the Poles themselves had periodically suggested, but its meaning would be quite substantially changed if such a prolongation were agreed upon in the context of an entirely new arrangement. The most important portion of such a new arrangement, in reality if not in appearance, would

be Poland’s

adherence

to the Anti-Comintern

Pact.’ Poland had

repeatedly rejected this proposal earlier, most recently when von Ribbentrop had suggested it on 27 September.’! As will become clear in the account of German-Polish negotiations in 1938-39,

Beck was

more

adamant

in his opposition to “his German

demand than to any other, and would never allow even internal Polish Foreign Ministry discussion of any compromise on it. Since the pact Beck refused to join provided solely for opposition to the international organization of Communism, and Poland was vehemently anti-Communist as well as on the least friendly terms possible with the Soviet Union, why the reluctance of Poland to join and why the insistence of Germany that she do so? The answer to the question of Poland’s attitude is that adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact was seen as a form of policy subservience to Germany, a subservience not only in regard to the Soviet Union but in every other respect as well. This was no idle speculation on Beck’s part. Once Poland took the step Germany wanted, she would be at Germany’s mercy because she would have ruptured her tie to France while exposing herself to the wrath of her great eastern neighbor. It was, of course, this very subservience that Hitler wanted. For

his ambitions

further east he needed either Poland’s acquiescence or that country’s

demand” as a 67. Burckhardt reported on 12 October that Forster was describing the phrase of “last territorial reflection of a also this Was 189). p. Burckhardt, in quoted Walters, to (Burckhardt maneuver purely tactical an what Hitler had told Forster? (pp. 178-79) is surely 68. The guarantees mentioned by the Germans were always purely bilateral; Cienciala ‘ mistaken in referring to international guarantees.

ki, pp. 547-48, n. 1. For sub69. On this issue, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 14, 86; Biddle Papers, p. 43; Wojciechows

4 and 23 November 1938, State sequent reports on the negotiations, see Biddle’s dispatches 782 and 814 of 760c.62/407 and 415. Ribbentrop, the 70. Is it entirely a coincidence th at this is the one point of the 24 October discussion that von n in his memoirs (p. 98)? originator of the Anti-Comintern Pact, “forgot ” in his account of the conversatio 71. Lipski Papers, p. 427, and No. 113.

654

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

destruction; any truly independent Poland would be a bar to his aims, and in the immediate future he especially wanted Poland quiet while he settled with England and France. In the weeks after the 24 October meeting, therefore, Hitler tried to obtain Polish

agreement by making tions.” He while with demand to

to German demands, and he was prepared to make it worthwhile for Poland concessions on the Carpatho-Ukrainian and possibly the Slovakian queswas enough interested in not unduly alarming Poland that he held back for a German plans for the annexation of Memel Here was another territorial which Hitler’s renunciation presumably did not apply.” At his Berchtesgaden

meeting with Chamberlain, Hitler had claimed to want only Lithuanian adherence to the Memel Statute, but that reference appeared only in the British, not the German, record

of the conference. No one in London believed Hitler’s promise on this subject worth anything.’*’ The Lithuanian government attempted to conciliate Germany by making concessions to the Germans in Memel, but Berlin was not interested in any accommodation. The Lithuanian relaxation of restrictions only meant a full nazification of the Memel territory, and the authorization to hold elections on 11 December 1938 merely produced the anticipation that, immediately after the election, Memel would be integrated into the Reich. As the agitation for annexation to Germany proceeded in Memel during November and eatly December, the government in Berlin was deciding whether or not to move for annexation immediately or to restrain the exuberance of the Memel Germans when the expected results of the 11 December elections led them to a public petition for annexation. Early in December, Hitler decided to postpone annexation unless the Lithuanian government willingly agreed—as they were not yet prepared to do. There is evidence that reluctance about compensation that might have to be arranged for Poland and concern over the risk of driving Lithuania into Poland’s arms were important considerations in the German decision to keep Memel quiet for a while, but the key element appears to have been the general uncertainty over whether any German-Polish agreement was likely to be reached together with a desire to avoid action that might interfere with arriving at one;/? After the 11 December elections, the enthusiastic Memellanders were restrained on orders from Berlin, but by mid-December it was assumed that the area would be seized,

it was hoped by an agreement with Lithuania under which pressure would be combined with generous promises of free trade via Memel to induce Lithuania to become a satellite of Germany, possibly in a customs union.” The timing was tied by Hitler to his other plans. When he spoke to the leader of the Memel National Socialists, Ernst Neumann,

following the elections about 17 December, Hitler told him that the Memel question would be settled by annexation in 1939 at the end of March or preferably in mid-April, 72. As on other occasions, the adoring Forster repeated his mastet’s views with great accuracy, in this case to Burckhardt on 29 November 1938 (Burckhardt, p. 232). 73. The Latvian acting minister of foreign affairs indicated on 28 September that in spite of Hitler’s statement two days earlier, the Fihrer would ask for Danzig and Memel after the Sudetenland with the Corridor coming ' next (U.S. 1938, 1:77). 74. N 4658, N 4885/2/59, FO 371/22220. There were some

steps by the British and French as signatory

powers during the winter of 1938-39, but these made no difference any mote. 75. On the Memel issue in October-December 1938, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 359-75; Lorenz to GGring enclosing

matetial on Memel, 25 November and 3 December 1938, T-120, 2621/5482/E 382250-59; “Informationsbericht Nr. 82,” 2 December 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £.379; German press conference of

3 December 1938, Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/10, £187; Plieg, pp. 193-202; Memorandum by Collier on

the Memelland, 9 December 1938, N 6135/2/59, FO 371/22222. See also “Bestellungen aus det Pressekonferenz,” 9 January 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £10; Kitk (Moscow) tel. 35 of 26 January

1938, State 860M.01 (Memel)/557. 76. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 380, 395 n. 3.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

655

and that he wanted no acute crisis before that time.”” Negotiations with Poland were still under way—the Polish foreign minister himself was expected in Germany early in January—and Hitler wanted to arrange the final stages of the Czechoslovak and Memel questions in a manner coordinated with his policy toward Poland. The prospects of an agreement with Poland were perceived as slight in Germany by the time Hitler wanted to act against Czechoslovakia in March, so that German action in both cases was taken without regard for Poland’s interests; indeed, it was taken in order to put pressure on Poland from both flanks. Memel was taken from Lithuania under pressure a few days after the occupation of Prague.’’ Germany eventually tried to get Lithuania to become her ally in a quick war against Poland, the way she had once hoped to use Poland and Hungary in a quick war against Czechoslovakia, and offered the old

Lithuanian capital of Vilna as bait; but the Lithuanian government refused. As punishment, Germany, which had previously assured herself the right to occupy Lithuania by agreement with Moscow,” was to trade Lithuania to the Soviet Union for a portion of central Poland while retaining claim only to a small piece of Lithuanian territory for herself.8° Although these events took place well after the time under consideration here,

they are referred to not only because they complete the story of German policy toward Memel and Lithuania up to September 1939 but because they illuminate Hitler’s general procedure in such matters and, more specifically, show how Hitler subordinated his policies in this area to his broader aims toward Poland. Other matters were handled in the same way. The repeated German protests over the treatment of Germans in those areas of Czechoslovakia annexed by Poland were kept muted for the time being, even though there is evidence to show that Hitler himself

was quite upset about this issue.! When, after the enactment of a new Polish passport regulation, the Germans took the occasion to arrest and deport under horrible citcumstances thousands of Polish Jews living in Germany, and the Poles retaliated by deporting Germans, the Berlin government quietly gave way.*’ The son of one of the deported families shot a staff member of the German embassy in Paris, and the German government used this as an excuse for a national program of burning synagogues, wrecking stores, arresting many thousands of German Jews, and promulgating a vast series of anti-Jewish decrees. But the international repercussions of the notorious November pogrom were to be felt in Germany’s relations with the Western Powers rather than with Poland, and will be examined in that context.*

77. The reception of Neumann by Hitler is reported in a letter of the head of the German Foreign Ministry

department responsible for the Baltic States, Werner von Grundherr, to the German minister to Lithuania, Erich Zechlin, of 2 January 1939 (G.D., D, 5, No. 381). The exact date is not known as the meeting was kept out of the press (ibid., No. 382); but Neumann had been scheduled to visit Germany on or about 17 December

(ibid., No. 372). It is clear that Germany’s policy options were being reviewed on or about that date; note the final sentence of Ritter’s memorandum of 16 December (ibid., No. 380). Plieg, p. 202, refers to the HitlerNeumann meeting as having taken place “at the end of December” but gives no reason for this dating.

78. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 399, 405; Plieg, pp. 203-12. of 79. Note that Hitler’s war directive (Weisung) 4 of 25 September 1939 still looked toward the occupation [FrankLithuania, by force if necessary (Walther Hubatsch [ed.], Hitlers Weisungen fir die Kriegfiibrung, 1939-1945 ; furt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1962], p. 28). in Crisis: Nationalism and 80. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 58-59; Leonas Sabaliunas, Lithuania 147-49; UWS: 1939, 1:443; Communism, 1939-1940 (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1972), pp. must be compared with that G.D., D, 6, No. 328; 7, Nos. 410, 419, 429, 459, 481. The experience of Lithuania

eventually agreed to join in of Slovakia, which will be discussed in the next chapter. The Slovak government

satellite. hostilities against Poland and received territorial rewards appropriate for a willing 81. See G.D., D, 5, No. 99 for a comment

of Hitler to General Haushofer, and Burckhardt, p. 232, for a

comment of Hitler to Forster. Lipski Papers, No. 126. 82. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 84, 88, 89, 91, 92, 95, 97, 98, 107, 127; Ben Elissar, pp. 301-21; 5, No. 103. 83. For von Moltke’s report on the Polish reaction see G.D., D,

656

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

While the Germans waited for a Polish response to their demands, there was reluctance in Berlin to reprove Warsaw for its support of Hungaty’s annexation of the Carpatho-Ukraine, since in German eyes the Vienna award of 2 November had settled this matter at least for the time being.8* Only after the attempted Hungarian coup of 20 November did the Germans inform the Poles of their strong objections at that time to the action Poland had been hoping for—and von Moltke was careful to tell Beck at the same time that von Ribbentrop could not see why the Ukrainian question should cause difficulties for German-Polish relations.*° Considerable light on both Hitler’s policies and the hopes and preferences of the Polish government can be shed by aspects of the negotiations between Germany and Poland after von Ribbentrop had initially presented the German demands on 24 October. The Polish ambassador, Josef Lipski, had immediately warned in that meeting

about Germany’s raising the Danzig issue, but he promised to inform Beck of the German demands and to present the official Polish response. Lipski returned to Berlin on 1 November from conferences in Warsaw which culminated in instructions dated 31 October for his response to von Ribbentrop’s proposals.®° Von Ribbentrop, however, would not see Lipski until 19 November.®’ Although there were some circumstances which might be adduced to explain the delay of the foreign minister as purely technical and coincidental, these hardly provide an adequate explanation for a man who was otherwise not averse to summoning diplomats to ponerse in the middle of the night upon very short notice. The matter is necessarily speculative, but it is moray that Lipski’s immediate reaction and some signals received in Germany in the days after 24 October showed von Ribbentrop that the Polish response was almost certain to be generally negative.** During the period of delay, German exercise of its new power over Czechoslovakia symbolized by the Vienna award of 2 November and the planned German-French declaration which would show Poland her isolation, might lead to second thoughts in Warsaw, and at this

stage in the German-Polish talks (uplike the earlier talks with Czechoslovakia) Berlin did actually want to reach agreement. In the Tripartite Pact negotiations with Japan, which proceeded concurrently, von Ribbentrop repeatedly operated on the assumption that instructions from Tokyo might be modified under the impact of internal debate in Japan and remonstrances from the Japanese ambassadors in Berlin and Tokyo. He may have expected a similar development in the negotiations with Warsaw. If so, he was to be disappointed. Lipski who actually thought of resigning after the 24 October meeting, was if anything more obdurate than Beck about concessions to Germany—just the opposite of the Japanese envoys who were pressuring the Tokyo government to fall in with German wishes.® The instructions Lipski carried out when he finally saw von Ribbentrop on 19 November reflected the Polish government’s general position.” The question of better 84. Note the reference in Woermann’s note of 12 November on the subject, stating that the connection with the “well-known other question” probably ruled out a German demarche in Warsaw (ibid., No. 100). 85. Ibid., No. 104. On Polish-Hungarian interaction in the crisis over Hungary’s attempted seizure of the Carpatho--Ukraine with Polish support in November, see Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 2, 7, 9, 12, 13 (French text in Adam, No. 26), 14, 28, 29, 40, 46, 54, 55, 60, 61, 65, 67, 80, 109; Roos, pp. 373-75. 86. On Lipski’s stay in Warsaw, see Szembek, 29 October 1938, p. 366. The instructions of 31 October are

Polish White Book, No. 45, plus a sentence omitted from the published version to be found in Lipski Papers, p.

458.

87. See Lipski Papers, Nos. 126, 127. 88. See also Lipski’s own speculations on this point in his 12 November letter to Beck, ibid., No. 126. 89. On Lipski’s consideration of resignation after 24 October, and on his formal application for reassignment after 15 March 1939, see ibid., p. 501. 90. Lipski’s account, ibid., No. 127; the German record is in G.D., D, 5, No. 101. To facilitate German ptopa-

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

657

communications across the Corridor might be considered, though there was no willingness to make any new routes extraterritorial. On Danzig, the Polish position was a double one. They would not agree to annexation by Germany, but there was an interest in a new German-Polish treaty covering the status of Danzig and replacing the League’s tole. At this stage of the negotiations, Beck was apparently willing to let Danzig assume control of its own foreign affairs and to make other concessions in a new treaty, but he was quite insistent on maintaining a special status for the Free City.°! By a supreme irony, the two countries that had done most to undermine the League’s position in Danzig now both wanted the high commissioner kept there—each preferring to deal with the problems in Danzig via a mediator until a new permanent settlement could be worked out in accordance with its own preferences. During the last weeks of 1938 and in early 1939, therefore, both Germany and Poland tried to keep the League high commissionet’s position in existence and worked out arrangements to convince the suspicious British and French governments of the undesirability of withdrawing all League connections with the Free City at that time. Regarding the German demand that Poland join the Anti-Comintern Pact, however, the earlier Polish refusals were simply reiterated; on this

subject there was no possibility of compromise. Beck offered to discuss German-Polish relations in personal conversations, but held out no hope on this German proposal. There were further German-Polish discussions in November and December 1938,

but both parties appear to have hoped that the other would modify its position. In any case, there was no progress aside from an agreement that von Ribbentrop would return

the earlier formal visit of Beck by going to Warsaw, while Beck would stop over in Germany to meet Hitler early in January 1939 in the hope of preparing some possible agreements that might be signed when von Ribbentrop made his official visit to Poland.” Lipski had warned the German government at the beginning of these talks that Berlin’s demands raised the greatest dangers. All close observers were convinced that Poland would fight rather than give in to Germany on issues she considered vital to her independence;

Burckhardt was

of this opinion, and American

Ambassador

Anthony

Biddle, probably the only foreign diplomat close to Beck, was also sure of it.° Even German Ambassador von Moltke had some doubt that his own government recognized the strength of Polish feeling and determination.” During this period, Hitler appears to have wavered between the hope that Poland ganda to the effect that the Poles had assumed an uncompromising position afier the British guarantee of March 1939, Lipski’s warning about the danger of an annexation of Danzig for German-Polish relations as well as von Ribbentrop’s response were excised from the text of the German record as published in the German White Book, No. 198. Now that the full text has long been available, the use of it or the doctored version provides a handy test for the bona fides of those writing on the subject. 91. Biddle dispatch 755 of 20 October 1938, State 760K.62/55; Kuykendall dispatch 78 of 9 December 1938, State 860K.01/104; G.D., D, 5, No. 102; Burckhardt, p. 229. 92. Kuykendall dispatch 78 of 9 December 1938, State 860K.01/104; Burckhardt, pp. 229-30, 233. pp. 186-88; Denne, 93. This complicated issue is treated at length in Burckhardt’s memoirs; see also Cienciala,

dispp. 159-75; Roos, pp. 388-89, 394-95; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 96, 117, 118, 123, 124, 129, 133, 135; Kuykendall insispatch 85 of 21 December 1938, State 860K.01/112; C 15953, 15954/197/55, FO 371/21804. On Polish see also the note by tence that the League play a role until a new German-Polish agreement could be reached,

Bottcher of 4 November 1938, T-120, 1315/2371/D 496126.

pp. 180-86; Roos, pp. 389-90; 94, On the rest of the November and December negotiations, see Cienciala, G.D., D, 5, Nos. 112, 113, 115, 116; Lipski Papers, Nos. 128-31. 872 of 28 December 1938, State 95. Biddle tel. 260 of 6 December 1938, State 862.4016/1980; Biddle dispatch

860K.01/109; C 15954/197/55, FO 371/21804.

:

Kuykendall dispatch 82 of 15 December 96. Biddle dispatch 872 of 28 December 1938, State 860K.01/109; cf.

December that there would be war with 1938, State 860K.01/110. But note von Weizsacker’s certainty on 14

pp. 158-59). Poland in which Britain and France would remain neutral (Groscurth Diary,

658

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

would agree to a peaceful incorporation of Danzig by Germany—either as part of a new settlement or by indicating a willingness to acquiesce in a German fait accompli—and the expectation that his demands could be obtained only by war.” In order to increase pressure on Poland, the restrictions on the German press regarding that country were eased somewhat on 5 December; the general impression one gets is that Hitler, who

had seen Czechoslovakia buckle after a show of firmness, simply could not believe at first that the Poles would not do the same.®? In January 1939 he would himself discuss the problems with Beck—whose courteous treatment by the Germans contrasted sharply with the vituperation accorded Benes’—but those negotiations cannot be seen in isolation. By the beginning of 1939 other German moves consolidating her hold on Southeast Europe in the wake of Munich were beginning to yield results; and although not pointed directly toward Poland, these developments cannot but have increased German confi-

dence in the success of their Polish policy. Of the countries of Southeast Europe, Bulgaria as a nation defeated in the World

War was, naturally enough, most inspired by what looked like a season of revision after Munich. The Bulgarian government looked to Berlin for support of its own revisionist hopes, primarily by asking for credits to rebuild its armed forces. The government in Berlin could take such approaches in stride; they held some earlier French credits against the Bulgarians and in general thought it best to restrain Bulgarian exuberance lest hostilities develop as a result. The German government might wish to start wars at times of its own choosing, but it did not want inconvenient hostilities started by others. In the case of Bulgaria, that meant hostilities against Romania with which Germany herself was trying to develop better relations. In spite of the restraint that these attitudes imposed on German-Bulgarian

relations, however,

there was

a determination

in Berlin to keep

Bulgaria as much in the German orbit as possible; and if arms credits were a necessaty ingredient of that, Berlin would eventually grant them.!0° The rapprochement between Germany and Yugoslavia that had preceded Munich continued thereafter, although the fate of her Little Entente ally naturally alarmed public

opinion in the South Slav state. Nevertheless, as long as Hungary was restricted by Germany to the annexation of ethnographically Magyar portions of Czechoslovakia—as opposed to the historic borders—and as long as Stojadinovi¢ remained in power, Berlin could depend on the maintenance of good relations with Yugoslavia. The fall of Stojadinovic over internal problems on 4 February 1939 introduced a new and uncertain element from the perspective of Berlin. The new government reaffirmed its adherence to friendly relations with Germany, an intention underlined by the appointment of the minister to Berlin, Aleksander Cincar-Markovié, to serve as the new foreign minister. Efforts were made from the German side to offset the possible weakening of political ties by the beginning of arms deliveries that would tie Yugoslavia to Germany, but any

fruits of such a policy lay in the future. For the time being, Belgrade’s attitude was unexpectedly an open question for Berlin. Stojadinovié would never return to power, and with him an element that both Berlin and Rome had counted on in the Balkans disappeared permanently from the scene.!% 97. On Hitler’s thinking about war with Poland soon after the 24 October von Ribbentrop-Lipski talk, see Keitel

Papers, pp. 196-97; for his contingency orders to occupy Danzig but on the assumption that there would be no war with Poland, see the orders of 24 November in TMWC, 34:481-82, and of 8 December, ibid., pp. 416-22.

98. G.D., D, 5, No. 110. 99. See Wojciechowski, p. 549, citing a report on Forster’s comments in Danzig after he had seen Hitler,

100. On German-Bulgarian relations in the period November 1938—March 1939, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 240, 241,

250, 251, 263, 270, 274, 301-3, 312, 314, 315; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 72, 362. Marguerat, pp. 121-22, emphasizes German use of Bulgarian demands as a lever on Romania.

101. On German-Yugoslav relations, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 229, 232, 276, 285, 288, 290, 291, 296, 307, 308; 6,

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

659

BY compensating strengthening of Germany’s position occurred as a result of developments in her relations with Romania. The collapse of France’s position in Europe with the mutilation of Czechoslovakia probably had a greater effect on Romania than on any other country in Europe other than Czechoslovakia herself. In view of the traditional ties going back to the beginnings of Romanian independence and manifested in the way in which the elite of Romania looked to France as the model for everything from fashion to government, the revelation of France’s abdication was particularly shocking. Worry over Hungarian gains at Czechoslovakia’s expense—the revision of the border originally established by the Treaty of Trianon being considered a dangerous precedent by Romania—combined with an ever present fear of Russian territorial ambitions to suggest a change in policy that would move Bucharest’s position closer to Berlin’s.!° Feelers from Romania were put out in behalf of King Carol as soon as the Munich Conference was announced. From the beginning of this new development, the German minister in Romania, Wilhelm Fabricius, urged that Germany take advantage of the trend and concentrate on the economic sphere. Arms deliveries from Germany might help, but the key element in his view was always the building up of vast German debts to Romania by massive German orders for wheat and oil, with such debts tying Romania almost permanently to Germany.!9 There was a positive response from Germany, where von Ribbentrop was interested, where there was a desire for exploiting the general situation to develop better political and economic relations, and where the Romanian objections to Hungaty’s seizute of the Carpatho-Ukraine provided a temporary symmetry of political purpose.!°* An especially important motive for Germany at this time was her obvious need for Romanian oil. Anticipating war with the Western Powers, Germany was building up her armed forces, a buildup which implied the need for more and more petroleum products in the face of as yet inadequate synthetic production and the practically certain interruption of supplies from overseas in case of wat. Under these circumstances, a major German effort to secure control of Romania’s economy, especially her oil industry, was clearly indicated. As a mechanism

for developing closer relations with Germany, King Carol hinted

that he would himself like to stop there and perhaps see Hitler, a suggestion to which the latter responded favorably.'% As in 1936, the king arranged for Georges Bratianu, a member of one of Romania’s most influential families, to test the waters in Berlin during a visit from 2 to 12 November

1938.19 At almost the same time, difficult economic

negotiations between Germany and Romania seemed to have at least some chance of resulting in agreement; Carol made the needed concessions, but he demonstrated his concern for his country’s independence by driving a very hard bargain.!°8 As a matter of E EE EE oo and annexed memorandum on the problems of the 1938, December 17 Paul, Prince to Neuhausen 205; No.

of the fall of Germans in Yugoslavia, T-120, 2621/5482/E 38212041; Hoptner, p. 133 (whose account 323; report by Sir Stojadinovié on pp. 121-33 is most useful); Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 296, 309, 315,

Ronald Campbell on Yugoslavia’s 1435/409/92, FO 371/23883.

foreign relations

under

the new

government,

27 Februaty

1939, R

102, See Batowski, pp. 143-44; D.D.F., 2d, 12, No. 242. p. 120, n. 2. 103. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 227, 228, 230, 231, 234; Hillgruber, pp. 23-24; but see Marguerat, Nos. 235, 236. The Romanian 104. On von Ribbentrop’s interest, see G.D., D, 5:259, n. 1; see also ibid., in Berlin for the preceding foreign minister since March 1938, Nicolas Comnéne, had been Romania’s minister

ten years.

105. A very useful survey of this aspect in . 106. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 237-39, 243; Marguerat,

pp. 95-103. p. 120.

:

see G.D., D, 5, No. 242; Hillgruber, p. 25; 107. On Bratianu’s 1936 visit, see ans p- 360: on his 1938 visit,

Marguerat, p. 121.

Marguerat, pp. 101-3. 108. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 246-48; cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 19;

660

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

fact, the strong economic position of the Western Powers, especially Great Britain, in

Romania’s economy enabled Romania to operate with considerable effectiveness in restraining any substantial German advance there for a considerable time.’ The agreement reached between Germany and Romania on 10 December 1938 had some advantages for Germany but in no way came up to Berlin’s original hopes." While the negotiations for the economic agreement were still under way, King Carol visited Germany. His talks with Hitler on 24 November and with Goring two days later show a similar combination of desire for better relations with Germany and an insistence on an independent status for Romania. Hitler was all sweetness and light, declaring disinterest in any but the German minority in Romania, but refused to commit himself to

leaving the remainder of the Carpatho-Ukraine with Czechoslovakia. The prospect of a further shift of Romania to the German orbit nevertheless existed, particularly through trade relations. If these prospects were not immediately realized, it was because of steps King Carol took right after the visit to consolidate his domestic position.'!! In his talks in Berlin the king had already signalized his concern about the internal situation in Romania, where he intended to remain in charge, by asking for the recall of Arthur Konradi, one of the leaders of the German minority. The king was willing to adapt his foreign policy somewhat more to German preferences, but he obviously wished to secure himself against domestic pressures that might undermine his rule. After the recent experience of Czechoslovakia, he probably saw in the Romanian Iron Guard with its ties to German National Socialist organizations the potential of Henlein’s Sudeten Germans. Immediately after his return to Bucharest, on 30 November, King Carol had Corneliu Codreanu, the head of the Iron Guard, and thirteen of its other leaders shot. He was to discover, like von Schuschnigg, that the Third Reich considered imita-

tion a form not of flattery but of impertinence. The murdering of political opponents, like the holding of questionable plebiscites, was to be a German monopoly, and Hitler

was, ot pretended to be, enraged over the murders. Coming so soon after his meeting with the king, it looked as if the killing of the Romanian fascist leaders had his approval. Although there is only indirect evidence on the subject, Hitler may also have been upset over the weakening of an important pro-German element in Romanian political life. In any case, the German government professed to be shocked, and the German press was instructed to expatiate at length on the evils of such treatment of political opponents.!!2 The setback to German-Romanian relations did not last long. Romania still wanted to sell her surplus wheat, and Germany still needed to buy Romanian oil. The Romanians wanted to reinsure themselves with the ever more powerful Germany, which always had the option of supporting the revisionist demands of Hungary and Bulgaria against them; and the Germans wanted very much to draw Romania with its natural riches and strategic position closer to themselves. For a while, a British economic counteroffensive ptevented a reorientation of Romania’s trade system; but while this determined and at least

partially successful British effort helps to explain the reaction of London to the eventual

109. A detailed analysis in Marguerat, pp. 103-19, which supersedes the relevant portions of Wendt, Economic Appeasement. See also Adamthwaite, p. 215; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 278, 350, 407.

110. Marguerat, pp. 122-25. 111. On the royal visit to Germany and the conversations held there, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 254, 257; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 99, 107, 117, 133; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 449, 450, 452; Lipski Papers, No. 128; Hillgruber, pp. 25-28; Marguerat, pp. 120-21. On the desire of King Carol to have Wohlthat lead an economic mission to Bucharest, see G.D., D, 5, No. 257. 112. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 260, 261; Lipski Papers, Nos. 128, 129; D.D.F., 2d, 12, No. 455; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 107, 112, 151, 171, 324; “Informationsbericht Nr. 82,” 2 December 1938, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £379; German press conferences of 1, 2, 3, 8, 10 December, Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/10, ff.

177, 184, 188, 198, 210; Hillgruber, pp. 28-30; Marguerat, p. 123.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

661

German success in ptessuring Romania in March, it could not prevent that success.!15 In the first weeks of 1939, German-Romanian relations improved again. The new Romanian foreign minister, Grigore Gafencu, did what he could to overcome the real or imagined bad impression left by the murders, and the Germans were receptive to the economic prospects involved in a closer alignment of Romania with Berlin.!44 Once again Bratianu went to Germany with the king’s approval, and once again as in November Goring’s special trade assistant Helmuth Wohlthat was asked to come to Bucharest for economic negotiations.'!5 This time Wohlthat did go, and he found the Romanians

extremely cooperative. Here was a great opportunity for Germany to secure something very much like economic domination of Romania, and there was no further hesitation about political murders. Expansion of soybean planting, in which Germany had long been interested, increased purchases of wheat, and a share in Romania’s oil production were all far more real than sentimental regrets about admirers of the Third Reich. By the

end of February 1939 there were clear signs of a possible new Romanian economic alignment with Germany, an alignment that could not but have repercussions on Germany’s

relations with Bulgaria, which have already been mentioned, with Poland, Romania’s ally,

and with Hungary, Romania’s hostile neighbor.!! The Hungarians had had plenty of opportunity since Munich to learn that they had drawn Germany’s disfavor upon themselves.!!” The signs of Czechoslovakia’s becoming more and more a dependency of Germany, which in turn would not allow Hungary to seize as much of that country as she wanted, were too obvious to overlook. The German veto of Hungary’s planned occupation of the Carpatho-Ukraine on 20 November was soon followed by reports that the Czechoslovak government was considering adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact and would thereby enter the German orbit.!'® The first signs of a rapprochement between Germany and Romania were even more frightening for Budapest. It was certainly not entirely a coincidence that within days of the German veto and King Carol’s meeting with Hitler there was a major reorganization of the Hungarian government in which Istvan Csaky replaced Kalman de Kanya as foreign minister.'!? The new foreign minister was known for his pro-German sympathies, and he immediately developed further the policy of a closer relationship with Berlin which Kanya had found it expedient to adopt on the morrow of Germany’s veto.!”° Csdky was invited to Berlin to review the unfortunate way in which GermanHungarian relations had been developing in recent months, and he hastened to accept.'!

113. Marguerat, pp. 125-30. 114. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 264, 275, 279-81, 286, 287, 289; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 331, 343, 397; Hillgruber,

pp. 30-31. By this time the Romanians also realized that with the railway cut by Hungarian territorial gains, the Carpatho-Ukraine was no longer of such importance to them (cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 214). A rather different picture of Gafencu’s views in January 1939 is presented by A. Chanady and J. Jensen, “Germany,

2 Romania and the British Guarantees of March—Aptil, 1939,” Australian Journal of Politics and History, 16, No.

(Aug. 1970), 205.

" 115. G.D:, D5, No:.282: about British counter116. Ibid., Nos. 284, 293-95, 297, 298, 306. Note that the Germans became concerned

to Bucharest measures that might interfere with German predominance and thought of sending Wohlthat back before 15 March (ibid., No. 309). See also Marguerat, pp. 130-33; Chanady andJensen, pp. 206-7. had been an 117. Even in the area of supplying armaments the Germans were uncooperative, although this important factor in Hungarian reluctance to tisk wat (Macartney, 1:245). ww 118. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 68. 119. Roos, p. 379; Hoensch,

December, account of Ukraine to 120. Kanya

10 Ungarische Revisionismus, p. 230. For a short interim, from 28 Novembet to

and useful Prime Minister Béla Imrédy also held the portfolio of foreign minister. An extensive Carpathothe interaction of Hungarian internal affairs with the German veto of the invasion of the 1:305-17. Macartney, in is Kanya of replacement the and produce a change of government 1:241. had made a violent enemy of von Ribbentrop by his sharp comments; see Macartney,

244, 252, 255. 121. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 115, 119, 121; G.D., D, 5, Nos.

662

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Even before going to meet von Ribbentrop, Count Csaky pushed forward with the project already started under his predecessor for Hungary’s adherence to the AntiComintern Pact.!22 During December 1938 the Hungarian government coordinated its planned adhesion with Germany and Italy, and also decided at the urging of the Axis powers to leave the League of Nations.!% Difficulties about the German minority in Hungary continued,!%* but the Budapest government was obviously doing its utmost to fall in with German preferences.!*° The decision to join the Anti-Comintern Pact and leave the League would not turn out quite the way the Hungarians had calculated. They lost considerable sympathy in the West and they found themselves very much at odds with the Soviet government. The Russians decided to make a major issue of the adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact and retaliated by closing the Soviet legation in Budapest and the Hungarian legation in Moscow.'”° The precise motives for this policy—not extended to other signatories of the pact—are not known. Moscow may well have felt that the Hungarian action was inappropriate at the time the Soviets themselves were supporting Hungarian aspirations for the Carpatho-Ukraine,!?’ or they may well have meant the whole gesture as a warning to Poland under no circumstances to follow the Hungarian example. As it turned out, the

Budapest government was to discover that solidarity with the Axis was often a one-way street. The other parties to the Anti-Comintern Pact were unwilling to respond to Hungarian requests for demonstrative action in Moscow.!?8 They did not understand that Berlin’s view of the Anti-Comintern Pact was entirely different from Budapest’s, that Berlin was interested in its use against the Western Powers and had not the least desire for trouble with the Soviet Union. Only telegrams of congratulations would recompense Hungary when, like the puppet state of Manchukuo, she joined the Anti-Comintern Pact

formally on 22 February 1939.12 The troubles over Hungary’s acts of symbolic obeisance to Germany—joining the Anti-Comintern Pact and leaving the League—still lay in the future when the Hungarian foreign minister met Hitler and von Ribbentrop on 16 January.'3° Hitler complained at length about Hungary’s policy in the fall, insisting that it would have been so much better to have settled with Czechoslovakia then, once and for all. That opportunity had been lost because of Hungary’s reticence, but now new paths had to be found. Hitler was 122. On Kanya’s taking the decisive steps on 13 October before his replacement by Csaky, see Macartney, 1:288; for further offers to join the Anti-Comintern Pact during KAnya’s remaining time in office, see ibid., pp. 312-14. 123. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 47, 123, 131, 155 (French text in Adam, No. 33), 156, 166, 176, 184, 208; G.D., D, 4, No. 408; 5, Nos. 256, 258, 259, 265-69, 271, 283; Ciano, Diary, 19-20 December 1938, ps 209:

Macartney, 1:317-19; Thomas L. Sakmyster, “Army Officers and Foreign Policy in Interwar Hungary, 1918-— 41,” Journal ofContemporary History, 10, No. 1 (Jan. 1975), 30. 124. G.D., D, 5, No. 253; “Informationsberticht Nr. 89: Zur Lage des Deutschtums in Ungarn,” 17 December 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, ff.405—9; cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 305.

125. Note the explanation of Hungary’s policy provided to the Poles, who were skeptical about Hungary’s new reticence on the Carpatho-Ukraine, in Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 132.

126. Ibid., Nos. 177, 181, 194 (French text in Adam, No. 34), 202, 213, 222, 224, 231, 232, 236, 239, 248, 269, 285, 288, 306; 4, Nos. 61, 65, 67, 72. 127. Note Macartney, 1:292, n. 4, 322.

128. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 287, 293, 297, 298, 308, 312, 317, 329, 335, 336, 338, 339, 341, 342, 349, 368,

387; G.D., D, 4, No. 412; 5, No. 283. The Hungarians believed that German dependence on raw materials from

the U.S.S.R. was responsible for Berlin’s attitude (Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 369, 376). This was certainly an aspect of the impact of any severance of Germany’s relations with the Soviet Union that worried Berlin, see G.D., D, 4, No. 488; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 11, n. 37. ; 129. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 218, 344, 348, 350, 353-58, 361, 362. On the restoration of Soviet-Hungarian relations, see ibid., 4, Nos. 225, 236, 258, 410. 130. On the meeting, see ibid., 3, Nos. 212, 230; G.D., D, 5, Nos. 272 (Hitler-Csaky), 273, 278; Lipski Papers,

No. 132; Macartney, 1:319-21.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

663

willing to give the Hungarians another chance, but they would have to do things his way. As to what that might be, Hitler was specific on three things. First, Czechoslo vakia

would be made to disappear, second, this would be done through the joint actions of Germany, Hungary, and Poland—which he obviously still thought amenable to subordinating herself to Germany.'3! And finally Hitler gave Csaky the same view of timing he had given Ernst Neumann the preceding month, though in this case we have a fuller record of precisely what was said: “He had come to the conclusion that between Octobet and March nothing of a military sort could be carried out in Europe.” What was meant, although the Hungarian government did not understand it immediately, was that if Hungary worked closely with Germany at times and in ways determined by Berlin, she could expect a further share of the Czechoslovak booty. Once Budapest had decided to march to Berlin’s tune, she would have to make her moves conform precisely; the Germans were accustomed to a very exacting standard of drill, a point Hitler had tried to explain to his Magyar visitors by referring to the coordination of a soccer team as a model. This meant that all Hungarian efforts to speed up the process would be unavailing and in fact resented by Berlin.122 The Germans were also interested in restraining the Hungarians in their relations with Romania. Although the Magyars resented this, they were expected by Berlin and Rome to be at least civil to the country in which Germany was developing a greater stake.'5 It was also assumed that Magyar revisionist aspirations would not be turned on Yugoslavia, especially at a time when the future course of that country was in doubt after the fall of Stojadinovi¢.'54 Whatever the Hungarians thought of all this, and there are considerable signs of continued minor frictions between Germany and Hungary,!*5 having made their peace with Germany the Magyars had to stick to their new policy if they did not want Germany herself to take over the Carpatho-Ukraine and possibly much of Slovakia when Czechoslovakia disappeared. By the time Hitler was ready to move on the timetable he had mentioned earlier, he had given up on Poland, at least for the time being; but the Hungarians would finally receive their reward. And that reward would be doubly sweet. Not only were they instructed by the Germans on 13 March to match into the Carpatho-Ukraine,'%° but they could have the satisfaction of seizing the whole area without having to turn a bit of it over to the hated Romanians.!*” The first steps toward closer German ties with Romania and far more decisive 131. The comments Hitler and von Ribbentrop made separately to Csaky about Poland need not have been subjectively dishonest. Von Ribbentrop was less definite than Hitler, and both may well have thought that there was a teal possibility of agreement at least until von Ribbentrop’s trip to Warsaw ten days after Csaky’s visit to

Berlin, and possibly even after that. 132. For Hungary’s unsuccessful attempts to hasten the process, see Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 254, 268, 280, 294, 303, 313, 318, 340, 351, 366, 385, 388, 390 (French text in Adam, No. 36, erroneously dated May instead

of March), 401, 404 (French text in Adam, No. 37).

133. Ibid., Nos. 230, 245, 256, 259, 261, 264, 310, 311, 337, 367. 134. Ibid., Nos. 250, 252, 256, 259, 260, 262, 265, 266, 273, 275, 277, 337. 135. Ibid., Nos. 251, 257, 267, 333, 334; “Bestellungen aus det Pressekonferenz,” 22 February 1939, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £55. Note Horthy’s comments to the U.S. minister on 28 January, Mont-

gomery tel. 18, State 740.00/557. On German-Hungarian economic relations, see Forstmeier (ed.), p. 109.

the 136. See above, p. 648; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 414, 415, 427-30, 432, 435, 439, 440. For evidence that

Hungarian government was determined to move into the Carpatho-Ukraine as soon as Germany occupied Bohemia, with or without Berlin’s approval, see Macartney, 1:334, n. 7. I do not share Macartney’s reading of this evidence; had Hitler actually wanted to keep the Hungarians out of the Carpatho-Ukraine, he could easily have restrained them by threatening to reopen the question of the border between German and West Hungary. 481, 482, 137. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 426, 438, 442, 451-53, 459, 461, 466, 468, 471, 472, 474, 475, 477,

A critical issue was 485, 486, 493, 494; 4, Nos. 12, 26; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 2, 4, 6, 13, 29, 39; Macartney, 1:333—34,

Poland and the easternmost corner of the Carpatho-Ukraine with its segment of the railway connecting

is in B.D., 3d, 5, Romania as well as some villages with Romanian population; a summary of the developments

No. 28.

664

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

measures to bring Hungary back into Germany’s. good graces had been taken by the time Polish Foreign Minister Josef Beck stopped in Germany on his return to Warsaw from the Riviera. On 5 January he met with Hitler in the presence of von Ribbentrop and the two ambassadors, and on the following day had a conversation just with the German foreign minister.'38 Hitler reviewed the Czechoslovak crisis from his perspective, expressing regret over the way Chamberlain and Daladier had pushed him away from liquidating Czechoslovakia. He repeated his familiar complaints about the hesitations of the Hungarians, but asserted that Hungary as well as Poland and Germany would have to participate in the future destruction of Czechoslovakia. His lengthy discussion of the Carpatho-Ukrainian question shows his recognition of its importance to Poland. Here was patt of the bait for his proposed new settlement with Warsaw. The demands for Danzig and the route across the Corridor were put forward in the context of a German guarantee of Poland’s western border and special rights in Danzig as von Ribbentrop had put them in October, though Hitler left the question of the Anti-Comintern Pact for von Ribbentrop on the following day. On the Danzig issue Beck stressed the great difficulties of acceding to the German demand, but it is worth noting that he was far more definite

in rejecting any Polish adherence

to the Anti-Comintern

promised to consider the German

demands, and it was agreed that von Ribbentrop

Pact. Otherwise

he just

would come to Warsaw later that month. What conclusions were drawn by the Germans and Poles from these talks, and how were these hopes confirmed or refuted by von Ribbentrop’s visit to Warsaw? Hitler and von Ribbentrop were disappointed by Beck’s reluctance to place the future of his country at Germany’s mercy, but they do not appear to have given up all hope that Poland would yet give in. There was certainly greater doubt that agreement would be reached than earlier, but von Ribbentrop went to Warsaw still hopeful that a combination of kind words, tempting offers, and German pressure might produce an agreement along the lines Berlin wanted. The conversation in Warsaw apparently convinced him that friendly words would be of no avail. Only direct and vehement pressure could accomplish anything.'*° The change in Germany’s assessment and approach would be evident immediately after the conclusion of von Ribbentrop’s visit on 26 January. The German procedure in moving toward the destruction of Czechoslovakia in the six weeks from the beginning of February to 15 March shows that, on the basis of his own talks with Beck and now von Ribbentrop’s report on his experiences in Warsaw, Hitler had shifted his perception of Poland considerably. Although he had probably not yet given up all hope of drawing Poland into the German orbit, it was pressure, not compromise, that would now be the essence of German strategy. While Hungary would be allowed a share of the spoils in spite of her disappointing performance of the year before, Poland was rigidly excluded even though she had played a role Germany liked in 1938. There were two distinct facets to this procedure. Poland was not allowed to play a part or secure a share, and the early seizure of Moravsk4-Ostrava by the Germans was largely designed to preclude any last-minute effort by Poland to gain by the final dissolu138. On Beck’s talks in Germany, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 119-21; Polish White Book, Nos. 48, 49; Beck, pp. 182— 83; Cienciala, pp. 188-90; Szembek, pp. 404-8; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 200, 215, 221; Biddle Papers, pp. 43-45, 300-9; Biddle tel. 4 of January 1939, State 862.5016/2052; von Weizsacker to Consul General Danzig, tel. 239 of 9 January 1939, T-120, 1215/2371/D 496171. 139. On the Warsaw visit of 24-26 January 1939, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 122, 125, 126; Polish White Book, Nos.

50-56; Lipski Papers, No. 133; Szembek, pp. 411-17; Winship (U.S. chargé a.i. Warsaw) dispatches 912, 923,

930, of 20, 28 January, 3 February 1939, State 760c.62/439, 442, 445; Kuykendall dispatch 116 of 6 February 1939, State 860K.01/120; Biddle Papers, pp. 310-14; Cienciala, pp. 194-96; Kleist, pp. 19-23; §.U., No. 125; “Informationsbeticht Nr. 9,” 30 January 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34. Himmler visited Poland

in February 1939,

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

665

tion of Czechoslovakia. Furthermore, the insistence of the Germans on a military protectorate of Slovakia posed a direct and obvious threat to Poland, not unlike the way the German occupation of Austria had outflanked Czechoslovakia from the south in the pteceding year. When the Germans repeated their demands after 15 March, therefore, they thought themselves in a stronger position to exercise pressure, and though more hostile as well as doubtful, may still have had some hope that Poland would succumb to their demands peacefully.!40 Beck’s reaction was entirely different. The maintenance of Poland’s independence from foreign dictation was axiomatic with him, and he was therefore very much alarmed by the German demands. As long as these had been presented only by von Ribbentrop, there was always the possibility that in the face of a firm Polish stand the Germans would withdraw or modify them in order to pursue other aims, perhaps in the colonial field. Now that he had heard them from Hitler himself, von Ribbentrop’s insistence sounded even more ominous. The slight easing of Polish relations with the Soviet Union signalized by the Polish-Soviet declaration of 27 November had probably been in part a means of strengthening Poland’s independent position vis-a-vis Germany. There was, however, no way in which the Polish government of the time believed it could develop really close relations with the Soviet Union safely, partly for fear of Soviet ambitions, partly for fear of provoking a violent German response. Beck’s attempts to further his scheme for a Third Europe through a common border with Hungary and close ties with Italy should also be seen as part of his effort to counter German pressure and, he hoped, to contain German expansion. The Polish government’s increasingly disdainful attitude toward Hungary was surely a measure of Warsaw’s disappointment over the failure of this approach—a failure caused by Berlin rather than Budapest. After the January meetings, Beck still clung to this policy, but even a visit by Count Ciano to Warsaw could not breathe life into a project that was probably incapable of realization from the beginning, could only have worked with the participation of Czechoslovakia rather than on her ruins, and was certainly not capable of life once Germany attained a position of such power that she could direct the policies of Italy, to say nothing of the smaller countries of Southeast Europe.!*!

Two further lines of Polish policy in the face of Germany’s demands need to be noted. If it was impossible to develop Polish relations with the Soviet Union to the point where the latter could be a counterweight to Germany, there was at least the theoretical possibility of reviving the alliance with France that had suffered so in the Czechoslovak crisis. There was a similar theoretical possibility of interesting England in the fate of Poland, an idea that the role played by the British government in the Czechoslovak crisis suggested would be as important as it was problematical. The combination of reticence about informing France and Britain concerning the German demands and the soundings, especially in London, about closer relations in the face of a Germany mightier than ever and possibly threatening to everyone should be seen, in my view, as Beck’s way of securing Western support if Germany became too insistent. He did not wish the Western Powers to know of Germany’s demands, for fear partly of weakening the international position of Poland and partly of being pressured into conceding some of them. After all, 140. The Soviet government has published evidence that there was an expectation and even a hope in the German government that the Poles would reject the demands (5.U., No. 266), but the statements of Bruno Peter Kleist on the views of Hitler and von Ribbentrop to this effect are dated 2 May 1939 and may reflect subsequent reinterpretation. There is, in Kleist’s comments, also some confusion of the January and the March

sti A German-Polish exchanges. 141, On Beck’s continued attempts for his Third Europe scheme, see Cienciala, pp. 175-76. On Ciano’s visit to

pp. Warsaw, see his Diplomatic Papers, pp. 273-75; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 187, 283, 327, 345; Szembek,

424-25; Cienciala, p. 189.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War I

the proportion of Germans in Danzig was higher than the proportion of Poles in Tésin. But the longer a crisis in German-Polish relations was postponed, the more likely it was that Germany’s continued aggressive actions would either impinge directly on vital interests of the Western Powers or alarm them into a firm stand out of sheer fear of any further strengthening of Germany. In that context, Poland could be seen from London

and Paris as a useful counterweight to Germany rather than a burdensome and troublesome dependent. Here too was a reason to let the negotiations with Germany continue quietly; the longer they lasted, the more likely that German action would bring changes in Western attitudes, a speculation that would prove correct.'*? The plans for a trip by Beck to London developed in the winter, but it would take place under circumstances changed by the German action of 15 March.'# If Beck was working on securing support against Germany on the one hand, he was also trying to think of ways to work out some agreement with her on the other. If a permanent freezing of the status quo was not possible, was war the on/y alternative? Might there not be some way to provide a prestige success for Hitler that would assuage Poland’s powerful western neighbor without threatening Poland’s vital interests and,

above all, without simply opening the way for further German demands? No thought was ever given to any possible compromise on the German demand that Poland join the Anti-Comintern Pact since this was seen as a derogation of Polish independence in international affairs. The two other German demands, those on Corridor transit and Danzig, however, were in a different category.

Before the January meetings, Beck was considering some compromise on the route across the Corridor.'** He had also considered some new status for Danzig giving the Free City, and hence its National Socialist government, more rights of its own. After his

Januaty conversations with Hitler and von Ribbentrop, Beck appears to have been willing to go somewhat further. In mid-January he had his chef de cabinet, Michal Lubiénski, work out a scheme

for a German-Polish

condominium

in Danzig which

would leave its inhabitants the option of living under German rule while retaining Poland’s special rights in the area. Perhaps under the pressure of others in the Polish government opposed to the idea of concessions to Germany in Danzig, Beck directed that the project be dropped a few days later.'45 When von Ribbentrop was in Warsaw, therefore, no such proposals were discussed; instead, in the face of the German demand

for the annexation of Danzig and Poland’s reluctance to do more than consider the problem, the two foreign ministers merely agreed on a joint procedure to follow if the League withdrew from its role in the Free City. Beck had, however, not been absolutely negative. His statement that Poland “could not part with tangible rights in exchange for mere guarantees”’!*° could be read as a hint for a compromise as much as a rejection of German demands. It was certainly not as clear-cut a no as he gave to von Ribbentrop’s anti-Soviet schemes. After von Ribbentrop’s Warsaw visit, Beck considered still another possible way out 142. On Poland’s relations with France and England in the period November

1938—February 1939, see

Cienciala, pp. 168-206, passim; B.D., 3d, 3, chap. 9; Kennard to Sargent, 23 December 1938, C 27/27/55, FO 371/23129; Strang’s notes on B.D., 3d, 3, No. 531, in C 403/54/18, FO 371/23015; Wilson (Paris) tel. 94 of 16 January 1939, State 740.00/546; Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 173.

143. G.D., D, 5, Nos. 130, 140. 144. Szembek, Diary, 22 November, 6, 7 December 1938, pp. 380, 383, 385; Biddle Papers, p. 43. Although the

evidence is thin, there would appear to have been consideration of telief for German customs and transit payments, issues that had in prior years caused considerable difficulties. 145. The account in Cienciala, pp. 190-92, is based mainly on Lubienski’s account and correspondence with him. It may be noted that L. was very familiar with the technical details of the Danzig question, having previously served as chief of the section for Danzig of the Polish Foreign Ministry. 146. Szembek, 1 February 1939, p. 414.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

667

of the dilemma over Danzig. This time the idea was to partition the territory of the Free City with the town of Danzig itself and the eastern two-thirds of the area of the Free City being annexed to Hast Prussia, while the western projection of the territory into the Corridor would be annexed by Poland.!47 Beck may well have thought that he could secure the endorsement of his own government more easily to such a proposal than to the earlier one because it would open the way for the construction of a mote secure railway and possibly a canal to Gdynia entirely within Polish territory, widen the Corridor at its narrowest point, and secure for Poland the small rural Polish population of the Free City. The prospect of obtaining the city of Danzig itself along with most of the land area and population of the territory of the Free City as defined by the peace treaty might have looked attractive to the Germans, had they been seriously interested in a settlement negotiated freely by the two countries.'48 But nothing came of any of these considerations, because the German destruction of Czechoslovakia on 15 March showed all too

obviously what would happen to any country that yielded to Germany portions of its territory inhabited by Germans and allowed the Germans to construct extraterritorial routes across its territory. Under the impact of the German move, neither compromise project could be brought forward. The most obvious sign that all was not well in German-Polish relations was in the field that had been kept quiet during the preceding five years, that of minorities and

telated incidents. If the years of better German Polish relations had been characterized

by a deliberate effort to restrain the publicity, if not the reality, of nationality conflicts, the evidence of a new atmosphere was there now. The various incidents, troubles, and

negotiations ranging from arguments over Polish stamps to brawls about Danzig restaurant signs do not merit detailed examination here. What is important is that issues and emotions that had been repressed by government policy on both sides of the border were in February and March 1939 once again becoming the staple of diplomatic and publicistic controversy. The barometer pointed to storms ahead in public at the same time as secret negotiations were apparently leading to trouble.'*° In the preceding years, the broader policy concerns of the two countries had led them to push such daily irritants to the background. The next few weeks would determine whether that would happen again or whether the past procedure would be reversed with the minorities issue being inflamed rather than dampened to serve other goals. 147. I have discussed this project in a short article, “A Proposed Compromise over Danzig in 1939?” in Journal of Central European Affairs, 14, No. 4 (January 1955), 336-37. Now that the project prepared by Lubienski is known, it is almost certain that the discussion in the Szembek diary of 10 January 1939, pp. 407-8, belongs, as Cienciala believes, in the context of that proposal. This makes it most likely that Beck’s authorization for a partition plan to be prepared in the Polish Foreign Ministry came after von Ribbentrop’s visit. When U.S.

Ambassador Biddle reported on the partition plan on 7 July 1939, he referred to it as having “gained their [Beck and his associates] serious consideration before the Polish mobilization measures of March 21” (Biddle dispatch 1139 of 7 July 1939, State 760c.62/714). This report by the extremely well-informed Biddle also points to the period between von Ribbentrop’s journey and 15 March. 148. The report by von Moltke on a conversation with Beck on 13 or 14 March should, probably, be read in this context. Beck explained that in his forthcoming London trip he hoped to persuade the British that a vacuum in Danzig should be avoided and that the League should retain a role until Germany and Poland had

reached a bilateral agreement. Having just worked out with von Ribbentrop an interim procedure to covet the contingency of League withdrawal, Beck was obviously referring to some long-term solution of the Danzig question when he claimed to hope that an agreement that would do justice to the interests of both parties could

be reached (G.D., D, 5, No. 140). See also Ciano’s evaluation of Beck’s position on Danzig in Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 274. 149. On the minorities question and incidents early in 1939, see GD 10 MSaINos 1285 13151323134; 137; 6, No. 125; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 11, 14, 21, 27 February, 6 March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, ff.45, 47, 52, 60, 65; “Informationsbericht Nr. 15,” 27 February 1939, ibid., 101/34,

££.65-67. On 4 March 1939 the Polish general staff decided to prepare an operational “Plan West,” having had only a “Plan East” (Forstmeier [ed.], pp. 364-65).

668

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The discussion of German policy toward Czechoslovakia, Poland, and other parts of East and Southeast Europe after Munich has dealt primarily with the short-term aims and methods of German policy. The question that remains and that has only been touched on at certain points in the narrative is the one that asks, What were Hitler’s larger perspectives after Munich? With the initiative so clearly in his hands, what did he look forward to doing in the coming years? Austria had been annexed. Large parts of Czechoslovakia had been taken, and the rest of Bohemia and Moravia, Hitler was deter-

mined, should follow. But what of the future once Czechoslovakia had entirely disappeared as Hitler had always intended it should? One very important clue has already been touched on in the account of German relations with Poland. This was Germany’s insistence on Poland’s becoming a vassal of Germany, a fate which was to be practically demonstrated by the new territorial settlement proposed to the Poles in October and that was to be politically acknowledged by adherence to the Anti-Comintern Pact. That leads to the broader question of what Hitler hoped to do once Poland, as well as Hungary, had subordinated themselves to his will. Why, in particular, the insistence that

Hungary and Poland, both known to be vehemently anti-Communist—one of which was tuled by a regime that had come to power in violent reaction against a Communist regime and the other led by men who had come to the fore in a war against the Soviet Union—should formally adhere to the Anti-Comintern Pact with its vague denunciation of the Comintern and without any concrete and substantial obligations? It is hardly to be believed that Hitler or von Ribbentrop thought Horthy or Beck would be more antiCommunist after joining the pact than before. ; The answer to this puzzle will be found quite readily if it is recognized that for countries like Poland and Hungary (like Spain) joining the Anti-Comintern Pact was purely a formal gesture of political and diplomatic obeisance to Berlin, separating them from any other past or prospective international ties, and having nothing to do with the Soviet Union at all. This is not to say that Hitler had given up his ambition to seize vast portions of Soviet territory; he did indeed expect to do that, but he never looked upon it as a project in which Germany would need the help of all sorts of allies. When the time came, Germany would carry out that task by herself, though others might help if they were so inclined and would be rewarded by slices appropriate to their contribution. The focus of Hitler’s intermediate planning, between the immediate destruction of Czechoslovakia and the eventual seizure of huge portions of Russia as Lebensraum for German settlers, was aimed against the Western Powers. They had been trying to restrain his activities in Central Europe, and they might become really dangerous if he entered upon his great eastern venture without having settled with France and Britain first. When he did settle with them, he wanted to be able to concentrate all his forces in the west with-

out having to worry about trouble with Poland on his eastern border, and he therefore tried by persuasion and pressure to convert that country into a satellite. All they and the Hungarians had to do was to acknowledge the overlordship of Berlin, share in the Czechoslovak booty, and keep his eastern flank quiet while he dealt with the West.15° The subsequent fate of Poland and Hungary in this scheme of things was obviously 150. In this connection, the memorandum for military conversations with Italy that Keitel prepared on instruct-

tions from Hitler on 26 November 1938 and transmitted to von Ribbentrop is of considerable interest. Germany and Italy would fight in the west, crushing France first. The attitude of Hungary was expected to be favorable to the Axis while Poland and “the Balkans,” presumably meaning Yugoslavia and Romania, were

considered doubtful. One of the tasks expected of Italy was to help keep Germany’s eastern and southeastern flank quiet, if necessary by moving jointly with Hungarian forces against Poland (G.D., D, 6, No. 411; cf. S.U., No. 76). Von Ribbentrop explained to Canaris on 14 December that there would be a war with the Western

Powers after the disappearance (Ausschaltung) of Czechoslovakia and with the closest ties to Poland (Groscurth Diary, p. 159).

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

669

open—they might be totally subjugated or further rewarded. The options were endless, but once the Western Powers had been dealt with, they would be Germany’ s options, and there was no need to decide ahead of time. That the focus of Hitlet’s intentions beyond the immediate one of destroyin g Czechoslovakia was against the West is clear from a number of other actions taken and policies pursued by Germany after Munich. Because the successful effort to have Hungary and the unsuccessful one to have Poland join the Anti-Comintern Pact have just been reviewed, it may be best to turn first to the long and complicated negotiations by which Germany tried to have its existing Anti-Comintern Pact with Italy and Japan converted into a tripartite military alliance. The earlier stages of this effort have already been mentioned.'5! By August 1938 a deadlock had been reached in the negotiations, with the Japanese insisting on restricting the applicability of any new commitments to the Soviet Union while Germany wanted an alliance directed against all powers. This discrepancy remained after Munich, and here is an important clue to German policy aims. If the Germans wanted an alliance that promised them help against the Western Powers during the crisis over Czechoslovakia, why did they insist on this after the Munich settlement? In a way, Hitler had answered that question when he explained the need for a war

to defeat England and France to Mussolini when they met on the way to the Munich meeting.'°? It was thus as a part of his expectation of a showdown with Britain and France as the next project that Hitler wanted a tripartite military alliance even after the

Munich Conference; in fact von Ribbentrop handed one of a series of drafts of the proposed treaty to Count Ciano at the meeting itself.!5> Unlike Hungary and Poland, Italy and Japan were looked upon as active rather than passive associates in the confrontation with the Western Powers. While the Italians were still thinking about this project, von Ribbentrop was sent to Rome with a new draft treaty. Describing his proposal as a message for Mussolini from Hitler, von Ribbentrop invited himself to Rome by telephone on 23 October, the day before he asked Poland to join the Anti-Comintern Pact, and he discussed his new project in the Italian capital on 27 and 28 October.'°4 The lengthy conversations impressed Ciano with the conviction that Von Ribbentrop was absolutely determined on war. The German foreign minister told Mussolini that Hitler was certain there would be war with England and France in a few years and that it was now advisable to sign a tripartite alliance. The Japanese, he asserted, appeared to be willing, and opponents of an alliance in Tokyo might at any moment reverse that situation. Czechoslovakia was finished. Germany intended to continue good relations with Poland and to develop closer bonds with Yugoslavia, Romania, and Hungary. With Russia weak for many years, “all our energies can be directed against the Western Democracies.”!*> Although from the German point of view Italy was important to any war with France, the stress von Ribbentrop placed on the tripartite character of any agreement shows that Japan was considered critical for the coming war with England. Mussolini’s response was somewhat disappointing to the Germans. He agreed in

151. See above, pp. 427-31. 152. Anfuso, pp. 75-79; Ciano, Diary, 29-30 September 1938, p. 240. 153. Sommer, pp. 141-45; Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 41-44. These two accounts will be uped

heavily, and sources cited in them account—the English edition being from the Italian archives to which German archives. 154. Sommer, pp. 145-51; Toscano,

will generally not be referred to here. It should be noted that Toscano’s the last he revised before his death—is especially important for documents he had access and which contain far more on the negotiations than the ; Origins ofthe Pact ofSteel, pp. 46-70; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 242-46.

155. Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 244. The reference to Poland was not as dishonest as it sounds; von Ribben-

trop may well have expected Polish acceptance of the demands he had just presented.

670

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

principle that war with the Western Powers would indeed come; but he approved of an alliance only in principle, while arguing that the time for a formal signing had not yet attived. The arguments Mussolini advanced for postponement do not sound particularly convincing, and nothing changed in regard to any of them between late October 1938 and January 1939 when he reversed himself. Mussolini’s real reason for wanting to wait was presumably the desire to secure the immediate advantages of having the April agreement with England go into effect, something that was already clearly imminent and would be accomplished on 16 November 1938.1%° The Germans and Italians did agree to arbitrate jointly the territorial claim of Hungary against Czechoslovakia, and this led to the Vienna award of 2 November; but von Ribbentrop had to content himself for the

time being with agreement only on the idea of a military alliance, an alliance which, as Mussolini pointed out explicitly, would be an offensive one.

On returning to Berlin, von Oshima Hiroshi, who had just replacing Togo Shigenori, whose his transfer to Moscow. Like the

Ribbentrop handed the draft alliance to his old friend officially become Japanese ambassador to Germany, opposition to closer relations with Germany had led to newly appointed Japanese ambassador to Italy, Shiratori

Toshio,!>’? Oshima was an ardent believer in signing an alliance with the European Axis,

but he would find it impossible to secure even agreement in principle from his government in Tokyo. The Japanese government included advocates of an alliance with the Axis, but there was strong opposition, especially to the formulation that included the possibility of a war with England, something that was often seen in Japan as also including a possible war with the United States. As has been pointed out in the review of German-Japanese trelations in the summer

of 1938, there were those in the government who thought that

Japan had all she could handle in the never ending war in China. If there was any other possible enemy against whom help might be desired, it was Russia, not England. Though

eager to displace Britain’s great influence and economic interests in East Asia, particularly in China, these elements still opposed a drastic break with England. The alliance between the two island kingdoms had long since fallen in ruins, but there was a strong faction within the Tokyo government that saw only dangers and disadvantages in the complete rupture implied in a general alliance with Germany and Italy. In this attitude, they were supported by warnings and urgings from Britain as well as from the United States.'°* The fact that the British government, apparently from cryptographic intelligence or some other very good source, had quite accurate information on

the Japanese position in the negotiations was of considerable assistance to them in their efforts to strengthen by discreet urgings those in Japan opposed to the general military alliance.!5? On careful consideration, the British decided that such cautioning was all they

could do; there was no sense in trying to buy off Japan by concessions. The Japanese would work with Germany and Italy with or without an alliance if they thought it in their interests to do so, and they would break any alliance they might have if they did not wish to catty out its obligations. The Tokyo government would have to choose without any 156. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 404, 409; Ciano, Diary, 27 October 1938, p. 265; Harvey Diaries, 4, 5, 20 October, pp. 209-10, 214-15; Memorandum by Lord Halifax on the Anglo-Italian Agreement, 21 October 1938, R 8513/

23/22, FO 371/22414; D.D.F.,, 2d, 12, Nos. 15, 38, 180, 236, 271. 157. Shiratori did not, however, assume his position in Rome until the end of 1938. Note Ciano’s comment on

his predecessor, Hotta Masaaki, on his farewell visit of 21 October: “a fine face but as he is somewhat cool and

fearful, he does not fit into these new times. We were carrying on a policy of the Triangle [Rome-Berlin-

Tokyo], but he was always telling me stories about London” (Diary, p. 259).

158. Sommer, pp. 152-62; Drechsler, pp. 112-24. Note, esp., G.D., D, 1, No. 607; B.D., 3d, 8, Nos. 124, 473;

Hungarian Documents, 2, No. 547.

159. See B.D., 3d, 8, Nos. 254, 295, and the information from a most secret source Halifax gave the cabinet on 15 February 1939, C 2029/421/62, FO 371/22944.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

671

inducements from Great Britain to influence them,

For some time, the Tokyo authotities simply did not choose; that is, they debated what to do for several months, the key point holding up agreement being the extension ofthe applicability of the alliance to countries other than the Soviet Union. The Japanese did sign a cultural agreement with Germany on 25 November, the anniversary of the Anti-Comintern Pact; and von Ribbentrop took this as a harbinger of success for his tripartite project. There was, however, no favorable reaction to his draft pact from Tokyo which he might have used to hurry up the Italian government.!! The delay of the Japanese should have suited the Italians, if not the Germans, but at the turn of the year, Mussolini changed his mind. Instead of delay, he now suddenly wanted a quick agreement. The reversal of Mussolini’s attitude was almost certainly the result of developments in Italy’s relations with France. Although interested in securing the advantages of recognition of the Italian empire in East Africa by the implementation of the Anglo-Italian agreement of April 1938, Mussolini distinguished between England and France, his demands upon France being the more immediate. He therefore hardly welcomed the news that Germany, which was proposing a military alliance against England and France, was also planning a joint declaration with France analogous to that Hitler and Chamberlain had signed the day after the Munich Conference. At Italy’s request, certain changes were made in the planned German-French declaration, but although the Italians were kept informed about the project, they could hardly be expected to like it.1° What Mussolini does not appear to have realized for a while was that his alarm was completely unfounded. The German-French talks that produced the declaration of 6 December with von Ribbentrop traveling to Paris for the occasion was, from the point of view of the Germans, purely eyewash. If the French could be lulled into complacency and thereby restrained from a real effort at rearmament, that was all to the good; and Mussolini never quite grasped that in this respect German policy in reality fitted in very well with his own ambitions. Attentive to the propaganda effect, he saw it as crossing his hopes, and it took a few weeks for the Italian leader to recognize that what the Germans were telling both their own press and foreign diplomats was true, namely, that the ptomise to consult each other included in the declaration by France and Germany had no meaning or importance whatever for Germany. When Berlin said that there was no substance to the agreement, it really meant it.'°? As von Weizsacker had told the Italian 160. B.D., 3d, 8, Nos. 318 (comments in F 13894/71/23, FO 371/22181), 364, 433, 441. Ott was considering a

joint German-British mediation in the Sino-Japanese War, but both Berlin and London discouraged the idea; in addition to Sommer, p. 156, see Peck, No. 132.

161. Sommer, pp. 162-64, and esp. n. 63; German press conference of 24 November 1938, Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/10, f£.155-56. The internal Japanese discussions are well summarized in Morley, pp. 73-78. For German economic activity in East Asia at this time, especially the development of new trade arrangements with Manchukuo,

see Office of Military Government

for Germany

(U.S.), “Report on Deutsche

Bank,”

Exhibits 225—30. 162. A useful account in Walter Bussmann, “Hin deutsch-franzdsischer Verstandigungsversuch vom 6. Dezember 1938,” Nachrichten der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Gottingen, 1, Philologisch-Historische Klasse, 1953, No. 2. The German published documents are in G.D., D, 4, chap. 3; French documents in D.D.F., 2d, 12. See also Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 97; S.U., No. 82; “Informationsbericht Nr. 83,” 5 December 1938, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, ff.381—-83; Adamthwaite, pp. 284-94. 163. On the worthlessness of the agreement, see G.D., D, 4, Nos. 337, 343; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 78,” 24 November 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101 /33, f£.367—69 (“Einen tealpolitischen Wert

fiir die Internationale Lage hat nach hiesiger Auffassung dieser Vertrag ebensowenig wie der zwischen Chamberlain und Hitler”); Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 121; Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 152-60. Note Hitler’s comment to the new French ambassador, Coulondre on 21 November that the recovery of Alsace-Lorraine

P. would cost too much German blood (Robert Coulondre, Von Moskau nach Berlin [Bonn: Athenaum, 1950],

309), a form of casualty mathematics charactetistic of Hitler but hardly reassuring in its implications. What if the expected casualty statistics were to change?

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ambassador on 8 November, the thing that counted was the will to carry out a promise, and of this there was none; in the six weeks since the parallel Anglo-German declaration,

Germany had not to his knowledge paid any attention to it.!° As the second man in the German Foreign Ministry, this was one thing he was in a position to know. During November 1938 Italian-French relations deteriorated considerably. They had been fraught with tension before, in spite of the temporary rapprochement of 1935, but the situation became far worse as Mussolini turned toward his anti-French objectives. It was this turn, combined with the recognition that England could not be separated from France—a point reinforced by the Anglo-French meeting in Paris on 24 November— that made the Italians so anxious for general staff conversations with the Germans even while they delayed on the alliance project during November and December.!® The German response to this idea was not overly enthusiastic, partly because of doubts about the military value of Italy’s armed forces, and partly because the political situation was still unresolved. The rapid worsening of Italy’s relations with France would soon remove the latter obstacle. Most likely on instructions of Fascist party secretary Achille Starace, acting on a tip from Mussolini, at the conclusion of Ciano’s speech of 30 November in the Chamber of Fasces and Corporations the deputies began shouting in unison the specifics of Italy’s “national aspirations”: Tunis, Corsica, Nice, and Savoy.'%° The reaction of the French

government and public to this noisy demonstration was immediate and loud. The vast public uproar actually suggested to some that war was imminent—and the Germans for a while worried that Italy might drag them into war at a time of Rome’s rather than Berlin’s choosing. This fear was as unwarranted as Mussolini’s worry about the FrancoGerman declaration.’ Italy was no more about to start a real war than Germany was about to make a real peace with France; although Italy did indeed have demands on France, Mussolini was at that time thinking of making enough noise that the French would accept in quiet relief his planned coup against Albania.'©8 Mussolini did, however,

also come to the conclusion that a formal alliance with Germany and Japan would now be to Italy’s immediate advantage in her confrontation with France. When on 15 December he saw Oshima, whom von Ribbentrop had urged to go to Rome to advocate the tripartite alliance, Mussolini stated that his decision to go ahead with the pact would

come between the middle of January and the middle of February, a very substantial change from the indefinite time he had mentioned to von Ribbentrop less than two months before.!® In the latter part of December, Mussolini decided to speed up the process; the more he thought about it, the better he liked it. On 23 December he told Ciano that he had decided to accept von Ribbentrop’s proposal, and on 1 January he instructed Ciano to inform the Germans that Italy wanted to sign the tripartite alliance during January 1939.1 The developing tension with France and the accompanying Italian public hostility toward that country were probably the main factors in this speeding up of the 164. G.D., D, 4, No. 349. 165. A good account of this is in Toscano, Origins ofthe Pact of Steel, pp. 78-85. See Mack Smith, pp. 134-36; D.D.F., 2d, 12; Adamthwaite, pp. 255-58. There was also a German-Italian cultural agreement signed on 22 November 1938. 166. Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 86, 89-96. German press directives of 1, 2, 6, 10 December 1938,

Bundesarchiv, Traub, Z.Sg. 110/10, ff.177, 183, 192, 210; Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 125; B.D., 3d, 3, Nos.

461, 462, 464, 465. 167. Toscano (p. 96) correctly points out that German worries about Italy rushing into war were greater “than Rome ever imagined.” See also Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 330.

168. Ciano, Diary, 3 December 1938, pp. 291-92.

169. Ibid., 15, 16 December 1938, pp. 196-98. 170. Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 101-8; Sommer, pp. 165-69; Weizsacker-Papiere, p. 149.

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timetable. 17! The Germans were delighted by this piece of good news, and von Ribbentrop promised to get Japanese approval in time for a big signatur e ceremony in Berlin at the end of the month. With a text agreed on by Germany and Italy and with the Japanese ambassadors in Berlin and Rome enthusiastic about the alliance, all looked ready. But these appearances were deceiving. The Japanese government would come to a favorable conclusion in January 1939 no more than it had in the preceding two months. In lengthy internal debates, diplomatic circumlocutions, a conference of Japanese representatives in Europe, and the sending of a special diplomatic mission from Japan to Europe, the Japanese evaded saying yes to the German-Italian proposal.!72 The critical point, now as before and for the whole spring and summer of 1939, was

that the Japanese were willing to participate in new commitments as long as these were restricted in their applicability to the Soviet Union and to no other power; Germany and Italy, however, were interested in precisely the reverse. The succeeding drafts proposed by Berlin and Rome gradually removed previous references to the Comintern and other language suggesting that the pact was directed against Russia, and instead stressed the comprehensive nature of the obligations to be assumed. Conversely, the drafts discussed by the Tokyo cabinet stressed the primacy of hostility to Russia and allowed for the alliance to be directed against other countries only if these were acting jointly with Russia or had themselves turned communist. Von Ribbentrop long remained optimistic about the chances of his scheme. He was encouraged in this by Oshima, while Shiratori, though personally an advocate of signing, was mote realistic in his assessment of the

situation in Tokyo and hence more accurate in his expressions to the Italian government. There was some hope that by delaying a frank communication to the German government of the attitude in Tokyo, there would be an opportunity for the elements in the Japanese government who favored the alliance directed as much against England and France—and by implication the United States—as against the Soviet Union to win out in the agonizing debate. Although a variety of formulas was tried, none could be found that reconciled the incompatible. Since the advocates of a general alliance could not get their way, especially in the face of the emperor’s siding with those opposed to it,'” the German and Italian governments became increasingly convinced that agreement on a tripartite alliance was at least for the time being impossible.!” The turn toward a bilateral German-Italian alliance in view of the failure of tripartite negotiations would not come until after 15 March and will, therefore, be discussed in the

next chapter. Two aspects of the German-Italian negotiations, however, must be examined at this point because they provide considerable insight into the policies of both countries, especially of Germany, in the winter of 1938-39. The first of these is an implicit but highly revealing aspect of the tripartite negotiations. If the Germans and Italians had at any time been willing to settle for an agreement directed against Russia, they would have secured the immediate and enthusiastic participation of Japan. The fact that the two Axis powers were willing to let the negotiations drag on and eventually fail over their insistence on a treaty whose provisions were also directed against the Western Powers surely illuminates the priorities of Berlin and Rome during those months. It is in 171. Mussolini had repeatedly emphasized the negative attitude of many Italians as an obstacle to a formal alliance with Germany; he may well have believed that such objections would be muted if the alliance were signed at a time of obvious tension between Italy and France. 172. Accounts in Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 116-66; Sommer, pp. 171-92; Morley, pp. 78-90, 273— 82; see also Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 326.

;

173. Okata Tokushiro’s reading of the evidence in Morley, pp. 85-87, appears to me to be conclusive on this

, point. 174. As in late 1938, the British and Americans again urged Japan not to burn her bridges to the West; see B.D.,

3d, 8, Nos. 467, 479, 488, 491, 501, 519, 523, 526, 536, 543; 9, Nos. 20, 24; U.S., Japan, 2:161—-63.

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this regard that the tripartite pact negotiations must be seen in the same context as the German insistence that Poland and Hungary join the Anti-Comintern Pact; as German satellites, those two countries would keep Germany’s eastern flank quiet while Germany in alliance with Italy and Japan fought the Western Powers.! By 15 March, neither of these schemes had much prospect of success: Poland had declined to join the AntiComintern Pact, and the Japanese were unwilling to face war with the West. On neither of these projects, however, had the German government given up all hope of success; and the new decisions required by Berlin’s recognition of these failures were therefore not taken until after 15 March.!76 The other aspect that should be noted is that as the Italians agreed to align themselves militarily with Germany, they raised some practical problems in the relationship between the two countries which they hoped to have settled in the framework of their new partnership status. There were problems in regard to the foreign exchange that Italy was required to pay for a small proportion of her imports from Germany, the balance being settled in a clearing account. Italy was desperately short of foreign exchange and wanted the requirement dropped, but Germany was in about the same situation and did not feel it could do without what Italy was obliged to provide. Both Hitler and Mussolini became involved personally in the decisions made in this controversy, which was eventually resolved by a compromise, but which showed that a desire for closer relations did not automatically solve all problems.!”” The other question was the old one of South Tyrol. The Germans had expressed a willingness to accept a mass transfer of the South Tyrol inhabitants who thought of themselves as Germans; but it had hardly been appropriate to develop and implement plans to accomplish such a transfer of population at a time when the presence of a similar element, larger but better treated, within Czechoslovakia

was

to provide the

political excuse for the destruction of that country. Discussion of the South Tyrol issue had, therefore, been muted in the summer and early fall of 1938. Appropriately, Hitler himself appears to have raised the issue again with the Italians at the Munich Conference,

which ended the cause of go ahead with the alliance thought it best to take up persons in South Tyrol citizenship.

earlier diffidence. When subsequently the Italians decided to project von Ribbentrop had suggested, they simultaneously this question with the Germans, especially in regard to those who held German (or had until recently held Austrian)

Von Ribbentrop, who was obdurate on the foreign exchange question, was certainly

willing to be accommodating on this matter. He could repeat Hitler’s decision that there could be no South Tyrol question between Italy and Germany. Many South Tyroleans could be quietly transferred to Germany right away, though a total transfer would have to await Germany’s acquisition of appropriate living space for them. Since Hitler and von Ribbentrop, at any rate, did not expect this contingency to be far off, the problem did not look particularly difficult to them. As for some small-scale immediate transfers, the Germans could and did begin on that promptly.'”8 The Berlin government found it easier to make concessions to their Italian ally when mere people, not hard cash, were the subject of discussion. By late February and early March 1939, Germany and Italy were moving toward a 175. Note Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 272, 371.

176. Toscano (p. 124) appears to me to have turned this around when he argues that Poland’s refusal thwarted the anti-Soviet plans of Germany at that time. Had German policy been directed against the Soviet Union in the winter of 1938-39, why let the negotiations with Japan fail when that country was more than willing to go along with such a policy? 177. Documents on this issue may be found in G.D., D, 4, chap. 4. 178. Ibid., Nos. 427, 444; Toscano, Ongins ofthe Pact ofSteel, pp. 109-10, 117, 119; Latour, pp. 28-30.

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general alliance with each other. On Italy’s side the major motivating factors were the claims against France and the decision to move to the seizure of Albania, probably early inApril!” On the German side, it was the expectation of war with the Western Powers. Either with or without such a war, Hitler expected the return of Germany ’s prewar colonial empire. But this was to be a return free of conditions, restrictions, or German diplomatic concessions; and the soundings from the West in this regard were all waved aside.'®° On 25 January 1939 Hitler would phrase this attitude in terms appropriate to his listener by telling the Italian fascist leader Roberto Farinacci that he would not loosen Germany’s ties to Italy in return for the colonies.!8! He simply expected to get them back, and the desultory preliminary preparations for colonies made earlier in 1938 were teplaced by far more precise and determined planning in the winter of 1938—39.182 The details of colonial preparations reveal little about German foreign policy at this time, but the general decisions Hitler made and communicated to the agencies and individuals involved certainly reflect both his general concern with the whole question and his attitude toward relations with the West. By early December 1938 Hitler had decided that Germany would demand all her colonies back, that he would offer no compensation in any form, and that he expected to organize a state colonial office out of the National Socialist party’s Colonial Policy Office.'® In view of the negotiations with Japan for a tripartite military alliance, the Pacific portion of the former German colonial empire was quickly excluded from the discussion, and it was assumed that Germany would insist on the return only of her African colonies.'** On 13 February, Hitler told the head of the party’s Colonial Policy Office that his agency would have charge of Germany’s colonies; and in subsequent weeks he laid down some basic guidelines that Franz Ritter von Epp was to follow in preparing the administration of Germany’s restored colonial empire.'85 This was one field of endeavor in which Hitler believed there would be no change of direction after 15 March 1939; Germany was to go ahead with her plans.!8¢ Not long after strict directives were issued that the term “South Tyrol” was to disappear from German maps and publications,'*’ instructions also went out that the German colonies

179. Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 127-31; for Italian interest in prompt staff talks with the Germans, see ibid., pp. 162-65. 180. Although not as significant as the publicity attendant upon it might lead one to believe, the approach of South African minister Oswald Pirow belongs in this context. On Pirow’s trip and Hitler’s rejection of the conditions attached to the Pirow proposals, see Wiener Library Bulletin, 12, Nos. 5—6 (1958), 53; G.D., D, 4, Nos.

268, 270-72; C 14063/84/18, FO 371/21683; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 217, 294, 295, 324, 411; Gilbert (Berlin) tel. 758 of 28 December 1938, State 741.62/325; Oswald Pirow comments on 16 November 1951, Munich, Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, ZS 283; and the document cited in n. 183, below. Note also the account of the Hitler-Karl Haushofer conversation of November referred to in James Douglas-Hamilton, Motive for a Mission (New York: St. Martin’s, 1971), p. 84 (the same meeting as that mentioned in G.D., D, 5, No. 99, cited in n. 81,

above). 181. . the letter of Farinacci to Ciano of 25 January 1939 cited in Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, p. 122, n. 102. On this day Hitler also met with the leadership of the National Socialist party (“Daten aus alten Notizbiichetn,” p. 37); in the evening the leaders of the army, navy, and air force were shown the new chancellery (Domatus, 2:1045). 182. See Weinberg, “German Colonial Plans and Policies,” pp. 464-68; Hildebrand, pp. 594-98. Cf. D.D.B., 4, No. 42. 183. Memorandum of 6 December 1938 on a conference in the OKW, Wehrwirtschafts- und Rustungsamt, T-

Ait 77, 642/1838570-72. 184. See the report on a conference in the Naval High Command on 25 January 1939, ibid., frame 1838549,

and “Bericht 1 iiber den Stand det kolonialen Vorarbeiten,” 27 January 1939, ibid., frames 1838561—64.

185. Details in Weinberg, “Colonial Plans and Policies,” pp. 466-68. See also Joel C. Hudson (U.S. consul

Berlin), Report 1268, “German Colonial Questions,” 21 March 1939, State 862.014/456. 186. “Bericht 3 tiber den Stand der kolonialen Vorarbeiten,” 18 April 1939, T-77, 642/ 183857778. 187. G.D., D, 4, No. 453; “Informationsbericht Nr. 18,” 3 March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34,

£.83.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

should henceforth be referred to as such—no longer as “former” colonies.'*8 Hitler certainly did not expect that crushing France and humbling England would require no effort on Germany’s part. By the diplomatic moves just reviewed he hoped to strengthen Germany’s position substantially, but as in the past he depended primarily on Germany’s own atmed might.'8° At the very time in October 1938 that the mobilization of the German army for an attack against Czechoslovakia was being reversed, Hitler ordered a new program to build up the German air force for use against England.'°° Originally scheduled as a fivefold increase, this enormous program had to be scaled down in practice even while it was being nominally affirmed, but the general thrust was clear: Munich was not an end to the danger of war but the prelude to hostilities with the Western Powers.'9! The strategic planning of the German air force during the winter of 1938-39 was accordingly directed toward plans for war against England,!°? and the National Defense Council (Reichsverteidigungsrat) created in 1933 held its first meeting on 18 November 1938 to hear Goring hold forth on the need for Germany to build up her armaments.!%3 The German navy, like the air force, was ordered to speed up its construction pro-

gram. On 1 November Hitler told Raeder to move the construction program forward as rapidly as possible,!°* and during the subsequent weeks a whole new program was developed. With Hitler pushing for the maximum possible naval program, what came to be known as the “Z-Plan” was prepared and then approved on 17 January 1939.!% It was understood, of course, that it would take several years for the larger ships provided by the Z-Plan to be completed, but Hitler was at this time thinking of a war against the

West that was still some time off. To make sure that within the tight limits of Germany’s resources the navy could be made ready in the shortest possible time, the new construction program was given priority over all other projects, including those of the army and ait force, by a special decree issued by Hitler on 27 January.'°° On the same day, naval aviation was turned over to the jurisdiction of the German air force; this and the decision to concentrate on the construction of battleships to the exclusion of aircraft carriers were the price the German navy had to pay to Goring for its priority position. These two concessions would make it essential for the German air force to participate in any war against England by attacks on English shipping as well as on land targets. The navy’s ZPlan would be only barely initiated in the few months remaining before the outbreak of wat, but it shows the real thrust of Hitler’s policy in the period after his promise to Chamberlain that the Anglo-German Naval Treaty along with the Munich agreement would set the tone for Germany’s future relations with England.!%” 188. Instructions of 24 April 1939 in T-77, 642/1838555.

189. Von Ribbentrop’s summary of Hitlet’s opinions on this subject is recorded in Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 243. 190. See the record of Géring’s conference of 14 October 1938, TMWC, 27:160—64; cf. Irving, Mik, p. 67.

191. The details can be followed in Homze, pp. 222-27. 192. See ibid., pp. 242-44; TMWC, 35:562-63; Karl Gundelach, “Gedanken tiber die Fihrung eines Luftkrieges gegen England bei der Luftflotte 2 in den Jahren 1938/1939,” Webrwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 10 (1960), 33—46.

The appointment of Hans Jeschonnek as chief of staff of the Luftwaffe as of 1 February 1939 was GGring’s way of assuring compliance with Hitler’s wishes for rapid expansion; the ambitious young general was a devoted supporter of Hitler and any and all inspirations of the Fiihrer (see Homze, pp. 235-37). As it became obvious that the Luftwaffe was failing, he would commit suicide on 18/19 August 1943.

193. TMWC, 32:411-15. 194, Ibid., 35:567; Diilffer, p. 492. 195. The best summary is in Diilffer, pp. 492-501; the full text of the navy’s 25 October 1938 memorandum on a naval war with England is in Salewski, 3:27—63. See also Thiess, pp. 130-31, 187. 196. Differ, p. 502; G.D., D, 7:556.

197. For the problems relating to the Z-Plan until 1 September 1939, see Diilffer, pp. 503ff. This book also contains a discussion of the last Anglo-German naval discussions. For an example of the interrelations of the

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

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If oh expansion programs seemed appropriate for the Getman navy and air force in Hitler’s eyes, the army was expected to continue to grow along previousl y established lines.1°8 The main concern of the Fiihrer in regard to this branch of the armed forces was its loyalty and absolute obedience to his commands and inspiration. A series of generals who had been particularly outspoken in their criticism of the military risks Germany ran in the Czechoslovak crisis were retired from duty, and the others were overawed , lectured to, and generally argued into line.!99 With von Brauchitsch more subsetvient

than ever and Halder willing to go along, Hitler could feel confident that there would be no repetition of the doubts and hesitations he had contended with in the summer of 1938. The quiet acceptance by the army of the barbaric events in Germany on 9 and 10 November attested to a moral bankruptcy already revealed after 30 June 1934. Hitler, naturally enough, preferred enthusiasm to acquiescence, and he personally undertook an effort to generate that. In a series of talks to selected officers, he tried to show how Germany’s strong racial core gave it greater strength than any of its potential enemies, even including the United States. As the first of the operations Hitler expected to carry out in 1939 approached, he lectured the higher officers of the army on 10 February 1939 on the need for their absolute obedience and total devotion in a state that he expected to lead into war with England and France.20 In view of the reaction of the German public to the obvious danger of war at the height of the crisis at the end of September and their enthusiastic applause for Chamberlain and Daladier who seemed to them to be peacemakers, Hitler was especially concerned about getting the German public into a more bellicose mood.°! Always very much interested in the issue of home-front morale, he set about ways to correct what appeared to him to be a major deficiency in Germany’s preparations for war. Hitler’s vehement speeches denouncing England right after Munich, which will be discussed subsequently, were probably a part of his campaign to prepare the German public for the paths along which he planned to lead them; but his main emphasis in the weeks after

Munich was on a press campaign. On 20 October the German press was instructed to stress the need for increases in armaments in order to raise the war willingness of the population.” On 10 November, Hitler personally spoke at length to several hundred German journalists. A few hours after authorizing the great pogrom, Hitler reviewed his tactics in 1938 for the journalists, attacked the critics of his policies, and called for greater efforts in the future.?% The central points in Hitler’s speech were clearly a general disregard of any and all navy’s priority and other programs, in this case that of antiaircraft guns, see Homze, p. 229. 198. There was some experimentation on the seized Czechoslovak fortifications as a sample of how to break through the Maginot Line. 199. Miiller, pp. 381-87. 200. Ibid., p. 383. There is a full account of the speech in Jochen Thies, Architekt der Weltherrschaft (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1976), pp. 79-80, 112-18. Other speeches of a similar nature by Hitler early in 1939 are discussed, ibid., pp. 119-20. Goring also spoke to a group of high army officers about this time. 201. For the continuation of this attitude, see Gilbert report 480 of 5 December 1938, State 862.00/3806. 202. “Informationsbericht Nr. 71,” 20 October 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £.319.

203. The text of a recording has been edited by Wilhelm Treue, “Rede Hitlers vor der deutschen Presse (10. November 1938),” Vierteliahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 6, No. 2 (April 1958), 175-91. Dertinger, who was one of those present, prepared a report which is in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, ff.357-61, to which he teferred in his “Informationsbericht Nr. 49,” of 16 May 1939, ibid., 101/34, £251. Note also Dertinger’s

postwar comments in Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, ZS 870. A report based on information given the Times correspondent in Germany was sent to the Foreign Office by the British chargé in Berlin, Sir George Ogilvie-Forbes, on 18 November

1938 (C 14136/42/18,

FO 371/

21658); a more detailed report by one of the correspondents present, Count von Toggenburg, was given to an

official in the Foreign Office on 23 November (C 14476/1941/18, FO 371/21746). Together with a secret service report on the speech, these documents were sent to Chamberlain.

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prospects for international peace and the need to have the press work hard to bring the public solidly behind the regime in any future war, regardless of the purposes of such a war and any possible setbacks in it. The very fact that in the early years of his rule Hitler had felt obliged to stress the peaceful nature of German policy he now cited as a reason for the press to redouble its efforts. The propaganda campaign in the press would have the double task of correcting any temporary illusions of peace growing out of the recent peaceful settlement of a major dispute as well as removing any still lingering effects at home of those assertions of peaceful intent that Hitler had once used to lull suspicion abroad. Here was the domestic propaganda program preparing the public to call for war and accept its sacrifices at the same time as the military and diplomatic preparations were also under way." It is only when this range of preparations and policies is looked at as a whole that one can deduce from Hitler’s actions in a great variety of foreign and domestic fields some understanding of his determination to move forward in 1939. Reports of Hitler’s speech of 10 November soon reached the government in London? and presumably other governments as well, not a surprising development since hundreds were present and no one was pledged to secrecy. What had been the British and French reaction to the European developments after Munich? Chamberlain saw the reports on Hitler’s comments

at the end of November

1938; by that time the

hope for peace raised by the Munich agreement had already largely evaporated. In the days immediately after the Munich Conference, the sense of relief over the avoidance of wat mingled in England with several other strains of thought. There was a feeling of shame over the treatment of Czechoslovakia, over its sacrifice to the fear of war.206 There was considerable sentiment for a more vigorous program of rearmament to make up the deficiencies revealed in the crisis and assure a stronger position for England in any future crisis caused by Germany.”°’ Many of those who had not been supporters of rearmament earlier now changed their position wholly or in part.2°8 The record shows Lord Halifax as especially insistent on building up England’s armed forces.2°° A related factor was the concern over French weakness, especially in the air; and the London government did what it could to spur the French to remedy a grave deficiency of which the French were themselves very conscious indeed.210 Another area in which the British government hoped to shore up its defenses was the diplomatic-economic one. As early as the summer of 1938, as a result of the German annexation of Austria, some consideration had been given by London to the problem of assisting the countries of Southeast Europe to maintain their independence of Germany by new trade procedures that might offer them alternative markets for those products

204. The speech of Heinrich Himmler to SS officers on 8 November with its wild anti-Semitism and insistence on the common aims of Germany and Italy fits in here; see Bradley F. Smith and Agnes F. Peterson (eds.), Heinrich Himmler: Gebeimreden 1933 bis 1945 (Frankfurt/M: Propylden, 1974), pp. 25-49. 205. See n. 203, above.

206. For a similar reaction in Australia, see Andrews, pp. 149ff. A very interesting and positive evaluation from the Canadian side is in Documents on Canadian External Relations, 6, No. 903.

207. Pownall Diary, 3 October 1938ff., pp. 164ff.; Cabinet 48 (38) of 3 October 1938, C 11611/540/62, FO

371/21633; C 13298/429/62, FO 371/21632; C 12505, C 12571/1425/18, FO 371/21710; Ironside Diary, 2 November 1938, p. 70. The appointment of Sir John Anderson as lord privy seal with special responsibility for ait raid precautions (ARP) on 1 November 1938 belongs in this context (Wheeler-Bennet, Sir John Anderson, pp. 211-15). 208. The Labor party finally dropped its opposition to rearmament, though they would remain opposed to conscription. On Lord Lothian’s views, see Butler, Lord Lothian, p. 226.

5

209. This is evident from the cabinet and the Committee on Foreign Policy minutes and Lord Halifax’s pushing for a national register and then conscription in the winter of 1938-39. See CAB 27/624; Gibbs, pp. 510-11.

210. French air rearmament after Munich is discussed below; on British urging of such French steps, see C

11641/55/17, FO 371/21600.

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that Germany was accepting as part of her effort to dominate the atea.2!! After Munich, measures of this kind seemed more urgent than ever. Although it was recognize d that to some extent the complementary trade relations between Germany and the countries of Southeast Europe were natural, and that the possibilities open to England were relatively limited, there were some steps that could and should be taken. If Britain did nothing, these countries would have little choice but to enter the German orbit. As one memorandum on the effects of Munich on Southeast Europe put it, “the immutability of public taste” could no longer be brought forward as a reason for not buying Greek tobacco; English smokers would just have to develop a taste for it.2!2 In this and other telated matters, the British government attempted to assist the countries of Southeast Europe in maintaining an economic independence of Germany.2!3 Without going into great detail, however, it would be fair to say that only in the cases of Romania, Greece, and Turkey

did these measures attain any real measure of success.2!4 The push for rearmament and the effort to counter German economic domination

of Southeast Europe were not, however, the only, and at first certainly not the most,

important reaction to Munich in the British government.2!5 There was considerable hope that the agreement reached at Munich and the Anglo-German Declaration signed the day after might open up a new era in which there would in fact be better relations between England and Germany. If Hitler’s last territorial demand in Europe had been met, there was perhaps an opportunity to reopen the conversations looking toward a general European settlement that had been broken off after the Hitler-Henderson meeting of 3 March 1938, at which Hitler had ignored the British approach suggesting colonial concessions in return for the maintenance of the political status quo in Central and Eastern Europe. The annexation of Austria had put a halt to conversations about an Anglo-German settlement, and the hopeful sign that some in London thought they had seen in the conversation with Wiedemann had turned out to be a mirage. Now, in the aftermath of Munich, optimism revived, and Chamberlain himself was

one of those most determined not to allow to slip by what might be a real opportunity. From a perspective of several decades, one has only to think of the moves toward a lessening of tensions after the Cuban Missile Crisis to see how the averting of war can lead those on the brink in other directions; the English government of 1938 could look back to the Dogger Bank incident of 1904, which had brought England face to face with

wat with Russia and from which those two long-term antagonists had moved toward an entente. Within the British government, the possibility of a new approach to Germany was studied with care in the aftermath of the Czechoslovak crisis.?!° Since the colonial 211. C 2777/1941/18, FO 371/21715 (commentary on B.D., 3d, 1, No. 121); R 5338, R 5362/94/67, FO 371/22342. 212. Nicholls to Mallet, 24 October 1938, C 12915/772/18, FO 371/21705. For other documents on British

efforts to support Greece by taking part of the Greek tobacco crop, see R 8368, R 8384, R 9728/361/19, FO 371 /22363; 33d meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 21 November 1938, CAB 27/624. FO 371/21704; C 13864, C 13865/772/18, FO 371/21705; R 8044, R 8690/94/67, FO 213. C 14616/541/18, 371/22344; R 9045/94/67, FO 371/22345. See also R 8921/626/21, FO 371/22380; 37th meeting of the

cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 8 February 1939, CAB 27/624; Cadogan Diary, 17 and 18 October 1938,

sual sa On British efforts to compete with Germany in regard to Turkish trade credits, see G.D., D, 5, Nos. 552, 553; E 555/9/44, FO 371/23283; E 1177/43/44, FO 371/23284. For the British economic counteroffensive

in Romania and its successes at this time, see Marguerat, pp. 103-19. 215. There was some discussion of a reorganization of the cabinet, which Lord Halifax urged but Chamberlain

would not agree to. 7 216. Note the 15 December 1938 internal Foreign Office explanation of a letter of 5 October on the censor-

ship of anti-Nazi plays: “As we then hoped that, as a result of the Munich Agreement, we were entering upon

an eta of more friendly relations with Germany, and as we had in mind the possibility of getting the German Government to co-operate in facilitating the emigration of Jews, we were particularly anxious not to cause

680

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

issue had been brought up by the British themselves on 3 March, and since it was believed to be one of the few, if not the only, issue actually outstanding between London and Berlin, the earlier British ideas on this subject were reviewed to consider the possibility of perhaps reopening the question and discussing it with Germany.7”” These hopes and expectations were quickly and thoroughly dashed by Berlin. In response to the reports from the German embassy in London on British desires for better relations with Germany, State Secretary von Weizsacker explained that there was absolutely no interest in any such ideas in Berlin, where all plans and projects were moving in an exactly opposite direction.?!§ While von Weizsaicker was quietly discouraging, Hitler was positively violent in public. A vehement anti-British speech at Saarbriicken on 8 October set the theme for a continuing anti-British tone in the German press and in the speeches of other German leaders.!? This campaign certainly had its effects in England, and any hopes which survived that barrage were eliminated by the impact of the anti-Jewish pogrom of November.” German persecution of the Jews had affected the tone of Anglo-German

relations in the past, but there had been a

countervailing force in the argument that such behavior on the part of Germany might be in part a reaction to the troubles Germany had suffered as a result of war, defeat, a hard peace treaty, and the depression. The fact that the most violent persecution followed Germany’s greatest diplomatic triumph gave the lie to all such excuses, and the remnants of pro-German sympathies in England burned up in the flames and smoke that destroyed the synagogues in Germany.”?! Before the turn of British policy away from consideration of a general settlement with Germany and the implications of this turn are examined in detail, it might be best to review briefly the role of the November pogrom in the evolution of policy in the United States, the one other major power where the government and public were definitively turned against the Third Reich by that conspicuous sign of a reversion to barbarism. The relations of Germany with the United States had continued to be rather poor during 1938. The American public was alarmed by the antics of the German-American Bund, and the American government was concerned about the signs of German ageression in Europe.” There were, ‘furthermore, a number of minor issues in dispute between the two countries, ranging from American refusal to sell the Germans helium for their dirigibles to the German refusal to continue payments on the Austrian debts to

unnecessary harm in our relations with Germany.” C 15573/528/18, FO 371/21701. The general situation is reviewed in Donald Lammers, “From Whitehall after Munich: The Foreign Office and the Future Course of British Policy,” Historical Journal, 16, No. 4 (Dec. 1973), 831-56. See also D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 41, 88, 219, 226,

280. 217. C 14471/42/18, FO 371/21659; introductory notes to the memorandum

on the colonial problem in C

1305/184/18, FO 371/21679; C 13430, C 13657/184/18, FO 371/21682; U.S. 1938, 1:95-97; Cadogan Diary, pp. 116-20, 122-24; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 258, 280, 306; German information from London of 21 October 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/33, £327. Pirow’s trip to Germany touched on colonial matters

although by then the question was no longer actively considered in London. Note Arnold J. Toynbee’s proposal of 15 October 1938 that all of Germany’s colonies be returned to her with her Pacific colonial empire incteased to include all of New Guinea and part or all of Borneo as a means of securing German support

against Japan in East Asia, C 13691/42/18, FO 371/21658. For Toynbee’s suggestion of concessions to Germany in 1936, see above, p. 202, n. 85. 218. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 250-54, 260; 5, No. 73. 219. The Saarbriicken speech is in Domarus, 1:954—-56 (but dated to 9 October). See also Wilson to Moffat, 22 October 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 14; von Hassell, 15 October 1938, p. 27; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 60, 110.

220. See Haim Shamir, “Die Kristallnacht, die Notlage der deutschen Juden und die Haltung Englands,” Jahrbuch des Instituts fiir Deutsche Geschichte, 1 (1972), 171-214; Harvey Diaries, 13 November 1938, pp. 217-19. 221. Note Dirksen’s report of 17 November, G.D., D, 4, No. 269; cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 49; Irving

(ed.), Breach ofSecurity, pp. 50-51. 222. See above, pp. 475-77.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

681

Ametican cteditors although all other creditors were being paid.??? German diplomats assumed that in view of the bad state of German-American relations, any war that broke

Out as a result of the Czechoslovak crisis would, sooner or later, see the United States

entering on the side of Germany’s enemies. The Munich agreement ended this particular danger, but-it left the American government worried about the growing might of Germany.?%4 The whole problem of Jewish and other refugees from Germany had received considerable attention—if little helpful action—from the Washington government even before the November 1938 pogrom.225 The reaction to the pogrom itself was extremely violent. Public opinion turned finally and definitively against Germany, and the government reflected popular dismay.2?6 The American ambassador to Germany was recalled to Washington to the accompaniment of a strong statement personally made more pointed by President Roosevelt, and the Germans retaliated by recalling Dieckhoff from Washington to the accompaniment of propaganda attacks on the United States.227 Relations deteriorated to the point where it looked as if they might be broken off altogether,?”* and although this did not happen, the situation remained very strained and the refugee problem helped to keep it so.?”° As before, the economic aspects of German-American relations quickly reflected the basic political and ideological clash. Even in late October 1938 the possibility of an agreement with Germany under the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act was still being considered in the State Department.#3° A new German proposal was, however, turned down in December; the basis for the decision was that fruitful conversations were simply not possible under the then current circumstances.”*! In fact, President Roosevelt was

apparently thinking of restrictions or retaliatory action in the economic field.”32 It was precisely at this time that the American government was in the final stages of negotiating a trade agreement with England, signed on 17 November, of which Washington with good reason believed Chamberlain to be the only supporter within the British government.?3 Similarly, this was the time when President Roosevelt, who participated on 14 November in a top-level conference on the construction of a large American air force, decided to do what he could to assist the French in remedying the deficiencies in their air armaments.**4 The alignments of the future were already becoming apparent, at least in 223. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 12 May 1938, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/11, £361; U.S.

1938, 2:494-500; Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 466. See also Offner, pp. 234ff. 224. Moffat to Gilbert,

3 October 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 13; Moffat to Wilson, 5 October 1938, ibid., Vol.

14. 225. U.S. 1938, 1:791—92, 794-96, 799-801, 809; 2:446—51; cf. ibid., 1938, 2:596-98. 226 Giinther Moltmann, “America’s Reaction to the November 1938 Pogrom,” Wiener Library Bulletin, 16, No. 4 (Oct. 1962), 70-71. 227. U.S. 1938, 2:396—-99, 401-2, 405, 451-53, 456-57; Moffat Papers, pp. 221-22; Roosevelt’s emendations on

the draft of the 15 November

1938

statement

in Hyde

Park, PSF

Germany;

“Bestellungen

aus der

Pressekonferenz,” 9 January 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101 /12, £.10. The two ambassadors remained

officially accredited until Germany declared war on the United States in 1941. 228. Note by Hugh Wilson, 3 December 1938, State 611.623/330'/; Roosevelt memoranda for Hull, 10, 23 December 1938, Hyde Park, OF 198-A; Moffat Papers, pp. 222-24; U.S. 1938, 2:453—55. 229, U.S. 1938, 1:819-22, 824-25, 839-46, 856-57, 860, 871-80; Gilbert to Moffat, 10 December, and Moffat to Gilbert, 28 December 1938, Moffat Papers, Vol. 13. 230. See Alvin H. Hansen to Francis B. Sayre, 26 October 1938, State 61 1.0031/3942%2. 231. U.S. 1938, 2:427-31. 232. Welles to Roosevelt, 23 December 1938, and Morgenthau to Roosevelt, 17 January 1939, Hyde Park, PSF

Germany. See also U.S. 1938, 2:479-81.

1938, 233. U.S. 1938, 2:57—-60, 65-71; cf. Moffat Papers, pp. 220—21; Roosevelt to Hull and Welles, 17 October rk, OF-20. in Hyde Park, ag me 14 November meeting, see General H. H. Arnold’s memorandum of 15 November

OF 25-T; Haight, pp. 55-59. The French purchases of planes in the United States are discussed below.

682

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

outline. There were still some contrary currents. Hugh Wilson was very much in favor of endeavoring to repair the difficulties in United States relations with Germany,”?° and there were those in Germany who urged restraint in the anti-American propaganda campaien.236 In spite of Germany’s withdrawal from the United States-German Mixed Claims Commission on 1 March 1939 when it became obvious that the bulk of the German case in the sabotage claims dispute rested on forgery,?>” there was considerable discussion within the American government about the possibility of having Hugh Wilson return to his ambassadorial post in Berlin. By the time this question was nearing a favorable decision, the German occupation of Czechoslovakia on 15 March destroyed the opportunity. Thereafter the key question was to be whether the American neutrality legislation would be revised, and ambassadors would not be exchanged again until after a world war had intervened.?* The repercussions of the pogrom on England were not as spectacular as on the relations of the United States with Germany, but combined with the general rejection by the German government of any prospect of better relations with Britain after Munich,

they were of great and lasting significance all the same. When the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy met on 14 November, Lord Halifax in reviewing developments stated that the public reaction in Germany to the obvious danger of war and the relief over Munich had apparently infuriated Hitler, who now wanted to depict England as Germany’s main enemy and who also now might believe that von Ribbentrop had been right after all in saying that England would not fight. Combined with the “happenings in Germany of the last few days” this meant that only a resolute attitude backed by a display of strength was appropriate. “He had reluctantly come to the conclusion that in present circumstances no useful purpose would be served by a resumption at the present time of the contemplated Anglo-German conversations.””3? At the meeting of the cabinet two days later, the prime minister explained that “the colonial issue could only be discussed as patt of a general settlement. Such a settlement was clearly impossible in present citcumstances, and it followed that there could be no question of returning colonies to Germany.” The ctitical issue now was tearmament.24! 235. See the report of the Hungarian minister in Washington on Hugh Wilson in Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 278. 236. Gilbert tels. 36 and 37 of 14 January 1939, State 711.62/201; Gilbert tel. 85 of 2 February 1939, State 762.00/237; but see “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 2 February 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

NOW/MO ESS: 237. American Commissioner, Mixed Claims Commission, to Roosevelt, 26 January 1939, p. 5, Hyde Park, OF 198-C. For the earlier development of this issue, see above, pp. 120-22.

On American concern about admitting Wiedemann as consul general in San Francisco, the post to which Hitler had banished him, see Moffat Diary, 6 Match 1939, Moffat Papers, Vol. 42; Welles to Roosevelt, 6 March 1939, Hyde Park, OF 198. 238. Moffat Papers, pp. 229, 230, 232; Moffat Diary, 13 and 15 February 1939, Moffat Papers, Vol. 42; Moore to

Bullitt, 27 February 1939, Hyde Park, R. Walton Moore Papers, U.S. 1939, 1:25-26. These discussions were in part influenced by the sudden death of the American chargé in Berlin, Prentiss Gilbert, on 24 February. 239. 32d meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 14 November 1938, C 14396/42/18, FO 371/21658; Harvey Diaries, 16 November 1938, p. 220.

240. Cabinet meeting 55 (38) of 16 November 1938, C 14063/184/18, FO 371/21683. On 18 November Lord

Lothian wrote to Malcolm MacDonald, the secretary of state for Dominion affairs and secretary of state for the

colonies, that though he had once favored some restoration of colonies to Germany, he now opposed any such steps because of Germany’s racial policies (Lothian Papers, GD 40/17/374/ 636-37). 241. See Chamberlain’s comments at the 14 and 16 November meetings cited above, and C 14277/36/17, FO

371/21597. As Lord Halifax minuted on 22 November: “And if the Question came up, state that it was quite

impossible in the present atmosphere which they [the Germans] had created to talk of colonies. And press on

with rearming” (C 14561/62/18, FO 371/21665). Cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 118, 139, 141; D.D.F., 2d,

12, Nos. 295, 312.

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

683

The British leaders did still have some hope that there might be a way either to weaken the Axis or to restrain Hitler by developing relations with Italy which had, after all, clearly shown a reluctance to follow Germany into a world war in the crisis over Czechoslovakia. As already mentioned, the Anglo-Italian agreement of April was formally implemented on 16 November, and plans were made for Chamberlain and Halifax to visit Rome in January 1939.24 As a practical matter, however, this made little difference. Since Britain was quite unwilling to abandon her alliance with France, there

was no way to reconcile Italy and her demands on France with the Western Powers. The British and French could discuss common approaches to Italy when the British leaders went to Paris for talks, but neither their conversations of 24 November nor the subse-

quent parallel efforts of the British through regular diplomatic channels nor those of the French through Paul Baudouin could resolve the problem presented by Mussolini’s decision to press the aspirations of Italy against France.243 A major issue that emerged from the Franco-British meeting was in the field of defense preparations. While the British had been urging the French for some time to rebuild their air force, the French now began to insist on a larger contribution by the British on land. With the disappearance of the Czechoslovak army from Germany’s eastern border, the French argued that only England could make up the difference; and there was increasing recognition within the British government that however unpalatable the prospect, a new large British land army for deployment on the continent would have to be created. This issue would be debated with increasing concern in London.”+ By 22 February 1939 the cabinet had decided one of the key issues in principle: a substantial expeditionary force rather than a token couple of divisions would have to be sent to France alongside the advanced striking bomber force if it came to war.74° The other major hurdle was the issue of peacetime conscription to provide the manpower for such an army on an assured basis and with the necessary replacements; but on this question the prime minister was not yet prepared to move, especially in the face of the united and vehement opposition of the Labor party, the Liberal party, and the entire labor movement of the country. These British discussions of military options were, of course, related to expectations of future German moves. In a negative sense, it was obvious enough that Germany did not want good relations with England; but what did she want? There were few doubts that Germany expected to exert control over the remainder of Czechoslovakia, though it was by no means clear whether she planned to do this by indirect pressure or total occupation. There was much embarrassed talk about the guarantee Britain along with France had promised the Czechs. There was little economic aid to the crippled state, though 242. See esp. the entry in Ciano, Diary, 16 November 1938, p. 281; B.D., 3d, 3, No. 456; R 10221/240/22, FO

371/22429. As von Mackensen reported from Rome on 7 December 1938, the program of the Italians for the visit was “to have no program” (tel. 323, German embassy Rome [Quirinal], Pol 2, Italien-England, Bd. 5, Bonn, Pol. Archiv of AA). 2d, 12, No. 243, The British record of the Anglo-French talks is in B.D., 3d, 3, No. 325; the French in D.D.F., Hungarian 390. See also ibid., Nos. 314, 334-36, 344; R 8506/361/19, FO 317/22363; U.S. 1938, 1:106; Harvey Diaries, Documents, 2, No. 98; Adamthwaite, pp. 246-50; Pownall Diary, 28 November 1938, pp. 170-72; document in T-120, 24 November 1938, pp. 223-25; Osusky tel. 1331 of 25 November 1938, Czechoslovak 1039/1809/412222—23,

see Cc For other aspects of Italy’s role in relation to France and England at this time,

Diaries, 11 December 1938, 14365/5302/18, FO 371/21779; Cadogan Diary, 12 December 1938, p. 129; Harvey

p. 227; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 113, 143; Adamthwaite, pp. 260-61.

C 300, C 358, C 940, C 244. C 15175, C 16018/36/17, FO 371/21597; C 314, C 1503/136/14, FO 371/22915; chap. 13; Adamthwaite, 1978/281/17, FO 371/22922; Pownall Diary, 5 December 1938ff., pp. 172ff.; Gibbs, pp. 252-53; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 280, 293, 360, 375, 376 cf. C 2505/15/18, FO 245. Cabinet meeting 8 (39) of 22 February 1939, C 2606/281/17, FO 371/22923; 371/22966.

684

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

there was much talk about that subject as well.74¢ One cannot read the record of the discussions in London on these topics without drawing the conclusion that the British government was determined to run no risks and make no sacrifices for those they had urged to sacrifice themselves. It could be and was argued that any other policy would encourage the Czechs and enrage Hitler to no useful purpose, but the other side of this argument surely was that Britain had indeed an obligation to Czechoslovakia and that the credibility of any obligation she assumed in the future might well be measured by her fidelity to the most recent one. These matters must by their nature remain speculative, but I believe that the irritation over the endless delays of the Czechoslovak government in the face of years of British warnings combined with a sense of shame over Munich to make the Czechs personae non grata in London.?47 They were certainly treated that way, in regard to both the promised guarantee and the possibility of economic assistance. The psychological converse of this would be evident after 15 March: there could be no softening of adherence to the British obligation to Poland, and any future Anglo-German agreement would first have to provide for the return of the promised independence to the Czechs.748 If there was no serious effort to maintain the independence of Czechoslovakia in the face of German pressure, what other German moves were expected and how did the London government see itself reacting to them? A variety of reports reached London predicting all manner of German plans. Some of these pointed to anticipated German moves eastward, others expected aggression in the west, and still others predicted some combination of the two. Though read with care in London, the impact of most of these was simply to reinforce the belief that continued rearmament was the only possible course and that an accommodation with Germany was impossible under the circumstances.#? The information which London received from opponents of Hitler did not lead to different conclusions. Schacht’s report that Hitler was not to be trusted, that he considered the Munich agreement worthless, and that no one really influenced him was hardly surprising by mid-December 1938.7? Some new schemes from Carl Goerdeler and others met with a frigid reception from the British government; Goerdeler proposed that England arrange the cession of Danzig and the Corridor to Germany, the return of Germany’s colonies, and a very large loan, in return for which a new German government would behave nicely. He ruined the credibility of the German opposition by nationalistic demands that were considered preposterous in Britain.*>! That all such men 246. On this issue, see B.D., 3d, 3 and 4, passim; cabinet meeting 57 (38) of 30 November 1938, C 14903/111169/18, FO 371/21789; 34th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 6 December 1938, CAB 27/624; Kral, Minchen, No. 275; Osusky tels. 1240 of 2 November and 1245 of 3 November 1938,

Czechoslovak documents in T-120, 1039/1809/412208 and 412036; Cerny (Paris) tel. 1276 of 15 November 1938, ibid., frame 412211; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 32, 40, 93, 125, 189.

247. See the comments of the British ambassador in Tokyo reported in Kral, Miinchen, No. 279. 248. The role of a restored Czech independence as a British demand after 15 March 1939 will be discussed in the review of Anglo-German informal soundings in the summer of 1939. The failure of Bernd Martin to understand its significance in English policy after the outbreak of wat is only one of the basic flaws in his study Friedensinitiativen und Machtpolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg, 1939-1942 (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1974).

249. See W 15502/104/98, FO 371/22538; C 15689/93/62, FO 371/21627; cf. S.U., No. 90. Note the description of German aims as “world domination” by Major von Schwerin, the new head of the British

Empire section of German army intelligence, on 26 January 1939 (C 1291/15/18, FO 371/22963) which was given to Lord Halifax for the 1 February 1939 cabinet meeting.

250. C 15642/62/18, FO 371/27666; see also C 14398/541/18, FO 371/21704. Earlier, Kirkpatrick had sent Strang a list of Hitler’s broken promises which the Foreign Office had printed with a few additions. Kirkpatrick, who thought that Chamberlain’s Munich actions were correct, added that “it is a paradox that whilst England and U.S. are angry with the P.M. for having given way to Hitler, Hitler is angry with the P.M. for not letting him have his way” (C 15228/528/18, FO 371/21701).

251. C 15084/42/18, FO 371/21659; C 14809, C 15438/62/18, FO 371/21665; C 938/15/18, FO 371/22961; C 1290/15/18, FO 371/22963; Harvey Diaries, 11 December 1938, pp. 226-27; Cadogan Diary, 10, 11 December

Undoing Munich: October 1938—March 1939

685

in any case had no influence in Germany was increasingly obvious from London; there was no sign that the generals would ever find the courage needed to change the course of a tegime they served faithfully, and Schacht himself was dismissed from his Reichsbank post in January for warning against the costs of new projects.252 In regard to two areas of possible German action the news received by London was mote specific and appeared to call for more definite reactions. Early in 1939, the British government received reports of a planned German attack on Holland. The discussion of these reports in late January and early February, culminating in a decision shared by France to go to war if Germany invaded either Holland or Switzerland (Belgium being already covered by the 1937 pledge), is significant in two ways.253 The combination of urgency and determination, with the British government deciding in a period of about ten days to go to war at the next German move then anticipated, on the sole condition that the country attacked defend itself, surely signifies a hardening of opinion. The key issue now, as the British told the Belgians on 16 February, was the “attempt of Germany to dominate Europe by force.”>4 It was this fundamental issue, rather than any specific German

demand,

that exercised the British government,

and it did not make much

difference in what direction the Germans moved. Just a short time before the English leaders had warned Mussolini during the conversations in Rome on 12 January about the dangers of a German move eastward toward the Ukraine about which there were also rumotrs.*°° Having as they saw it agreed to a German demand at Czechoslovakia’s expense which had some justification as implementing the principle of self-determination,

and having agreed to it under

circumstances

where

it was

presented

as

Germany’s last territorial demand and as completing the unification under Berlin’s control of the German population outside the borders of the Reich, an issue in which Hitler had claimed to be interested, the British now saw amy further German move automatically as belonging to an entirely different category, by Hitler’s as well as by their own standards. That category was denial of self-determination to others, not assertion of it for Germans; and this meant expansion for control of Europe—precisely what London was determined to resist. The second aspect of this decision which must be noted is that it represented what 1938, pp. 128-29. Goerdeler’s foreign policy demands from the British in 1938-39 are very intelligently discussed by Hermann Graml, “Resistance Thinking in Foreign Policy,” in The German Resistance to Hitler (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970), pp. 6-14. 252. TMWC, 36:365-75; Wiedemann (who was dropped the same day), pp. 234-35. 253. The relevant exchanges have been largely published in B.D., 3d, 4. Additional material will be found in the records of the 35th, 36th, and 37th meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 23 and 26 January and 8 February 1939, CAB 27/624; Cabinet 2 (39) of 25 January 1939, C 1065/15/18, FO 371/22962; meeting

of Lord Halifax and Mr. MacDonald with the Dominions representatives, 28 January 1939, Halifax Papers, FO

800/310; C 1822/13/18, FO 371/22958; C 1292/15/18, FO 371/22963; Harvey Diaries, 15-16 and 24-29

January 1939, pp. 245, 247-48; Pownall Diary, 23 January 1939, pp. 183-84; Cadogan Diary, pp. 139-47; U.S. 1939, 1:2-7; Johnson (chargé London) tels. 117 of 28 January and 175 and 176 of 7 February 1939, State

740.00/553, 570, 571. meaning The Belgians, in line with their general policy, preferred what they called an “independent” course, others to that they would help no one, stay neutral until attacked themselves, then fight if attacked and expect

1939, p. 253. help them; D.D.B., 5, Nos. 50, 52-56; Overstraeten, pp. 317-22; Harvey Diaries, 12 February Late in 1938, the Foreign 254. D.D.B., 5, No. 56. The same point had been made to the U.S. on 28 January.

April, 1939.” The Office had been asked to prepare an “Appreciation of the Situation in the Event of War in

Germany, Italy joining the text is in C 16090/1941/18, FO 371/21747. It assumes Britain and France fighting

degrees of sympathy for latter after a short delay, with all other countries remaining neutral though with varying idee one side or the other. Johns Hopkins University 255. B.D., 3d, 3, No. 500, p. 525. Mario Toscano in Designs in Diplomacy (Baltimore: into an imaginary British plot to Press, 1970), pp. 56-60 desctibes the Soviet government’s turning this around pp. 205-6; Harvey Diaries, pp. Halifax, also see trip, Rome the On Ukraine. the seize to encourage the Germans 231, 238-44; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. PAE PANT p

686

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

had become so much a shared assumption of.the British leaders that it was applied almost automatically to a contingency which did not arise. Later reactions to news about possible German moves against Romania and Poland can be understood mote easily if it is remembered that British entrance into a war was practically assumed if two conditions wete met: a German attack on another country and forcible resistance by the country attacked. The Dutch wete to be spared for little over a year; the Swiss were on Hitler’s agenda for the period after a German victory which never came;?°° the Lithuanians were not expected to fight for Memel; and the Czechs—about whose possible fate word was beginning to reach London in February—were also thought unlikely to fight after what had happened to them the year before.25’ The indications reaching London about German demands on Poland, however, opened up other perspectives. Even before the German demands on Poland were presented to Lipski by von Ribbentrop, the position of Poland and the likelihood of German demands on her were being discussed in London.#** Although Beck tried to keep the German demands secret for a while, the British minister to Warsaw, Sir Howard Kennard, was sending rather

accurate information to London the day after the von Ribbentrop-Lipski meeting on 24 October.?>° There was concern that the French alliance with Poland might confront London with a dilemma analogous to that created by the French alliance with Czechoslovakia, but from the beginning there were important differences. In the first place, the concern over French policy now reflected worry about French weakness and lack of resolution rather than the other way around. In the second place, there was a greater belief that Poland would fight rather than make major concessions—though the latter possibility was not entirely excluded. In the third place, though there were doubts about the proper handling of Danzig, there was a general recognition that the population of the Corridor was overwhelmingly Polish so that German demands and Polish firmness in regard to that area were seen from London in an entirely different perspective from that in which the Sudeten area with its millions of Germans had been seen earlier.2 Although interested in the Danzig question in a special way because of its relationship to the League and Lord Halifax’s chairmanship of the special League committee charged with watching developments in the Free City, the British government watched the whole range of problems in German-Polish relations with great care. Relatively accurately informed about the German-Polish negotiations, the British were, nevertheless, troubled by what they considered the inadequacy of their knowledge, and they decided to invite Beck to London both to learn more from him and to discuss the situation.°! Their invitation coincided with Beck’s desire, and while his trip had originally been scheduled for January or February, in fact it was postponed until after 15 March. If the prospects for the maintenance of peace looked slim from London’s point of view, there was also a reluctance to give up all hope. The likelihood of wat was too terrible to accept with simple resignation, and various avenues of exploration were still thought possible. These were primarily of an economic nature. Some efforts in this

256. Norman Rich, Hitler's

War Aims: The Establishment ofthe New Order (New York: Norton, 1974), pp. 401-2.

257. C 1822/13/18, FO 371/22958; C 2209/15/18, FO 371/22965; C 3234/15/18, FO 371/22966; Cadogan Diary, 11 and 13 March 1939, pp. 155, 156.

258. Note B.D., 3d, 3, No. 206; C 12277/2168/55, FO 371/21808. 259. B.D., 3d, 3, No. 223. London received a full report based on Forster’s account to Burckhardt on 13 December 1938, C 15395/197/55, FO 371/21804. 260. See B.D., 3d, 3, No. 385, n. 1; C 14878, C 16019/2688/55, FO 371/21809; C 14170/267/18, FO 371/21697; C 16018/36/17, FO 371/21597.

261. 35th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 23 January 1939, CAB 27/624; memorandum

by Makins, “Proposed Visit of Colonel Beck to England,” 27 February 1939, C 2607/92/55, FO 371/23133; cf. Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 380.

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687

direction had been started in the late fall of 1938 but without much success.2® These wete resumed early in 1939, and for a short time it looked as if some progress were being made.**? If these faint indications misled both Chamberlain and Henderson into excessively optimistic forecasts that soon sounded ridiculous,2% such anticipation surely reflected theit eagerness for success. The German directives to the press that nothing was expected to come from this at all proved more accurate.26 The culmination of the preliminary talks was intended to be a visit by the British minister of overseas trade to Berlin, scheduled for 15 March, it was among the first casualties of Germany’s aggression that day. The British attempts at better economic relations as a possible preliminary to better political relations with Germany were not the only such projects destroyed by the German action. A series of proposals for increasing Franco-German trade had also been under discussion for some time. These included plans for joint ventures of major proportions in the French colonial empire and for raising the level of trade and travel between the two countries.2° The condition for such long-range projects, of course, was that “both governments be convinced that during this time [of three or more years] there would be no unexpected developments.”?°’ This comment, made on 10 March 1939 by Lucien Lamoureux,

a former minister of finance and close associate of Daladier and

Bonnet, demonstrated both the hopes of the French and the impossibility of their realization. A brief survey of French policy after Munich must, however, also include several other important issues. In France as in England there was a short period of hope after the Munich Conference, of hope that the age of threats and dangers was over and that better relations with Germany might open a period of peace and stability in Europe. If this lasted a few weeks longer in Paris than in London, it was because of two elements in the situation peculiar to France. In the first place, the talks inaugurated by Frangois-Poncet for a Franco-German declaration analogous to the Anglo-German agreement of 30 September which lasted for several weeks and culminated in von Ribbentrop’s Paris visit of 6 December suggested the possibility of an eta of improved relations. That all this was purely an optical illusion has already been explained. The other element was the personality and policy of French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet. Bonnet had been the most persistent advocate of concessions to Germany before Munich and continued to follow this line thereafter. Unlike Lord Halifax, who became slowly but steadily more determined to resist further German demands, Bonnet moved in the opposite direction. The evidence suggests that in the last months of 1938 Bonnet would have preferred that France abdicate any role in Europe altogether if Germany would leave her alone. He appears to have wanted to drop the French tie to Poland lest it confront France with the same dilemma that the French treaty with Czechoslovakia had produced, and he was similarly willing to abandon completely the French treaty with the Soviet Union. This view might color French perspectives on the European situation for a while, but it did 262. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 257, 259, 261ff.

15 February 263. A useful account in Wendt, Economic Appeasement, pp. 536-72. See also Biddle dispatch 950 of 1939, State 862.014/446;

U.S. 1939, 1:14-17; C. A. MacDonald, “Economic Appeasement and the German

Moderates, 1937-39: An Introductory Essay,” Past and Present, 56 (Aug. 1972), 119-27. in C 2533/15/18, FO 264. B.D., 3d, 4, Nos. 118 (comments in C 2139/15/18, FO 371/22965), 162 (comments 3. See also Harvey Diaries, 10371/22966), 195 (comments in C 3184/15/18, FO 371/3184), appendix 1, No. 13 March 1939, pp. 260-61; Cadogan Diary, 10 March 1939, p. 155; Feiling, pp. 396-97.

v, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £55; 265. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 22 February 1939, Bundesarchi ibid., 101/34, f£.69-71, 85. “Tn formationsbericht Nr. 15,” 27 February 1939, “Nr. 18,” 3 March 1939, 266. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 371-98, passim; Adamthwaite, pp. 294-98. 267. G.D., D, 4, No. 397. 268. See above, p. 671.

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not have major practical results because Bonnet himself was afraid to raise the question with either Poland or the Soviet Union.?” There were contrary currents in France. The major concern of many led by Prime Minister Daladier was to remedy the obvious deficiencies in the French armed forces, the most conspicuous being in regard to the French air force.?” Strenuous efforts were made to speed up the construction of modern planes. It was apparent, however, that France was too far behind in this field to catch up within the foreseeable future by domestic production, and so the French government returned on a large scale to a possibility already explored in a small way earlier: the purchase of airplanes from the United States. In a project sponsored by Daladier himself and avidly supported by Ambassador Bullitt, a special air mission under Jean Monnet was sent to the United States with Roosevelt’s approval.?”! The president saw the relationship between French weakness in the air and her policy toward Germany very clearly; he also saw how French orders and investments could assist in the building up of the American military aircraft industry which, like all American war production capacity, had been pretty effectively dismantled after the World War. In the face of some reluctance on the part of the American army chief of staff, Malin C. Craig, the president insisted on a vast expansion of America’s air force in what came to be the real beginning of the United States rearmament program presented by the president to Congress at the beginning of 1939. Roosevelt saw in this, combined with large-scale sales of planes to France and a revision of the neutrality laws to permit the sale of weapons in time of war, the most likely deterrent to future adventures by Germany leading to a new world war. Whether he was correct in this belief—the converse of Hitler’s view that he had to begin a war while Germany still had a head start in rearmament—will never be known. Time ran out before American tearmament had made substantial progress, and unexpected obstacles interfered even in the little time available. An airplane accident on 23 January revealed the negotiations to sell the newest American warplanes to France and produced such a storm of criticism among isolationists in and out of Congress that the president had to pull back, leaving the question of neutrality legislation to his supporters in the Congress, where opposition proved too strong. Nevertheless, substantial orders were placed by the French for American warplanes, thus contributing to the increased preparedness of both countries. There was also some hardening of French opinion after von Ribbentrop’s visit as it became evident that there was no substance to the anticipated rapprochement with Germany.’”? The main factor making for a firmer attitude by the French government, however, was the behavior of Italy. Ironically it was the threatening and bellicose talk from Rome that aroused French public opinion and provided a focus for the French government to become resolute in the face of danger. This danger was not as acute in reality as it appeared to be, but the demands for territory which the French considered integral parts of their country and cherished portions of their colonial empire brought home the dangers of weakness in a way that the Czechoslovak question never had.273 In the first 269. U.S. 1938, 1:83-84, 98; Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 592; C 12161/1050/17, FO 371/21612; C 16019/ 2688/55, FO 371/21809; Phipps to Sargent, 31 December 1938, C 1507 90/17, FO 371/22912. See also the Foreign Office comments about this issue on Kennard’s 28 November 1938 report on Franco-Polish relations in C 14878/2688/55, ff.253-56; Adamthwaite, pp. 265, 270-78; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 89, 158, 216, 335. 270. See Gamelin, 2:364ff.; Bullitt tel. 1736 of 11 October 1938, State 740.00/490.

271. The account here is based on the excellent study by Haight, chaps. 2 and 4. Haight was able to secure access to the papers of several French participants; one of the key French documents is the record of the 5 December 1938 meeting of the Permanent Committee of National Defence in Gamelin, 2:371-78. See also Lindbergh, pp. 80-92, passim; D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. 160, 171.

272. Wilson (Paris) tel. 2076 of 8 December 1938, State 751.62/514; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 134, 282;

Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 151-60. 273. ‘The minutes of the 24 February 1939 meeting of the Permanent Committee

of National Defence

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months of 1939, therefore, the French appeared to be recovering at least to some extent from the loss of netve so evident in the Czechoslovak crisis. The fact that Bonnet was increasingly under attack from both left and tight was a symptom of the way France might react if there were indeed “unexpected developments.”274 If the alliance of France with Poland was in disarray after the participation of Poland inthe partition of Czechoslovakia, that with the Soviet Union was clouded by even more mistrust than before Munich. The Soviet government denounced the Munich agreement and reexamined its own options, a process that was redoubled when Litvinov returned to Moscow from Geneva in early October. A strong isolationist tone was sounded by Stalin and Molotov at the celebration of the November Revolution, a tone that was noted by German, British, and French diplomats.?”> The very description of the conflict—the “Second Imperialist War”—confidently predicted by Moscow as coming soon, suggested a sense of distance from developments. A slight improvement in relations with Poland was agreed to by Moscow,””° but this too could be interpreted as a means of isolating the

Soviet Union from developments elsewhere in Europe by encouraging Poland to be more independent of Germany in her policy. Other than in this regard, rumors of changes in policy and personalities probably outran reality, except for the continuation of the purge in the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs as well as elsewhere. There is little information about French relations with the Soviet Union in the winter of 1938-39; the two countries with an apparently more active relationship with Russia were Germany and Great Britain. The Germans had agreed with the Soviet government in October that the press in both countries would be restrained in its attacks on the other. A more substantial factor was German interest in a new economic agreement with the Soviet Union. Negotiations involving a large German trade credit had broken down in March 1938, and in October the Germans wanted to reopen the question. All the evidence points to economic factors being critical in this decision on the German side, though obviously a credit involving a long-term pattern of repayment implied at least some continuation of peaceful relations. The Soviet government, however, appears to have seen the question primarily in political terms, having the matter taken up enthusiastically by its ambassador to Germany and insisting that at least some of the negotiations take place in Moscow, not as in the past in Berlin. The Germans, who wanted a

trade agreement, offered the compromise of sending their chief negotiator, Karl Schnurre, to Moscow; but just as the Russians prepared to welcome their guest, von Ribbentrop responded to exaggerated French press accounts by canceling the trip scheduled for the end of January 1939.77 What is revealing for the importance attached to the issue by Moscow is the attitude of the Soviet government when the German ambassador was instructed to present a draft credit and trade agreement in the absence of the expected Schnurte.7”* The negotiations took place with Foreign Trade Commissar Anastas Mikoyan himself; and in a series of meetings in February, the Soviet representative step by step came to agree to the liana aMDems aaa Aas an ev le 2he erpela neal se actions. See (Gamelin, 2:391-401) show it devoted entirely to the problem of defense against possible Italian also Adamthwaite, pp. 262-63. 3, Nos. 247, 270, 352; 274. Note the observant reports of the Hungarian minister in Paris, Hungarian Documents, 298. No. Manchen, Kral, in minister and the report of the Czechoslovak is based on that book, and 275. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 7. Much of the following account reports in D.D.F., 2d, 12, Nos. sources cited there on pp. 6-13 will not again be cited here. Important French

164, 366, 460.

,

276. The Polish-Soviet Communiqué of 26 November 1938 has already been discussed. p. 10, n. 33. No new evi277. The evidence on this incident is listed in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, since. appeated has matter the on light sheds that dence D, 4, No. 490, n. 2); see von 278, This instruction is presumably Berlin tel. 12 of 4 February 1939 (G.D., Schulenburg to von Weizsacker, 6 February 1939, ibid., No. 487.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

major elements in the German plan2” As the Russians agreed to the great scope of raw materials deliveries that the Germans wete requesting, the Germans themselves looked mote closely at the impact on their other needs of the requited export of manufactured goods to pay for all this, and concluded reluctantly that they could not implement in practice what they had themselves proposed in the negotiations.?8° If no success was attained at that time, therefore, it was German, not Soviet, policies that were responsible.

The Russians were quite willing to work out a large-scale mutually satisfactory economic arrangement with Germany on terms very much along lines the Germans had proposed but saw the prospect foundering on obstacles of German creation; they would be more cautious when the Germans approached them again later. That caution should be seen as a logical reaction to the Soviet government’s having observed the Germans go back on their own plans twice in the most recent past; what is more revealing about the underlying Soviet position is the willingness even to entertain another approach from Berlin in the face of such disappointing experiences. There is an interesting contrast between this attitude and that displayed by the Soviet government in the face of approaches from London. The discussion of possible Soviet participation in the projected new guarantee of Czechoslovakia did not lead to anything,”*! but in other areas there was greater British interest. In view of the signs of Soviet withdrawal from European problems and a deterioration of Anglo-Soviet relations, there was a desire to improve those relations and a willingness to take new steps in

that direction. In the face of an increasingly hostile tone in the Soviet press (by contrast with the German-Soviet press truce), the British government hoped to develop better ties with Russia and planned to send a cabinet minister to Moscow.**? In the same days of late February 1939 that Mikoyan was moving gradually to meet German economic wishes, the Russians were indicating that Robert S. Hudson of the Department of Over-

seas Trade would not, as requested, be received by Stalin when in Moscow.?*? Hudson’s meeting with Ambassador Maisky before his trip was quite discouraging; unlike the Soviet ambassador to Germany, who had been instructed to express a wish for better Soviet-German relations, Maisky had received very different guidelines from Moscow.?*+ On 14 Match Halifax briefed Hudson for his journey to Moscow with emphasis on doing nothing that might encourage a Soviet withdrawal into an isolationist stance.2® By then, however, Stalin had already adopted a very different line.

The Soviet position on the international situation was outlined by Stalin in public on 10 March 1939. Although by that time the economic negotiations with Germany were being aborted by the Germans, Stalin left open the possibility of better trade relations with “all countries.” His denunciations were directed at the Western Powers for their attempts to embroil the Soviet Union with Germany, a conflict for which he professed to see no visible grounds. Although this should surely not be interpreted as showing that Stalin had already decided to sign up with Germany by 10 March 1939, it does show that 279. Ibid., Nos. 490, 491, 493. 280. Ibid., Nos. 494, 495. 281. See, e.g., ibid., No. 249; B.D., 3d, 3, No. 325; Kral, Miinchen, No. 264. 282. N 57, N 1029/57/38, FO 371/23677; Harvey Diaries, 17 February 1939, p. 255; cf. C 15569/5302/18, FO

371/21779. On the origins and purposes of Hudson’s trip to Scandinavia and Moscow in 1939 see also the file N 64/63 in FO 371/23653, passim. 283. London tel. 22 to Seeds, 23 February 1939, and Seeds tel. 29 of 28 February 1939, N 1001 and N 1087/64/63, FO 371/23653; cf. G.D., D, 4, No. 325; Fierlinger tel. 186 of 3 March 1939, Czechoslovak docu-

ment in T-120, 1316/2376/D 497036. 284. See the excerpt from Litvinov’s letter to Maisky of 19 February 1939, §.U., No. 128; cf. ibid., Nos. 140, 141. 285. N 1342, N 1389/57/38, FO 371/23677; Harvey Diaries, 9 March 1939, pp. 259-60; J.U., Nos. 129-31; B.D., 3d, 4, Nos. 121, 125, 128.

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he was willing to consider the possibility seriously, and it would be so interpreted by the Germans.**° Stalin appears to have thought it likely that Germany would turn next against either Poland and Romania or the Western Powers, or both, and such steps on Germany’s part need not provide “visible grounds” for a German-Soviet conflict.287 Soviet intelligence was receiving from Richard Sorge in Japan generally accurate reports on the German attempt to secure Japanese adherence to a generalized, as distinct from an exclusively anti-Soviet, alliance, as well as on the divisions within the Japanese

government about this issue. From Rudolf von Scheliha, a high official in the German embassy in Warsaw who had been in Soviet pay since at least early in 1938, the Russians were receiving reports on the German demands on Poland.”88 Soon after the 10 March speech, the Soviet government appeats to have received a report on a conversation of 13 March of a close associate of von Ribbentrop, Peter Kleist, that Hitler’s war plans were directed against the West, that he expected to settle first the Czechoslovak question (letting the Carpatho-Ukraine fall to Hungary as Russia preferred), then to take care of Poland, thereafter to crush the Western Powers, and finally to turn on the Soviet Union.?*? This kind of information reinforced what was evident from a look at the map; before Germany could turn against the Soviet Union, she would have to deal with a number of other obstacles. From Stalin’s perspective there were apparently good reasons to explore the possibility of postponing the evil day—possibly forever—by standing aside or assisting Germany rather than by aligning Russia with those directly affected by Germany’s immediate ambitions. When in early March Hitler moved to take over the rest of Czechoslovakia, he was confident that no one would interfere, and he had given instructions to the Hungarians

to participate. Since the Poles had not been willing to fall in with his plans, they were not notified. Probably because of fears that the information would leak out, he also refrained from giving advance notice to his Italian ally; in fact von Ribbentrop and von Weizsacker deliberately misled the inquiring Italian ambassador.?”? Having misled the Axis partner, Hitler was not about to give notice to the other two parties to the Munich agreement, England and France.”°! He had been warned of possible repercussions; Sir Horace Wilson mentioned that these would be great if German troops marched into the country.” Hitler, however, was determined to go his own way. It was no longer possible to use the remaining Germans in Czechoslovakia as a plausible excuse: while the German press was inventing new atrocities, the German legation in Prague reported that a representa286. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 12-13; U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, pp. 744-45. Large parts of Rosso’s 12 March report on the speech now appear in English in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 52-53. 287. See Kirk (Moscow) tel. 85 of 23 February 1939, State 761.62/497; Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 284; Osusky report 8 of 23 January 1939, Czechoslovak document in T-120, 1039/1809/412392; Fierlinger report 68 of 14

February 1939, ibid., 1040/1809/412714-23.

288. Some reports of both Sorge and von Scheliha are included in the official Soviet publication of diplomatic

documents. On Sorge, see Frederick W. Deakin and G. R. Storry, The Case of Richard Sorge (London: Chatto &

Coward, McCann & Windus, 1966); on Rudolf von Scheliha, see Heinz Hohne, Codeword “Direktor” (New York: Geoghegan, 1971), pp. 39, 148-49, 165-67, 191.

extremely 289. §.U., No. 149. The Soviet informant in this case is identified as a “German Journalist.” This great accuracy, and interesting document reflects Hitler’s and von Ribbentrop’s views in early March 1939 with He had accomthere is no teason to believe that Kleist knew himself to be speaking to a Soviet informant. with the Soviet panied von Ribbentrop on his visit to Warsaw and was used by the latter for his first soundings embassy in Berlin in April. 290. G.D., D, 4, Nos. 205, 214; see also ibid., No. 224.

consult England and France; he 291. Hans Fritzsche claims that he tried to have Goebbels persuade Hitler to eventually negative. Hildegard and doubtful was Hitler that and idea the opposed Ribbentrop von that claims 207-9. pp. 1949), g, Thiele-Verla (Stuttgart: Fritzsche Springer (ed.), Es sprach Hans

292. G.D., D, 4, No. 219.

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tive of the Germans “deplores the perfectly correct, even accommodating, attitude of the Czechs everywhere.”2°3 In view of this situation, the Slovaks were required to provide the needed pretext for what was to have been an ultimatum from Berlin; at the last moment, threats made personally by Hitler to the Czech president, Emil Hacha, were

substituted.”* By the time the browbeaten Hacha had agreed to German occupation of his country as a means of averting the threatened bloodshed, the Germans had already crossed the border marking Hitler’s “last territorial demand.” What had looked to many to be a sign of German triumph had been discarded as a reluctantly accepted temporary obstacle.

293. Ibid., No. 181. 294. Hoensch, S/owakei, p. 292; G.D., D, 4, No. 228; Gajan and Kvaéek, No. 56; Kral, Die Deutschen, Nos. 278

279.

‘

Chapter 27

The Road to War

he German triumph over Czechoslovakia seemed to be complete and unchallenged. Hitler himself gloated over his conquest in Prague, and German commandos seized the remaining weapons of the Czechs even as the great Skoda arms factory fell under German control. The Slovaks, who might have thought that their subservience to German schemes would assure them favorable treatment, were soon disabused of their ex-

pectations. Not only did the Germans allow some additional Slovak territory to be annexed by Hungary in connection with that country’s occupation of the CarpathoUkraine,! but the main area of Slovakia itself was to be under German control. The

nominal independence of the new Slovak state was compromised at birth by a treaty of protection with Germany; furthermore, wherever and whenever the Germans chose to go beyond that treaty’s terms in military occupation or political control, Berlin would reject all Slovak protests.* The status of being Hitler’s client was hardly a comfortable one. In the first months of pseudoindependence, there was always the possibility that Germany might trade parts ot all of the “country” to Poland or Hungary in pursuit of her own policies; a bit later, Slovakia would be both a base and a partner in the attack on Poland. While this role in the war would bring some small accretion of territory, it would also tie the Slovaks even more permanently to the German juggernaut.* If Hitler was in full control of Bohemia and Moravia and in effective control of Slovakia, he was now also ready for other territorial gains. Memel had been the one piece

120; Vnuk, pp. 138— 1. See Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 470, 553, 560; 4, Nos. 8, 13, 56; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 111, Z.Sg. 101/34, £151; 49; Dertinger, “Tnformationsbericht Mr. 29,” 25 March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Kennan, No. 14. 3, Nos. 447, 478, 489; 2. A good summary in Hoensch, Die Slowakei, pp. 334-50; see also Hungarian Documents,

Keitel Papers, pp. 203-4; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 40, 95, 98, 554.

111, 120. Cf. Dertinger, 3. Note Hitler’s response to Horthy’s desire for pieces of Slovakia in G.D., D, 6, Nos. 101/34, f£.209-11. Vnuk (p. 127) “Tnformationsbericht Nr. 44,” 2 May 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

March in part in hopes notes that von Ribbentrop delayed signing the protection treaty with Slovakia until 23 treaty). that of revision a required have might of an agreement with Poland (which the resultant territorial cessions, 4. On Slovak participation in the attack on Poland at Germany’s request and (eds.), A Hastory of the Cechosee G.D., D, 7, Nos. 214, 237, 468, 488; Victor S. Mamatey and Radomir Luza n. 16. 280, p. 1973), Press, University Princeton N,J.: (Princeton, slovak Republic, 1918-1948

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of land he was confident of seizing in 1939,5 and the Lithuanians were pressured into yielding it to Germany on 22 March.° Hitler himself went to the city Germany had lost after the war, but the original idea of combining the seizure of Memel with that of Danzig had had to be abandoned.’ This did not mean, however, that Hitler had lost

interest in the demands on Poland; only a temporary postponement seemed indicated. The outflanking of Poland’s position from the south by the extension of German militaty power to Slovakia and the possible further outflanking of Poland from the north by the reduction of Lithuania to the status of a German satellite once its port was in German hands might in fact render the Warsaw government more willing to give in to German demands.® The obvious accretion of German strength would have precisely such an effect on Romania, Poland’s southern ally. The negotiations for a new German-Romanian trade agreement had been initiated before the 15 March coup, but it was only after that startling event that the German representative, Helmuth Wohlthat, was able to drive a

bargain so favorable to Germany that it practically delivered the riches of Romania’s oil and agriculture into the hands of the Third Reich. The international repercussions of aspects of the German pressure on Romania will be reviewed in the context of British and French reactions to the Prague coup; what is relevant to an understanding of German policy is that Wohlthat was able to convert the stronger German position immediately into a great further advance. The concessions made by the Romanians were so extensive and extraordinary that both Hungary and Bulgaria would come to suspect that the Germans had secured the economic treaty of 23 March by promising to guarantee Romania’s territorial integrity.’ It would take a while for these worried associates of Berlin to become convinced that not political promises but raw pressure had won for Berlin the subservience of Romania.!° There was, thus, some reason for the German government to believe that its greatly

strengthened prestige and improved strategic position might yet be converted into Polish and not only Romanian concessions. Although there is some later evidence indicating that Hitler had never had any hope,of Polish agreement to his renewed demands handed to the Poles on 21 March, and that he expected and even preferred for these to be turned down, this would seem to overstate the case.!! From his point of view, the position of Poland may have appeared so hopeless as to suggest at least the possibility of a reconsideration by Warsaw of its earlier negative stand. A surrender by Poland right after the destruction of Czechoslovakia and simultaneous with or immediately following those of Romania and Lithuania would have assured quiet on Germany’s eastern front while she faced Britain and France. The Germans were to learn quickly that Poland’s leaders would not follow the example of Prague, Kovno, and Bucharest. Although Polish Foreign Minister Josef Beck had returned discouraging answers to 5. Note Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 2,” 10 January 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, £.213. 6. See above, pp. 654-65; Dr. Kausch, “Sonderbestellungen,” 22 March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

101/12, £.90; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 27,” 22 March 1939, ibid., 101/34, ff. 137-39. 7. Hitler had thought of combining the naval trip to Memel with one to Danzig; after von Ribbentrop’s visit to Warsaw in January it was obvious that this would not be possible. The Hitler-Greiser talk of 24 February 1939 about naval visits to Danzig in 1939 reflects the shift in Hitler’s perspective (G.D., D, 6, No. 261 and n. 1). 8. Note Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 20.

9. Ibid., No. 27; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 67, 97, 110, 219.

10. Hillgruber is so determined to disprove the ultimatum report of Viorel Tilea, the Romanian minister in London, that his account (pp. 42-48) misses the main point. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 30, 31, 78, 111; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 508, 509, 531, 546; Marguerat, pp. 132-35. Note the ecstatic comment of the quartermaster

general of the German army, Eduard Wagner, in Der Generalquartiermeister, p. 85. 11. S.U., No. 266. See also Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 28, 29; and Hitler’s comments to Lipski on 1 Match,

Lipski Papers, No. 135.

The Road to War

695

German approaches in prior months, there were indications that he was willing to explore possible new approaches to the Danzig question, and his comments at the conference in the Polish Foreign Ministry on 24 March show that he might well have been willing to return to them at some calmer time;!? but the aftermath of the German occupation of Prague was hardly such a moment. Not only had the Czechoslovak government yielded to Germany the areas inhabited by Germans and allowed German extraterritorial routes across its territory—only to have these concessions pave the way for total German domination—but the very way in which the Germans assumed effective control of Slovakia was resented in Warsaw and perceived quite correctly as aimed at Poland.!3 When von Ribbentrop reiterated the Germans’ demand for Danzig and the extraterritorial routes across the Corridor in exchange for a guarantee of Poland’s western border, he also hinted at concessions in regatd to Slovakia, and invited Beck to follow Hacha to Berlin for the signing of a treaty—with the end of Poland by German-Soviet agreement threatened as the alternative.'* The Polish government answered indirectly by military moves in the Corridor, showing its willingness to respond militarily to any German attempt for a fait accompli.! The direct reply was a polite no.!6 Though ready to discuss minor adjustments in the situation, the Poles would not meet the German demands, especially under circumstances that would both establish Poland’s status as a client state of Germany—in the same way that joining the Anti-Comintern Pact would have—and open the way for further German demands, as in the case of Czechoslovakia,

which had also been promised a German guarantee of the borders the German army had crossed the week before. The Germans came to think that the Polish government decided on 24-25 March to work out an agreement with England which now appeared feasible and to respond negatively to the German proposals.'” Beck was in fact skeptical about Britain’s willingness to fight Germany.'® In replying firmly but politely, the Polish foreign minister was trying to stave off a German move but without provoking Berlin. He hoped that the recognition of Polish firmness would lead the Germans to reconsider the advisability of starting what would be a war rather than a diplomatic action, while simultaneously showing the British government that Poland would stand up for her own rights. He had already seen some signs that such a posture would find support in Britain and anticipated that a resulting Polish-British combination of some sort would restrain Germany and create a different international atmosphere.'? Hitler, in the meantime, 12. The memorandum on this conference quotes Beck as saying: “The line [at which Poland would fight] also involves the nonacceptance by our state, regarding the drastic spot that Danzig has always been, of any unilateral suggestion to be imposed on us. And, regardless of what Danzig is worth as an object (in my opinion it may pethaps be worth quite a lot, but this is of no concern at the moment), under the present circumstances it has become a symbol” (Lipski Papers, No. 138). In this connection Beck’s comments on Danzig while in London on 4 April should also be noted with care: “this [the Danzig question] was not yet in negotiable shape. Poland, in any event, would not be prepared to discuss it under threat or to accept any imposed solution” (B.D., 3d, 5, No. 1, p. 3). Cf. G.D., D, 6, No. 74. One has only to compare these discussions of Danzig with

Beck’s language in turning down anything he absolutely rejected to see the difference.

410, 444, 454; 13. Lipski Papers, Nos. 136, 137; G.D., D, 5, No. 139; 6, Nos. 4, 12; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos.

4, Nos. 21, 32; Cienciala, pp. 208-9. See also G.D., 14. G.D., D, 6, No. 61; Polish White Book, No. 61; Szembek, pp. 433, 434; Biddle Papers, pp. 43-44. D, 6, No. 73 for another, but not communicated, form of the German demands. G.D., D, 6, No. 85; Hans 15. Biddle Papers, p. 46; U.S. 1939, 1:102; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 40, 43, 49, 50;

Webraissenschafiliche Roos, “Die militarpolitische Lage und Planung Polens gegenuber Deutschland von 1939,”

in Danzig, in this case with Rundschan, 7, No. 4 (1957), 194. For a report on the sort of thing the Poles feared 141. No. 6, D, G.D., see Liechtenstein, to reference 16. Lipski Papers, Nos. 138, 139; Szembek, pp. 438-39.

17AG DAD NGHINoA 299 p2318; 18. Biddle tel. 30 of 18 March 1939, State 740.00/631. 19, The evidence is reviewed in Cienciala, pp. 214-18.

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pondered the question of whether or not this Polish refusal should be considered final; for a short time he hesitated to consider it final, as, like Beck, he wanted to observe the

development of British policy.2° As Hitler told the commander-in-chief of the German army on 25 March, the possibility of a coup in Danzig was tied to some sign from Poland that such a step would be accepted, under protest but accepted nevertheless; a plan for military operations against Poland was to be prepared, but its execution would depend on factors yet to be developed. These factors, once it became clear from the Polish reply that a coup in Danzig would lead to more than protests,”! would necessarily involve the German government’s reading of the policies with which other nations responded to the events of 15 March. With both Warsaw and Berlin looking in the direction of London, the development of policy there must now be traced. News of possible German moves against the truncated Czecho-Slovak state had reached London in early March 1939 from a variety of sources, but no action to defend what was perceived as a lost cause against what

looked like internal dissolution under outside pressure was taken or even seriously contemplated.” The earlier alarms pointing to a sudden German attack in the west had led to firm decisions in London, but then had been followed by skepticism of such alarms and new hopes for the future when the anticipated German moves failed to occur.” Now the situation had again changed, the Munich settlement lay in ruins, the first mass of non-Germans had been subjected to Hitler’s control. The leaders of Britain were stunned in spite of the warnings received. If Chamberlain spoke cautiously in the House of Commons on 15 March, this was in part due to the need for a short time to assess the situation; what could be done or said when

Czecho-Slovakia herself was obviously gone? This question would be answered soon after, but in his first public statement the prime minister alluded to the loss of confidence resulting from the German action, an issue of critical importance to the whole policy now coming to an end.*4 The steps taken immediately were few and minor. The trade talks were ended and the planned visit of the president of the board of trade, Oliver

Stanley, to Germany was canceled. ‘There was a great deal of debate about the recall of Ambassador Henderson, and it was finally decided to summon him back to London for consultations. Similarly, a formal protest was filed in Berlin, but primarily at French urging. The debate over these measures, however, points to a reluctance over reopening discussion of the details as opposed to the fundamental issues of the Czechoslovak question; they give little clue to the more basic reorientation in British policy maturing during the third week of March.?° 20. G.D., D, 6, No. 99; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 30,” 25 March

1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101/34, ff. 153-57. 21. The angry German referral throughout the 1939 negotiations to the Polish military steps in the Corridor in late March suggests that these constituted the omen read by Hitler as precluding Polish acceptance under protest of a German seizure of Danzig. 22. The evidence is summarized in Sidney Aster, 1939: The Making of the Second World War (London: André Deutsch, 1973), pp. 21-23, 28-29; earlier information gathered by the Czechoslovak government is summarized by Luza, Transfer, pp. 174-75. 23. See above, pp. 684-85. There is a longer account in Aster, chap. 2.

24, Aster, pp. 28-32. An impression of the collapse of support for the policy of appeasement in the House of Commons by one of its strongest adherents may be found in Robert Rhodes James (ed.), Chips: The Diary of Sir Henry Channon (London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1967), pp. 185-86. 25. On the immediate repercussions of 15 March on the British government, see Aster, pp. 29-37; Julian C.

Doherty, Das Ende des Appeasement (Berlin: Colloquium, 1973), pp. 103-8; G.D., D, 4, No. 244; 5, Nos. 11, 16, 35; Strang minute of 16 March on Henderson’s No. 110 of 15 March 1939 and Cadogan note of 16 March

1939, C 3123 and C 3313/19/18, FO 371/22993; B.D., 3d, 6, Nos. 247, 264 (comments in C 3102/15/18, FO 371/22966), 308, 401; Cabinet 11 (39) of 15 March 1939, C 3353/19/18, FO 371/22993; Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 294-95; Johnson (chargé London) tel. 351 of 17 March 1939, State 740.00/628.

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In the cabinet and other internal discussions of 15 and 16 Match as well as in Lord Halifax’s strong comments to German Ambassador von Dirksen there ate evident the themes that would appear in Chamberlain’s speech in Birmingham on 17 March. The British leaders believed that they had tried to work for a peaceful settlement of European disputes, giving the clearest evidence of their determination by agreeing to the cession to Germany of those portions of Czechoslovakia inhabited by Germans. Now Hitler, without provocation, excuse, or negotiations had seized the areas inhabited by his own ad-

mission overwhelmingly by Czechs. He had broken not only his promise that the Sudeten area was his last territorial demand but also the basis of his case for the unification of German peoples under German control. Thus the whole assessment of German aims on which British policy had been based was altered. As Chamberlain asked: “Is this the end of an old adventure or is it the beginning of a new? Is this the last attack upon a small State, or is it to be followed by others? Is this, in fact, a step in the direction of an

attempt to dominate the world by force?” The very defense Chamberlain presented of his policy at Munich pointed to a policy now terminated by German initiative. The indications were that the new policy to take its place would be less compromising, that the old German argument would simply not be accepted any more, and that an entirely different line would be taken. The process of defining that new line would be quicker than might have been expected, but that was due to a fact then hidden from public view, namely, that the discussion of a firm policy if Germany moved into Holland, as rumored eatlier in the year, helped to shape the thinking of those in the British government who had participated in it. The precipitating element around which the new British policy crystallized with astonishing rapidity was the allegation that Germany was threatening to move into Romania. As in the case of the Morocco scare of January 1937 and the May Crisis over Czechoslovakia in 1938, there would subsequently be much agitated discussion of the real or imaginary character of the German threat. In this instance, I read the evidence as showing that the Romanians had excellent reasons for believing that Wohlthat was pressuring for concessions, and that those in the Romanian government and diplomatic setvice who did not want their country to fall under German domination dramatized this pressure to an extent not entirely warranted by the situation but without substantial distottion. Romania faced threats and pressures, though not the immediate danger of invasion.?/ Whether or not the danger was as immediate and dramatic as suggested by the Romanian minister in London, Viorel Tilea, and at first believed by the British govern-~_

ment, is really of secondary importance. As the German intervention in Spain in the — summer and fall of 1936 had first made plausible the rumors of German landings in 26. Full text in Chamberlain, The Struggle for Peace, pp. 413-20. Aster (p. 35) refers to this as Chamberlain’s most

.. . but he important speech of 1939 and adds: “When Chamberlain spoke in public, he may have been discreet,

was always honest.” Cf. G.D., D, 6, No. 23.

;

by Viorel V. 27. Aster, chap. 3, covers the story in great detail, partly on the basis of information provided

Documents, 3, Nos. 495, Tilea, the Romanian minister in London, who played a key role in it. See also Hungarian

18 March 1939, State 496, 502, 504; 4, Nos. 22, 25; U.S. 1939, 1:72, 74-75, 79-80; Kennedy tel. 380 of

186-96; Pownall Diary, pp. 740.00/630; Bullitt tel. 539 of 22 March 1939, State 762.71/49; James, Chips, pp.

p. 28; C 3538, C 192-93; Doherty, pp. 108-11; Chanady and Jensen, pp. 211-17; Irving, Breach of Security,

to the Reuters report on the 3563/3356/18, FO 371/23060 (on the latter of these documents, which pertains

my message received Romanian denial that there had been an ultimatum, there is the annotation “Compate

Sir Reginald Hoare to Ingram, 19 from ‘C.’ this morning”—a reference to a Secret Service report, ibid., f.79); No. 42. Note that the Romanian 6, D, G.D., 155; No. S.U., 371/23062; March 1939, C 4655/3356/18, FO tel. 28 of 18 March 1939, State 762.71/35; ambassador in Warsaw also referred to a German ultimatum, Biddle tel. 20 of 27 March 1939, State cf. Bullitt tel. 514 of 18 March 1939, State 762.71/40; MacMurray (Ankara)

740.00/693.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Morocco; as the invasion of Austria had made credible the rumors

of German

troop

movements in May of 1938—and had left the authorities in London skeptical in May of German denials exactly like the false denials of March—so the reports of German threats to move against Romania sounded plausible immediately after German troops had suddenly moved into Bohemia and Moravia. The fact that Hungary had moved troops into the Carpatho-Ukraine in obvious concert with Germany and that Hungary was known to be antagonistic to Romania suggested the obvious possibility of Germany’s securing the right to send troops across Hungary into Romania in exchange for the territorial expansion of Hungary at Romania’s expense.”8 Such an arrangement would not be worked out by the Germans until the following year, but it is hardly surprising that it looked very likely from the perspective of London in 1939. From London, previously alerted to possible German moves on Romania, currently perturbed by intelligence reports on German military concentrations in Bohemia that were hardly warranted in the absence of Czech resistance, and knowing of Hungarian and Bulgarian revisionist aspirations against Romania, the imminent threat to the latter could cause anxiety even if the Romanian government itself came to downplay the danger. The fact that a few days after almost repudiating Tilea the Romanians signed an agreement with Germany so favorable to Germany’s economic and political interests as to lead Hungary and Bulgaria to suspect that only German guarantees against revision had secured Romanian acquiescence, would leave the British certain that their initial concern had been essentially correct, whatever the precise nature of the negotiations between Berlin and Bucharest.2? The international uproar which followed Tilea’s deliberate leaking of the ultimatum story to the press very likely stiffened the Romanian government against even greater concessions to Germany; and in this case there were immediate as well as long-range effects from the way in which the Romanian minister had drawn attention to the renewed persistence with which Wohlthat pushed the Romanian government after 15 March.°° It is the impact of the Romanian issue on broader questions of British policy, as contrasted with the details of German-Romanian relations, however, that must be examined.

,

When the cabinet met in London on the evening of 18 March, Chamberlain presented his ideas on policy.*! The minutes deserve quotation at some length.

|

\

The Prime Minister said that up till a week ago we had proceeded on the assumption that we should be able to continue with our policy of getting on to better terms with the Dictator Powers, and that although those powers had aims, those aims were limited .. . he had now come definitely to the conclusion that Herr Hitler’s attitude made it impossible to continue to negotiate on the old basis . . . No reliance could be placed on any of the assurances given by the Nazi leaders . . . it was on the basis of this conclusion . . . that he had made his speech at Birmingham on the 17th March . . . he regarded his speech as a challenge to Germany on the issue whether or not Getmany intended to dominate Europe by force. It followed that if Germany took another step in the direction of dominating Europe, she would be accepting the challenge. A German attempt to dominate Romania was, therefore, more than a question whether Germany would thereby improve her strategical position; it raised

28. See Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 7.

29. Note the comment by F. K. Roberts of the Foreign Office on 24 March on the record of the CadoganTilea meeting of 20 March: “The account of German-Romanian Agreement which has appeared in the press seems to justify M. Tilea” (C 3709/3356/18, FO 371/23061). Chanady and Jensen, pp. 214 and 216, come to essentially the same conclusion, stressing Romanian perception of the reality of a military threat. 30. Gunther (Bucharest) dispatches 830 of 4 April and 834 of 5 April 1939, State 762.71/87 and 89. 31. Cabinet 12 (39) in C 3632/15/18, FO 371/22967.

The Road to War

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the whole question whether Germany intended to obtain domination over the whole of South Eastern Europe. He agreed, therefore, with the Foreign Secretary’s view that if Germany were to proceed with this course after warning had been given, we had no alternative but to take up the challenge. On this basis our next course was to ascertain what friends we had who would join with us in resisting aggression. Asked whether we alone should resist German aggression, the Prime Minister said that this was not in his mind. He added that he thought that at least we could rely on the cooperation of the French . . . he was not asking the Cabinet to determine there and then whether we should declare war on Germany if Germany invaded Romania. What he wished to ascertain was whether the Cabinet agreed generally with the change of policy which he had outlined. =) _ The chancellor of the exchequer, Sir John Simon, who had been foreign secretaty when Hitler came to power in Germany, “said that he was in entire agreement.” The Dominions

secretary,

Malcolm

MacDonald,

Dominions high commissioners that prime minister’s Birmingham speech. also agreed with the prime minister’s was, not whether we could prevent

reported

that in a meeting

with

the

afternoon he had heard their agreement with the Oliver Stanley, the president of the board of trade, speech and analysis. Stressing that “the real point Romania from being overrun, but whether, if we

went to war with Germany, we could defeat her,” he noted that the last war had shown

that the temporary overrunning of one country “would not affect the final outcome.” He thought it especially important that “in approaching other countries not to lay too much emphasis on the fact that our attitude would depend on theirs.” The fact that after stressing that “we should make it clear that we were in favor of action to resist German aggression” Stanley was to be included in the group designated to draft the telegrams that were to be sent out to the countries of East and Southeast Europe is noteworthy. Lord Halifax agreed with the view that the British approach should not be confined to the question of an attack on Romania. His perception is expressed in the minutes as follows: The real issue was Germany’s attempt to obtain world domination, which it was in the interest of all countries to resist. He agreed that we were the only country who could organize such resistance. It was, no doubt, equally difficult for this country to find effective means of attacking Germany, whether Germany attacked Romania or Holland. The attitude of the German government was either bluff, in which case it would be stopped by a public declaration on our part; or it was not bluff, in which case it was necessary that we should all unite to meet it, and the sooner we united the better. Otherwise we might see one country after another absorbed by Germany. + Chambertlain’s view was

that the real point at issue was whether we could obtain sufficient assurances from other countries to justify us in a public pronouncement that we should resist any further act of aggression on the part of Germany. He thought that such an : announcement might deter Germany at any rate for a period, and that we should take full advantage of the breathing-space thus offered. He thought that Poland was very likely the key to the situation . .. we should explain . . . that we thought that the time had now come for those who were threatened by German aggression (whether immediately or ultimately) to get together. We should enquire how far Poland was prepared to go along these lines.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The prime minister did not think that an immediate attack on Romania was likely, but even so Britain should approach a series of countries—Russia, Poland, Yugoslavia, Turkey, Greece, and Romania wete mentioned—to see whether support would be forthcoming from them “in order that we could make a strong pronouncement of our determination to resist further German aggression with the knowledge that we should be supported in such action.” The cabinet agreed that in concert with the French government such approaches should be made, and that if satisfactory assurances could be obtained, a public announcement of British intention to resist any new act of German ageression in Southeast Europe should be made. In the next few days, these projects would be implemented, and as the implementation was affected by the responses of others and new British perceptions of dangers in Europe, there would be some modifications. None of these, however, went far outside

the framework set by Chamberlain and his cabinet on 18 March. The government in London would try to recruit allies; and there was hope that Germany either might be bluffing or would be deterred by an impressive anti-aggression front; but if the Germans moved in new aggressive action, the situation would clearly be one in which England would fight. In 1938 the London government had hoped to avoid war by postponing commitment to the last minute: if Czechoslovakia and France were left in doubt of British help, they might make greater concessions; if the Germans were left to worry about possible British intervention if they went to war, they might prefer to make a peaceful agreement. When this strategy appeared to work, first, because Czechoslovakia made enormous concessions and, second, because Hitler at the last moment shrank from

testing British resolve and refrained from attacking Czechoslovakia, there had appeared to be hope of continued peace. Now that the Germans had destroyed that settlement, an entirely new approach would be tried. The British warning would come at the beginning, not the end, of negotiations; and the Germans would be left the choice of restraint or

wat, while potential victims of German aggression could yield if they were so minded or resist in the knowledge that they could count on British help.** The exact location—and hence the local details which might be stressed by German propaganda—made no difference in the basic British policy; nothing makes this more obvious than Lord Halifax’s combining Holland and Romania at a meeting of the cabinet that had agreed a few weeks earlier to go to war if Germany invaded the former. From the perspective of both geography and prior British views of their own vital interests, the two countries coupled in this fashion were far apart; but in the policy of restraining a German drive for European or world domination they were in the same category. The cabinet deliberations reflected a general shift of British public opinion which reacted very strongly to the breaking of the Munich agreement. In all walks of life, there

was a distinct breach with the past. As the British Legion, the main English veterans organization, phrased it on 25 March in declining an invitation to a meeting to be held in Berlin: “The events of the last few weeks have aroused the most profound resentment in every section of the community in Great Britain, and not least among ex-service men.’3 In some ways the reaction in Paris, at least of Daladier himself, but to a great extent 32. The British decision to protest the annexation of Memel without considering that action as ageression like the feared German moves against Poland or Romania can be understood in this framework. B.D., 3d, 4, No. 441; Collier minute of 21 March 1939 on this document in N 1500/30/59, FO 371/23600.

33. Wotton, p. 253. See also Sven Hedin’s noting of the changed views of Lord Match in his Ohne Auftrag in Berlin (Tubingen: Internationaler Universitats-Verlag, assessment of the British policy change, speculating that it was perhaps designed see Canadian Documents, 6, No. 946. An analysis by the French ambassador to summarized in Adamthwaite, pp. 305-6.

Londonderry from 12 to 20 1950), p. 38. For a Canadian to impress the United States, London of 4 April 1939 is

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of the French public and of many in the government as well, was similar. If the French humiliation over abandoning their Czechoslovak ally at Munich had been greater, and the willingness of many both in prominent positions and among ordinary people simply to write off French interests in all of Eastern Europe had also been greater than such currents in England, the French had been recalled to a fitmer position by the publicity attendant upon Italy’s aspirations for expansion. The fact that these aspirations, whether or not Rome intended to pursue them with force, involved not only allies or colonial areas but portions of metropolitan France brought home the danger of Axis aggression in a way nothing else could. Hitler’s constant public reiteration of his renunciation of any claim to Alsace-Lorraine was based on an assessment of the French that was fat shrewder than Mussolini’s. The tearing up of the Munich agreement, coming so soon

after the voicing of demands by Germany’s Italian partner for Nice, Corsica, and Savoy would really alarm the French. The trade talks between France and Germany were broken off as abruptly as the English-German ones.*4 Not only was it at French insistence that protests were delivered in Berlin, but the whole pattern of reaction in Paris was at first stunned and then angry. As reported to London, Berlin, and Washington, the French government—even

including Bonnet—had

“had it.55 When

the British ambassador before leaving for

England saw Daladier on 18 March, he was asked to tell Chamberlain and Halifax that

France would speed up her rearmament, stand firm, and resist any further aggression.>6 At lunch with American Ambassador Bullitt the same day, Daladier expressed his pteference for dropping Bonnet. He voiced a certain determination to go to war if Germany moved on Danzig or Poland and discussed the possibilities of real help for Poland and Romania from the Soviet Union with Bullitt, who had been ambassador in

Moscow before his assignment to Paris. Bullitt cautioned about Russian duplicity but said France should negotiate for assistance anyway. Poland and Romania, he was certain,

would fight if the Red Army entered, but he thought that it might be possible to arrange for arms, munitions, and planes to be supplied to them by the Soviet Union in case of war.?’ Although the issues which would dominate the diplomacy of subsequent weeks are touched on here, one further point must be made about Daladier’s expression of determination. He had sounded similarly determined at times in 1938, and his weakening as conveyed to London in September had contributed to the British decision to arrange a settlement on the basis of a territorial transfer. Would such a weakening occur again? An interesting clue to this question is in a report on the views of Pierre-Etienne Flandin sent to Berlin on 22 March. The great French advocate of appeasing Germany and cutting French commitments lamented the collapse of the earlier policy and noted the complete change in France as well as England. Thete would be no return to past policies after the situation had calmed down, and any in Germany who thought so, or who thought that Germany’s stronger position would restrain France and England, were deluding themselves. The democtacies, and especially the British democracy, react slowly, Flandin

34. G.D., D, 6, No. 11

35. Ibid., 4, No. 244; 6, Nos. 20, 22; B.D., 3d, 4, Nos. 270, 276, 278, 280, 281; Phipps tel. 136 Saving of 17 March 1939, C 3393/130/17, FO 371/22916; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 492, 534. Adamthwaite (pp. 129, 134-35, 301-2) stresses the extent to which the government was stiffened by the Chamber which, for once,

was in session at the time of crisis. 36. Phipps tel. 111 of 18 March 1939, C 3377/90/17, FO BU 22912. 37. The full text of Bullitt’s tel. 513 of 18 March is in 740.00/632; only excerpts are printed in Bullitt Papers, pp. 323-25. It should be noted that in this conversation Daladier expressed doubts about Bullitt’s certainty that the Poland would fight rather than yield to Germany. The French prime minister thought Beck “completely in wrong in his hands of the Germans”; by 31 March he was delighted to see the opposite and that “he had been opinion of Beck” (Bullitt tel. 605, State 740.00/715). Cf. Bullitt Papers, p. 332.

702

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

asserted, but once the English had decided to act, nothing would hold them back.** There would be no new Munich, as the French explained to the Vatican in June when the new Pope Pius XII urged a conference. First Hitler would have to restore the promise of the last Munich—an independent Czechoslovakia—before any thought could be given to a new one.*? The details of how to act and in what manner to proceed were changed during the last two weeks of March. The London government kept the initiative but moved in concert with the French. Their first approach was to the countries listed above (p. 700), asking them what they would do to help Romania if she were attacked. The responses were to a large extent questions about what England proposed to do. A variety of schemes was canvassed in London, and some of these were tried out on various governments; but views on three points crystallized during these days of diplomatic maneu-

veting.*” Throughout the British governmental discussions, the redefining of a new policy of warning Germany that Britaja would go to war if Germany attacked another country became increasingly precise. n 18 Match Chamberlain had still thought of awaiting the support of others before committing England, he increasingly turned to the view that a firm British commitment to act was in England’s own interest, was more

likely to rally others to her side, and would offer a greater hope of saving the peace by deterring ageression.*! A second point already stressed in the cabinet meeting of 18 March and increasingly evident thereafter was the key role of Poland. Not only did Poland appear to be a likely victim of German demands and possible aggression,.she was also a country known to have close ties with Romania, the country which appeared to be subject to immediate German demands and whose oil and grain resources would be critical to any allied plans for blockading Germany in case of war. If Poland gave in to German demands and became subservient to the Thitd Reich, Hitler could turn all his forces on the West, a

38. G.D., D, 6, No. 69. For signs of a weaker French position, however, see Cienciala, pp. 215-16. 39. Le Saint Siége et la guerre en Europe, 1, Nos.s59, 73.

40. The details cannot be recounted here. They are covered by the recent works of Aster (chap. 4) and Doherty (pp. 114-27) as well as the earlier books by Namier, Hofer, and Beloff. 41. Meeting of ministers at 10 Downing Street, 19 March 1939, C 3858, C 3859/15/18, FO 371/22961; Cabinet 13 (39) of 20 March and Cabinet 14 (39) of 22 March, C 3598 and C 3889/15/18, ibid.; 38th meeting

of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, CAB 27/624; Feiling, pp. 401-3, 407; G.D., D, 6, No. 48; Halifax, p. 209. Conferences with the French on 21-22 March played a part in the deliberations, see Aster, pp. 87-88; Harvey Diaries, p. 297. Note Dalton’s impression of the prime minister’s briefing of Labor leaders on the situation in the negotiations: “We all get the impression that the P.M. now realized that his ‘appeasement’ policy has been a failure; that he is completely disillusioned with Hitler, and very apprehensive about the future” (Dalton Diary, 23 March 1939, London School of Economics). Chamberlain recorded himself as responding in a private talk with Irish Prime Minister Eamon de Valera two days later to the statement that de Valera “hoped very much that what had happened would not deflect me ftom the policy of appeasement even though methods had to some extent to be altered. In particular, he hoped that I should not be tempted to embark upon a preventive war. I replied that I would never do that and that in my view the policy was still the same, namely, the securing of peace by the removal of reasonable causes of war, whilst pursuing a programme of te-armament, but I said that, Hitler having now demonstrated that his word could not be relied on, it was at present hopeless to engage

in any negotiations with him or [for?] a settlement of grievances and, on the contrary, it was necessary in my view to see what steps could be taken to prevent his pursuing any further his policy of swallowing neighbouring small states. With all this Mr. de Valera agreed, though with deep regret and reluctance. He said, however, that he much feared that we should find it impossible to stop Hitler’s further advance in Eastern Europe since we should be faced with the crumbling of the resistance of the smaller states who would be so frightened that they would make agreements with Germany, the effect of which would be to subject them to her domination. I

replied that I fully appreciated this point, but that we hoped, that if we could give certain specific assurances, to strengthen the will to resistance on the part of those who otherwise would be the next victims of German aggression” (Memorandum by Chamberlain of 27 March 1939 in Halifax Papers, FO 800/310, ff.220-21). Cf. the analyses of the Hungarian ministers in London and Berlin (Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 525, 555).

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factor as obvious to London in March 1939 as it had been to Betlin in the months since October 1938 when von Ribbentrop on Hitlet’s instructions had first tried to implemen t such a policy. The Poles themselves, however, while they wanted British and French support against German demands, still hoped that Germany might temporize rather than attack, and they wished to do nothing that might provoke a war. Although German diplomats and propagandists would proclaim loudly and repeatedly that Poland was reckless and provocative, the facts were the exact opposite. Throughout the negotiations the Polish government etted, if at all, on the side of caution, to such an extent that in the end they would be attacked before they had completed their own mobilization. While caution lest Germany be provoked was one element in Poland’s refusal to participate in a common front with the Soviet Union, certainly another was her fear that the Red Army, if once in the country, would never leave.* Most of Poland’s leadets in 1939 were not only anti-Communist in political orientation but had participated in the war against Russia from 1918 to 1920. This recent experience, combined with a hatred and fear of Russia derived from centuries of war, partition, and

abortive uprisings, made the leaders of Poland—as well as the vast majority of the nationally Polish segment of the population—most dubious about Russian good faith and Soviet help. As they had refused to align themselves formally with Germany for fear of falling under her control, so the Polish government would decline any formal alignment with the Soviet Union. If the British and French had any doubts on this score, they would quickly be disabused. While the Western Powers either already recognized or soon learned that the Poles did not wish to be associated in a common front with the Soviet Union, they themselves had very mixed feelings about close cooperation with Russia, the third of the critical issues of late March.*? They had grave doubts that effective cooperation between Poland and Romania on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other was possible, and they were very doubtful that the Russians were in any position to provide much more than supplies to their neighbors. The assessment of Soviet military power by the British and French military and political leaders in 1939 was remarkably uniform: the Russians would defend themselves vigorously if attacked; they were not in any condition after the purges and in view of the communication and transportation system near their borders to develop any strong offensive beyond those borders. Although the French appear to have changed their opinions of Soviet military power—somewhat raising it in the summer of 1939 and lowering it in the winter of 1939-40—the British held to the same view consistently} As Chamberlain wrote on 1 January 1940, when tHe inability of the Red Army to defeat Finland in the time it had taken Germany to defeat Poland appeared to give substance to the prior assessment at the same time as it aroused more vehement anti-Soviet sentiments throughout the world: “I still regard Germany as the Public Enemy No. 1, and I cannot take Russia very seriously as an aggressive force though no doubt formidable if attacked in het own country.”#* —] The concept that Soviet help to the Poles was not likely to be particularly effective reinforced the knowledge that it would not be especially welcome. Stalin’s determined efforts to appease Hitler until the very moment of the German attack in 1941 suggest that the Soviet leader’s assessment of his country’s military power was not so far different from that entertained in the West. What all this meant for Soviet policy in 1939 42. Litvinov’s suggestion of mid-March for a partition of the Baltic States into Soviet and Polish spheres of influence along the line of the Dvina River was likely to increase rather than decrease Polish apprehensions ; udurowycz, p. 145). “aNote ‘the argument between Cadogan and Vansittart over the relative demerits of Italy and the Soviet

Union as a potential ally of Britain in late March 1939, in C 3865/19/18, FO 371/22996. 44. Quoted in Feiling, pp. 427—28.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

will be examined in a moment; but the view from London, here discussed first, certainly suggested that the Soviet government might contribute to the deterrent effect of a British commitment to aid Poland or Romania by a similar promise, with the implementation of any such promise if war did come being left as vague as the implementation of the

commitment from London. Faced with the reality, as opposed to the theoretical con-

tingency, of a German

attack, all sorts of problems would look different both to the

victims of invasion and to the prospective allies of the latter. What the internal deliberations of the British government reveal is both confusion and ambivalence about the best way to obtain from Moscow a promise to assist any future victim of German aggression, in the hope that the deterrent effect of a British-

French anti-aggression front would be strengthened by Soviet support, under circumstances and in a form which would not have the opposite effect of either directly provoking a German attack or indirectly inviting such an attack through the repercussions of an alignment with Russia on the very countries to be protected against attack. If these problems were never resolved, as the interminable discussions within the British and French governments and between them and the Soviet government throughout the spring and summer of 1939 would reveal, one must, in my opinion, keep constantly in mind a fundamental difference in the appreciation of the situation as seen from London on the one hand and from Moscow on the other. In London the constantly reiterated belief that a war, once started anywhere, would

surely involve Great Britain meant that the emphasis should be on such measures as might avoid a war altogether and those which would: strengthen the side Britain would fight on if war started after all. Such a war, it was assumed in a complete reversal of the pre-1914 beliefs, was sure to be a long one; and the hope was that at the end the Allies

would again triumph over Germany. Whether war started in the east or in the west, it was important for the hope of such a victory that a maximum possible strain be imposed on Germany on both fronts since initial German military superiority was assumed and only Germany’s divided exertions had exhausted her in the World War to a point where, with the United States replacing Ryssia, the Allies had finally triumphed. From London, as from Paris, the hope of victory in what was believed would be a lengthy and difficult war was closely associated with the two-front concept—and it was simultaneously hoped that by presenting Hitler with the prospect of such a war he just might be convinced to desist from launching one.* From the perspective of Moscow, the situation was rather different. Nothing suggests that Stalin was not also worried about German military strength and the prospects of a war with such a powerful adversary, and nothing suggests that he too did not want all the allies he could get if the Soviet Union were ever involved in a war with Germany; but there is considerable evidence to show that Stalin did not share the opinion that a war started by Germany anywhere would necessarily involve the Soviet Union on the opposing side—it might, but it might not. Stalin’s famous speech of 10 March cannot be interpreted, as some have tried to do, as the reflection of a decision to

45. This calculation never assumed that Germany would be /e/d in the east, only that she would be strained by fighting there as well as in the west. This point was made slightly differently by Lord Halifax in the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy on 27 March: “He argued that there was probably no way in which France and ourselves could prevent Poland and Romania from being overrun. We were faced with the dilemma of doing nothing or entering into a devastating war. If we did nothing, this in itself would mean a great accession to Germany’s strength and a great loss to ourselves of sympathy and support in the United States, in the Balkan countries and in other parts of the world. In those circumstances if we had to choose between two great evils he favored our going to war’ (CAB 27/624, f.213). Lord Chatfield, the minister for the coordination of defense, expressed agreement with these views; they are reflected fairly accurately in his not always very informative memoirs, The Navy and Defence, 2 (London: W. Heinemann, 1947), 175.

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align need such need

himself with Germany, but it certainly does express a view that a war in Europe not involve the Soviet Union at all. The Soviet Union might remain aloof from a war—at least until a time of its own choosing—and a German aggressive move not necessarily bring on a general conflict.4 If we ask what led Stalin to this view and what sort of war not involving the Soviet Union he may have visualized, we are confronted with the fact that the available evidence is necessarily indirect and incomplete. The ideological predisposition to believe that so-called capitalist-imperialist states were destined to fight each other or gang up for a joint attack on Soviet Russia would suggest the possibility of an option: a war within the capitalist camp from which the Soviet Union could temain aloof. The geographic realities almost forced a frame around this broader view. If Germany attacked in the west, there would certainly be an option for Russia to join in or abstain from the conflict as Stalin thought best; there is no evidence that Stalin believed a war in Western Europe,

which he appears to have thought would be a long, drawn-out struggle, necessarily involved a role for Russia. The concept of a two-front war as an absolute requirement for the defeat of Germany did not occur to Stalin until June 1941 after a second front had existed twice only to be erased while Russia aided the Third Reich. If Germany attacked in the east, and that meant if she attacked Poland, then the critical question

would be whether the attack was just a sort of transit operation leading to an attack on the Soviet Union itself—in which case there would clearly be no option—or whether it might be a separable act which, especially if Germany became involved in a war in the west because of the attack on Poland, would give Moscow the choice between joining Germany’s enemies, remaining aloof altogether, or joining with Germany.

The information recetved by Moscow in the winter of 1938-39 was undoubtedly analyzed with great care. We do not know—and are unlikely to know for many decades, if ever—what

all the information was and how it was interpreted; but there are some

very important clues. The Soviet government has itself published some of the reports from agents in locations critical for an assessment of German plans. In 1937 the Russians had recruited Rudolf von Scheliha, counsellor of embassy in the German embassy in Warsaw, who supplied the Soviet government with information from there

until the outbreak of war.47 While a number of von Scheliha’s reports have been published, it is difficult to believe that there were no others.4* Certainly whatever else he reported and Moscow believed or discounted, the Moscow government could learn two things from Scheliha: the Germans were making demands on Poland, and the Poles had not agreed to fulfill them. On these two key issues Stalin was apparently as well, if not better, informed by March 1939 than either London or Paris, which Beck had tried to keep in the dark about his difficulties with the Germans as long as possible. The other key informant was the long-time Soviet agent Richard Sorge, who supplied Moscow with information from the German embassy in Tokyo.” Again we probably do not have a full run of Sorge’s reports, but again two things stand out in those of his reports from Tokyo in the winter of 1938-39 which have been published. 46. The text of his speech is in Joseph V. Stalin, Leninism (New York: International Publishers, 1940), pp: 61970; important sections in Beloff, 2:221—-23. The opinion that this speech reflects a previous decision by Stalin to sign with Germany is advanced in Angelo Rossi (pseud. of Angelo Tasca), Deux ans d ‘alliance germano-sovietique (Paris: Plon, 1949), p. 217. For a list of contemporary diplomatic reports and interpretations, see Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 13, n. 48. See also Toscano, Designs, pp. 52-53.

47. Von Scheliha continued thereafter to send reports from Berlin until his arrest in October 1942; he was executed in December of that year (Héhne, Codeword Direktor, pp. 148-49, 165-67, 191, 202). . §.U., Nos. 45, 79, 83, 84, 276, 388. as (ae scholarly work on Sorge is needed; the best work is Frederick W. Deakin and G. R. Stony, The Case ofRichard Sorge (London: Chatto & Windus, 1966).

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

The Germans were trying to secure an alliance with Japan; but while the Japanese were willing to make an alliance as long as it was directed against the Soviet Union, the Germans kept insisting, and the Japanese kept refusing, that such an alliance be extended

to apply to the Western Powers. We do not know what interpretation Stalin placed on these reports, and on similar ones then appearing in the press as a result of leaks in Tokyo, but it is reasonable to assume that the information pointed to the possibility that Germany was not thinking of an attack on Poland as merely a preliminary to an invasion of Russia—in which case an alliance with Japan against Russia would surely have been desired by Berlin—but was at least as much concerned with the possibility of a war with the Western Powers. Stalin’s 10 March speech, whether based on such information and assessments ot not, certainly reflected a view of the international situation in which Russia might have,

and hence could explore, a range of alternative courses of action.*? Certainly there was nothing in either this speech or in any other speech or action of the Soviet leaders which in any way resembled the often expressed view of the British leaders that a war anywhere in Europe would quickly spread as the World War had spread from the Balkans to engulf the world. If the Soviet government had once accepted the view expressed by Litvinov to the effect that peace was indivisible, there were no signs of it in 1939. The Soviet reaction to the German destruction of Czechoslovakia on 15 March a few days after Stalin’s speech confirms the sense of isolated observation with an eye to alternatives just described. As the Germans, who had long denounced Czechoslovakia as the Central European outpost of Moscow, noted with interest, Soviet reaction to the events of 15-16 March was mild indeed: a mixture of polite disapproval over the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia with a sense of relief over the Hungarian occupation of the Carpatho-Ukraine.*! The reaction of Moscow to the immediately ensuing changes in British and French policy is even more revealing. While the exchanges about British and Russian proposals concerning the possibility of support for the next victims of German aggression were in progress,” the Soviet government was establishing an interpretation of Western policy which would subsequently never vary and has remained the official line of Soviet historiography until the present. Although Maisky appeats to have reported accurately on British reaction to the German move of 15 March, he was told by Litvinov that this was all a passing mood and that Britain and France would go back to the line that Soviet propaganda ascribed to them, that of trying to get Hitler to attack in the east.°? At the very time that the British government was casting about for ways to deter Hitler from moving east or to make sure he faced strong resistance if he did so, the Russian government was determined to interpret this policy as meaning the exact opposite, and to use this explanation to explain a free hand for itself.54 50. The first part of March 1939 was a time when the Soviet government began efforts at securing several Finnish islands in the Gulf of Finland in exchange for parts of Soviet Karelia. Was this a part of a program of Stalin for sealing the Soviet Union off from developments in Central Europe? See G.D., D, 5, No. 470; 6, Nos. 60, 257, n. 3; Moffat Papers, pp. 238-39; U.S. 1939, 1:953-54, 954-55, 957. Perhaps Litvinov’s sounding of the

Polish ambassador in Match (n. 42, above) belongs in this context. 51. See esp. G.D., D, 6, No. 51. The Soviet Union was the only non-Axis power to accord de jure recognition

to Slovakia. 52. A substantial selection of the relevant documents has been published in B.D., 3d, 4, chaps. 5 and 6. See also

S.U., Nos. 160-64. 53. An abridged text of Litvinov’s letter of 19 March is in S.U., No. 167. Although this letter appears to be a

tesponse to reports from Maisky on British reactions, only one of these asserting that the British were taking

the threat to Romania seriously, regardless of whether or not there had been a German ultimatum, has been published (ibid., No. 165). The first report of Surits from Paris appears to have been similarly accurate (see ibid., No. 189). 54. See ibid., No. 171 and n. 85.

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In the negotiations of 20-30 March, therefore, in which the British government tried to find a way to harmonize a common front against German aggression with

Poland and Romania on the one hand with the Soviet Union on the other, the official

Soviet line—now voiced by Maisky in response to Litvinov’s coaching—was that Chamberlain was not yet willing to accept military obligations in Eastern Europe although he said he was.°> As is well known, Chamberlain was to do precisely that on 31 March and to lead his country into war pursuant to the obligation then assumed. The fact that the British step of 31 March would leave the Soviet government less, not more,

inclined to cooperate with England and France as well as the whole lengthy diplomatic bargaining of 1939 can be understood only if one recognizes that this deliberate and continuing misinterpretation of British and French policy in Moscow had been formulated as an accompaniment to exploring options for staying out of a wat with Germany, options which appeared to the Soviet leaders to have been made conceivable by what they knew or thought they had reason to believe about German plans and intentions. While they would explore the latter most cautiously in the spring and summer of 1939, the very steps that the Western Powers took to confirm their opposition to German expansion eastward only increased the possibility that a German attack on Poland might result in a European war from which the Soviet Union would try to profit without the danger of major participation. It is at least possible that in this Stalin was influenced by the situation in East Asia, where the Soviet Union was relieved to see Japan embroiled in

an apparently endless war in China and where a trickle of aid to the Chinese Nationalist government seemed to pay enormous dividends for a minimal investment. As already mentioned, there were agitated discussions in London about the fate of Romania in late March while the Romanian government tried unsuccessfully to secure a small share of the Carpatho-Ukraine. When that failed in the face of Hungarian greed backed by German might, Bucharest tried to keep on the best possible terms with Germany in spite of the pleasure over British interest.°° The discussions and negotiations about Romania, which

had included

concern

about Poland

from the start, were

to

crystallize into a public formulation of policy as a result of reports reaching London about German-Polish relations while the formation of an anti-aggression front was being considered. The Germans had presented their demands to the Poles again on 21 March only to have them politely declined on 26 March. The Polish declination had been worded in such a manner as to leave open the possibility of further negotiations.*’ The German government recognized this fact but, as will be seen, preferred not to follow up on such an opening. The German record of this episode was, therefore, doctored with special cate before wattime publication in the German White Book.** In the mounting and obvious tension of those days, the Germans decided as part of their pressure on Poland to make 55. Ibid., No. 187; other relevant documents, ibid., Nos. 176-94, passim; B.D., 3d, 4, chap. 6; C 3727/3356/18,

FO 371/23061. See also Les relations franco-britanniques, pp. 403-11.

56. On the Hungarian-Romanian tension over the Carpatho-Ukraine, see above, p. 663; see also Hungarian

Documents, 3, Nos. 450, 469, 481, 484, 503, 507, 510-13, 517, 519, 520, 537, 549, 551, 559, 561; 4, Nos. 1-27,

passim. On Romanian efforts to stay on good terms with Berlin, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 80, 92, 153. 57 of 57. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 101, 103; Lipski Papers, No. 139; Biddle Papers, pp. 47-48; U.S. 1939, 1:102; Biddle tel.

30 Match 1939, State 760c.62/481. yon 58. See White Book, No. 208. The same thing was done with the record of the subsequent meeting of would line propaganda German the Since 211). No. Book, White and 118 No. 6, D, G.D., (cf. Beck Moltke with

be that Polish “intransigence” was responsible for the outbreak of war, and was in turn the product of English policy, at this point and in many other instances extensive “surgery” had to be performed on the documents of von published by the German Foreign Ministry. The commission of surgeons operated under the leadership record the ways the in versed well especially was months, crucial the in Poland to Moltke, who, as ambassador had to be operated upon to fit in with German propaganda.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

a diplomatic issue of some incidents of 26 March at Bromberg.” Von Ribbentrop protested to Lipski on the following day,“° while the German newspaper accounts of it suggested to Ian Colvin, the Berlin correspondent of the News Chronicle, that a repetition of the kind of press campaign that had preceded the destruction of Czechoslovakia was about to be launched. At the suggestion of the British military attaché in Berlin, Frank Mason-Macfatlane,

Colvin flew to London

on 28 March, and Rex Leeper, the press

officer of the Foreign Office, arranged for him to meet Undersecretary Cadogan and Lord Halifax, who took him to the prime minister on the 29th.°! The fact that Colvin’s information on German plans in 1938 had proved correct now lent some strength to his warning of an imminent German thrust at Poland.% There was some

skepticism in London about the imminence

of a German attack;

but since the government had already drawn from the negotiations of the last two weeks the conclusion that it would be exceedingly difficult to construct a multilateral antiaggression front as long as the Soviet Union made Polish participation a prerequisite for its signature and the Polish government refused to join any pact to which the Soviet Union was a partner, the possibility of a separate step concerning Poland was already under review.°? In fact the concept of a guarantee of Poland as a means of both encouraging her not to cave in without resistance and of deterring Hitler from even trying had developed in Chamberlain’s thinking to a point where on 27 March he expressed himself as willing to make a commitment to Poland even if Poland would not assume a similar obligation toward Great Britain. “If Poland declined to entertain a commitment of this kind then nevertheless we should be prepared to give her the unilateral assurance as regards the Eastern Front seeing that our object was to check and defeat Germany’s attempt at world domination.’’®+ In view of this attitude, Colvin’s warning precipitated the public announcement of a policy already being formulated. The rapidity with which the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy and the cabinet agreed, the Dominions were informed, the French were involved, and the official announcement

was made in Parliament on 31 March must be seen as the final stage in a process of defining a policy developed over a period of two weeks.® The phraseology of Chamberlain’s formula of 31 March was designed to cover the petiod while Britain engaged in negotiations for some common front against aggression. He stated: 59. On this, see Dertinger, “Informationsbeticht

Nr. 31,” of 27 March

and “Nr. 32” of 28 Match

1939,

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, f£.159-63; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 28 and 29 March 1939, ibid., 101/12, f£.95—96. 60. G.D., D, 6, No. 108. 61. Colvin, None So Blind, pp. 299-310; Cadogan Diary, 29, 30 March 1939, pp. 164-66; Harvey Diaries, 29, 30

March 1939, p, 271. 62. For Polish alarm at this point, see G.D., D, 6, No. 115; Bullitt tel. 595 of 30 March

1939, noon

(State

740.00/709) reporting the conversation he had just had with the Polish ambassador, who had told him “that he was in communication with Warsaw a few minutes ago and that the tension between Berlin and Warsaw is greater than ever; that no progress whatsoever has been made in the conversations between Berlin and Warsaw

and that the Polish government believes it to be possible that Hitler will attack Poland tomorrow or Sunday in order to attempt to finish Poland before Beck can have time to sign a definite alliance with Great Britain.” 63. Cadogan Diary, 22, 26, 27 March 1939, pp. 163-64. 64. 38th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 27 March 1939, CAB 27/624, £.204. The choice

of language with its reference to an “Eastern Front” is particularly revealing. This evidence and other materials cited by the author lead to an interpretation very different from that in Cienciala, chap. 7. 65. Minute by Mr. Speaight, “Possibility of a German Coup in Danzig,” 29 March 1939, C 4859/54/18, FO

371/23016; Cabinet 15 (39) of 29 March, Cabinet 16 (49) of 30 March, Cabinet 17 (39) of 31 March 1939, C 4552, C 4736, C 4656/15/18, FO 371/22968; 39th and 40th meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign

Policy, CAB 27/624; C 5265/15/18, FO 371/22969; C 4525/54/18, FO 371/23015; Chiefs of Staff Paper 870, 28 March 1939, CAB 53/47; Strang, p. 161; Cadogan Diary, 30, 31 March 1939, pp. 165-66; Hoare, pp. 347-50; Hamey Diaries, 25 March 1939, p. 268;-Lukasiewicx Papers, p. 183.

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In order to make perfectly clear the position of His Majesty’s Government before those consultations are concluded, I now have to inform the House that during that period in the event of any action which clearly threatened Polish independence, and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist with theit national forces, His Majesty’s Government would feel themselves bound at once to lend the Polish Government all support in their power.

Efforts would be made to supplement this promise by other commitments of aid, beyond the existing Franco-Polish treaty, but Great Britain had taken her stand. Parliament and public supported the policy; perhaps the diary entry of General Pownall summarized the position: “A continental commitment with a vengeance! But I’m sute it’s the right policy.” It would prove easier to secure reciprocity ftom Poland than some form of participation by the Soviet Union. Plans for Polish Foreign Minister Beck to come to London went back some months; the visit took place on 4-6 April, a few days after the developments just described.°’ The Polish government was quite agreeable to an exchange of commitments pending a final settlement of the precise terms of a treaty. Pressed hard by Chamberlain, Beck maintained his objection to combinations involving the Soviet Union and would only go so far as to say that “he had no opinion to express and no objection to raise” if the British government worked out a system under which help from Russia could be expected in case of war. Even so, he stressed the danger that any alignment of Britain with the Soviet Union might precipitate the very conflict all still hoped to avoid. None of this would keep the British government from trying. The negotiations with the Soviet Union would continue until the German Soviet Pact made the whole time and paper-consuming process as ridiculous as it had become futile. No effort will be made here to recount these long negotiations; they will only be referred to from time to time. The pattern projected before 31 March would be reinforced, not altered, by the British

step; and then the focus shifted to German plans toward Poland and the Soviet Union. The Russian government had been given a preliminary view of the guarantee concept on 29 March; on the 30th Arthur Greenwood of the Labor party had leaked the intended announcement in Parliament to Maisky; and on the 31st Lord Halifax officially informed Maisky before Chamberlain’s statement was made. The official reaction of the Soviet government to the British policy was negative from the beginning.’ Had it been positive, the road to some agreement would have been open, but this was precisely what Moscow wanted to avoid, at least until the alternative of an agreement with Germany had been explored. After all, once London had 66. Pownall Diary, 3 April 1939, p. 197. Note the entry in Jones, 2 April 1939, pp. 430-32. Christopher Thorne, The Approach ofWar, 1938-39 (New York: St. Martin’s, 1968), p. 220, prints a Gallup Poll of 4 August 1939 in which the question “If Germany and Poland go to war over Danzig, should we fulfill our pledge to fight on Poland’s side?” was answered 76 percent yes, 13 percent no, and 11 percent don’t know. Though of a later date, the focus of this question on the Danzig issue in its narrowest form surely indicates broad public backing

for Britain’s guarantee of Poland. 67. The British records are in B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 1, 2, 10, 11, 16.

68. See esp. ibid., pp. 11-13.

the 69. See ibid., No. 3, summarizing the record; S.U., No. 198 on Greenwood’s information, and No. 200 on

Maisky-Halifax talk. Adam B. Ulam, Expansion and Coexistence: Soviet Foreign Policy, 1917-1973, 2d ed. (New York: Praeger, 1974), p. 275, suggests that the only way for the British to secure Soviet support would have been to turn the phraseology around, that is, to announce that they would not help defend Poland unless the

Soviet Union agreed to do so also. The speculation is intriguing, but as Ulam himself admits is far removed from the real options of the time. 70. B.D., 3d, 4, No. 597; S.U., No. 203.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

committed itself, it might either break that promise—in which case the Soviet Union would find itself perceived as an enemy along with Poland—or it might honor that promise—in which case there was the possibility of a general war from which Russia with its differing view of that contingency might abstain if Germany gave signs of limiting her ambitions in the east.7! Exploring such possibilities would take time, and the Soviet government’s long-term device for securing that time was to make its initial demands for agreement high and to raise new demands during the course of negotiations; in the short run it was to prevent a meeting between Lord Halifax and Deputy Commissar for Foreign Affairs Vladimir Potemkin originally scheduled for 15 May.” By that date, the first signs of a possible deal with the aggressor were already evident to Moscow, but the realization of such a deal necessarily depended on the evolution of German plans and policies. As for any early Soviet joining of Britain, that was made less likely by the very steps London took to show its determination to stand by Poland. The doubling of the territorial army and finally the introduction of conscription against the solid opposition of the Labor and Liberal parties reassured the French and the Poles about the reality of Chamberlain’s commitment, but it suggested to Moscow the possibility of even greater concessions if Russia refused to join the defenders of Hitler’s prospective victim.’? The very same days in which the British government developed and, in a process speeded up by concern over a possibly imminent German attack on Poland, formulated and announced its determination to stand by Poland were also the days when Hitler gave up whatever hopes he might have entertained of securing Poland’s peaceful submission to his will. The evidence on this process in the last days of March and the first days of April is by no means entirely clear, but there is enough to establish firm outlines. On 10 February Hitler had explained to some assembled officers his general determination to launch a war. He had been obliged to pull back in September 1938 and had not reached his goal. But he had to fight a war still in his lifetime; no German would ever again be held in such complete confidence by the people; so he alone was capable of leading them into a war. The aims of war were to be first domination in Europe and then world hegemony. The first war toward such goals would have to be launched soon because of the rearmament of others which might enable them to overtake Germany.’4 Such general perspectives, however interpreted by his audience, do not yet point with precision to an attack on Poland as the first war to be started. Hitler subsequently explained the details of this decision twice, once on 22 August and once on 23 November 1939, In his August speech, discussed later in this chapter, Hitler said that “it 71. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 15. 72. On Potemkin’s travels in April and May, see ibid., pp. 16-20. See also the documents published in S.U., such as Nos. 264, 265; Biddle dispatch 1058 of 12 May 1939, State 740.00/1576. Note Litvinov’s letter to

Maisky of 4April 1939, S.U., No. 210. 73. On the importance of the armaments and especially the conscription issue, see Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 14-15; Pownall Diary, 17 April 1939, p. 199; Hore-Belisha Papers, pp. 187, 195-99; Hoare, pp: 337-39; Cadogan minute of 27 March 1939, C 3247/130/17, FO 371/22921; Bullitt tel. 588 of 28 March 1939, State 740.00/697; Kirkpatrick minute of 21 April 1939, C 5610/15/18, FO 371/22970; Aster, pp. 98-99. The

government’s decision to introduce conscription legislation was announced on 26 April; both the French and the American governments had been pushing the British discreetly but insistently in this direction. New BritishFrench staff talks had already been authorized by the cabinet on 8 February; for an account of their development, see Gibbs, chap. 17. Chamberlain, however, refused to enlarge the basis of his cabinet by including

representatives of the Conservative opposition like Eden or Churchill. 74. Groscurth Diary, pp. 166-67; Miiller, p. 98, n. 62; Thiess, pp. 112ff. Halder’s account of Hitler’s views to the American consul general in Berlin, Geist, on 12 April as being a desire for Lebensraum in the east and his turning

against Britain and France because they would not allow him to realize his eastern aims shows how clearly the new chief of staff of the German army understood Hitler’s perspective at the time (Geist tel. 247 of 13 April 1939, State 740.00/794).

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714

was cleat to me that a conflict with Poland had to come sooner or later. I had already made this decision in the spring, but I thought I would first turn against the West in a few years, and only afterwards against the East. But the sequence could not be fixed. One cannot close one’s eyes before a threatening situation. I wanted to establish an acceptable relationship with Poland in order to fight first against the West. But this plan, which was agreeable to me, could not be executed since essential points had changed. It became clear to me that Poland would attack us in case of conflict with the West.75 In November, after the Polish campaign, Hitler phrased this account slightly differently but in a basically similar fashion: “The decision to march into Bohemia was made. Then followed the erection of the Protectorate [of Bohemia and Moravia on 15 March] and with that a basis for action against Poland was laid, but it was not quite clear at that time

whether I should start first against the East and then the West or vice versa. Moltke often made the same calculations in his time.’ Under pressure the decision came to fight with Poland first.”7” Hitler was on these two occasions speaking to military commanders whose enthusiasm he knew was for an attack on Poland alone.’8 His explanation, which makes that attack not a primary project for the recovery of land lost in 1919—as the military would have it, but as Hitler never even mentions—but instead an unfortunate necessity preliminary to starting a war against England and France, about which the military, as Hitler also knew, were quite unenthusiastic, may in fact be taken as a reasonably accurate reflection of his real thinking. The demands that had been made of Poland in October 1938 would have made Poland subservient to Germany and incapable of carrying out her obligations under the Franco-Polish Pact when Germany turned against the West—what Hitler described as “an acceptable relationship.” Poland had refused those demands. Hitler may well have thought that with the destruction of the rest of Czechoslovakia in 1939 he might have acquired just the stick and carrot for another bloodless triumph: the stick of a stronger strategic position toward Poland and the carrot of Slovakia to offer as bait. After 15 March both were waved in front of the Poles by von Ribbentrop in the meetings already mentioned. Before the Polish polite refusal of 26 March, Hitler had, to Italian Ambassador Attolico, described the Polish attitude as unclear.”

The evidence on Hitler’s views in the days immediately following is indirect, but everything points in the direction of a rapidly forming decision to attack Poland unless there were a prompt surrender. The fact that Beck might still hope for agreement with Germany was recognized,®° but since surrender was not forthcoming, the alternative was to be not negotiation but war. The closer relations of Poland with England, especially the British guarantee followed by Beck’s visit to London, calmed the situation in Poland,*! and gave Beck the hope that in a newly stabilized situation negotiations leading to some compromise could be resumed now that Poland could negotiate—and hence presumably make concessions—from a position of strength.’ The same developments had the 75. Text in Nuremberg document 798-PS, TMWC, 26:338-39.

76. The reference is to the vatious deployment plans of the elder Moltke; they are summarized in Peter Rassow, Der Plan Moltkes fir den Zweifrontenkrieg (1871-1890) (Breslau: Priebatschs Buchhandlung, 1938). 77. 789-PS, TMWG, 26:329. 78. Even after World War II von Brauchitsch was certain that the war on Poland had been necessary; see his affidavit, ibid., 32:464—65; cf. Groscurth Diary, p. 41.

79. G.D., D, 6, No. 52, p. 49.

,

80. See n. 57, above; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 32,” 28 March 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg.

101/34, £.163.

81. G.D., D, 6, No. 154, For obvious reasons, this document was omitted from the German White Book.

to 82. For evidence of this attitude, see Beck’s comments to Kennedy in London (U.S. 1939, 1112-13), (Lipski Berlin in ete military Polish the and Lipski to and 185-86), pp. Papers, (Lukasiewicx Lukasiewicz

Papers, pp. 529-30; Antoni Szymanski, “Als polnischer Militarattaché in Berlin, 1932-1939,”

Politische Studien, 13

Fi2

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IT

opposite effects on Hitler, who concluded that Poland would respond to neither the stick nor the carrot in acceding to German wishes but instead would try to retain her independence at the risk of wat if necessary.*? Concessions on transit problems of changes in the status of Danzig would, of course, not make any difference in this regard, as neither would make Poland a German satellite if arrived at in the traditional form of negotiation. As a shrewd and well-informed German observer explained on 5 April: the Getman-Polish contacts of recent weeks had led to the conclusion that a peaceful solution was not possible. “The Corridor and Danzig questions are only superficially the points of dispute.”*4 From Hitler’s point of view, the subordination of Poland as the desired preliminary to an attack in the west could be secured only by war. In the military sphere, this meant that orders had to be issued to prepare a military attack on Poland; the first of these came out on 3 April, having been drafted in the immediately preceding days. It called for preparations to be completed by 1 September, ordered a variety of technical military details in the interim, and, as in the case of the pre-

ceding year’s plan for an attack on Czechoslovakia, emphasized that an effort would be made to isolate Poland politically. This effort would, again as in the preceding year, be aided by strengthening the defenses in the west and by so arranging German military action as to assure a speedy crushing of Poland’s armed forces.*° In the diplomatic field, the immediate implications of this decision for the German government were to break off all talks with Poland, to strengthen the alignment with Italy, and to try to secure additional support for the isolation of Poland. The first of these was quick and simple, since it depended solely on the German government itself. Although at times posturing as an advocate of peace, the state secretary in the German Foreign Ministry, Ernst von Weizsacker, was an obvious person to implement this policy, not only because of his official position but also because of his strong anti-Polish sentiments. As eatly as 29 March he had informed the Danzig authorities that Germany would follow a policy of pressure to the point of destruction (Zermiirbungspolitik) toward Poland and instructed them on the steps they were to take accordingly.®° On 5 April von Weizsacker informed the German ambassador to Poland that the German government had decided to drop its proposals: he was to avoid any and all negotiations with the Poles. Lipski would be told the same thing, a chore von Weizsacker performed with

[1962], 180-81; cf. Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 76). For Beck’s

effort to start moving along this line, see the

important feeler of Count Michal Lubiénski, Beck’s chef de cabinet, on 6 April, in G.D., D, 6, No. 167, and his

comments to Bullitt in U.S. 71939, 1:117-19. Of interest is the similarly moderate line taken by the Polish ambassador in London, Count Edward Raczynski>on 2 April 1939 (Dalton Diary, LSE). Polish military planning at the time was purely defensive. For a good analysis of Beck’s general view of concessions, see B.D., 3d, 6, No.

223. The specific concessions Beck appears to have had in mind at this time concerned partitioning not the territory of the Free City but its functions. He was apparently considering giving up the representation of Danzig in foreign affairs and its ties to the Polish postal system (ibid., 5, No. 263, in which Atcziszewski lists

concessions Poland would make, leaving open the possibility of a few more; cf. ibid., 4, No. 547). The British added the idea of representation for the Free City in the Reichstag (ibid., 5, Nos. 285 [p. 324], 569, 580, 631). Nothing came of any of this since the Germans were never interested in discussing a compromise with Poland. The contrast between Beck’s attitude after his visit to London and that of Benes after the May Crisis is, how-

ever, instructive and perhaps relevant to the way in which the policies of the two were seen by London. 83. See Walter Warlimonet, Im Hauptquartier der deutschen Wehrmacht (Bonn: Athenaum, 1964), p. 34; Helmuth Greiner, Die oberste Wehrmachtfiihrung, 1939-1943 (Wiesbaden: Limes, 1951), p. 30. 84. Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 34,” 5 April 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, f. 175. The

text reads “Die Korridor- und Danziger Frage [sc] sind nur Themen des dusseren Anlasses.” 85. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 149, 185. Note that the one section of the plan which looked to the possible occupation of

portions of the Baltic States, and thus might have clashed with Russian ambitions, was struck from the order by a directive dated 13 April 1939, ibid., p. 187, n. 3. Cf. Henke, pp. 242-44.

86. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 124, 126. Von Moltke had practically given up hope for success in the negotiations by 31 March (see Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 565) but was not in accord with the idea of cutting off contacts entirely.

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great relish on the following day.’ It is inconceivable that this strategy of avoiding any talks with Poland, a strategy inaugurated in early April and adhered to until the end of August, was a joint whim of von Ribbentrop and von Weizsacker.*® We do not have Hitlet’s instructions to this effect; but given his close attention to matters pertaining to Poland, we must assume that as In sO many important cases, he gave them orally either on 1 April when he was in Wilhelmshaven, gave a speech on foreign policy, and talked with von Ribbentrop, or on 4 April when he stopped in Berlin on his way from Hamburg to Munich, more likely on the former occasion.®? Since this strategy differed radically from that of 1938, when a process of escalating demands by the Sudeten Germans had been utilized and negotiations of one kind or another had gone forward during the whole period from March to August, one can only conclude that Hitler deliberately decided to do things differently in this regard. The reason is easy to see; in this sphere his 1938 strategy had simply not worked. He had in 1938 been required to settle for his ostensible demands, and he was not about to take a chance on that happening again. If you did not want a negotiated settlement, and wished to avoid the risk of being nudged into one against your own preferences, the safest thing to do was not to negotiate at all.°° The clear and consistent adherence of Germany to this line in the face of Polish efforts to revive substantive conversations on an equal basis during the summer of 1939 surely reflects a clearly enunciated order by Hitler that his diplomats fully understood and, given their own attitude toward Poland, found congenial and simple to implement. The risk of war with the Western Powers was consciously assumed. If it could be avoided, well and good; but if it could not, that only showed how urgent and essential a war against the Western Powers, and especially England, really was. In any case, Germany would not pull back from its insistence on making Poland a subservient client state, since this was designed precisely to clear Germany’s rear for the coming war in the West.?! The isolation of Poland was to be in part the work of German propaganda. In 1938,

German propaganda had stressed the strength of German defenses in the West as a means of deterring the Western Powers from helping Czechoslovakia, and on the sufferings supposedly inflicted on the Sudeten Germans as a means of undermining Czechoslovakia’s political and moral position with the Western Powers. The noisy emphasis on the western fortifications continued in 1939, highlighted by Hitler’s tour of

87. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 159, 169. Lipski’s account in Polish White Book, No. 70, as corrected in Lipski Papers, p. 528.

In the talk with Lipski, von Weizsacker reminded him that Poland could have shared in the Slovak booty if only ... Von Weizsicker’s rabid anti-Polish views and his extreme anger over the British guarantee of Poland were by no means unique. When the British military attaché in Berlin reported on the anti-British feelings in German public and official circles, the chargé agreed with the assessment. Sir Orme Sargent minuted on 15 April: “So much for so-called moderate opinion in Germany. Last year we wete repeatedly told that moderate opinion was disappointed and discouraged because H.M.G. was not standing up to Hitler. Now that H.M.G, ate standing up to Hitler we hear that this same moderate opinion is disgusted with us and can’t understand

why H.M.G. are standing up to Hitler” (C 4897/13/18, FO 371/22958). 88. Cf. von Scheliha’s report in S.U., No. 308. 89. Hitler had gone to Wilhelmshaven for the launching of the Tipitz on 1 April and had then taken a trip to Heligoland on the Robert Ley, returning to Hamburg on 4 April. On the anti-British speech of 1 April, see Henke, pp. 239-40. Keitel signed the military order on Hitler’s instructions on 3 April. The British chargé in Berlin reported on 6 April that before leaving for Berchtesgaden again Hitler had given instructions “that the é Polish question was to be reserved entirely to himself” (B.D., 3d, 5, No. 14). had not Hitler that others and 242-45) (pp. Henke by advanced that to counter runs interpretation 90. This decided on a military conquest of Poland until sometime in May. Like Miller (p. 391) I believe that the on evidence better supports the interpretation advanced here. If Hitler seriously considered a peaceful solution terms Poland might be willing to accept, why the ending of conversations in early April and the denunciation of the 1934 pact with Poland on 28 April? Henke in part contradicts his own theory (p. 246).

91. Henke, pp. 245-48.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the area and the accompanying bombastic speeches in late May.” A general trumpeting of German military strength was to serve the purpose of discouraging any and all who might consider aiding Poland. This campaign was tied in part to Hitler personally, the enormous military parade on his fiftieth birthday on 20 April being designed to impress both the foreign visitors present and those who could see the pictures and newsreels, a medium of special importance in the 1930s.°? There was, furthermore, to be an international propaganda campaign against Poland. The Foreign Ministry had developed plans for this by 17 April, but implementation was delayed until mid-May.** This slow beginning of the campaign was clearly specified in the directives to the German press.”° Caution in the early stages appears to have been due to concern that the campaign divide England from Poland rather than push them closer together as the first appearance of atticles about incidents in Poland had done at the end of March. The way to accomplish the desired objective, in German eyes, was first to attack England and its policy of building up a front against aggression both to consolidate opinion within Germany and to frighten off the British.°° The second line would be to stress Polish intransigence, with

special emphasis on the Danzig issue, on the assumption that this was the weakest point in the British perception of their new tie to Poland. As Danzig Senate President Greiser explained on 5 May, the German plan was to make lots of noise about Danzig in order to separate Britain from Poland and then in or after August to collapse the whole Polish position when Germany was ready to move.”’ Closer ties with Italy would also strengthen the German position and offer the chance that others would think twice before interfering with Germany’s moves. The German action of 15 March temporarily cast a pall over German-Italian relations. This step was not only taken without prior notice to Mussolini, who prided himself on having sponsored the Munich Conference, but it also had deeper ramifications.’® There was the Italian public to consider; never enthusiastic about the tie to Germany, it now saw the

Germans gathering more gains while Italy stood by unrewarded.”? More significant from the point of view of Mussolini and Ciano was the possibility that Germany’s greatly strengthened position in Southeast Europe would be exploited by her at the weakest spots adjacent to Germany. The Italian leaders saw Hungary more indebted to Germany than ever for the permission she had received to occupy the Carpatho-Ukraine.! They feared that Germany would now use the Croatian problem inside Yugoslavia to bring about the disintegration of that country and as a result appear on the shore of the Adriatic.!°! The Italian reaction to the coup of 15 March was actually obvious enough to 92. On Hitler’s trip, see Groscurth Diary, p. 175, n. 339; Domarus, 2:1189-91.

93. Fritz Terveen, “Der Bildbericht tber Hitlers 50. Geburtstag,”

Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 1, No. 1 (Jan.

1959), 75-84; B.D., 3d, 5, No. 275; Vauhnik, pp. 24-25. On propaganda about German military strength, see the directives to the press of 27 April, 8, 9 May 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £107; 101/13,

FELON: 94, G.D., D, 6, No. 367 and n. 2. For a general account, in need of correction at some points, see Hagemann, pp. 390-411. 95. The directives are in Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, passim. See also Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 69.

96. A good brief account in Henke, pp. 239-41. 97. S.U., No. 295. 98. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 86, 87, 140; Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 168-70; Siebert, pp. 115-17. Economic difficulties in German-Italian relations at this time did not help the situation (G.D., D, 6, Nos. 44, 62, 174, 175,

360). 99. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 37, 52; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 526, 548.

100. Note Attolico’s emphasis on this in his report of 18 March 1939 quoted in Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, p. 174; full text in Mario Toscano (ed.), “Report of the Italian Ambassador in Berlin to Count Ciano 18 March 1939,” Bulletin of the Institute ofHistorical Research, 26 (1953), 218-23. 101. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 15, 45; Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 521, 524; 4, No. 34a—c; Siebert, pp. 117-18; Toscano,

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give the British and French, but especially the British, the idea that there might be a chance to detach Italy from Germany’s side and that they might make efforts in that direction.!? The failure of these efforts, at least in the short run, was due primarily to the steps Berlin took to mend its fences. The Germans very quickly reassured the Italians. With Hitler’s view of allocated sphetes of Lebensraum, in which Germany would move east while Italy dominated the Mediterranean, it was easy enough to promise Rome that Germany considered Yugoslavia in Italy’s sphere and to issue instructions and distribute assurances accordingly.'°> These assurances did not, however, include a precise definition of the lines dividing the spheres of the two powers.!% The coordination of the two powers, instead, took the form of exchanges of support on specific issues. The Germans, who had delayed staff talks with the Italians because they did not wish to encourage Italy to start a war with France at a time inconvenient to themselves,!% now decided that the

time for staff talks had come.' Basic strategy was not to be discussed, but some talks that would make the Italians feel better could go forward. When Keitel and Pariani met

in Innsbruck on 5—6 April, they exchanged technical information, political nonsense, and silence. The technical information concerned theit armaments and communications; the

political nonsense was an exchange of assertions that war with the West was necessary but should be postponed for a couple of years; the silence concetned the respective real intentions of the two countries. Keitel was as careful to refrain from mentioning the directive for preparing an attack on Poland that he had just signed as Pariani was to avoid reference to the occupation of Albania scheduled for the following days.!°7 All once again looked well, though the foundations for later misunderstanding had been laid. The Italians, who were about to seize Albania in any case, now moved on the assumption, which proved correct, that the Germans would back them in this action which, though planned long before 15 March, now looked like Rome’s consolation

prize.!6 Once again an Italian adventure linked her more firmly to Germany, this time by provoking British and French guarantees of Greece and Romania. Whatever opportunities for a turn toward the West might have existed, Mussolini himself would not turn

away from the ambitious course he was steering, and which he could steer only in Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 170-72, 175-76. On 21 March, Ciano told the Hungarian minister that when Yugoslavia was partitioned, there should be a common Italian-Hungarian border (Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos.

15, 46). 102. rieBritish efforts, see Aster, pp. 81, 83-85; Harvey Diaries, 20 March 1939, p. 265; Cadogan Diary, p. 162; Lukasiewicz Papers, p. 184; G.D., D, 6, No. 114; Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 176-77, 180-81, 200;

Siebert, pp. 124-28, 154; R 1845/57/22, FO 371/23808; R 3002/1/22, FO 371/23785. On the French effort, see Adamthwaite, p. 306. 103. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 55, 86, 87, 94, 100, 207; Toscano, Origins ofthe Pact ofSteel, pp. 177-86, passim, and p. 200, n. 44; Siebert, pp. 118-22; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 27, 29 March, 5 April 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg, 101/12, ff.94, 96, 102; Dertinger, “Informationsbericht Nr. 34,” 5 April 1939, ibid., 101/34, ff.

171-73. Mussolini’s speech of 26 March reflects his perception of German loyalty to this division, see G.D., D, 6:105. 104. Toscano (Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 188-92) has ptopetly emphasized this point and has shown how this differed from the Anglo-French entente of 1904. 105. This is surely partly responsible for Hitler’s emphasizing to Attolico on 20 March that war with the West had best be postponed for a year or two (G.D., D, 6, No. 52). are 106. Ibid., No. 57.

107. Ibid., p. 930. On the talks in early April, see ibid., pp. 932-34; Rintelen, p. 60; Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 214-32; Mack Smith, pp. 147-48. April 108. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 140, 143, 150, 158, 164, 166, 170-72; Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 70; Engel Diary, 8 1939, p. 45; Siebert, pp. 128-43; Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 232-34. The Hungarians had offered on

4 April to join in a war on Yugoslavia if Italo-Yugoslav hostilities developed out of the Italian action inAlbania (Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 58). Mack Smith’s account of the seizure of Albania (chap. 11) stresses its impact on Rome’s mote realistic assessment of Italy’s military deficiencies (p. 153).

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Germany’s wake.!0 ; In addition, Mussolini now raised the question of transferring German-speaking South Tyroleans to Germany once more; and there were promptly new discussions of this subject.!!0 While the German diplomats were still a bit skeptical about the total resettlement the Italians seemed to have in mind, Hitler clearly wanted to accommodate Rome’s preferences. In line with his earlier views on the subject, in late March he ordered Heinrich Himmler to start the transfer proceedings; and in April or May Hitler instructed him to organize a total transfer operation. The details do not need to be recounted here; the critical point is that whenever questions were raised or problems occurred, Hitler insisted on the transfer going forward.'!! Himmler was in Hitler’s eyes the right man for this job—and he would receive vastly greater responsibilities of this kind in 1939. Important for German-Italian relations in the summer of 1939 is that Hitler was absolutely determined to remove any and all possible irritants to Italy on this score; when a minor incident brought the matter to his attention again in June, he exploded in rage, banned the very term “South Tyrol,’ and ordered the transfer to proceed.!!2 If these matters of specific and immediate concern were solved to the at least apparent satisfaction of both Berlin and Rome, that merely restored the nature of their relationship to what it had been before 15 March. The desire of the Germans to isolate Poland and the desire of Mussolini to gain a stronger position for extorting concessions from France would animate their joint movement forward with the old project of converting the Anti-Comintern Pact into a firm military alliance against Britain, France, and

eventually the United States. In April and early May these negotiations continued; but in spite of von Ribbentrop’s periodic revival of hopes, the project continued to founder on the unwillingness of the Japanese government, in the face of strong opposition from the

Japanese navy, to agree to anything other than an alliance against the Soviet Union.' The latter was precisely what the German government did not want; Berlin wished to use the Japanese threat to immobilize the Western Powers and thereby possibly isolate Poland. The various texts prepared by the Japanese were all deficient on this critical point; and although von Ribbentrop in particular continued to hope for an eventual agreement with Japan, the evident reluctance of the Japanese to assume obligations tied

109. The guarantees of Romania and Greece were announced on 13 April. There had been lengthy and fruitless efforts to persuade Poland to join in the guarantee of Romania; in the end French insistence played a major role in the British decision to go ahead in the new crisis created by the Italian seizure of Albania. See B.D., 3d, 5, chaps. 1 and 2; Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 235-40; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 195, 197, 203; U.S. 1939, 1:129; 42d meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 11 April 1939, CAB 27/624. Adamthwaite,

pp. 308-10, 313, stresses the extent to which Italy’s move reinforced earlier French worries about her own Mediterranean and North African interests. The guarantees ended the possibilities explored in the negotiations documented in n. 100, above; see esp. Siebert, p. 162. The Hungarians were quick to note, all the same, that the

British government carefully differentiated between the de jure recognition of Albania’s disappearance as contrasted with the refusal of London to recognize the disappearance of Czechoslovakia (Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 79). 110. Latour, pp. 31-37, cites the published documents and some important papers from the unpublished Himmler

flies. Cf. “Bestellungen

aus der Presskonferenz,”

26 May

1939, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer,

Z.Sg.

101/13 54.83; 111. Latour, pp. 37-42. 112. Hassell Diary, 21 June 1939, p. 61. The 22 May German-Italian alliance contained a reference to the final character of the boundary between the two countries. 113. Von Ribbentrop became so anxious to have his project succeed that he was even willing to have the German ambassador in Japan, Eugen Ott, involved in the negotiations and sent him a detailed summary of the whole record (G.D., D, 6, No. 270). Although it is not certain that Sorge passed on a copy of this to Moscow— as a friend of Ott’s he presumably knew about it—the Soviet collection does contain an earlier report (S.U., No. 214) of 9 April which gives a very accurate picture of the situation.

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to European developments!'4 hastened the emetgence of two new lines of policy as substitutes for the tripartite military alliance.115

ee i amiiontinonn was a bilateral

rection of Japanese policy alliance between the two Axis partners. The conversations of Goring in Rome in mid-April had appeared to show a harmony of German with Italian intentions although the Italians were worried about the tone of the German leader’s references = Poland.1'° Since Mussolini really did want several years of peace to prepare for the war against the Western Powers, he was in any case less interested than Germany in the role of Japan as a global counter to England and more interested at that time in a clear demarcation of German and Italian interests in Europe and the assurance of Berlin’s full support.'!” Ironically the very concern of the Italians over some possible German project against Poland and German worry about a possible Italian attack on France led the two powers to work out what looked temporarily like a united front.'18 On 6 and 7 May at a meeting in Milan, von Ribbentrop and Count Ciano agreed to sign a military alliance whose exact terms were yet to be worked out but which was to be specifically and exclusively directed against Britain and France. Unlike the various texts for a tripartite pact that had been discussed, this treaty would be a firm alliance for offensive as well as defensive purposes. Once the Italians had indicated that a bilateral alliance was agreeable to them, Hitler wanted it as firm as possible. There were also to be consultations on future policy, but there was neither a specific delimitation of precise spheres of influence in the Balkans nor an explicitly written as opposed to verbal agreement that the Axis would keep peace for two or three years. The Germans, who still hoped to bring in Japan, were happy to have Italy officially aligned with them without having to commit themselves to a peaceful settlement with Poland.!!? On the contrary, they could hope that the existence of the alliance with Italy enhanced the possibility that their attack on Poland would lead to an isolated rather than a general war.'2° The Italians,

114. To judge by Hitler’s comments on 20 March, he appears to have recognized this fact before von Ribbentrop (G.D., D, 6, No. 52). In the end the still divided Japanese metely congratulated Germany and Italy on the signing of their alliance (ibid., Nos. 425, 427). They had warned the British that a general—as opposed to a limited—Anglo-Soviet alliance would lead them to sign a broad alliance with Germany and Italy. 115. The account in Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 198-213 and 257-89, is particularly good and detailed. Many otherwise not accessible Italian documents are quoted at length or at least cited. The account in Sommer, pp. 193-229, stresses von Ribbentrop’s personal role and illusory hopes and provides more information on the internal discussions in Japan; it also covers in considerable detail the American and British efforts to discourage Japan from aligning herself with the Axis. Additional details on the internal Japanese debates may

be found in Morley, pp. 90-105. 116. Accounts of the conversations of Géring with Mussolini and Ciano in G.D., D, 6, Nos. 205, 211, 252;

Ciano Diary, 15-17 April 1939, pp. 66-67. The Italian minutes of these talks, referred to by Ciano in his diary, appear to be lost. Ciano, who had himself recently been in Poland, was sure the Poles would fight rather than give in. His conclusion on 17 April: “The Germans should not think that in Poland they will make a triumphant entrance as they have done elsewhere; if attacked, the Poles will fight. The Duce also sees it in this way.” ; 117. Attolico, who was most worried about a German

attack on Poland, was especially insistent on both

delimiting spheres of interest very precisely and securing a clear picture of German intentions. 118. Good accounts in Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, pp. 289-370; Siebert, chap. 4. See also Mack Smith, pp. 162-64. 119. Sommer’s reconstruction (pp. 227-29) of the Hitler-von Ribbentrop discussion of this matter on 10-11 May is most reasonable. Siebert (pp. 180-81) correctly stresses that the German draft prepared before the Milan meeting had included a clause protecting one party against precipitate action by the other, which had been designed to keep Italy from dragging Germany into a war with France at a time of Italy’s choosing. Now

that the Germans knew that Mussolini had no such intention, that clause was omitted from their draft for the

alliance so as not to give Italy an escape clause if Germany moved against Poland without consulting Rome. German120. Von Ribbentrop had expressed the view that Britain would not mobilize one soldier in case of a Polish war (G.D., D, 6, No. 209; Weizsacker-Papiere, p. 153).

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ot at least Mussolini, could believe that the might of Germany had been lined up behind Italy’s aspirations. Since von Ribbentrop had not implemented his Ministry’s advice that he prepare Italy for a German-Polish war, the Italian leader could imagine that his country might look forward to wonderful years of peaceful gains followed by even more wonderful years of gains in war.!2! By the time the final text of the Axis alliance, the Pact of Steel as it was called for propaganda effect, had been signed on 22 May, there were already some indications of progress along the second line of policy to emerge ftom the tripartite negotiations. As von Ribbentrop had indicated to the Italians, a new tripartite pact of the sort the Japanese wanted, namely, one “restricted within the framework of the anti-Communist idea,” “would be absolutely valueless.”!22 On the contrary, if Germany faced Britain and France as intermediate enemies who might or might not aid Poland (the Soviet Union being perceived as the later enemy from whom Germany would seize the Lebensraum she wanted), then far from wanting an alliance against the Soviet Union in 1939, Germany could well use an alignment wth Russia. This would completely isolate Poland and facilitate the destruction of that country as well as the defeat of the Western Powers, who would be tackled later unless they came to Poland’s aid. The weeks between Stalin’s 10 March speech and Vyacheslav Molotov’s address of 31 May saw the two powers move gingerly toward each other. There is not much point to the argument over who took the initiative in this process. It might be said that the Soviets gave the hints and the Germans took the specific steps, but the process was really one of feeling each other out, at least in the early stages. The Soviet Union had made repeated efforts to establish better relations with National Socialist Germany over the yeats, but these had invariably been warded off by Hitler, who clearly felt that the Russians had nothing to offer him at that time.!?? This would now change as there was interest on both sides: Stalin to stay out of a European war, strengthen the Soviet Union, and deal with Japan’s expansionist policies in East Asia; Hitler to remove the possibility of an alignment of the Soviet Union with the Western Powers and to isolate Poland, which, unlike Czechoslovakia, had a very long border indeed with Russia.!*4 If the earli-

est hints—such as Stalin’s speech itself, Potemkin’s opening to the Italian ambassador in Moscow a few days later,!*5 and the Tass communiqué of 3 April denying that the Soviet Union had agteed to aid Poland with war materials and to stop selling war materials to Germany in case of war!?°—all came from the Soviet side, this may have been due to the fact that the Russian government was better informed about German intentions than the 121. It was, of course, precisely because the Japanese were unwilling to do with open eyes what the Italians

allowed themselves to be inveigled into with closed eyes that the alliance had two rather than three members. Ciano failed to secure clarity on the Polish question, the very one which had contributed to Italian urgings that the meeting of the Axis foreign ministers be held. It is hard to imagine any of his predecessors being quite so foolish. 122. Magistrati to Ciano, 27 March 1939, quoted in Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, p. 200, n. 44. This was why the German counter to the Japanese proposal for notifying Britain, France, and Ametica that they were excluded from the application of the alliance specified “that, under absolutely no conditions, should any written or oral communication be made to either England or France” (Attolico to Ciano, 4 April 1939, quoted ibid., p. 213). The Axis alliance was, as Ciano told the Soviet chargé in Rome, in no way directed against the Soviet

Union (Diary, 8 May 1939, p. 79). 123. See above, pp. 62-66, 143-44, 173-75, 242-44. It should be noted that Georgei Astakhov, one of the

figures in these earlier Soviet moves as representative of the People’s Commissariat of Foreign Affairs in Tiflis, Georgia, would play a critical role in 1939 as the Soviet chargé in Berlin (ibid., p. 222, n. 66). 124. Hitler had explained that possibility as a means of not having to fight too many enemies at one time as eatly as June 1931: “and if it should be necessary, there will be peace for a while even with Stalin.” Edouard Calic, Ohne Maske (Frankfurt/M: Societats Druckerei, 1968), p. 80. 125. See Rosso to Ciano, 18 March 1939, in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, p. 53. 126. G.D., D, 6, No. 161; Rosso to Ciano, 3 April 1939, in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, p. 55.

The Road to War

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other way around. In any case, in the following days there were soundings from the German side,” and in Goring’s conversation with Mussolini on 16 April there was a detailed review of the possibility of improved relations of the Axis with Russia as a means of isolating Poland. While both favored the idea, there was concern about Japan’s attitude toward such a project, which was discussed as one combining a trade treaty with a promise of nonaggression.!?8 On the following day, von Weizsacker had a friendly conversation with the Soviet ambassador to Germany in which general themes—Russia’s desire to isolate herself from a European war and German anxiety over a new Triple Entente that would make an attack on Poland very hazardous—as well as a specific Soviet request for deliveries from the Skoda arms works were touched upon.!29 In those very days the Germans were trying hard to have Japan agtee to a tripartite military pact preferably in time for Hitler to announce in his 28 Aptil speech, and von Ribbentrop did not hesitate to use the possibility of a rapprochement with the Soviet Union as a means of pressuring the Japanese on 20 April.130 The Japanese, however, were not to be moved from their objections to an alliance directed against the West, both the German desire and the Japanese refusal being known to Moscow.!3! Here, of coutse, was also a complicating factor for English and American diplomacy. The British, not wanting their negotiations with Russia to throw a reluctant Japan completely into Germany’s arms, tried to work out the terms of their proposed alignment with the Soviet Union and their responses to Soviet insistence on an alliance along lines suggested by Moscow in such a fashion as to keep Japan from dropping her objections to the German proposals.'*? British diplomatic efforts fared very poorly during April. In the face of Litvinov’s and Maisky’s asserted belief that the British government was trying hard to steer German aggression into the Soviet Union via Romania—at the very time when London, trying to find ways of blocking a German seizure of Romania, issued its guarantee of that country—there was not much prospect of securing an agreement.!35 The negotiations were going so badly, with the Soviet government rejecting each Western proposal in turn, that even leaders of the Labor party who were vociferous supporters of a treaty with Russia were beginning to think that perhaps the Russians were at least partly at fault.!5* Though increasingly dubious about the possibility and even advisability of an agreement with Russia, the British government kept trying, hoping at least to keep the Soviet Union neutral if she would not agree to help Poland.'** Though 127. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 22-23. 128. G.D., D, 6, No. 211. See Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 61-64. Both Géring and Mussolini referred to

Stalin’s speech. 12 OGD; 1D: 65 Nos. 215, 217, 130. Sommer, p. 202; Attolico to Ciano, 25 April 1939, Toscano, Origins of the Pact of Steel, p. 264. The Japanese

ambassador to Italy subsequently referred to his warnings to Tokyo after this meeting and the one of 16 June as having been discounted as preposterous in the Japanese government (G.D., D, 8, No. 11). 131. See Sorge’s reports of 9and 15 April 1939 (S.U., Nos. 214, 235). 132. See B.D., 3d, 9, Nos. 25, 26; and the evidence cited in n. 142, below. 133. See S.U., Nos. 211, n. 99, 217. Maisky suggested on 9 April that Britain might not go to war with Germany

even if the latter occupied France and the French empire (ibid., No. 218).

134. Dalton diary, 12 April 1939, LSE. Maisky claimed to be mote optimistic when he saw Dalton again on 17

April (ibid.); the British guarantee of Romania had helped. On the negotiations, see B.D., 3d, 5, chaps. 3 and 4; SU, Nos. 207; 214, 223, 224; 226, 227, 231, 233, 237; 41st meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign

Policy, 10 April 1939, CAB 27/624. The French received negative replies similar to those given England, see S.U., Nos. 215, 222, 232. The many accounts of the Anglo-French-Soviet negotiations in the existing literature

on the pubate now added to by Adamthwaite, pp. 310-13, 323-27; and Gibbs, chap. 19; neither has drawn

+ lished Soviet documents. 135. A Soviet alliance proposal of 17 April, so worded as to invite rejection by requiring all. sorts of policy actions not only by England and France but also by Poland and Romania, particularly set back the negotiations,

43d and 44th see B.D., 3d, 5, No. 201 (comments on it in C 5460/15/18, FO 371/22969); S.U., Nos. 238-40; Paper 887 of COS 27/624; CAB 1939, April 25 and 19 Policy, Foreign on Committee meetings of the cabinet

720

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

originally skeptical about the possibility that the Soviet Union might actually side with the Germans,!36 the British were no longer so sure of this by early May and hence made new efforts for an accommodation.!37 Moscow’s negative and distrustful attitude to all proposals from London and Paris hardly augured for success in spite of modifications made in response to Russian criticisms.'8 There can be no doubt that Prime Minister Chamberlain was hesitant about an alliance with the Soviet Union; but it is surely of interest to note that as he dropped his objections, the Russian government did its utmost to create new difficulties in the negotiations—the exact opposite, as we shall see, of its

procedure in the negotiations with Berlin. In any case by the time the new Western proposals were presented to Moscow, there had been a significant change in personnel. On 3 May, the resignation of Litvinov and his replacement by Molotov was announced.!% The significance and import of this Soviet move was at once widely discussed. In the middle of important negotiations, the man who had represented the Soviet Union on

the international stage for years was suddenly dismissed. In the absence of direct evidence, one can only speculate on the reasons for this dramatic move by Stalin. Nothing suggests motives of domestic policy. In foreign policy, as between Soviet relations with European powers on the one hand and East Asian powers on the other, there is again nothing in Soviet relations with China or Japan in those months that seems relevant to this step; the fisheries negotiations with Japan, the border troubles with Manchukuo, the aid to China over the difficult Sinkiang route, in regard to none of these issues is there

any apparent link to the change at the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs. In the relations between Soviet Russia and the European powers, the process of

elimination clearly points to Germany. Poland can be excluded easily, for since the slight rapprochement of November 1938, there had been no change in the frosty relationship between the two countries nor were there any signs of any. Once the Polish rejection of the German advances to her, combined with the British guarantee, had relieved Moscow of any anxiety that there might be a German-Polish alliance against Russia, Litvinov had felt as free to scold the Poles as Molotov would.!*° In the negotiations with Britain and France, Litvinov had the experience of years of prior contacts, full familiarity with the details of current negotiations, and the reputation of having in prior years advocated an alignment

with

the Western

Powers

by contrast

with

his predecessor’s,

George

Chicherin’s, identification with the Rapallo policy of alignment with Germany. Had Stalin wanted an agreement with the West, Litvinov would have been the obvious person to secure it. The handling of the talks with England and France, however, shows that

Stalin did not particularly want such an agreement; and the published Soviet documents 24 April 1939, CAB 53/48; Cabinet 21 (39) of 19 April 1939, C 5747/3356/18, FO 371/23064; Cabinet 24 (39) of 26 April 1939, C 6204/15/18,

FO

371/22971.

The

Italian ambassador

to Moscow,

reviewing

the

negotiations on 5 May, summarized the developments of April as showing “Moscow had begun to feel it was not really threatened by Germany and that, therefore, it was no longer in the position of having to solicit but, rather in the position of being solicited . . . I believe that the Soviet proposals were made in the conviction that, given their all-encompassing nature, the British government would never agree to accept them” (Rosso to Ciano, 5 May 1939, in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, p. 67). Some skepticism about Soviet capabilities for more than defensive operations appeats to have resulted from Hudson’s Moscow visit in March, see Cabinet 18 (39) of 5 April 1939, C 5028/54/18, FO 371/23016. For evidence that Hudson had been authorized by Lord Halifax to go well beyond trade talks, see N 1929/64/63,

FO 371/23654. Cf. G.D., D, 6, No. 183. 136. See Davies, 3 April 1939, p. 440; C 4517/19/18, FO 371/22996; C 5460/15/18, FO 371/22969. 137. See n. 142, below.

138. C 5430/3356/18, FO 371/23063; S.U., Nos. 249, 252, 253, 256, 261, 262; G.D., D, 6, No. 257. 139. For other changes in the people’s commissariat of foreign affairs after Litvinov’s dismissal, see U.S., Soviet

Union 1933-1939, pp. 770-72. See also Teddy J. Uldricks, “The Impact of the Great Purges on the People’s

Commissariat of Foreign Affairs,” S/avic Review, 36, No. 2 (June 1977), 187-204. 140. S.U., Nos. 204, 205, 211; cf. ibid., No. 277. Bodurowycz points to some trade talks but little else.

The Road to War

724

demonstrate both Stalin’s reluctance and Litvinov’s faithful implementation of the dictatot’s policy." If the possibility of an agreement with Germany was to be explored seriously, on the other hand, and the soundings in Berlin and Soviet knowledge of

German intentions suggested that this might be a good idea, then Litvinov, however pliant and obedient, was .obviously not the man for such negotiations. His very reputation as the Soviet spokesman in Geneva would stand in the way. The fact that he was Jewish, furthermore, would raise an unnecessary obstacle to talks with the Germans. The

ideological differences might be bridged as the relations between fascist Italy and Soviet Russia in the 1920s and early 1930s had shown, and as Potemkin as former ambassador to Rome frequently recalled; but Stalin could well believe that Hitler would find it easier to explore the possibilities of agreement with the Soviet Union if he did not have to conduct negotiations through a minister of Jewish background who had long been the object of ridiculing cartoons in the National Socialist press. If one makes the safe assumption that Stalin was shrewd enough to know that so spectacular a step would be taken as a sign of possible Russian policy changes, he may have thought of it as a test of German intentions. If they did not respond to this broad hint by some serious step in Russia’s direction, perhaps they were just not interested; and he would have to see what made the best policy under such citcumstances. If they did respond, then he would be free to work out the best approach to that situation. The sure way to give the Germans an opportunity to respond to the hint from Moscow was to make certain that nothing happened in the days immediately following the replacement of Litvinov by Molotov that could be taken in Berlin as a closer edging of Moscow toward the West with the implication that there was no chance for Germany to form a new relationship with the Soviet Union. This consideration appears to me as the most likely explanation of the two first actions of the new commissar. The British had just developed a new proposal in response to the Soviet alliance project, and this greeted Molotov on his assumption of office. He immediately denounced this proposal on the basis of what can only have been a deliberate misinterpretation of a key point of the British proposal.!42 It was perhaps symbolic of the situation that on the day, 10 May, Chambetlain announced in the House of Commons that Britain was prepared to agree that “if the Soviet Government wished to make their own intervention contingent on that of Great Britain and France, His Majesty’s Government for their part would have no objection,” Tass published a Soviet communiqué denouncing the Western Powers for trying to push Russia by herself into a war with Germany.'#9 The opportunity to resolve real or imagined misunderstandings had appeared to be provided by the forthcoming meeting of the League Council in Geneva where it would be Russia’s turn to assume the chair. Potemkin was scheduled to attend, and Maisky had been pushing for Lord Halifax to go, hinting that Litvinov would appear if Lord Halifax did.'#4 The British government was most interested in the idea of Lord Halifax having a in my earlier study of the 141. As this and the following paragraphs show, I have modified the views expressed primarily because alternatives, opened merely replacement the that 24) p. Union, Soviet subject (Germany and the show a much clearer determination the Soviet documents published since that book and its reprint appeared from above—than was previously not to sign with the West on Litvinov’s part—obviously under direction evident. 19-20; Cabinet 26 (39) of 3 May 1939, 142. See the evidence cited in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. ; 45th meeting of the cabinet Committee C 6546/54/18, FO 371/23017 and C 6595/3356/18, FO 371/23065

280, 281, 283. Interesting is Maisky’s long letter on Foreign Policy, 5 May 1939, CAB 27/624; S.U.. Nos. 278, 284. No. ibid., May, to Molotov of 10 Se U., No. 282.

c. 454; Tass text in ain in Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, 5th series, 347 (1939),

143. Chamberl its parliamentary fight for the conscription bill. This was also the day on which the British government began occasion; he would do 5. Maisky had operated via the Daily Herald on this FO 371/2306

144. C 6743/3356/18, 6/18, FO 371/23066; C 7468, C 8701/3356/18, FO so again repeatedly in May and June 1939, C 7108/335

tae

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

chance to discuss matters with either Potemkin or Molotov, who would now be expected to go.'45 It looked as if such a meeting would take place; while on his Balkan and Hast European trip in the preceding weeks, Potemkin not only heard advice to the effect that all should get together to hold Germany in check'*6 but he even worked out a possible method for cooperation with Poland.'4’ Instead of going to Geneva from Warsaw, howevet, Potemkin returned to Moscow to confer with the newly appointed Molotov, the Council meeting being postponed to accommodate his travel plans. On 16 May Moscow announced that the Soviet Union would be represented by Ambassador Maisky, neither Potemkin nor Molotov making the trip.!4* The Soviet government could now await the German teaction to Litvinov’s dismissal, the rejection of the most recent British-French

proposals as well as the refusal of Potemkin to go to Geneva being known to Berlin. In the German capital, the change in the Soviet government was taken precisely the way Stalin appears to have meant it, namely, as a sign of Soviet willingness to work out some sort of rapprochement.'#? The German press was immediately instructed to cease all polemics against the Soviet Union and against Bolshevism, a directive whose impor-

tance must be seen in the context of a society in which this had long been one of the main themes of government propaganda.'*? On 5 May, Karl Schnurre, the head of the East European department of the German Foreign Ministry’s economic policy section, could tell the Soviet chargé Astakhov that the Soviet request for deliveries from Skoda would be granted; the happy chargé tried to find out whether Germany would change her attitude toward the Soviet Union now that Litvinov was gone and asked whether Germany would not resume the economic negotiations broken off in February.!>! It is difficult to believe that Astakhov would have asked questions of this sort without authorization from Moscow. On 6 and 7 May, von Ribbentrop and Ciano agreed at their meeting at Milan to work for an improvement in relations with the Soviet Union.'5? On 6 May Hitler asked to be briefed on the Soviet Union,' and on the same day Ambassador von der Schulenburg was summoned to brief von Ribbentrop.'*4 The belief of the ambassador that “the Soviet Union had been seeking a rapprochement with Germany for some time,” that the action of Britain and the attitude of Poland could lead to war in the east, and that Stalin

wanted “an understanding with the Rome-Berlin Axis” appears to have had some impact on the German foreign minister.!°° There was actually enough discussion of a possible 371/23068. 145. Halifax to Seeds No. 105 of 10 May 1939, C 6753/3356/18, FO 371/23065; Cabinet 27 (39) of 10 May 1939, C 7106/3356/18, FO 371/23066. 146. See the record of his talk with Turkish Presidefit Ismet Indnti, 5 May 1939, S.U., No. 273. 147. See Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 19; S.U., No. 285. 148. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 20; G.D., D, 6, No. 401. Lord Halifax, therefore, met Maisky in Geneva (S.U., No. 303; B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 581, 582), but hardly needed to go there to see him. 149. G.D., D, 6, No. 325; “Informationsbericht Nr. 45,” 4 May 1939, Bundesarchivy, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34,

f£219=23. 150. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 23-24; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 4, 5, 6 May 1939, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101/13, ff. 3, 5, 6. With

the German-sponsored

occupation

of the

Carpatho-Ukraine by Hungary, the Ukrainian question had earlier disappeared from the German press (ibid., 101/12, £.102), although German intelligence operations there continued (Hungarian Documents, 3, No. 557).

151. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 25, n. 58; G.D., D, 6, No. 332. Note the fact that Greiser knew

the details of the Skoda question correctly on the same day (S.U., No. 295). 152. G.D., D, 6, No. 341; Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 65-66. 153. Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, p. 158; Kleist, pp. 37-38; Hilger, pp. 293-97. 154. G.D., D, 6, No. 325, n. 4; U.S. 1939, 1:318-21. The informant of the U.S. embassy was Hans Heinrich

Herwarth von Bittenfeld, see Charles E. Bohlen, Witness to History, 1929-1969 (New York: Norton, 1973), pp. 69-87.

155. Von der Schulenburg gave his views to the Italian minister in Teheran on 8 May before flying to Germany; Petrucci to Ciano, 8 May 1939, in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, p. 69.

The Road to War

793

agreement between Germany and the Soviet Union in those days for leaks, both deliberate and otherwise, to reach most capitals and for the German government to prohibit any press discussion of a German-Soviet rapprochement.'56 Although the former Austrian minister in Moscow who was working in the eastern section of the German Foreign Ministry recommended in response to a renewed feeler from Astakhov to Schnurre that Germany not move toward acceptance of the approaches from Moscow, von Ribbentrop, undoubtedly with Hitler’s approval, decided otherwise.!5” On 18 May, the day after Astakhov had asserted that there were no quarrels between Germany and the Soviet Union, that sure measures could be found to remove the distrust of Germany still existing in Moscow, and that the negotiations between England and the Soviet Union were

hardly likely to lead to the result England desired, von

Ribbentrop personally instructed von der Schulenburg in Berlin that he was to go immediately to Moscow and suggest to Molotov that economic negotiations be resumed in the hope of reaching a new trade agreement but that he was to be most reticent otherwise.!58 Molotov responded in a friendly manner (very much unlike his reception of approaches from London or Paris) but insisted that “political bases” were needed for any resumed economic negotiations.!*? What did Molotov mean by this demand which both he and Potemkin refused to explain when asked? Von der Schulenburg and Augusto Rosso, the Italian ambassador in Moscow, both thought some formal political guarantee of nonaggression was implied, something both believed difficult to reconcile with the Axis hopes for a military alliance with Japan. There is much to be said for this interpretation. What else could the Soviets want, especially since they themselves would not specify what they wanted? As they and all others had noted, Hitler had ceased attacking Russia in his speeches and the German press had dropped its anti-Soviet line; so there was nothing to ask for in regard to the political atmosphere. Quiet and unofficial reassurance about German intentions Moscow did not need; it was getting full and reassuring reports on this subject from Warsaw and Tokyo. On 5 May Sorge had reported on the Japanese government’s refusal to accept the German proposal for an alliance directed against the West; on 7 May von Scheliha had

informed the Soviet government that Germany had expected the Poles to turn down the

German offer, would accept no proposal from Warsaw, had occupied Slovakia as part of

an anti-Polish strategy, and after destroying Poland would defeat England and France, with the Soviet Union reserved for a later war.'®° Since 11 and 12 May were the days when fighting between Russian and Japanese troops was beginning on the border between Manchuria and Outer Mongolia in what is generally known as the Nomonhan

incident,!*! it is hardly surprising that the Soviet government would expect some political pp. 147-52, 375-79 (erroneously 156. On the leaks, see Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 25; Stehlin,

Schairer, 6 May 1939, dated to 30 April rather than 6 May); note by Strang on Goerdeler’s warning through Dr.

Designs in Diplomacy, pp. C 6794/15/18, FO 371/22972. See also Renzetti to Attolico, 7 May 1939, in Toscano,

1939, Bundesarchiv, 12 May enz,’ 70-71. The press directive is in “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonfet Ds 6,INo. S50. Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, £.18; for Soviet recognition of it, see GD meeting; the recommendation against 157. G.D., D, 6, No. 406 is the record of the Schnurte-Astakhov aan responding, ibid., n. 5.

to von Weizsacker of 22 May (ibid., p. 158. Information on the instruction is from von der Schulenburg’s letter

No. 13 (also in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, 464) and his comment to Italian Ambassador Rosso in D.D.I, 12, on a

For von Ribbentrop’s comments p. 72). See also Kordt, Wahn und Wirklichkeit, p. 158; Kleist, pp. 38-39. the Papal Nuncio, see Saint Siége, 1, No. 47. possible German rapprochement with the Soviet Union to 1:321—22, 159. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 414, n. 2, 424; D.D.L, 12, No. 13; US. 1939, Scheliha). (von 276 (Sorge), 274 160. §.U., Nos. ambassador in Moscow the day before he met 161. Molotov had complained about the incident to the Japanese see Chiyoko Sasaki, Der Nomonhan Konflict fighting, n Nomonha von der Schulenburg (ibid., No. 299). On the beginning on p. 54 and that of negotiations for an events military the of account the with 1968), Bonn, (diss., than that in Morley, pp- 157-78. armistice beginning on p. 97. Sasaki’s account is more complete

724

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

gesture from Germany, especially since it was the Germans who had broken off the eatlier economic talks. In the days from 21 to 29 May the German government pondered Molotov’s reply. Although the idea of a tripartite military alliance had now been deferred in favor of the Pact of Steel, signed on 22 May, von Ribbentrop had still not given up on bringing in the Japanese. In line with his strong anti-Western attitude, he appeats to have thought out at this time the concept of something like a four-power association in which the European Axis powers would use their good offices to effect a reconciliation between the Soviet Union and Japan in a grand design which would harmonize a tripartite military alliance against the West with an improved relationship of the Axis to Russia.!°* Nothing came of this brainchild of von Ribbentrop then—or when he pushed it again in 1940. As Oshima told the German foreign minister, any proposals of this sort sent to Tokyo would mean

cutting the ground away from under any hopes for a tripartite pact, since the proposed Japanese reassurance to Russia that she had nothing to fear from Japan ran directly counter to the views of those in Japan who supported a three-power pact.'® In the face of the unwillingness

of the Japanese

to meet

the German

desire

for an alliance,

however,' and in view of what were considered to be alarming indications of a possible agreement between Russia and the Western Powers,!® von Ribbentrop decided to have State Secretary von Weizsacker explore with the Soviet chargé the possibility of better German-Soviet relations, starting with resumed economic negotiations.'!°° On 30 May von Weizsacker and Astakhov had a long conversation marking a major German step forward.!°’ Hitler had approved this step, a point von: Weizsacker was careful to explain to Astakhov; and with that essentially political gesture in which appropriate reference was again made to the absence of any quarrels between the two powers, the Germans hoped to get the trade negotiations resumed in a context clearly as political as it was economic.'68 The reason for Hitler’s willingness to take this step will be discussed in a moment; the Soviet reaction must first be noted.

After Moscow’s rejection of the British proposal of early May, the London government in consultation with the French tried again, this time making further concessions to the Russian point of view.!® It was in fact the British public expression of confidence 162. See also G.D., D, 6, No. 441 of about 25 May. 163. D.D.L, 12, No. 48; also in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 75-76, cf. ibid., p- 80. Note that von Ribbentrop was so upset by Oshima’s veto that he told Géring about it (D.D.I., 12, No. 231). 164, On the negotiations with Japan between 4 and 30 May, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 326, 339, 344, 345, 363, 382, 400, 447; Sommer, pp. 229-39; U.S., Japan 1931-1941, 2:2-3; Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 332-38,

355-66. On the relationship of any British-Soviet agreement not covering the Far East to Japan’s abstention from an alliance with the Axis, see B.D., 3d, 9, Nos. 52, 62, 76, 94. For an effort by Japanese Prime Minister

Hiranuma of 23 May to have the United States help him out of the dilemma of Japanese diplomacy, see Cordell Hull, “Memorandum for the President,” 1 July 1939, Hyde Park, PSF Japan.

165, The Germans had been able to follow the Anglo-French-Russian negotiations from the constant public discussion in the west as well as from a leak in London; see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 233, 239, 269, 343; Cadogan Diary, 26 January 1940, p. 249. 166. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 26-31; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 437, 441, 442, 446, 449, 450; D.D.L.,

12, No. 53; cf. Szymanski, pp. 184-85. 167. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 451, 452.

168. See ibid., Nos. 446, n. 3, 453. 169. On the British internal deliberations, see Aster, chap. 6 (though I do not think his interpretation valid);

Vansittart memorandum

of 16 May 1939, C 7169/3356/18, FO 371/23066; 47th and 48th meetings of the

cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 16 and 19 May 1939, CAB 27/655; Cabinet 28 (39) of 17 May and 30 (39) of 24 May 1939, C 7400, C 7727/3356/18, FO 371/23066 and 23067; Cadogan to Halifax, 23 May 1939,

C 7469/3356/18, FO 371/23066; Chips, pp. 199-201; §.U., Nos. 298, 309; G.D., D, 6, No. 458. When at the cabinet meeting of 24 May the secretary of state for the Dominions, Malcolm MacDonald, passed on the request of the high commissioners voiced on the preceding day that after the signing of the treaty with Russia and the attainment of a strong position by Britain, the search for appeasement should be renewed, Chamberlain

The Road to War

795

that they had now met the principal Soviet wishes and hence could expect prompt agreement that had played a role in the German internal deliberations of late May. When the new Anglo-French proposal was handed to Molotov on 27 May, however, the latter again deliberately misunderstood it, denouncing the plan for a provision it did not even contain.’ Clearly the Soviet government was determined not to bind itself in that direction. The signs from Germany were awaited first. The signing of the Pact of Steel on 22 May was in a way one signal Moscow could read. This was not a tripartite pact; the Axis negotiations with Japan had evidently foundered on the divergence between the aggressive thrusts of the proposed European and Asiatic partners: if Japan would not bind herself against the West, clearly the Germans were unwilling to subordinate their designs on Poland and against England and France to Japan’s hopes for an alliance against Russia. In an indirect, but for Moscow very important, way, the Germans had confirmed that the Soviet Union was not enemy No. 1. On 30 May the Russians received the second and now direct signal from Berlin in the form of von Weizsacker’s talk with Astakhov.'!’! Here was the word not from a subordinate economic negotiator but from the second man in the German Foreign Ministry, speaking for Hitler. On the following day, Molotov responded in public in a speech to the Supreme Soviet by announcing that economic negotiations with Germany might be resumed.!”? Whether or not the “political bases” were complete, the Soviet government obviously thought that the possibility of fruitful negotiations with Germany existed. In his thinking about isolating Poland, Hitler appears to have been less sanguine

about Japan than von Ribbentrop. Perhaps racial predilections, perhaps a more realistic assessment of Japanese military capabilities, perhaps just his general impatience had made Hitler skeptical about Japan’s joining a military alliance well before von Ribbentrop became doubtful about the prospects for success. Hitler’s comments on the subject to Attolico on 20 March suggest that by then he had concluded from the negotiations already under way for many months that a firm commitment of Japan to the Axis was not to be expected in the near future.!”? The very brief reference to Japan in Hitlet’s foreign policy speech of 28 April was hardly a sign of great expectations.'4 In that speech, Hitler had formally denounced the 1934 agreement with Poland and the 1935 naval agreement with England, with most of his denunciations

aimed at the United

Kingdom.!”5 Hitler had also used the Reichstag forum for a lengthy ridiculing and denunciation of a public suggestion by President Roosevelt that Hitler and Mussolini help calm the excited international atmosphere by promising not to try to take over a long list of countties. That appeal, issued on 14 April, was one of a number of steps taken by the

Prague.'”° It grew out Roosevelt administration in the spring of 1939 after the march on Se RIT ee ei RE eee (ae AsSy ean gether

be strong but that countered that such ideas were premature: “It was necessary not merely that we should a move (C 7678/15/18, others should realize the fact.” Furthermore, public opinion was not ready for such that they handed a copy FO 371/22973). Note that the British were so confident that agreement was imminent 67). No. 5, (D.D.B., of the text to the Belgians 170. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 31-32; S. U., Nos. 311, 312. see Weinberg, Germany and the 171. The Tass communiqué of 29 May may have been another hint to Berlin;

Soviet Union, p. 32.

Foreign Policy Moscow, 1939), pp. 10-11; SsU., 172. Vyacheslav M. Molotov, The International Situation and Soviet 12, Nos. 73, 77, 80, 86; Toscano, Designs in D.D.L, 689; No. No. 314; G.D., D, 6, No. 463; B.D., 3d, 5,

Diplomayy, pp. 80-81. : ' 173. G.D., D, 6, No. 52, pp. 48-49. England and France against alliance military a sign to refusal Japan’s to mention 174. Lipski attributed the short (Lipski Papers, p. 533). D, 6, No. 290. 175. Text in Domarus, 2:1148-79. Cf. Henke, pp. 251-53; G.D., al the Rapids, pp. 21 1-13; Morgenthau Papers, Presidenti 176. Moffat Papers, pp. 231-39; Adolf A. Berle, Navigating , “Franklin D. Roosevelts Friedensappell vom Moltmann Giinter Park; Hyde Diary, 11 April 1939, Vol. 1, p. 59,

726

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

of a combination of hopes: that a war might be avoided altogether, but that if it came, the Western Powers would stick together, if possible in concert with the Soviet Union. Such a prospect could only be heightened by measures to strengthen the Western Powers militarily!” by diplomatic encouragement of an anti-aggression front,'’8 by trade moves designed to weaken Germany,!”? and by an amendment of the neutrality laws that would open up to the members of the anti-aggression front the possibility of purchasing war supplies from American industry.'®° The last of these in particular was to fail in the face of isolationist opposition, but even without that sign of American reluctance to provide substantial assistance to his potential enemies, Hitler thought he could feel confident in ignoring the United States at least in 1939.18! The denunciation of the German-Polish agreement in the speech was the public sign of the earlier turn in German policy,'8? and as already indicated, Hitler was so determined

on wat with Poland that he had at the beginning of April instructed his diplomats not to engage in any negotiations with Warsaw. Beck’s speech of 5 May responded to Hitler with a clear but polite defense of the Polish position; whenever in April, May, and June the Polish government tried to reopen discussions, the Germans waved them off.!8° Polish hopes that their distant attitude toward the Soviet Union would be recognized in Berlin as a sign of a continued policy of balance were not realized;!** on the contrary, by 14. April 1939: Ein fehlgeschlagener Versuch zur Friedenssicherung,” Jahrbuch fir Amerikastudien, 9 (1964), 91—

109; Bullitt tel. 748 of 15 April 1939, State 740.00/820;

G.D., D, 6, Nos.

34, 107, 200, 228, 250;

“Informationsbericht Nr. 38,” 14 April 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, ff. 187-93.

177. The best source on American assistance in the building up of the French air force is Haight. 178. Henke, pp. 250-51; U.S. 1939, 1:248-51; S.U., No. 297; G.D., D, 6, No. 403. Roosevelt urged Stalin

through Oumansky, the Soviet ambassador in Washington, to work out an agreement with Britain and France, telling Oumansky on 30 June that if the Soviet Union joined Hitler, the latter would turn on the Soviet Union as soon as he had defeated France (Davies, pp. 449-50). Oumansky’s report on the conversation as printed (S.U., No. 359) mentions Roosevelt’s urging an agreement, but not the warning. See also G.D., D, 6, No. 750). The repetition of Roosevelt’s warning about German intentions and the importance of a Soviet agreement with the Western Powers when the new American ambassador went to Moscow in August is discussed in the text, p.

749 below.

«

179. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 14, 24, 27, 33, 56, 71, 89, 104, 130, 157; U.S. 1939, 2:567—74. 180. The proposed amendment to the neutrality law was introduced by Senator Pittman on 20 March 1939. The administration’s perspective is reflected in chap. 45, “Neutrality Disaster,” of Hull’s memoirs. 181. Note that even Hans Thomsen, the German chargé in Washington, placed the whole burden of his comments on possible American intervention on the person of Roosevelt—without warnings about the

potential power of the United States and with idiotic speculations about American unwillingness to entrust troop convoying to foreigners in spite of the contrary experience of 1917-18 (G.D., D, 6, No. 403). Hitler in any case was inclined to listen to the German military attaché in Washington, General Friedrich von Botticher, whose assessment of the United States was even lower than Thomsen’s; see Weinberg, “Hitler’s Image of the

United States,” p. 1012; Engel Diary, June 1939, p. 47. Thomsen’s report on the defeat of the neutrality law revision is in G.D., D, 6, No. 650. See also the comments of Hitler and von Ribbentrop about the United States right after Hitlet’s 28 April speech, ibid., Nos. 295, 296. 182. See Biddle Papers, pp. 51-55. 183. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 247, 334, 350, 355, 387, 429, 464, 492; Krauel (Geneva) to the German Foreign Ministry, Pol V 4551 of 22 May 1939, T-120, 1315/2371/D 496277-78; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 202, 221; Cienciala,

pp. 239-41; Burckhardt, pp. 280-309; Biddle dispatches 1057 of 19 May (State 760c.62/631), 1069 of 1 June (State 8601KK.01/187), and 1139 of 7 July 1939 (State 760c.62/714); Biddle to Roosevelt, 10 June 1939, Hyde Park, PSF Poland. Under these circumstances, British steps to restrain Poland or urging her to be conciliatory were hardly needed; B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 237, 459 (comments in C 6910/54/18, FO 371/23018), 713 (comments in C 8102/54/18, FO 371/23020); G.D., D, 6, No. 278. It should be remembered

that this situation was

known in Moscow. See esp. von Scheliha’s report of 25 May (S.U., No. 308) which describes the situation very accurately: Poland interested in the possibility of negotiations with Germany, Germany of wanting such approaches but having decided to fight Poland and bring about her complete collapse, Hitler interested in

working out a way to limit the war and in any case fully in charge of this whole policy himself. Similarly, the German ambassador to Warsaw tealized that the Poles would fight if attacked but preferred to avoid war and would not provoke one (G.D., D, 6, No. 622; note that this report was shown to Hitler).

184. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 227 (p. 234), 225, 389; S.U., No. 289

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25 or 26 May von Ribbentrop was already thinking of partitioning Poland with Russia.!85 Efforts by the Italians, who were impressed by England’s determination to fight alongside Poland, to mediate between Berlin and Warsaw wete tejected.'8° Similarly, the efforts of the Japanese—who saw Germany’s desire to destroy a nationalist Poland in 1939 very much the way the Germans had seen Japan’s China policy in 1937, namely, as a breach of the barriers containing the Soviet Union—were also rejected by the Germans just as the Japanese themselves had rejected the German warnings two years earlier.!87 As Hitler told some of his leading military officers on 23 May, he was determined to attack Poland at the first opportune moment.!88 This particular meeting had been occasioned by questions about priorities in raw materials allocation, growing particularly out of Hitler’s earlier decision to give first priority to the navy’s Z-Plan for new construction.!*? Hitler not only upheld his earlier decision in favor of the navy! but took the occasion to explain his general thinking about the future. Just after the signing of the Pact of Steel and the report of von der Schulenburg on his talk with Molotov, Hitler was explicit in his desire to attack Poland,

not for Danzig, but for living space in the east. He warned against colonies as no solution to the problem of feeding the population; as always, Hitler used the term Lebensraum to refer to agriculturally usable land."! He explained that he would prefer to crush Poland without simultaneously fighting England; but he was quite explicit that England was the main enemy and would have to be defeated sooner or later anyway. If she intervened, or later if she did not, England would be crushed by the cutting off of her vital trade routes, something to be accomplished by the conquest of the Low Countries and the Atlantic coast of France as bases (with the audience left to infer that the navy needed its priority so that it would have its ships ready to use the conquered bases for their designated purpose). The latter operation, the conquest of the French coastline, discussed by Hitler as simply incidental to the defeat of England, was not seen as particularly difficult (a point on which Hitler differed from his generals). The war as a whole, whether fought in a single phase or preferably in two, would he hoped be short, but preparations for a long wat were necessary all the same. In any case, whether Poland could be destroyed in an isolated action or not, the power that had to be defeated as the primary enemy of German

expansion was England.!? Noteworthy is Hitler’s reference or lack of reference to other countries. The United States is not mentioned. Italy, though an ally, was not to be told of German intentions, a 26 May 1939, G.D., D, 6, 185. See paragraph 7 of the draft of von Ribbentrop to von der Schulenburg of 25 or No. 441; cf. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 25-26.

Germany and Italy affirming 186. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 297, 429. On the deliberate British leaking of information to

D, 6, Nos. 377, 385; Siebert, p. 182. her intention to stand by Poland, see B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 431, 489, 525; G.D., 9, No. 36; S.U., No. 321; Biddle to Hull, 187. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 394,429; Szembek, pp. 397, 399-400; B.D., 3d, Library of Congress; Biddle to Roosevelt, 20 May, 10 June, 17 June 1939, Cordell Hull Papers, folders 116, 117,

20 May and 10 June 1939, Hyde Park, PSF Poland.

is discussed further in the text. On the 188. G.D., D, 6, No. 433; also in TMWC, 37:546-56. The conference

n. 45. Like a number of other key documents document itself, see Hildebrand, p. 610, n. 592; Henke, p. 257,

by Hans-Giinther Seraphim; like that do not fit his ideological preconceptions, this one has been questioned authentic. as accepted be now the others, this one can 189. See Diilffer, pp. 507, 510, 529-30. ' 190, See his answer to Géring’s question at the end of the record. other raw materials; in fact he had just for colonies acquiring of on renunciati a mean not did 191. This the acquisition of African territories— explained to Ritter von Epp his colonial plans which assumed year (Geldern report on the coming the n France—i and presumably from a defeated England Reichskolonialtagung of 15-18 May 1939, T-77, 642/1838551—54). pp. 255— 58. Hitler’s thoughts about a war against 192. This summary is essentially similar to the one by Henke, similar to the German strategy a year later! gly astonishin surely are here England and France as presented

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

decision that was to have important consequences. Japan was similarly to be kept uninformed, and her reluctance to be more closely allied with Germany was recognized as a fact of the international

situation.!%9 In regard to the Soviet Union,

Hitler without

referring to the source of the idea asserted that economic relations would be possible only when political relations had improved. Far from rejecting the latter as a possibility as he had done in previous years, Hitler now mentioned the possibility that Russia might disinterest herself in the destruction of Poland. While he left open the option of a closer anti-Russian alignment with Japan if the Soviet Union were to follow an anti-German policy, this was now clearly the less desirable alternative. Hitler’s references to economic warfare, blockade, and preparations for a war of ten to fifteen years’ duration surely suggest that the possibility of breaching any British blockade as well as the hope of isolating Poland contributed to his thinking about economic and political agreements with the Soviet Union. Hitler had concluded that Poland could not be relied upon to remain a subservient client state while he fought the West: “The problem of ‘Poland’ cannot be separated from the conflict with the West.’!°* The question now was whether the Soviet Union would be a helpful neutral or associate while he fought the West and Poland, successively or jointly. He had been ready to explore this possibility when von Ribbentrop was still trying to harmonize such a project with his favorite idea of an alliance with Japan. As soon as the German foreign minister recognized that this was not a likely possibility in the near future, he and von Weizsacker could go ahead on the exploration of relations

with the Soviet Union with Hitler’s prompt approval.!® German foreign policy in the summer of 1939 was thus directed mainly to the preparation of an attack on Poland.'*° Subsidiary to the military preparations—it being expected that Poland would fight to defend herself—were several lines of policy in foreign affairs. First, an effort would be made to secure the assistance or neutrality of lesser powers whose acquiescence in German plans might not make much difference individually but whose collective joining with the British-French front against Germany would not only cause diplomatic, difficulties but would seriously affect Germany’s economic ability to wage anything but a very short war. In this category were Sweden, Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Belgium, Hitler having recognized that Franco’s Spain was still too weak from the civil war just ended to provide anything but a helpful neutrality to Germany.!9” Second, without informing either Italy or Japan of what was really intended, Hitler expected the military assistance of the former as a result of the Pact of Steel and a 193. Note that von Ribbentrop on 15 May had quoted Hitler to Ott as having repeatedly criticized the Japanese attitude in the tripartite negotiations (G.D., D, 6, No. 383, p. 410). 194. “Das Problem ‘Polen’ ist von der Auseinandersetzung mit dem Westen nicht zu trennen.” 195. Von Ribbentrop was not present at the 23 May meeting. There is no evidence that the delay of several days in which von Ribbentrop’s original response to Molotov’s comment was held up while the Japanese angle was explored was due to Hitler’s orders. On the contrary, von Ribbentrop appeats to have had the Fuhret’s agreement to going ahead but to have cast about first for some way to harmonize the new policy towatd Russia with his old one toward Japan. 196. Note Richard Meinertzhagen, Middle East Diary, 1917-1956 (London: Crescent Press, 1959), 28 June 1939,

pp. 159-60. On 19 June the counsellor of the German legation at the Hague said that around 20 August there would be an incident in German-Polish relations, so staged by Germany as to convince the German public of

the need for war and, it was hoped, to isolate Poland (Canadian Documents, 6, No. 974). The general nature of

Hitler’s intentions was apparently known more widely among German officials than has often been thought

likely. 197. This would appear to have been the import of a letter Hitler wrote Franco in March 1939 (see G.D., D, 6,

No. 605) in response to Franco’s letter of 11 January (ibid., 7:501—4); but the Germans did not want Franco to relieve British and French anxieties in this regard before war broke out (ibid., 6, No. 605). Ciano spoke to Franco along similar lines on 12 July 1939 (ibid., No. 663; D.D.I., 12, No. 611).

The Road to War

729

neutrality benevolent to Germany and malevolent toward the Western Powers from Japan because of that country’s own national interest. In the third place, Germany would explore the possibility of an agreement with the Soviet Union. Such an agreement would assure that country’s not lining up with the West until the defeat of the West had left her alone to face the subsequent German attack to the east, an attack made easier by the prior destruction of Poland. On the positive side, agreement with the Soviet Union would not only cut off Poland from any outside aid but would have the teverse effect of breaking any blockade of Germany. The disappearance of Poland would give Germany a common border with Russia and thereby enable her to secure needed raw materials from the Soviet Union by trade during that intervening war with the West before seizing them through conquest afterwards.!8 In the fourth place, Hitler would as soon separate the attack on Poland from a simultaneous war in the west, but since the former was in any case only preliminary to the latter, the risk of a wider war would be run this time. Only if Britain and France were willing to stand aside completely while Germany crushed Poland would they be given a short respite of perhaps a year. But nothing that they might pressure Poland into conceding or might offer themselves would make any difference. Hitler would under no circumstances allow negotiations with either Poland or the West to develop which might conceivably deprive him of a war. Everything was to be subordinated to this requirement of a war at all costs, limited if possible, but with both Poland and the West if necessary.

If the Western Powers did join in, that would not only confirm Hitler’s belief in the necessity to fight them but had the advantage of having the war start before British and French rearmament programs made any more progress. And there was a time schedule which would dominate everything. The choice of a fall campaign in 1938 and 1939 was not accidental. Hitler wished to move after the harvest and before bad weather set in; he

wanted enough time for his own first campaign but with a winter immediately afterward separating that campaign from any offensive by the Western Powers. In 1938 he had at the last moment recoiled from war; in 1939 the calendar would be more rigid both because Hitler was more determined and because the autumn rains in Poland made any postponement beyond the 1 September date he had tentatively set extremely dangerous. Hitler would, as will be seen, move that date forward if he could, and that shorter time-

table was to have its own important repercussions, especially on the negotiations with the Soviet Union as long as it was in effect, but barring the most extraordinary develop-

ments, he would not set it back.!”°

The major practical project to which, therefore, German energies were bent in the summer of 1939 was the projected attack on Poland. The plans for the army, navy, and ait force were worked out in detail. Hitler himself appears to have stayed out of the air force planning. He reviewed the army plans in detail, but without making drastic changes of his own.2 The naval plans, however, were more affected by Hitler’s personal

the Soviet Union, using 198. The transshipment of key raw materials purchased elsewhere in the world across but there is no evidence her ports and railways, to Germany was to become a matter of great importance later, A brief introduction in Weinberg, that this point was given much thought in Germany before the fall of 1939. ' 72-73. Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. plans with precise dates wete 199, On awareness in informed circles in Berlin that specific and concrete Nr. 52” of 25 May and his discussed by Hitler and Forster, see Dertinger’s “Informationsbericht

Z.Sg. 101/34, ff.269 and 313. After a “Tnformationsbericht Nr. 62” of 15 June 1939, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, diary (p. 177) that the date for the attack on Poland was set for 25

stay in Berlin inJune, Groscurth noted in his August.

0; 34:428-43. There appears to have been a eetOn the detailed German military plans, see TMWC, 30:180—20 her most

319-20. For Germany’s need for leak on the military plans from Haldet’s office, see Szymanski, pp. 703. On the economic preparations, see No. 6, D, G.D., see them, modetn weapons, as opposed to exporting of the Reichsverteidigungsrat under Goring on 23 Hitler’s order of 10 May in TMWC, 34:403-8; 2d session

730

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

pteferences because he wanted to combine actions of the German navy directly with the opening of hostilities. Having once hoped to pick up Danzig as a bonus on the way back by warship from Memel, Hitler still planned to bring the navy into the Danzig aspect of the attack on Poland. The project of a naval visit to Danzig, perhaps on 25 August, was being canvassed early in May.2° Hitler personally discussed the idea with Raeder in June.2°2 Consideration of a fleet visit to Danzig went on all during the summer; eventually one of the old battleships previously retired to the status of training ship was sent to Danzig in August, anchored opposite the Polish position of the Westerplatte in

the Danzig harbor, and given the dubious distinction of formally starting World War II by opening fire in the early morning of 1 September.?0 If Danzig, as Hitler had said, was not the object of war, but Lebensraum, this did not

mean that Danzig could not play an important part in the preparations. In addition to the naval aspect just described, Danzig was to be important in setting the diplomatic stage for a war in which the German public was to be united and the potential enemies of Germany might be disunited.? Hitler, therefore, worked out carefully a variety of plans with Albert Forster, who repeatedly met with him in 1939 to receive detailed and specific instructions.?°° Not only was German propaganda always to stress the Danzig question on the assumption that it was the weakest link in the chain between Poland and the West,2°° but quarrels were to be created in Danzig so that international attention might be focused on the alleged injustice inherent in the status of the Free City as opposed to the German plans for the destruction of Poland. Of the various categories of issues that might be created, Berlin picked the one of customs inspectors. Presumably this issue was

chosen because it affected Polish rights in the Free City and could accordingly be utilized to provoke Poland, while other internal matters in Danzig might leave Warsaw as uncon-

cerned as had so many prior violations of the Danzig constitution. In July and August, therefore, the focal point of news and attention was the reaction of the Poles to a series of provocative steps taken by the Danzig authorities on instructions from Berlin, provo-

cations designed to “keep the pot boiling’”°’ but always under enough restraint to keep it from boiling over. The time for action was to be picked by Berlin, not Warsaw; and the

cautious restraint of the Polish government left the German leaders confident that they could keep up the barking until the day and hour when they were ready to bite.208 June 1939, ibid., 33:145-60. There were also plans for disrupting Poland internally by contacts with ethnic Germans and Ukrainians inside the country. Though of intrinsic interest, these projects do not shed much light on the general lines of German policy. 201. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 361, 378. Salewski’s account (1:92—94) is superficial.

202. G.D., D, 6, No. 558. Cf. ibid., No. 635 and TMWC, 34:200-204. 203. The discussions revolved in part around the concern that the blame for the outbreak of war be pushed on the Poles, as von Weizsacker

expressed it (G.D., D, 6, No.

687). On this issue, see also ibid., No. 705;

Weixsdcker Papiere, pp. 155-56. For Hitlet’s readiness to sacrifice the Schleswig-Holstein and its crew, see the account of Hitler’s discussion with Raeder on 22 August 1939 in the Liebmann notes, Vierteljahrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 16, No. 2 (Apr. 1968), 143. 204. Note the finding that the German public was most solidly behind Hitler in the summer of 1939 in Marlis G, Steinert, Hitler's War and the Germans (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1977), p. 40. 205. See n. 199, above; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 693, 785; “Informationsbericht Nr. 77,” 18 July 1939, Bundesarchiv,

Brammet, Z.Sg. 101/34, £391. 206. For propaganda instructions, see “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 16 June, 8, 13, 18, 19 July 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, ff.53, 74, 78, 82, 83; “Informationsbericht Nr. 81,” 24 July 1939, ibid.,

101/34, ff. 401-3; “S.J. Nr. 149/39, Kampagnen der deutschen Presse,” 6 July 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/1, ff. 20-21. For British concetn over this matter, see Cabinet 30 (39) of 24 May and

the special meeting of ministers on 25 May 1939, C 7694, C 7728/54/18, FO 371/23019. 207. The quotation is from “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 23 June 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101/13, £. 61. 208. The whole dreary dispute over customs inspectors will not be reviewed here. That it was all engineered

from Berlin is obvious from G.D., D, 6, No. 774, which comes from von Weizsiicker’s files. The state secretary

The Road to War

734

An integral part of German military planning was the use of Slovakia as a base for attacking Poland’s southern flank; whatever objections the Slovaks might have were rudely overruled.2” Whether Lithuania might be an auxiliary on the northern, as Slovakia was on the southern, flank was apparently considered somewhat later. In any case, the Lithuanian government was treated with the utmost courtesy during the summer of 1939;

at least that would

keep Kovno

from

drawing

closer to Warsaw.2!0

Of the

Scandinavian countries, Sweden was by far the most important to Germany because of the Third Reich’s dependence on Swedish iron.2!! Neither the Four-Year Plan’s processing of the Salzgitter “potting soil” nor the acquisition of iron works in Austria and Czechoslovakia had eliminated, or even substantially reduced, that dependence. It should under these circumstances not be surprising that as war approached in 1939, German diplomacy paid special attention to efforts to assure supplies of Swedish iron ore in case of war.?!* Although not successful in securing formal promises from Sweden on the question, the Germans did feel confident that in practice they would get what they needed; and the experience of war would prove this expectation correct. Sweden would provide the materiel essential to Germany’s conduct of war. The other important countries—in addition to the Soviet Union—having a common border with Poland were Hungary and Romania. While the Hungarians had just acquired a common border with Poland thanks to German action against Czechoslovakia, they were cautious in their dealings with Berlin. In the crisis of 1939, as in that of 1938, Hungary followed a tortuous path, made even more difficult because on the one

hand they had tied themselves more closely to Germany while on the other hand the Poles were even more their traditional friends than the Czechs had become their enemies. Their anxious friendship for Germany was therefore tempered by concern over being drawn into a war with Poland; furthermore, the Hungarian leaders continued to believe that in a general war Germany would eventually lose. Under these circumstances Hungary followed a double policy in 1939. They continued to do their best to cooperate with Germany, maintaining close ties with Berlin and Rome and hoping for the maintenance of such a relationship if war did come.*!> The obvious danger of war, reinwas especially vigorous in fanning the flames of this trumped up issue at the time and continued to do so in his memoirs. The document on the subject originally published in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 44— 45, has now been printed as G.D., D, 7, No. 119 (von Ribbentrop’s approval of it, ibid., No. 139). It shows the

fear of the Germans that Polish concessions might deprive them of what they imagined was a propaganda advantage. The various collections of diplomatic documents are filled to overflowing with material on this matter. A very good summary was sent by U.S. Consul Kuykendall in his dispatch 221 of 11 August 1939, State one 760c.62/1284. Burckhardt’s memoirs recount the dispute, often from the German perspective. Only at also See following. were Forster and Hitler tactic the understanding to close come he does 326) (p. point ofModern Herbert S. Levine, “The Mediator: Carl J. Burckhardt’s Efforts to Avert a Second World War,” Journal

G.D., D, 6, No. 686; History, 45, No. 3 (Sept. 1973), 453. For Polish gestures of accommodation in Danzig, see issue, see U.S. 1939, for Roosevelt’s hint to Poland not to let the Germans provoke them on the customs

1:211, 213-14. 209. See above, p. 693; cf. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 644, 667, 768; 7, Nos. 3, 100, 165.

(Berlin) tel. 546 of 23 June 1939, 210. See above, pp. 693-94; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 292, 328, 408, 445, 421; Kirk State 760c.62/658.

countries. Although there were 211. I have not otherwise reviewed Germany’s relations with the Scandinavian n—some of which would important ideological issues inherent in the idea of “Nordic” or “Aryan” cooperatio

even the border dispute with have an impact on developments during World War Il—as a practical matter concerns of German foreign policy broader the for significance any if little had Schleswig North over Denmark in Danemark und das nationalbefore 1939 ot the origins of the war. See Hilke Lenzing, Dve deutsche Volksgruppe Scandinavian states from lining up with sozialistische Deutschland (1933-1939), (diss., Bonn, 1973). To keep the No. 284). England, Germany offered nonaggression pacts to them (G.D., D, 6,

212. Ibid., Nos. 187, 229, 242.

b, 114, 123, 133, 140, 149; G.D., D,6, Nos. 248, 213. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 399, 523; 4, Nos. 103 a and 13 April 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, ferenz,” Pressekon 436, 578, 595, 641, 706, 717; “Bestellungen aus der

Z.Sg. 101/12, £.107.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

forced by the comments of Hitler on 29 April and 1 May when Hungarian Prime Minister Teleki and Foreign Minister Csaky were in Germany, suggested that some reinsutance was needed. In those conversations, the German leaders stressed Germany’s strength, Poland’s suicidal obstinacy, the weakness of Britain and France, and the ability of Japan by her actions in Asia to keep the United States from any substantial military tole in Europe.2!4 The Hungarian government had already found a way to assure the United States through Ambassador Bullitt that they would not join Germany if it came to war.2!5 They even considered special steps for establishing something like a government in exile if Germany were to occupy Hungary as punishment for not joining her in a war on Poland.?!¢ It is clear that this double line disturbed Prime Minister Teleki, the man who though

a devout Catholic would commit suicide in 1941 rather than lead his country into war with Yugoslavia with which he had shortly before signed a treaty of friendship. On 24 July Teleki wrote Hitler, expressing his desire to work closely with the Axis but warning that Hungary would not fight Poland.*!” This step annoyed the Germans and Italians greatly. As a fuming Hitler told the Hungarian foreign minister on 8 August, Hungary was repeating her attitude of 1938. Germany would crush Poland, regardless of whether or not the Western Powers intervened, but in any case all would win or lose together. If,

as he certainly did not anticipate, Germany were to lose, Hungary would just become a portion of an enlarged Czechoslovakia. Perhaps aware of the fact that warnings from within the German army had reached Budapest in 1938, Hitler assured Count Csaky that the prospect of war against Poland had pulled the whole German army together behind himself. As for other countries intervening, there was an excellent chance that Russia

would stay out and share in the booty. Hungary would do best to remember who her friends were.2!8 One wonders, however, whether such frankness as Teleki’s letter if practiced by the Axis powers with each other would not have served them better. In any case, as the Germans would discover when they pressed the Hungarians on the subject in late August, Hungary simply would not help in military operations against Poland, though Germany could count on economic support in a general wat—support that was to prove of considerable importance.”!” At the beginning of the war, however, Hungary,

214. G.D., 6, Nos. 295, 296, 300; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 115, 116. The Hungarians warned the Germans

against sending to Romania weapons which would be used against the Germans themselves later (G.D., D, 6, No. 585; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 196, 209). On Mussolini’s telling the Hungarian military attaché in Rome

on 1 May that he intended to attack Greece if there were a general war, see ibid., No. 109. 215. Bullitt tel. 759 of 17 April 1939, State 740.00/906; cf. B.D., 3d, 5, No. 565; Hungarian Documents, 3, No.

522k : 216. For relevant documents, see John Pelényi, “The Secret Plan for a Hungarian Government in Exile in the West at the Outbreak of World War II,” Journal of Modem History, 36, No. 2 (June 1964), 170-77 and note following p. 243, By 24 June the Hungarian minister in Berlin had information that the Germans were planning to attack Poland in August-September 1939 (Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 198). 217. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 712, 739 and notes; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 215, 227, 244, 246, 253, 255, 260, 261, 265; cf. B.D., 3d, 6, No. 408. Note that Ciano’s initial reaction had been positive (Hungarian Documents, 4, No.

240).

218. G.D., D, 6, No. 784; Henke, p. 276. There is no record of this conversation in Hungarian Documents, 4, but see Nos. 303 and 372, which reflect the German views, and No. 267, which refers to the Hungarian foreign minister’s trip. The Hungarian minister to Paris, who returned to his post from Budapest on 23 August,

tepeated to the American ambassador Csaky’s account of a talk in Berlin with German Interior Minister Frick, Frick had talked “in a hait raising manner and had stated that Hitler was convinced that he could starve England to death by airplane attacks on British merchant shipping. Frick also had indicated that Hitler was likely to make war on Poland the end of this week” (Bullitt tel. 1557 of 23 August 1939, 6:00 p.m., State 760c.62/939). 219. Ibid.; G.D., D, 7, Nos. 175, 498, 519, 520, 533; Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 314, 315, 317, 327, 328, 332, 339, 341, 342, 347, 350; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 85, 95, 494; Macartney, 1:364-67. Note Ciano’s advice to the

Hungarians on 2 September: the outcome of the war was doubtful, and they had best be careful (Hungarian

The Road to War

733

though offered a share of the territorial booty, like Lithuania but unlike Slovakia, refused to attack her Polish neighbor.22° Since Romania had long been an ally of Poland, the Germans never expected het to participate directly in any war against Poland. What they wanted instead was the assurance that Romania would not join the front Britain and France wete trying to build up against them, because in wat, even more than in peacetime, Germany would need Romanian oil. In spite of the great progress made by the German synthetic oil industry, the growth of the German air force, the expansion of the German navy, and the increased mechanization of her army made very substantial imports of petroleum products critical for the Third Reich.??! Those from the Western Hemisphere would be cut off by any British blockade, and there was as yet no assurance that the Soviet Union would supply Germany’s needs. The imports of oil derived from oil shale in Estonia were steady and substantial, but covered only a small portion of Germany’s needs.?2 Romania was, therefore, from Germany’s point of view the most important country of Southeast Europe.” As for the Romanian alliance with Poland, it was directed only against Russia, and all efforts of the British and French to have it revised explicitly to cover Germany as well failed. The Poles did not want to change the alliance because Beck was certain that such action would drive Hungary completely into German arms and thus open up still another front against his country. Romania was reluctant to take the requested step for fear of provoking Germany and being drawn into the developing confrontation between that country and Poland.?*4 In any case, Romania had enough to worry about with the revisionist demands of her Hungarian and Bulgarian neighbors and was even more afraid of any peacetime alignment with the Soviet Union.”> Russia had territorial claims against Romania, and the Romanians had learned the hard way in the nineteenth century that being allied with Russia in no way protected Romania against those claims. Furthermore, the Romanian government had feared and continued to fear that any German-Russian war would be fought over their territory with Romania losing her independence to the winner.226 If Germany did attack Romania, the Romanians would be happy for any help they could get from anywhere; but until that moment arrived, they preferred to do nothing which they feared might draw them into any conflict. Perhaps because Romanian Foreign Minister Grigore Gafencu was a charming man who made an excellent impression in London and Paris, perhaps because he was not only one of the first East European leaders to publish his memoirs but to do so in German and English at that, the fact that it was Gafencu who had given way to pressure in March 1939 and had signed over his country’s economic future to Berlin has often oa eee Mean! re teers bibs Sots ee ol pee would push her Documents, 4, No. 338). Teleki, however, told Mussolini that at any conference Hungary Nos. 345, a-d, territorial demands against Romania and would do so even beyond the ethnographic line (ibid.,

351). 67. on Ibid., Nos. 353, 354, 358, 374, 377-79, 381, 385, 389; G.D., D, 8, Nos. 45, 48, 49, 51, 221. Marguerat, p. 138. Rombach, 1973), pp. 222, Wilhelm Meiet-Dérnberg, Die Olversorgung der Kriegsmarine, 1935 bis 1945 (Freiburg:

33-34. special concessions Germany most 223. When Germany and Russia partitioned Poland in 1939, one of the

oil by railway across what had wanted from the Soviet Union was assistance in the transportation of Romanian and about the effects of a section of general in delays shipment about worried was Berlin Poland. eastern been (see Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet the railway route being converted to the wider Russian gauge in particular

66, 68; U.S. 1939, 1:498).

Sites

Union, pp. 278. I have considerable doubts about Léger s 224. Beck, Dernier rapport, p. 321; B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 1, 2, 10, join ing that the two countries would communication to Bullitt of an alleged Beck-Gafencu secret understand 348-49). pp. Papers, (Bu/liit each other if attacked by Germany C 6244/3356/18, FO 371/23065. 225. B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 279, 285; Cabinet 24 (39) of 26 April 1939, 226. See above, pp. 181, 251-52; B.D., 3d, 5:331.

734

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

been overlooked. Although eventually dismissed as too pro-Western, Gafencu played a role in 1939 that assisted German interests far more than is often realized. He wanted and received a British and French guarantee for his country; but unlike Beck, who refused to make one-sided agreements with either Germany or the Soviet Union, Gafencu had made one with Germany, and during the crisis of 1939 did his best to keep on good terms with Berlin.22” These efforts, and the great concessions he had made, did not,

however, ptesetve the Romanian government from both continued German pressure and constant German distrust.?78 The German government was careful not to support Hungarian and Bulgarian aspirations on Romanian territory openly, but that was about the only concession Berlin would make.””? Otherwise, unremitting demands for political support and economic concessions reached Bucharest. At the same time as they were taking an increasing proportion of Romanian oil, the Germans were also building up their economic power within the country by special banking ventures.”°? As the German timetable called for war, Germany could be on the whole very satisfied by the way she was converting Romania into an economic satellite that might well feed the voracious German wat machine about as steadily as Sweden.?#! There was, so it seemed, no need for Germany to woo Bulgaria. The Bulgarian government on the contrary was apparently so inspired by Germany’s destruction of Czechoslovakia as to believe that a complete reversal of the peace settlement was just around the corner. For Bulgaria that meant dreams of all sorts of territorial gains. There was some consideration in 1939 of the idea, pushed independently by Britain and the Soviet Union, that Romanian cession of at least a portion of the southern Dobruja might

rally Bulgaria to the for schemes of this whet Bulgarian and The Bulgarian

side of the Balkan entente. The evidence indicates that it was too late type, and Gafencu’s rejection of such concessions as merely likely to Hungarian appetites is amply supported by the record.?°2 government was asking Germany for extensive arms deliveries and

credits to cover their cost. Since, like Hungary, Bulgaria had started rearming later than

Germany, Sofia was almost frantically insistent on receiving vast quantities of weapons; and these Bulgarian requests and the German efforts to meet them constitute the main theme of German-Bulgarian relations in 1939,?33 The Bulgarian government explained to Berlin that there was no chance of their agreeing to the sort of deal for joining the Balkan entente then mentioned; Bulgaria expected to regain her borders of 1913. While

the German government thought this was just fine, they let it be known that they could not say so in public.*** The desire for cooperation with Bulgaria was there, however, as

227. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 227, 234, 375. Chanady and Jensen (pp. 214-16) attribute all this to German

and

Hungarian threats and British weakness. Note the comment of the British minister in Bucharest, Sir Reginald

Hoare, that the prime minister, Armand Calinescu, was firmer than Gafencu (Hoare to Cadogan, 19 May 1939, R 4488/22/37, FO 371/23840).

228. The German disttust was particularly evident in the deliberate failure to meet commitments for armaments deliveries in exchange for Romanian wheat and oil, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 337, 354, 376, 398, 703, 738; Marguerat, pp. 149-51. For Getman pressure on Romania, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 488, 504, 662, 631, 651.

229. Ibid., Nos. 319, 625, 627, 633; Marguerat, p. 139. 230. Ibid., pp. 140-41, 146-47; OMGUS, “Report on the Investigation of the Deutsche Bank,” Exhibits 394, 395. 231. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 621, 632, 638, 639, 742; 7, Nos. 77 and n. 1, 94. Marguerat, pp. 141-48, stresses the persistent limitations on German economic control. 232. B.D., 3d, 5, No. 278, pp. 307-9; G.D., D, 6, No. 375. The Germans appear to have been seriously con-

cerned about the efforts to move Bulgaria into the anti-aggression front, see Irving, Breach ofSecurity, pp. 27, 65—

67. 233. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 17, 63, 67, 218, 243, 392, 415, 566, 656. 234. Ibid., Nos. 320, 346, 476, 479, 480; cf. Hoptner, pp. 162-64. The Bulgarian demands would have involved

territories held in 1939 by Yugoslavia, Greece, and Romania.

The Road to War

135

Bulgarian Prime Minister George Kiosseivanoy learned on his visit to Berlin on 5 July.235 Hitler assured Kiosseivanoy that he much preferred to fight a war at his present age than to fight one later, that Bulgaria was certainly perceived as Germany’s friend, and that he would do his very best to help Bulgaria build up her armed forces. Convinced that he could really count on this country, Hitler gave orders for Bulgarian arms wishes to be met generously, and as a result of this directive, real efforts were made in Germany, at a time when Germany was herself straining her resources, to assist Bulgaria in rebuilding its military strength.?%° Berlin understood the old friendship of Bulgaria for Russia, but since the immediate plans called for a war with Poland and with the West before any conflict with Russia, the prospect of a faithful satellite in the Balkans was an inviting one.

From the perspective of Berlin, there were many advantages to helping that satellite build up its power. When and how that would be used could be left until later; in the meantime, the known subservience of Bulgaria to Berlin could be utilized as a potential threat to keep Romania in line, to surround Yugoslavia, and to warn the Turks.

For Yugoslavia, the disappearance first of Czechoslovakia and then of Albania was especially shocking. The former had been its ally in the Little Entente, and although that alliance had lost most of its political and military importance, the shock of one of the successor states disintegrating and disappearing was considerable.**’ The Italian occupation of Albania moreover

left Yugoslavia practically cut off from the outside world,

facing Italy on two fronts as well as Germany and a newly enlarged Hungary on the north. It is hardly surprising that under these circumstances the government of Alexander Cincar-Markovié, which had replaced that of Stojadinovi¢ only in February, steered a cautious course in the European crisis. It was understood in England that Yugoslavia had to be extremely careful and could hardly be expected to expose itself to great risks. The German government wanted two things from Belgrade: that Yugoslavia place her mineral resources at the service of the German war machine, and that Yugoslavia not

only refrain from joining the British antiaggression front but move more closely to the Axis. On the first of these issues, the Germans had the advantage of an entrenched position in the Yugoslav economy, acquired in earlier years, that could be expanded by the leverage that Belgrade’s desire for arms from Germany gave Berlin. In this regard, therefore, Germany made considerable progress, with Géring’s Four-Year Plan, air force deliveries, and his representative Neuhausen as the local negotiator playing key parts:42? As for pulling Yugoslavia closer to the Axis, even the leverage exerted in connection with the atms delivery question did not enable Berlin to secure the desired degree of compliance. The Yugoslav leaders, both the new prime minister and Prince Paul, the

regent, wanted to keep their relations with Germany as good as possible, but they were unwilling to go any further.”#° In regard to Yugoslavia the Germans with the support of Italy tried to do what they had so successfully done earlier with Hungary, namely, to “Vertrauliche Informationen des 235. On Kiosseivanov’s Berlin visit, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 500, 508, 617; Presse,’ 4 July 1939, Bundesarchiv, Reichsministeriums fir Volksaufklarung und Propaganda fir die Oberheitmann, Z.S¢g. 109/1, f.12.

78, 102. 236. G.D., D, 6, No. 618, p. 717, Nos. 659, 703, 728, 738; 7, Nos. 1, 11,

237. Hungarian Documents, 3, Nos. 443, 473, 506.

238. R 1443, R 2701, R 2915/409/92, FO 371/22883; Hoptner, pp. 144-45.

for political pressure, see GD, D546; Nos. 21, 239. On the arms trade, its problems, and its use by the Germans Goring

738; 7, Nos. 81, 102, 240, 241; 142, 176, 210, 245, 262, 279, 573, 586, 615, 620, 683, 703,

128, “Deutsche Bank,” Exhibit 403; U.S. 1939, 1:199; conference of 25 July 1939 in TMWC, 38:367-70; OMGUS, efte fir

n, 1934-1944,” Vierteljahrsh cf. Roland Schonfeld, “Deutsche Rohstoffsicherungspolitik in Jugoslawie moved the bulk of 218-19; Hoptner, pp. 158-60. The Yugoslav government Zeitgeschichte, 24, No. 3 (July 1976),

its gold reserve to England and the United States, ibid., p. 156. 240. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 191, 192, 198, 256.

736

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

obtain a kind of ritual purification and identification by having the country leave the League of Nations and join the Anti-Comintern Pact. In spite of every effort, including personal pressure by Hitler and von Ribbentrop on both Prince Paul and CincarMarkovié when they visited Germany in April and June, Yugoslavia would not break

formally with its old policy and march in cadence to Germany’s tune.”4! Belgrade would do its utmost to stay neutral, providing some

economic

resources

for Germany, but

remained unwilling to join either Germany’s enemies or the Axis. Both because of its strategic location and the need of Germany’s arms industry for its chrome, Turkey was considered exceptionally important by Hitler. The effort to keep Turkey from aligning herself with the antiaggression front was entrusted to a man thought capable of the necessary finesse and intrigue. After his experiences in Vienna, Franz von Papen was recalled from temporary retirement by Hitler in April 1939 and sent to Ankara.?43 Perhaps the fact that he had hardly covered himself with glory in Turkey in the World War made him all the more eager to do his best this time around. Two recent developments would make it exceedingly difficult to restore in any future war the relationship Germany and Turkey had maintained—enjoyed is hardly the correct term—in the previous conflict. The territorial settlement by which France returned to Turkey the area around Alexandretta opened up the possibility of a Franco-Turkish alignment.*#4 Second, the Italian action in Albania appeared to threaten Turkey directly. The maintenance of a large Italian garrison there was taken as an indication of further Italian aggressive intentions in the direction of the eastern Mediterranean and thereby pushed Turkey toward the British anti-aggression front out of fear of Germany’s Axis partner.*45 In the face of this situation

even

the repeated blandishments

of von

Papen,

alternating with veiled threats and underlined by German refusals to carry out delivery contracts on armaments for Turkey could not keep the Turkish government from aligning itself with Great Britain.4° Turkey, like Yugoslavia, wanted to maintain good

relations with Germany, and she would send Germany the much-needed chrome until the last stages of World War II, but, officially Ankara was on the side of the West.247 That in practice the Turks themselves would see to it that this alignment meant little or nothing could hardly be foreseen by Berlin.248 Unlike Bulgaria, which seemed almost eager to tepeat its role of a subordinate ally of Germany, Turkey steered a course of cautious neutrality though with nominal ties to the West. From Hitler’s point of view, the most important smaller country in Western Europe 241. Ibid., Nos. 262, 271, 431, 474, 720, 733, 745; 7, No. 16. 242. Ibid., 6, Nos. 609, 691; Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 155.

243. The post had been vacant since late November 1938; the developments after 15 March 1939 obviously called the problem to Berlin’s attention. See Krecker, pp. 27-28. 244, G.D., D, 6, Nos. 59, 72. On the other hand, the Franco-Turkish negotiations were incredibly protracted, a

fact cited by Adamthwaite (p. 328) as characteristic of the “general dilatoriness which infected the main branches of the French government.” 245. See Irving, Breach of Security, pp. 58-62; Krecker, pp. 29-34. 246. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 259, 281, 286, 288, 289, 303, 305, 315, 317, 324, 336, 413, 475, 483, 489, 495, 496, 512, 513, 518, 533; S.U., No. 269; Siebert, pp. 144-49; Glasneck and Kircheisen, pp. 40-46; Pratt, pp. 156ff.;

Krecker, pp. 36-40. On the arms deliveries issue and the decisions of Hitler and Géring not to send the weapons ordered and ready for shipment but to try to keep some trade continuing because Germany needed chrome, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 321, 435, 454, 472, 703, 782; 7, No. 80; Krecker, pp. 41-43.

247. A British-Turkish declaration of mutual support in the Mediterranean was issued on 12 May. Relevant documents in B.D., 3d, 5, chaps. 3, 4, 6, 7; see also 46th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy,

10 May 1939, CAB 27/655.

248. It must be remembered that the relatively firmer position of Turkey in the spring and summer of 1939 was

based on two factors which would soon change: the greater distance from German power, and the assumption that the Soviet Union would join the anti-ageression front.

The Road to War

737

was Belgium. As already mentioned, he intended to occupy that country—along with Holland and Luxembourg—as part of his planned campaign in the west against Great Britain; but he certainly did not want the Belgians to join Britain and France until he was ready to launch a full-scale attack in the west. Any Belgian (from Getmany’s point of view) premature alignment with the Western Powers could be very dangerous to Germany because of Belgium’s proximity to Germany’s most important industrial area. Hitler was therefore most interested in having the Belgian government adhere to its “independent” but in reality neutral policy. That policy, adopted formally in 1936, not only screened German ambitions against Poland but also would make it much easier for the German armed forces to crush Belgium quickly when Germany was ready to do so. The Belgians would have denied themselves the opportunity to coordinate theit defensive strategy with England and France, a self-denial based in part on the principle of an independent policy, in part on memories of the propaganda repercussions of pre1914 staff contacts with the British, and in part on the basis that in the years of close staff contacts with France the Belgians had not in fact learned anything useful about French operational planning—mainly because there was nothing useful to learn, but the

Belgians did not know that. In any case, in spite of insistent urgings from London, Belgium allowed only minimal staff contacts and refused to open general staff conversation with the Western Powers.” Under these circumstances it will hardly surprise anyone that the German government in 1939 was free with the most explicit reassurances to Belgium, reassurances at

times accompanied by threats of the dire consequences that would befall Belgium if she were to abandon her independent stance and cooperate with England and France.*°? All discussion of revisionist aspirations for the territories of Eupen and Malmédy that Belgium had acquired at the end of the World War was banned from the German press; once Belgium was occupied, those lands could be seized easily enough.”*! In the meantime, Hitler himself would personally reassure the Belgians of his good intentions toward

them.252 The Belgian ambassador to Paris saw very clearly that German interest in Belgium was solely due to Germany’s intention of invading Belgium and worry lest the attacked country find a way to defend herself effectively, but such warnings were not heeded in Brussels.253 King Leopold, who certainly hoped to spare his country the terrors of another occupation, thought the best way to avoid that was to give the Germans no room to doubt Belgium’s innocence of any ties to Berlin’s enemies and to assist in avoiding war altogether by a special appeal for peace launched together with Queen

Wilhelmina of the Netherlands.254 As noble as it was futile, that gesture would neither

see Brian Bond, France 249. D.D.B., 5, Nos. 65, 66, 70, 71, 74. On Belgium’s prewar contacts with the British, 6, No. 196; Harvey Diaries, 27 and Belgium, 1939-1940 (London: Davis-Poynter, 1975), pp. 26-36; note B.D., 3d,

for them (D.D.B., 5, May 1939, pp. 292-93. The Belgians did think that staff talks with Holland might be useful No. 57).

fiir die Schriftleitung,” 18 250. ae 5, Nos. 63, 80, 81; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 516, 517, 694, 697, 701; “Bestellung August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, f.112. ibid., 101 /12, f£.94, 100. The German 251. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 27 March, 3 April 1939,

rman Frontier during World annexations of Belgian territory are reviewed in Arnold H. Price, “The Belgian-Ge 145-53. War II,” Marland Historian, 1, No. 2 (Fall 1970), 252. D.D.B., 5, No. 62. on 4 July 1939 wrote: “La violence de 253. Ambassador Pol Le Tellier in commenting on German press articles e a notre égard me porte plutot a lAllemagn de intentions des purité la de ces réactions, loin de me convaincte persuadent, comme en aout 1914, le es circonstanc les si sol croire que le Reich n’a pas renoncé 4 violer notre Dés lors, lintérét de lAllemagne est que la voie beige est la plus sure pour frapper ses grands ennemis. francais et anglais une défense Bat nos garants d’empéchet pat tour les moyens que nous organisions davance avec contre une agression eventuelle allemande” (ibid., No. 76).

efficace des frontiéres belges eten, pp. 339-42). The Belgian documents on the 254, Leopold had developed this project by 27 July (Overstra appeal are to be found in D.D.B., 5, Nos. 87ff.

156

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

resttain Hitler from attacking Poland nor, when he thought the time right, from invading

Belgium. By way of summary, therefore, it can be said that German policy aims toward the smaller powers in 1939 were largely, if not entirely, attained. Even if Hungary, Yugoslavia, and Turkey had not aligned themselves as closely with Germany as the Berlin government would have liked, on the critical strategic issues the Germans

could feel that

they had accomplished much. They could go to war reasonably certain of receiving needed iton ore from Sweden, oil and wheat from Romania, chrome from Turkey, various minerals but especially copper from Yugoslavia. They could be fairly certain none except possibly Turkey would openly join the citcle of Germany’s enemies, that Belgium would screen the industrial heart of Germany against attack until Getman

atmy was

otdered

to march

to the Channel

the and that and the

coast. This record, of course,

reflected not only the accomplishments of German diplomacy in 1939 but the strong position Germany had acquired by her actions of previous yeats. In the hope of reintegrating Germany into a peaceful European system, the Western Powers had for years quite deliberately steered away from dividing Europe into ideological blocks. Now when they tried to reverse that policy and to rally the smaller countries against Berlin, they found such a policy extremely difficult to implement in the short time left available, and the German leadership was for that very reason determined to keep the time as short as possible. If he hoped to obtain raw materials and political support from a number of smaller countries, or at least to keep them from joining his enemies, Hitler counted on direct and

active military aid from Italy. Although he did not tell the Italian leaders of his plans for an attack on Poland, Hitler assumed that he had successfully tied Italy to Germany by the Pact of Steel with its clear and unmistakable wording, wording that had met with full

Italian approval after a few minor changes requested by Rome.”°> Shortly after signing the pact, Mussolini had reiterated in writing to Hitler his strategic concepts for the forth-

coming joint war against the West and his belief that the Axis first needed several years of peace, together with the reasons for his opinion. Hitler neither agreed in writing nor argued with the details of the letter handed to him on 31 May. Perhaps the two leaders could discuss their views personally later that year.?5° Hitler had, as noted, decided not to take the Italians into his confidence; although

there is no evidence linking the two issues, everything that had gone before makes it plausible that Hitler’s determined action on the transfer of the South Tyrolean Germans in the summer of 1939 was his way of making sure that the Italians would have no complaints when the critical moment arrived.257 On the key issue of timing, Hitler, who had

already decided to strike that year, would simply accompli.*8 As for military staff contacts, these went commitments that one might have expected owing to secrecy and the divergent timetables of the prospective

confront Mussolini with a fait forward but without the precise the combined effects of German wartime allies. Few details could

be discussed under these circumstances;2? and when they were, discrepancies became 255. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 371, 386; Toscano, Origins ofthe Pact ofSteel, pp. 349-70; Siebert, pp. 178-84. 256. A full account is in Toscano, Origins of the Pact ofSteel, pp. 376-88. Note that Mussolini had not taken the option, offered to him at the time, of increasing his independence of Germany by some degree of rapprochement with France (see esp. Siebert, pp. 188-98). 257. Hitlet would not, however, allow great publicity about the transfer scheme; that might embarrass the German propaganda campaign about the ill treatment of Germans in Poland (see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 624, 643,

nn. 1 and 2). In any case, the land for the South Tyrolean Germans to settle on had fitst to be conqueted (see Siebert, p. 233, n. 80). 258. Note Keitel’s comments to Ciano about this in December 1942 (Ciano, Diary, p. 557). 259. G.D., D, 6:936-42, No. 660; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonfetenz,”

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, £.60.

22 June 1939, Bundesarchiv,

The Road to War

739

obvious. In the naval talks, the Italians revealed that their main concern would have to

be the protection of the supply route from Italy to Libya—an issue that would indeed play a dominant role in the whole Mediterranean and North African theater during World War I1.*° As for the possibility of combined offensive operations against Great Britain, the key was to be the building up of a naval base at Kismayu ftom which submarines and cruisers would be able to raid the British supply routes in the Indian Ocean. Italy, however, had only acquired this area, the Jubaland portion of Italian Somaliland,

from Britain in 1925; and by the time war broke out little had been done to prepare the base for its ambitious role.?°! Economic negotiations between the Axis partners also continued to be beset by difficulties;?°? propaganda and myth rather than hard planning and substance constituted the bond between Germany and Italy. Although for a short time it looked as if there might be some rapprochement between Germany and the Vatican, a development greatly desired and often urged on the Germans by their Italian and Spanish friends, nothing substantial beyond a temporary press truce came out of this project. No strengthening of the Axis was to be expected as a result of lessened tension between the new pope, Pius XII, and the authorities in Berlin.”

Although Mussolini and Ciano were worried about the possibility of war over Danzig and the Polish question generally, they preferred to have some yeats of peace.?64 The Duce was, however, in a particularly difficult position, largely of his own making. He

had committed Italy in writing and in public to the German side; he did not think Italy ready to honor that promise for some years to come; but he was most reluctant to tell the Germans frankly, as Teleki did, that Italy could not yet go to war. The memory of 1915, the self-esteem of Mussolini and his hope that some

exercise of a moderating

influence on Hitler might yet avert or postpone war, struggled with a recognition of what wat with the West would be likely to do to Italy in the immediate future. With Ciano, under prodding from Attolico, becoming increasingly alarmed,?® the Italians tried to get the Germans to give them a more specific picture of their intentions. Under the terms of the Pact of Steel, the partners were supposed to keep each other informed, and the Italians naturally believed that this applied to the greatest crisis of the moment, the one over Danzig and Poland. The various Italian requests for information and the discussion of a possible Hitler-Mussolini meeting during the summer of 1939 must be seen in this context.766 At the same time as the Italian worries might have alerted Hitler to the real state of never 260. G.D., D, 6:943-48. Ciano would bring up this subject at Salzburg in August, ibid., 7:36. The Italians

did follow up hints that there might be oil in Libya (Mack Smith, p. 122). Playfair, The 261. See the description of the situation at Kismayu during the East African campaign in I. S. O. Mediterranean and Middle East, 1 (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1954): 415-16. 262. G.D., D, 6, No. 423; Siebert, p. 228.

to settle the dispute over 263. On this whole episode, as well as on the new pope’s suggestion of a conference

German-Vatican Relations, 1939— Danzig, see William M. Harrigan, “Pius XII’s Effort to Effect a Detente in Nos. 18ff.; Note by Udet of 1940,” Catholic Historical Review, 49, No. 2 (July 1963), 173-91; Saint Siége, 1:8-18,

that Goring see the 11 April 1939 for Géring on his meeting with Hitler on 7 April 1939 about Ciano’s request

folder 65, frames 7391-92; “Informationspope while in Rome, London, Imperial War Museum, Milch Papers, £.205; “Bestellung fur die Redaktion,” 5 101/34, Z.Sg. Brammer, , Bundesarchiv bericht Nr. 43,” 27 April 1939,

, FO 371 /22023; Ciano, Diary, 13 May 1939, ibid., 101/13, £5; Osborne report of 17 July 1939, C 10227/54/18

see Klieforth to Moffat, 3 March 1939, Moffat June 1939, p. 98. For other perspectives on the new pope, Papers, Vol. 16; D.D.B., 5, No. 90. May 1939 in R 4495/409/92, FO 371/23884. 264. Note Prince Paul’s comments on his Rome visit of 10-11

the evidence of inadequate Italian military Cf. Ciano, Diary, pp. 79-80; Hungarian Documents, 4, No. 147; and AA in Forstmeier (ed.), PP- 202-21. article Raspin’s Angela and 13, chap. Smith, Mack in ns preparatio about Attolico’s No. 79. For Ciano’s initial doubts 265. See G.D., D, 6, No. 601; D.D.1, 12, No. 427; D.D.B., 5,

prodding, see his diary entries for 19, 21, and 22 July 1939.

266. D.D.1.,A12, No. 130; B:D., 3d, 6, Nos. Documents, 4, No. 195.

;

546, 711; Werzsacker-Papiere, pp. 155-56. See also Hungarian

740

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

mind of his prospective ally, however, Rome was also sending very different signals. The Italians not only joined in the condemnation of Teleki’s warning that Hungary would not participate in an attack on Poland;?®7 they took a variety of steps to assure the Germans of Italy’s complete loyalty to the Pact of Steel. On numerous occasions they defended the German position on the Polish question and made sure that Berlin knew it.2°* Both when asking for the details of Germany’s plans in regard to Danzig and when arranging the Hitler-Mussolini meeting scheduled for 4 August the Italians explicitly reiterated their promise to fight alongside Germany if war did break out.2 Though the Germans, therefore, came to understand that Mussolini preferred some diplomatic settlement of their dispute with Poland, perhaps by some conference of the Munich type at which Mussolini himself could shine, they had no reason to anticipate—and Hitler in particular had no

reason to assume—that the Italians would not fulfill their treaty obligations.?”° There may well have been an element of wishful thinking in the expectation of Mussolini and Ciano that there might be a peaceful settlement after all.27! Perhaps the troubles England was having at Tientsin with Japan in the summer of 1939 led Rome to hope that in spite of British warnings and their own repeatedly expressed opinion, England would not fight in 1939 after all.2”* The very aggravation over Germany’s failure to send the promised modern weapons may have reassured Rome that a conflict was hardly imminent; if Berlin expected the Italians to join them in a few weeks in a war certtain to determine the fate of their two countries, surely they would want Italy to be as strong as possible.?”? Although the Italian leaders had urged along the German-Soviet rapprochement and were given some information on it from Berlin and even more from the German embassy in Moscow,?” they certainly did not expect any rapid conclusion of a German-Soviet agreement. In view of von Ribbentrop’s repeated assertions that all was well and the similar opinion of Ciano’s brother-in-law, Massimo

Magistrati, the first

counsellor of the Italian embassy in Berlin, the Italians themselves on 28 July suggested a cancellation of the scheduled Hitler-Mussolini meeting.?’ As more and more alarming reports came to Rome in the following days, however,*’° Ciano began to doubt that all was as calm and peaceful as he had thought, whereas Ambassador Attolico had been sounding the alarm all along. The mixed news from Berlin in the first week of August led Ciano to think of a meeting with von Ribbentrop as a way of clarifying the situation once and for all. With Mussolini’s cooperation and approval, he prepared himself to argue for a period of peace and to suggest 267 Ciano, Diary, 24—26 July 1939, pp. 112-13. 268. See G.D., D, 6, Nos. 456, 629; D.D.I., 12, Nos. 463, 505; B.D., 3d, 6, Nos. 234, 261; Ciano, Diary, 7 July

1939, pp. 109-10. 269. See Ciano’s letter to Attolico of 2 July 1939, Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, p. 288; G.D., D, 6, Nos. 711, 718.

Since the request for information from Rome came just before Ciano’s visit to Franco, von Ribbentrop was especially careful to provide a deliberately distorted picture of the situation, something that must be remembered as background for Ciano’s final break with von Ribbentrop when the two met at Salzburg a

month later, and Ciano learned the truth. G.D., D, 6, No. 636; D.D.1., 12, Nos. 503, 504; Siebert, pp. 211-13. 270. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 718, 737; D.D.I, 12, No. 717; Ciano, Diary, 19-22 July 1939, pp. 110-12; WergsdckerPapiere, pp. 156-57; Siebert, pp. 220-21; “Informationsbericht Nr. 84,” 11 August 1939, Bundesarchiv,

Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, ff. 405-15. 271. Especially revealing are the reports of the Belgian ambassador in Rome, D.D.B., 5, Nos. 77, 83; cf. ibid.,

No. 79.

272. See B.D., 3d, 9, No, 244; Lee, chap. 7; Shai, chap. 6.

273. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 703, 738. 274. Ibid., Nos. 480, 523; Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 76ff.

275. See esp. Ciano, Attolico’s insistence August, pp. 115-16. 276. D.D.L, 12, Nos.

Diary, 26-31 July 1939, pp. 113-15. Note also Ciano’s continued negative comments on that war was coming and that Italy should act to head off German action, ibid., 2 and 3 See also Siebert, pp. 213-23. 750, 767. The infotmation was provided by Admiral Canatis; see also ibid., No. 648.

The Road to War

741

once again Mussolini’s idea of a conference to settle outstanding issues.?””7 A meeting in Germany was accordingly arranged, and the Italian foreign minister left Rome fully briefed on the need to avert war for the time being and certain that the Duce was “more than ever convinced of the necessity of delaying the conflict.””278 When Ciano arrived at Salzburg and met with von Ribbentrop at Fuschl, the castle the German foreign minister had expropriated for his own use from a murdered Austrian nobleman, he immediately discovered that Attolico had been right in warnin im.279 Although Ciano ; : him.*” would present to von Ribbentrop and subsequently6 to Hitler theS atray of arguments he and the Duce had thought up to urge postponement of war, the German leaders were obviously set on war.28° Ciano’s impression from the 11 and 12 August conversations was that “the decision to fight is implacable. He [von Ribbentrop] tejects any solution which might give satisfaction to Germany and avoid the struggle. I am certain that even if the Germans were given more than they ask for they would attack just the same, because they are possessed by the demon of destruction.’”*! Hitler was as determined as his foreign minister. “He, too, is impassive and implacable in his decision... He has decided to strike, and strike he will. All our arguments will not in the least avail to stop him.”?6? Hitler and von Ribbentrop also argued that Britain and France were unlikely to go to war to support Poland; but that if they did, as Ciano was sure they would, this was probably the best time to fight them anyway. Both Hitler and the Duce were still young; and any British and French intervention would itself show that these powers did not mean to allow the Axis the additional years of preparation that Italy preferred to have. Furthermore, Hitler argued—one must say with considerable accuracy— that the Western Powers were also likely to add to their own strength; and that their catching up in armaments could offset such accretions of strength as might come to the Axis from their own programs, from the greater aggressiveness of Japan once she had finished in China, and from the isolation of America once a lull in Europe had obviated

the possibility of a third term for Roosevelt as the Italian arguments for postponement suggested. Hitler explained with great care why timing was so important. War would begin by the end of August at the latest because the first major battles would take a few weeks to be followed by a few more weeks of mopping up. By the beginning of October, all of that operation had to be completed because thereafter, and especially after 15 October, the fall rains would render the armored columns on which he relied for deep penetrations immobile and would make it impossible for his air force to use advanced airfields.283 The blow destroying Poland was necessary in any case to clear the rear of the Axis

for the coming war with the West.

In this connection,

both Hitler and von

Ribbentrop repeatedly urged the Italians to use the opportunity provided by Germany’s

pp. 115-18. The section of the 277. G.D., D, 6, No. 777; Siebert, pp. 225-28; Ciano, Diary, 2-10 August 1939,

to me a particularly convincing Ciano diary for the last week of July and the first week of August 1939 appears misled and rather foolishly deceiving proof that Ciano did not retouch the text. He is hete revealed as badly himself; then he changes his mind slowly and against his own preferences.

278. Ibid., 10 August 1939, p. 118. about Italy’s loyalty to the Pact of 279. The day before von Ribbentrop had been boasting to Admiral Canaris Steel (Abshagen, p. 198). 1, 4, 118-20; Ciano, Diplomatic Papers, pp. 297-304; D.D.L, 13, Nos. 280. Ciano, Diary, 11-13 August 1939, pp. Magistrall, pp. 394-403; Schmidt, pp. 438-40; 21; G.D., D, 7, Nos. 43, 41; Weizsacker-Papiere, pp. 158, 180-81; useful

760c.62/862 and 867. There are Kirk tel. 827 of 18 August and Biddle tel. 184 of 18 August 1939, State pp. 192-93. accounts in Siebert, chap. 7; Henke, pp. 278-79; Mack Smith,

Weizsacker, Erinnerungen, p. 246. 281. Ciano, Diary, 11 August 1939, p. 119; cf. ibid., p. 582; 119. . p 1939, 2. Ciano, Diary, 12 August to the timing of an attack, see G.D., Ds aati of td tactical problems and their relation es For id 7:44.

742

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

move to do essentially the same thing themselves by crushing Yugoslavia. Since Italy could hardly be expected to participate in a quick campaign against Poland, such action would firmly commit her to Germany’s side, offer her the opportunity for great spoils, and free her rear for the coming showdown on Italy’s border with France.7*4 The Soviet Union would in any case stay out; Moscow was fully aware of Germany’s plans, and if Russia gained some territory out of the situation, that was all right too.7°5 As for Poland, it would be utterly crushed, and Hitler used the fact that he had agreed to transfer the South Tyrolean Germans to justify to Count Ciano his absolute determination to make no peaceful settlement with Poland. In the face of this barrage of arguments, Ciano dropped the idea of a communiqué designed to show that there was still the possibility of a peaceful resolution of outstanding issues. He had brought along a draft, but Hitler and von Ribbentrop objected,

so that nothing of the sort was issued. Ciano did not even bring up another proposal, a suggested partition of Danzig. This project had been worked on in Warsaw months eartlier, but Ciano did not know that.28° It had now come to the attention of the Italian

ambassador to Poland, Pietro Arone, who sent it to Salzburg for Ciano.”®’ The Italian foreign minister knew that the Polish government would not simply yield to German demands but was interested in resuming negotiations with Berlin;?8§ he could, however, hardly advocate a plan to partition Danzig with a Hitler determined to destroy Poland. He had Ambassador Attolico give von Weizsacker a memorandum on the project, but that was a decent burial rather than a formal proposal.?8° At a time when the German propaganda campaign against Poland was being moved at Hitler’s direction from the back pages to page two and then to page one of the newspapers,?”° when the German ambassador to Warsaw had been forbidden by von Ribbentrop to go to the country to which he was nominally accredited,””! and when the line publicly taken by Germany was that there could be no compromise whatever,?”* projects like the partition plan were of

no interest to Berlin. What Hitler did have in mind for the final stage of the GermanPolish drama will be discussed later. Ciano returned to Rome permanently disillusioned with the Germans. He was certain that Hitler would start a war, that it would be disastrous for Italy to join Germany, and that the obvious German misleading of Italy provided a fair basis for Rome to assert that it was Germany who had broken the alliance. He would do all in his power to convince Mussolini of this line and to dissuade him from entering the conflict.293 The Duce was torn between recognition of Italy’s incapacity to wage war on the one hand and fear 284, This would be in part Yugoslavia’s punishment for refusing to ally herself with the Axis; see ibid., p. 35. 285. Further information on German-Soviet relations was provided Italy a few days later; Ciano merely replied “trés bien.” G.D., D, 7, Nos. 76, 98. 286. See above, pp. 666-67. 287. Weinberg, “Proposed Compromise,” p. 338. 288. Biddle tel. 184 of 18 August 1939, State 760c.62/867; B.D., 3d, 6, No. 629.

289. G.D., D, 7, No. 59. Von Weizsacker had played a part in alerting Attolico and also believed that England and France would move in support of Poland (Siebert, pp. 213-15). 290. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 8, 11, 19 August 1939, Bundesarchiy, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, ff.100, 103, 113; “Vertrauliche Informationen,” 11, 14, 17 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg.

109/2, f£.43, 52-53, 69. 291. G.D., D, 7, No: 2. Perhaps von Ribbentrop was also upset about von Moltke’s comprehensive report of 1

August, ibid., 6, No. 754. The ambassador was desperate to return to Warsaw and very angry over being prohibited from going to his post; ibid., 7, No. 82; Hassell, p. 85; see also G.D., D, 7, No. 44. 292. “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 16, 17 August 1939, Bundesatchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, f£.107, 109. See also Kennard’s letter to Cadogan of 17 August 1939, B.D., 3d, 7, No. 48. 293. Anfuso, p. 103; Ciano, Diary, 13 August ff.; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 71, 72; U.S. 1939, 1:221; Siebert, pp. 249-51; cf. G.D., D, 7, No. 146. He would later learn about a deliberate lie by von Ribbentrop about his correspondence concerning French policy with Bonnet, see Siebert, p. 239, n. 3.

The Road to War

743

of appearing cowardly on the other. He was also worried lest an angry and disappointed Germany turn against Italy. On the other hand, if there were a peaceful settlement after

all, he wanted his share of the cheap booty, thinking of parts of Yugoslavia to be acquired by internal disruption and external pressure rather than by war.2% If a general war did come, however, he agreed with Count Ciano that Italy should find a way to stay out, at least in the beginning. In this there is some evidence showing that he was influenced by concern that in the early stages of war Italy would find herself having to play a role not unlike that of Austria-Hungary in the first months of war in 1914. At that time the Germans had concentrated their troops in the west and had left the Austrians to face the Russian armies essentially unaided, while this time Germany would attack in the east, leaving Italy to bear the brunt of the fighting with England and France, a prospect that the otherwise belligerent Duce found no more inviting than did his son-in-law.2% However, just as Ciano had avoided giving the Germans a clear statement that Italy would not join them in a general war, so no specific warning was sent from Rome after the Salzburg meeting either.”°° The Duce went back and forth between wanting to assure Hitler of full support and announcing that he could not do so.?*” He finally agreed to Ciano’s idea of another meeting of the two foreign ministers, the assumption being that Ciano would specify Italian neutrality in a general war initiated by a German attack on Poland. By the time Mussolini had reached this decision, the meeting planned for 22 August could not be held because von Ribbentrop was leaving for Moscow.?”* The question of Italy’s role in the war Hitler planned to start a few days later was again open. As for Japan, even if von Ribbentrop might still have had some

hope that the

Japanese would yet come around to a general alliance, Hitler himself was more realistic. The

negotiations

continued

in a desultory

fashion

through

the summer,

with

the

Japanese still insisting on a differentiation in their alliance obligations between those against the Soviet Union and those against the Western Powers.*? The Germans, for reasons previously explained, were completely uninterested in such a project—they wanted the exact opposite—and they warned the Japanese, though without being very explicit about it, that Japan’s attitude would incline them to sign a pact with the Soviet Union themselves.2 At a time when the Japanese wete involved in serious frontier incidents with Russia, this must have sounded unreal, coming as it was from the originator of the Anti-Comintern Pact. Furthermore, the Japanese were having quite enough trouble with the Western Powers. Their pressure on the British position in China, symbolized in June 1939 by the incidents at Tientsin, was considered by Tokyo as part of the preparation for the installation of the Wang Ching-wei puppet regime in occupied China,2°! with the British trying hard to handle the situation in such a fashion as to avoid pushing Japan into the arms of the Axis.2°2 In order to restrain Japan, President against Yugoslavia at 294. Hoptner, pp. 166-69, summarizes the evidence on Mussolini’s consideration of war this time. as clearly in Paris and 295. See G.D., D, 7, No. 226; Siebert, pp. 247-48. This possibility was recognized

advantage of Italy’s going London as in Rome, and some in the Western capitals argued that this would be one to war at the side of Germany. 296. Note esp. G.D., D, 7, No. 98.

Roatta (D.D.I., 13, Nos. 10, 297. Mussolini was again warned by Canaris via the Italian military attaché, General on Poland. The office attack the forgo to Hitler lead would Mussolini 67). Canaris hoped that a clear no from about a military alliance with Germany; of the Italian military attaché in Berlin was at no time very enthusiastic see also D.D.F.,, 2d, 9, No. 181.

124-26; Siebert, pp. 251-55, 261-63; 298, G.D., D, 7, Nos. 154, 190, 220; Ciano, Diary, 20-22 August 1939, pp. Kirk tel. 837 of 19 August 1939, State 760c.62/877.

248-56; Morley, pp. 105-11. 299. The negotiations are traced in Sommer, pp. 238-42,

300. G.D., D, 6, No. 537; 7, No. 11. 301. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 528, 735. 302. See n. 272, above.

744

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Roosevelt had returned the bulk of the American

fleet to the Pacific; and when

the

Germans once mote ttied to obtain a clear picture of the situation in Tokyo at the end of June, the Japanese response was in effect a repeated no with reference to the Japanese

navy’s concern about economic pressure ot a war with the United States.>% In July and August of 1939 the Germans, who now recognized that Japan would not agree to an alliance directed against Britain and France in time for the projected attack on Poland, if ever, lost interest in the alliance negotiations, while the Japanese, ignorant of Hitler’s timetable, continued their internal debates on the subject. The American denunciation of the Japanese-American trade agreement, the news of the British and French

military missions to Moscow, and the escalating fighting on the border between Manchuria and Outer Mongolia all suggested that it might be useful for Japan to draw closer to the Axis if there were a way to do it without increasing rather than decreasing Tokyo’s tisks.°°* From the perspective of Berlin, on the other hand, von Ribbentrop’s earlier ideas of harmonizing an agreement with Russia and the Axis relationship with Japan once again became important, accentuated by Russian interest in such a project.*® Naturally this, too, looked very different from Tokyo. There the idea of a German-Soviet

rapprochement was viewed with considerable alarm, especially if Germany were to provide the Soviet Union not only with political reassurance in Europe but with critical machine tools that Germany had declined to provide to Japan.*°° For a German government that had set itself a deadline for war with Poland such concerns were necessarily subsidiary. The earlier Japanese attempts to mediate between Poland and Germany were entirely unappreciated. The idea that the Japanese, who continued their refusal of a preferential position for Germany in the economy of occupied China and were busy squeezing German interests out of that area, should presume to tell the Reich how to conduct its trade negotiations with other countries provoked only anger in Berlin.” The possibility of a real bird in the Moscow bush as opposed to flocks of elusive hopes in the Japanese garden made the choice look easy for the German government. That there would be trouble with Japan in case of a German-Soviet agreement was recognized in Berlin; but if Germany and Russia could be reconciled, perhaps Russia and Japan could be also. But if Japan, once finished with her long involvement in China, could turn her full energies against the West, surely while so involved, she could not line up with the Western Powers. Even if Germany could not secure Japan’s full support, she need not fear the possibility of her enmity. The war in China would keep Japan alienated from the Western Powers the way the civil war in Spain had alienated Italy from her allies of the World War. The third line of German policy, the exploration of the possibility of agreement with the Soviet Union, must now be examined. By the end of May, the preliminary soundings from both sides had prepared the way for substantive negotiations; but that did not mean that the process in June and July was simple. From the point of view of the Germans, the great publicity attendant upon the negotiations between the Western Powers and Russia suggested on the one hand that they would do well to move quickly if 303. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 591, 597, 619. It is very likely that this query was occasioned by what looked to Berlin like a stalling of their negotiations with Russia; if so, the reply from Tokyo could only encourage them to court Moscow all the harder. The general nature of the Japanese position was known in Moscow, see S.U., No. 342. On the British request that the United States move its fleet back to the Pacific, see Pratt, pp. 176-77.

304. Sommer, pp. 263-74. 305. Note Weizsacker-Papiere, 18 Jane 1939, p. 154; D.D.I., 12, No. 376; G.D., D, 6, No. 618.

306. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 688, 704; Sommer, pp. 278-80. 307. See above, pp. 425-26; for the Japanese position in August 1939, see G.D., D, 6, No. 756. Note Goring’s

comments to Renzetti reported by Attolico on 14 June in D.D.I., 12, No. 231 (English text in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 87-88), and G.D., D, 7, No. 292.

745

The Road to War

they hoped to forestall an agreement of Russia with the West, whereas on the other hand it taised the possibility that the Soviet Union was merely toying with them, stringing Berlin along while driving a better bargain with the West by threatening to turn to Germany. From the point of view of the Soviet Union, there was the apparently attractive prospect of staying out of a European war which might damage others while profiting her, and there was a further incentive to free herself from danger in Europe to cope with current incidents along the border between her Far Eastern satellite of Outer Mongolia and the Japanese satellite of Manchukuo. On the other hand, there was always the possibility that the Germans, though serious about a war on Poland, were xo serious about an agreement with the Soviet Union. Not only had Berlin rejected all previous Soviet attempts at improved relations—a fact of which the Russians would repeatedly remind the German negotiators in 1939—but the most recent project, that of a trip by Karl Schnurre to Moscow, had been canceled by the Germans at the last minute under circumstances humiliating to Moscow—another fact of which the Soviets repeatedly reminded the Germans. Perhaps the Schnurre trip had been merely a German maneuver to frighten Poland; perhaps now the Germans were merely trying to keep the Soviet Union from aligning herself with the West. Once that alliance project had been aborted, Germany might refuse to sign an agreement with Moscow, leaving herself the option of continuing eastward after destroying Poland, with the help or tacit acquiescence of the Western Powers. Under these circumstances, it behooved Stalin to be very cautious, and

so he was.°08 The preliminary economic talks of June and early July 1939 were marked by hesitation on both sides.*°? The Russians made clear to the Germans that this time there would be no repetition of the January fiasco of the canceled Schnurre trip; agreement would have to be reached on the basis of the last Soviet proposals. The idea of a trip by Schnurre to Moscow was canvassed again, but the talks moved slowly.?!° The Russians wanted, in effect, a preliminary assurance that the talks would really lead to an agreement. The Germans were not entirely certain that they would or could do everything the Russians

asked

for, and during June not

only von

decided

to meet

der Schulenburg

but also the

commercial counsellor of the German embassy in Moscow and the military attaché, General Ernst Késtring, were in Berlin for consultations, with Késtring having a lengthy meeting with Hitler on 21 June.%!! In the last days of June, immediately after these

internal

discussions,

the Germans

most

of the Soviet

economic

demands, to assure the Soviet government that Germany had no hostile intentions toward the Soviet Union, and to try to work out some form of economic and political agteement.3!2 They assumed that the signs from Moscow wete such that, once they had 1939 as opposed to 308. Note the observation of the American chargé in Moscow, Alexander Kirk, that in war over a country 1938 the Soviet Union was much more cautious; in 1938 Russia was safe from a really big

(U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, p. which had no common border with Russia, while in 1939 the danger was real

751; cf. ibid., pp. 773-75). cited there have since 309. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 33-37. Many of the German documents

Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 81— appeared in G.D., D, 6; some of the Italian ones in English translation in

87.

530, 543, 568-70, 576; “Informationsbericht 310. See now also G.D., D, 6, Nos. 462, 478, 490, 491, 499, 514, U.S. 1939, 1:322-24. £337; 101/34, Z.Sg. Brammer, Nr. 67,” 23 June 1939, Bundesatchiv, described his meeting with Hitler to Oron le 311. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 499, 540, 614; D.D.1., 12, No. 386. Kostring

of the Chief of Military History. In Hale in an interrogation on 30-31 August 1945; the record is in the Office a conference of Hitler with von listing 1939 June 21 on entry an is there ern,” “Daten aus alien Notizbiich é Brauchitsch and K6string. G.D., D, 6, Union, pp. 34-35; Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, PP: 90-92;

312. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet The Germans and Italians partially coordinated thei Nos. 574, 579, 583, 588, 596, 614; U.S. 1939, 1:324-29. 12, Nos. 317, 451; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet D.D.L, 613; 536, Nos. 6, D, G.D., approach at this time, see

Union, p. 36; Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, pp. 94-95,

746

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

met the Russians’ basic economic and political prerequisites, agreement would indeed be reached. In Hamburg on 2 July, Hitler felt so confident about an agreement with the Soviet Union that he mentioned it in a speech to party officials in which he also assured them he would settle with Poland once and for all.3!3 When von Ribbentrop talked with the Bulgarian prime minister on 5 July during the latter’s state visit, he expounded his hopes for an agreement with the Soviet Union and the possibility of reconciling Japan and Russia as well.3!4 These hopes and the German expectations of moving forward during July were stimulated by Soviet feelers obviously put forward under instructions from Moscow.*!5 The Russian government let it be known that they much preferred an agreement with Germany to all other possibilities open to them, but this did not mean that Moscow was in the same hurry as Berlin. While the Germans were working with a deadline, the Soviet government was not;

and what made their negotiating position easier was that by about 20 June at the latest the Russians knew not only the general thrust of German policy but the timetable that went with it.3!¢ In response to the new German instruction to their Moscow embassy of 7 July,*!” the Soviet government delayed briefly. The decision-making process within the Soviet government in the second week of July is clouded in obscurity, but two facts are evident from the information available. The Soviet government, and that surely means Stalin, decided by 17 July that an economic agreement with Germany was possible, that is, that the Germans were really serious this time, that their offers were adequate for

Soviet purposes, that the Soviet Union could and would make the concessions on its part still needed for an agreement, and—perhaps most important—that the political implications of signing such an agreement during the diplomatic crisis of 1939 were favorable. On the other hand, the Russians now wanted the final stages of the economic negotiations to take place in Berlin, not Moscow, a step the Germans thought likely to reduce

the political effect somewhat. In the absence of direct evidence, this procedural demand appears to have been designed to keep control of the timing in Soviet hands. A German special negotiator in Moscow would have to secure a signed agreement within a few days; the permanent Soviet trade delegation in Berlin could always plead the need for instructions from Moscow.?!8 The Germans, in no position to object, could secure the needed

publicity and its political effects by other means and were willing to go ahead. A public announcement of the resumption of formal economic negotiations between Germany and the Soviet Union was issued in Moscow on 21 July. It has sometimes been suggested that the Soviet decision to go forward and also to announce publicly the economic negotiations with Germany was caused by leaks to the press on 22 July about a meeting between the British minister for overseas trade, Robert Hudson, and Goring’s assistant Helmuth Wohlthat on 20 July. That meeting will be dis-

313. Vauhnik, p. 29. Hitler was in Hamburg for the funeral of General Knochenauer; “Daten aus alien Notizbuchern,” p. 44; Domarus, 2:1216. 314. G.D., D, 6, No. 618, p. 715. Although von Ribbentrop often misled his visitors, his statements to

Kiosseivanov contain many themes about the Soviet Union that von Ribbentrop would subsequently repeat with great frequency. See also his comments to Attolico on 6 July in D.D.I., 12, No. 503. 315. The most famous of these was that of Astakhov to the Bulgarian minister in Berlin.on 14 June (G.D., D, 6,

No. 529); but Astakhov had spoken in a similar vein to the Estonian minister two weeks earlier (ibid., No. 469);

and comments clearly reflecting analogous directives were made by the Soviet air attaché in London directly to the German assistant air attaché two weeks later (ibid., No. 581). 316. See S.U., No. 333 in which Kleist, a close associate of von Ribbentrop, had given an accurate account of German policy and scheduling to a man, presumably von Scheliha, who passed the information on to Moscow. 317. G.D., D, 6, No. 628; cf. ibid., No. 661; U.S. 1939, 1:330. 318. The key document is G.D., D, 6, No. 685. For the intervening negotiations, see ibid., Nos. 642, 648, 677;

D.D.I., 12, No. 674. Molotov’s telegram to Maisky and Surits of 17 July (S.U., No. 376) appears to reflect the same decision to sign with Germany,

The Road to War

747

cussed later in this chapter, but there can be no more doubt that the Soviet decision communicated to the Germans on 18 July was entirely independently arrived at.3!? Even the public announcement, issued before the news leaks, represents an independent decision by Moscow. The reasons for that step could have been to pressure the Western Powers into greater concessions which in turn could be used to secute more from the Germans, or to reassure Germany of Soviet sincerity in spite of the reversal of location for the talks which the Russians had originally agreed to hold in Moscow and now insisted take place in Berlin. In any case, the road to a German-Soviet economic agreement was now clearly open with both sides expecting a conclusion in the near future because the major differences on terms had already been resolved and because both parties were confident that the “political bases” that Molotov had talked about now existed. From the perspective of Germany, time was of the essence. Just as soon as the resumption of formal negotiations had been agreed to, the German government not only expected these to lead to a quick agreement, but also wanted to have the political questions settled as soon as possible.*”° In the last days of July, Hitler, von Ribbentrop, and

von Weizsacker worked out the general outlines of a settlement with the Soviet Union in which there would be a partition of Poland and a partition of the Baltic States as well, though von Weizsacker did not favor the latter idea.*?! Such partitions would provide the Soviet Union with substantial additional territory in Europe, and Germany with an at least geographically isolated Poland to attack plus a share of the Baltic States. The Russians were obviously very much interested in these prospects; but they had to be concerned about the Far East as well, and they would repeatedly stress their desire for German steps to restrain Japan.*?? When Molotov and von der Schulenburg met on 3 August the Soviet representative was most favorable but not as concerned as the Germans about speed, while the Germans became increasingly frantic about the timing.**3 Berlin pushed for the quickest possible agreement in the economic talks. This necessitated new instructions for the Soviet negotiators; these arrived in stages, quite possibly geared to Soviet knowledge of the German intention to attack Poland right after 25 August but in any case meeting the remaining German wishes.*4 In response to German insistence, the Soviet government on 12 August sent new instructions to Astakhov to the effect that Russia was now ready for the political negotiations to be held in Moscow, and in which the broad political issues informally discussed up to then could be embodied in a political agreement.*° News of this step, which reached Berlin while Ciano was in Salzburg,° showed the Germans that agreement with Russia was practically certain. Only two things remained to be settled: the precise terms of an agreement and the speedy conclusion Germany wanted. Since Hitler was eager for a prompt 319. I suggested this in 1954 (Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 37-38), when the evidence was rather fragmentary. Now that we have a fuller German and Soviet record, the Soviet decision then dated to have been

taken on or before 21 July can be dated to on or before 17 July, with 16 or 17 July the most likely dates (though the early morning hours of 18 July are conceivable).

320. G.D., D, 6, No. 700. Cf. ibid., Nos. 714, 727; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 39, n. 31. 321. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 729, 736, 757; Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 157, 181. When von Weizsicker refers to the

German decision on peace or war depending on whether or not the Soviet Union signed with the Western Powers, he was presumably citing Hitler. 322. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 715, 729, 766; 7, No. 61; cf. U.S., Soviet Union 1933-1939, pp. 775-79.

323. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 744, 758-61, 766; D.D.L, 12, No. 118; U.S. 1939, 1:332-33.

U.S.-1939, 1:333-34. On 324, On the economic negotiations in these days, see G.D., D, 6, Nos: 761; 772, 775;

German press Soviet knowledge as of 7 August of the German attack schedule, see S.U., No. 402. For 5 August nz,” Pressekonfere der aus “Bestellungen see quiet, negotiations trade the of instructions to keep news 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer,

Z.Sg. 101 /13, £.98; “Vertrauliche Informationen,”

atchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/2, £.22. 325. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 18, 20, 50.

bauer

>

5 August 1939, Bundes-

of

in Diplomacy, p. 109. 326. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 40, n. 41; Toscano, Designs

748

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

settlement and was willing to make whatever concessions were necessary, he could see no reason for further delay. At first, on 13 August, Hitler planned to have Hans Frank go to Moscow, as he had

once gone to Rome in preparation for the Axis, to secure both final economic and political agreements.32” He quickly changed his mind however; with war on Poland to start in less than two weeks, he decided in the afternoon or evening of 14 August that von Ribbentrop, whom he considered “the best Foreign Minister that Europe had seen since Bismarck,’’28 should go to Moscow in person. The preparations for the incident that Hitler had ordered staged as the excuse for his attack on Poland—a faked attack on the German radio station at Gleiwitz and related provocations—had already been under way for several days.32° In these circumstances, Hitler was not willing to risk any delays. As he explained to the commander-in-chief, chief of staff, and other high officers on that same

14 August, he wanted to settle things with Poland by a quick war. The Soviet

Union would stand aside because he planned to work out a division of spheres of interest with her.*°° He did not think England would risk war, but his main concern was that the British might make it difficult for him to start a war on Poland by last-minute offers. Germany would stay on the defensive in the west should Britain and France intervene; but the war with Poland, certain in any case, was to be inaugurated with a prompt military offensive preceded by the seizure of the key bridge over the Vistula at Tczew (Dirschau) and was to be arranged in such a fashion that it could be postponed on fortyeight hours’ notice.*?! These details will be discussed later; the comments on Poland and the Soviet Union show Hitler’s concept of the planned trip of von Ribbentrop to Moscow ordered on the same day. The German ambassador in Moscow was accordingly instructed to offer the Soviet Union a formal visit by von Ribbentrop, who would spend a short time in the Russian capital and would expect to meet Stalin as well as Molotov to work out a German-Soviet agreement that would include a partition of Eastern Europe.*** Here was the key issue: while Britain and France hoped that an anti-aggression front would protect the independence of the states of Eastern Eutope that had emerged from the defeat of all the great 327. G.D., D, 7, No. 62. Ciano’s visit may have influenced Hitler’s thinking along these lines; for Frank’s role in the negotiations leading to the formation of the Axis, see above, pp. 208, 260. The idea of having Schnurre accompany Frank, as originally planned, can be explained by Schnurre’s familiarity with both the political and the economic talks, in neither of which Frank had been involved in any way. 328. Hitler had so described von Ribbentrop to Princess Olga of Yugoslavia; see Campbell to Cadogan, 17 June 1939, R 5148/409/92, FO 371/23885. When recounting the comment to Henderson, she had quoted the

description as limited to German foreign ministers (B.D., 3d, 6, No. 8). 329. The whole Gleiwitz provocation will not be reviewed in detail here; see Jiirgen Runzheimer, “Der Uberfall auf den Sender Gleiwitz im Jahre 1939,” Vierteliabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 10, No. 4 (Oct. 1962), 408-26. Alfred Naujocks, the man in change of the operation, had been sent to Gleiwitz on orders of Reinhard Heydtich on 10 August (ibid., p. 419). Heydrich’s plans for this faked operation, with concentration camp inmates in Polish uniforms to be killed as “evidence” of Poland’s aggression, were far enough advanced by 17 August to be discussed by Admiral Canaris with Halder (Franz Halder, Kriegstagebuch [Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1962] [hereafter cited as Halder Diary], 17 August 1939) and Keitel (Canaris diary entry for 17 August in TMWC,

26:337—38; cf. Abshagen, pp. 195-96). There is a review of the incident in Héhne, Orden unter dem Totenkopf, pp. 241-46. 330. Since the Russians had not yet agreed to receive a negotiator, Hitler merely mentioned the possibility that a prominent German might go to Moscow to work things out. 331. Halder Diary, 14 August 1939; Liebmann notes, Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 16, No. 2 (Apr. 1968), 162;

Hassell Diary, 15 August 1939, p. 74; Henke, pp. 279-80; Helmut Krausnick, “Legenden um Hitlers Aussen-

politik,” Viertehabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 2, No. 3 (Oct. 1954), 233. On the Dirschau bridge project, see also Halder Diary, 19 August 1939. In the end the Poles succeeded in blowing up the bridge as the Germans raced to seize it. A full account is included in Herbert Schindler, Mosty und Dirschau: Zwei Handstreiche der Wehrmacht vor Beginn des Polenfeldzuges (Freiburg: Rombach, 1971).

332,G.D Dy 7, Novob:

The Road to War

749

empires of Central and Eastern Europe in the World War, Germany wanted to terminate that independence, and it was her willingness to share the spoils with the Soviet Union that decided the latter to opt for agreement with Germany as opposed to simply standing aside in the approaching conflict.333 Moscow, like Berlin, had wanted an end to the independence of the new countries, wanted Germany to take the initiative, was especially interested in terminating the freedom of Poland, and had only waited for clear signs that Berlin was indeed ready to pay for Soviet cooperation by an appropriate division of the booty. Molotov was, therefore, most pleased on 15 August by von Ribbentrop’s message; the Soviet Union had wanted good relations with Germany for years and was happy to see that feeling finally reciprocated. There should indeed be a nonageression pact, and in addition to wanting help for better relations with Japan, Molotov had some other specific questions. Even before receiving a full report on the 15 August meeting, von Ribbentrop responded by a blanket agreement to all Molotov’s requests, indicated that Hitler wanted to move quickly, and offered to fly to Moscow anytime from 18 August on, preferably finishing the matter before 22 August.3%4 The day after his meeting with von der Schulenburg, Molotov saw the new American ambassador, Laurence Steinhardt. The ambassador followed up on Roosevelt’s

earlier conversation with Russian Ambassador Constantine Oumansky in which the president had urged the Soviet Union to work with the Western Powers, warning of the dangers of an Axis victory for all countries, including the Soviet Union.335 Stalin, however, had made up his mind to sign with Germany, not Britain and France, and

ignored this warning from Washington as he would later disregard American information about the German plans to attack the Soviet Union. By the time Molotov gave von der Schulenburg Stalin’s generally favorable response on the evening of 17 August, the ambassador had the German positive answer to all

Molotov’s queries of 15 August. The Soviet dictator’s proposal for a more leisurely pace than the Germans wanted touched off a series of frantic telegrams from Berlin.*°° War was imminent, and all the details of a nonaggression pact and secret protocol would be

worked out in Moscow during von Ribbentrop’s stay. Under the impact of the German importunities—clearly derived from their military timetable—the Russians began to move more quickly; in a negotiating procedure opposite to the one they followed with the Western Powers, the Soviet leaders became more, not less, accommodating as the

negotiations moved along, reflecting their desire for a successful outcome of this set of talks. As late as 4:00 p.m. on 19 August the Russian negotiators in Berlin were still stalling on signing the economic treaty which had been completed the preceding day. Later that evening, clearly in response to new instructions from Moscow, where von det Schulenburg saw Molotov twice that day, the Soviet trade delegate agreed to sign the 333. See on this also Georg Vigrabs, “Die Stellungnahme der Westmachte und Deutschland zu den baltischen

Staaten im Frihling und Sommer 1939,” Vierteljabrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 7, No. 3 (July 1959), 261-79; Hans Rothfels, “Das Baltikum als Problem internationale Politik,” Zur Geschichte und Problematik. der Demokratie: Festgabe fiir Hans Herzfeld (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1958), pp. 608-12. 334. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 70, 73, 75, 79, 89, 92; D.D.I, 13, No. 69.

Library of Congress, 335. §.U., No. 427; U.S. 1939, 1:29394, 296; Bullitt to Steinhardt, 12 August 1939, of the MolotovSteinhardt Papers, 1939, V-Z. The American embassy in Moscow had received a full account

on to the von det Schulenburg meeting of 15 August (U.S. 1939, 1:334-35), and the information was passed

see n. 154, above). The British (B.D., 3d, 7, No. 41; Steinhardt tel. 486 of 30 August, State 761.6211/149; Moscow to make an urging president the from message a sent American, the like Turkish government, 3d, 7, No. 499). agreement with the Western Powers; this message was delivered on 20 August (B.D., Hitler and von Ribbentrop from 336 G:D.D, 7Nos. 105; 111, 113, 125, 132, 133. Ironically the absence of

One may well wonder Berlin during much of August interfered somewhat with their own insistence on speed. telegrams, broken German of texts code the with reports Sorge’s matched had whether the Soviet government the German code, and hence followed the German schedule precisely.

750

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

treaty, a decision which was publicly announced on 20 August.**” At a time when the world expected the momentary outbreak of war in Europe, Germany and the Soviet Union had agreed on a long-term trade treaty with the provisions for two years of increased economic interchange financed in part by German credits.°% With that step out of the way, the political treaty was next. In spite of von der Schulenburg’s insistence, Molotov had been unwilling to agree to a date earlier than 26 or 27 August for von Ribbentrop’s Moscow trip. As soon as this became known in Berlin on 20 August, Hitler himself wrote Stalin urging that von Ribbentrop be received on 22 or 23 August at the latest.339 That made an impression in Moscow. Stalin must have recognized that he could either agree to Hitler’s schedule or pass up the opportunity of a deal with Germany at least for that year. On 21 August Stalin agreed to von Ribbentrop’s coming on the 23rd, and on the 22nd a public announcement that the German foreign minister was coming to Moscow to sign a nonaggtession pact was issued to the press.>*° The announcement itself made a major impact in the world. Its repercussions on the German government and on Britain, France, Poland, and other countries will have to be

discussed, but first a brief word should be said about the nonaggression pact itself.*! The pact, since it was designed to deal with the contingency of German aggression against Poland, did not contain the clause included in all earlier Soviet nonaggression treaties, that the treaty would be invalid if either party attacked a third power.*” Since the aggression that the pact was designed to protect was scheduled to occur right away, the pact was to become effective not when ratified but as soon as it was signed. As in the case of the Pact of Steel, special pains were taken to adjust the terms of the treaty to the extraordinary situation of Germany, a major power determined on attacking a neighbor and wanting treaties worded to accommodate that project, the difference being that the Russians, unlike the Italians, had delayed signing and so obtained an appropriate reward. Added to the pact was a secret protocol providing for the partitioning of Poland along the Pissa, Narev, Vistula, and San rivers.*43 The Germans had planned to leave Finland and Estonia to the Soviet Union, claim Lithuania enlarged by the Vilna area for themselves, and partition Latvia along the Dvina River. Stalin, however, wanted all of

Latvia, and with Hitler’s approval von Ribbentrop agreed to this. The section on the Balkans was less explicit, with Soviet claims to Bessarabia recognized and Germany declaring her complete political disinterest in the whole area. In this regard, both sides appear to have preferred a degree of vagueness. Had Stalin asked for more, he would almost certainly have received it, but he was apparently reluctant to push his luck in that area. Certainly on the Polish and Baltic portions of the settlement Stalin wished to be vety specific, and he would watch German observance of the new lines with great vigilance.*#4 Not since the invasion of Georgia in 1921 had the possibility of territorial 337. Ibid., Nos. 123, 132, 135; U.S. 1939, 1:335-36; D.D.L., 13, Nos. 100, 102; “Vertrauliche Informationen,” 21 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/2, ff. 85-86. 338. Text in G.D., D, 7, No. 131; an analysis, ibid., No. 436. See also Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp.

43-44, 339. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 142, 149; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 45. 340. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 157-60. On Hitler’s reception of the message from Stalin, see Speer, Erinnerungen, p. 176. 341. Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 46-49; G.D., D, 7, Nos. 170, 191, 205, 206, 213, 228, 229; D.D.I., 13, No. 264; U.S. 1939, 1:342-43; “Vertrauliche Informationen,” 22, 23, 24 August 1939, Bundesarchiv,

Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/2, ff. 89-90, 94-95, 102, 105-6. 342, This was so extraordinary a departure from past practice that the Soviet chargé in Rome thought it incon-

ceivable as late as 23 August (memorandum by Phillips, 23 August 1939, Houghton Library, Phillips Papers, Vol. 36).

343, In the hurry to draft the text, the Pissa River was omitted. This and other oversights were corrected by a subsequent protocol; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 48, 51 G.D., D, 7, No. 284.

344. See the discussion in Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, pp. 54-57. According to the unpublished memoirs

of von Below

(see chap. 16, n. 80), Hitler consulted an atlas when von Ribbentrop called from

The Road to War

751

expansion been so real and apparently without risk for the Soviet Union, and not since 1870 had Germany been so hopeful of securing a wat on one front. , For Hitler, the partition of Eastern Europe opened up what he considered the ideal situation for war. As he had told a number of the higher military leaders on 14 August he now on 22 August explained to a large assembly of generals and admirals his plan i strike at Poland immediately, most likely on 26 August.*4> This was the time to start a wat: he himself was the man to do it, and with Mussolini in Italy and Franco in Spain, there was an opportunity that might never recur, though he recognized that only the neutrality of Spain could be secured. All factors, of which he listed a considerable number, made this the best moment to strike. He was hopeful that Britain and France would stay out, and he listed the reasons for this expectation, but he also discussed at length why he

would go ahead even if Britain and France intervened. Here the forthcoming treaty with the Soviet Union, publicly just announced, would be of great assistance. Poland would be hopelessly isolated and any British blockade broken by the opening to the east. In this tegard, the pact with the Soviet Union would be helpful to Germany whether the war with the Western Powers took place simultaneously with the one against Poland or subsequent to it. The presence of von Ribbentrop for at least part of the meeting just before his departure for Moscow underlined the significance of this point. The war with Poland would be started on some propaganda pretext, whether anyone believed it was irrelevant.*4° The war would be fought to the utter destruction not only of Poland’s armed forces but of the country as a whole with the utmost brutality. As Hitler had said on 14 August, his main worry was that the British might make it difficult for him to start a war by some last-minute offer. He would find a way to protect himself against that “danger” in obvious revulsion against the way he thought he had been tricked out of war in 1938. This time no “S.O.B.” was going to keep him from war against Poland by pushing for a compromise proposal.*4” He would start a war one way Moscow for authority to yield the other half of Latvia to the Soviet Union. 345. The most important source for this talk is the account of Admiral Canaris in G.D., D, 7, Nos. 192, 193.

The best discussion of the sources is that of Winfried Baumgart, “Zur Ansprache Hitlers vor den Fiihrern der Wehrmacht am 22. August 1939,” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 16, No. 2 (Apt. 1968), 120-49, and 19, No. 3 (July 1971), 294-304, where two more accounts are added to the previously published ones listed by Baumgart. Other useful discussions are in Bracher, Machtergreifung, “Legenden,” p. 233; Vollmacht des Gewissens, 1:376-79.

pp.

759-62;

Henke,

pp.

281-85;

Krausnick,

Additional evidence used here: Enge/ Diary, pp. 58-59; Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte, ZS 545 (Erich Kordt); and the interrogation of Walter Warlimont by Harold Deutsch on 18 September 1945 in the State Department Special Interrogation Mission Papers (DeWitt C. Poole), National Archives, which is especially important

because of its antedating the discussion at the Nuremberg trial. The ribbon copy of the text handed by Louis

Lochner to the British embassy in Berlin, almost certainly prepared in the Abwehr, and published in B.D., 3d, 7,

No. 314 (cf. ibid., No. 399) is located in the Henderson Papers, FO 800/270, ff. 288-91. The reference in the report handed to the British mentioning an eastern border Reval, Lublin, Kaschau, mouth of the Danube as the

partition line in Eastern Europe appears to reflect the Abweht’s knowledge of the original rough line Hitler discussed with von

Ribbentrop

before the latter left for Moscow;

the statement ascribed to Hitler that von

Ribbentrop was instructed to make any needed offer and accept all Soviet demands is equally close to what is known of Hitler’s views. The same thing is true for his comments on the delays of the Japanese. These are the main specifics contained in this version that do not appear in the others. It is certainly entirely conceivable that Hitler made them and that Canaris mentioned them orally to his associates in the Abwehr when showing them is his written account and expressing his horror, reflected in Groscurth’s diary: “One is crushed. Everything no ethical lying and deception; not a word of truth. Quite correctly [Canaris’s diary] read, ‘there is absolutely le foundation” (Groscurth Diary, 24 August 1939, p. 179). an addition uniforms, Polish of use the to alluding specific, more was British the handed text the 346. Again diary (ibid., p. also pointing to the Abwehr as source of the document and likewise referred to in the Groscurth 180). See also Speer, Erinnerungen, p. 179. in the record handed to the British 347. The German is “Schweinehund” in the Canaris account; it is “Saukerl”

noting that Hitler voiced (where Chamberlain is mentioned by name in this connection). It is worth was that Stalin might make extraordinarily similar sentiments in 1941 when he said that his only political worry

qs2

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

or another; having discussed various types of incidents that might be manufactured in Danzig with Forster on the day before and knowing that faked border incidents with Poland were also being prepared, Hitler was confident by 22 August that he would have the pretext to serve his purpose.*#8 It should be obvious from the foregoing account that Hitler’s preference for fighting Poland separately from the subsequent war against the West at no time allowed for a compromise on his Polish demands as part of an accommodation with the West. If the Poles gave in completely, that of course would be acceptable as an easy step on the road to victory in the west, but Hitler did not expect such a surrender. He clearly understood, however, that any agreed, as opposed to a German-dictated,

solution of the

German-Polish controversy would involve concessions on his part, and these he was unwilling to make. As he had explained in his 14 August talk, and as he would repeatedly insist in the last days of peace, any German agreement with England would have to follow, not precede, the crushing of Poland; and only on these terms was he willing to try to isolate the war against Poland. An analysis of British policy’ in the summer of 1939 will show that, as the Italians warned Hitler, and as he himself thought possible but unlikely, Hitler’s planned sequence of events was out of the question from the perspective of London. In the British view independence, not the partition of the countries of Eastern Europe, was the prerequisite for any agreement; and since the German action of 15 March had destroyed one of those countries as well as confidence in the word of the German government, whatever contacts took place between Britain and Germany repeatedly emphasized the need for a German step to restore some measure of independence to Czechoslovakia as a key to the restoration of confidence. That a Hitler who was obsessed with the desire to go the next step forward even at the risk of war with England and France would ever seriously consider a step backward was quite out of the question; and the sense of unreality which characterizes the contacts between England and Germany during the last months of peace reflects this total incompatibility of German and British policies. Through June, July, and August, the British government pursued its efforts for an agreement with the Soviet Union. Since the Russian government has not released any of the reports it recetved from an agent in the coding section of the British Foreign Office,*°° as it has for the reports of Sorge and von Scheliha, we do not know the full

extent to which Moscow was aware of the details of the British negotiating strategy; but the general outlines were clear in any case from the actual conduct of the negotiations, from discussions in Parliament, from press leaks, and from the often deliberately unhelpful comments of such Englishmen as David Lloyd George.**! In those months, the London government gradually agreed to additional concessions to Soviet demands, most of which were newly communicated to the British and French negotiators when they informed Molotov of the latest concession. Instead of recounting this tedious process, the latter stages of which took place weeks after the Soviet government had informed Berlin that it would sign an agreement with Germany, it may be more useful to examine the motives of the parties to these talks.>°? a last-minute cooperative gesture (Wezsacker-Papiere, 18 June 1941, p. 260). 348. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 176, 188, 244. 349. Halder Diary, 14 August 1939. 350. See Aster, p. 317, on Captain John Herbert King; cf. Hoptner, p. 125, n. 41. 351. S.U., No. 372. There is a special irony in Lloyd George’s claiming that Chamberlain wanted an agreement with Germany, not the Soviet Union, when he himself would be the most prominent advocate of peace with

Hitler in 1940. 352. The most recent accounts are those of Sidney Aster and Norman H. Gibbs; both are on the whole very critical of Chamberlain. Important materials, in addition to the published British documents, are S.U., Nos.

The Road to War

758

The British government was interested in three objectives. All staff studies, whether

conducted by the British themselves or in coordination with the French, showed that it would be impossible for England and France to do anything substantial for Poland in the early stages of a conflict. Support from the Soviet Union, especially in matériel, would be essential to Poland’s defense. The only other hope for Poland was a Western victory over Germany with the revival of Poland after such a war. This prospect was contemplated in London with nothing like the alarm such a contingency had aroused in regard to Czechoslovakia in 1938 because the German minority in Poland was small compared to that in Czechoslovakia and was, after the German occupation of Prague, in any case of no

special interest.7°? Nevertheless, the guarantees already given to Poland and Romania would be greatly strengthened if the Soviet Union agreed in one way or another to assist those countries in resisting German aggression. The Anglo-Polish staff talks of late May only served to confirm this point.3>4 A second objective, which became increasingly important as the negotiations dragged on and which was probably the main reason for their continuation in the face of ever new demands, was the hope that by signing an agreement with Russia or at least pursuing the negotiations the Western Powers would make it less likely and perhaps impossible for the Soviet Union to ally herself with Germany.*5 As Lord Chatfield said during one of the discussions of a treaty with Russia on 26 June, even if a three-power treaty of mutual guarantee did not cover Poland, it “would at least have the effect that it would prevent Soviet Russia from making a Pact with Germany.” Lord Halifax agreed that this was theoretically true, but that there was still nothing to prevent Germany and Russia from making an arrangement to partition Poland once Germany had invaded Poland.*°° In mid-June and again in August members of the German opposition to Hitler warned the British government of a possible German-Soviet pact, hoping that an agreement between the Western Powers and Russia would deter Hitler; but although those warnings were listened to and may well have contributed to British willingness to make concessions to Moscow in those talks, they could not produce any willingness to

322-24, 327, 330, 331, 340, 357, 358, 360, 361, 366, 367; 49th, 50th, 53d, 56th meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 5, 9, 20 June, 4 July 1939, CAB 27/625; Cabinets 31, 32, 33, 34 (39) of 7,14, 21,

28 June 1939, C 8219, C 8577, C 8914, C 9158/3356/18, FO 371/23068, 23069; Minute by Chamberlain, probably 4 June 1939, C 9295/3356/18, FO 371/23069; Cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, “The Negotiations with Russia, Memorandum by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,” 8 June 1939, CAB

27/627. 353. Thete is a striking difference in the cabinet minutes between 1938 and 1939. The real or imagined grievances of the over three million Sudeten Germans loomed large in ptactically every discussion in 1938; the German minority in Poland was hardly ever mentioned in 1939 except as a possible source of incidents.

354. On the Anglo-French staff talks of 29 March-3 May 1939, see Aster, pp. 143-45; Gibbs, chap. 17; G.D., D, 6, No. 482. On British staff talks with the Poles, see the British brief for the conversations of 15 May 1939, COS No. 903, CAB 53/49; the report of the British delegation in C 9510/427/55, FO 371/23129; COS No. 905, “Anglo-French Action in Support of Poland,” 3 June 1939, CAB 53/49. The basis of British strategy,

assuming German military superiority at the outset of a war and looking to continued Allied increases in

2) hold strength, anticipating a long war, and intending for the allies to (1) hold the German offensive, Policy Germany and crush Italy, (3) defeat Germany, is spelled out in the “Conclusions on the Broad Strategic “Covering for the Conduct of the War,” agreed to by the British and French and printed as Annex I to the 915, ibid. A final Memorandum to the Chiefs of Staff European Appreciation 1939-40,” 25 May 1939, COS at beginning of Situation Military the of “Appreciation Office’s War the in is assessment updating of the August,” 4 August 1939, C 11122/13/18, FO 371/22960. was true; at a conThe inability of the French and British to help Poland did not mean that the reverse

“enigma” code machine, and in ference in Warsaw on 24/25 July 1939 the three powets discussed the German

what came to be known August the Poles provided England and France each with a machine, a key element in as the “Ultra” secret. p. 180. 355. There are repeated references to this in the Cadogan Diary, ¢.g., 16 May 1939, 27/625. 356. 54th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, CAB

754

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War bi

sign with the West on the part of the Russians.*57 As Lord Halifax commented in the

cabinet after the British had agreed to include the Baltic States in the scope of any treaty while the Russians refused to include Holland and Switzerland, “the wheel had thus

come full circle from the early days of the negotiations, when Russia had pressed for full reciprocity.”’°8 All the same, the cabinet did not want to break off the talks; there was

great public pressure for a treaty and, as Chamberlain explained in urging agreement to the idea, unprecedented for England, of starting military conversations with another country even before any political treaty had been signed, the talks would at least keep the Soviet Union from aligning herself with Germany.**? That prophecy of 10 July would prove mistaken, but it does help explain British policy.° Chamberlain at that time still thought the Russians really wanted an agreement with Britain,36! but many were doubtful.3°2 The Soviet rejection of the British-French proposal of 17 July changed Chamberlain’s view to where “he now doubted whether the Soviet Government really desired any agreement with us,’ and had he had access to the text of Molotov’s telegrams to Maisky and Surits of 17 July he would have been certain of Moscow’s disinterest, a disinterest doubtless connected with the simultaneous decision

by Stalin to resume formal economic negotiations with Germany.3* In spite of Chamberlain’s doubts and his skepticism about a possible German-Soviet alliance, the talks were continued; concern over the political repercussions from a rupture of the much publicized negotiations and the possible encouragement such a rupture might give Germany joined with the hope of restraining the Soviet Union from signing with Germany as motives for further concessions.*°° As Chamberlain minuted on 12 August in approving the proposal of Lord Halifax that in spite of prior inclinations, London now accommodate at least part way the Soviet insistence on a guarantee against their 357. The 16 June 1939 warning in B.D., 3d, 6:705 (iii) is marked on the original for the prime minister and was initialed by him (FO 371/22973). On the warnings from the German opposition, see Aster, pp. 274-75; Weinberg, Germany and the Soviet Union, p. 40, n. 43, and p. 42, n. 5. For a British assessment of a possible

German-Soviet rapprochement of 4 July 1939, see N 3335/243/38, FO 371/23686. 358. Cabinet 35 (39) of 5 July 1939, C 9573/3356/18, FO 371/23070. The way in which the concessions made

by Britain and France led to an increasingly one-sided text favoring Soviet interests, but one London and Paris agreed to in the hope of securing a common front that would deter Hitler, is also stressed in Halifax, pp. 54— 56. A summary of the active role of Hoare in pushing for an agreement with Russia is in John Arthur Hoare, Sir Samuel Hoare (London: Cape, 1977), pp. 294-98. 359. 57th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 10 July 1939, CAB 27/625. 360. A review prepared in the Foreign Office on 26 August of the information that had been available to London and the impressions drawn there concluded that the Soviet Union had no interest in aiding Germany

and would, therefore, either sign with Britain and.France or go into isolation (N 4146/243/38, FO 371/23686). It could well be argued that this was a shrewder analysis of Soviet interests than that made by Stalin himself— and would certainly be proved so by events—but it differed on a key point from reality: Stalin’s preference for aiding Germany if he thought the price was right. 361. Cabinet 37 (39) of 12 July 1939, C 9969/3356/18, FO 371/23070. 362. See Pownall Diary, 17 July 1939, p. 214. The usually well-informed Italian ambassador to Moscow was sute the Soviet government did not want an agreement and kept taising its price for that reason (Rosso report of 13 June, D.D.I., 12, No. 201, English in Toscano, Designs in Diplomacy, p. 85); cf. Crolla’s (London) report of 29 June, D.D.I., 12, No. 402, Toscano, p. 93, n. 93. 363. 58th meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 19 July 1939, CAB 27/625. 364. S.U., No. 376. If the wording of this document is authentic as published, it should end all discussion of serious Soviet interest in an agreement with the West as of 17 July at the latest and reflects the decision, referred to in n. 319 above, to sign with Germany. Note that Maisky quickly fell in with the new line, ibid., No. 381. 365. Cabinet 38 (39), of 19 July 1939, C 10225/3356/18, FO 371/23071. 366. 59th and 60th meetings of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, 26 July and 1 August 1939, CAB 27/625; Cabinet 39 (39) of 26 July 1939, C 10629/3356/18, FO 371/23071; Cabinet 40 (39) of 2 August 1939, C 10926/3356/18, FO 371/23072; British staff talks plans, COS 952 of 29 July 1939, CAB 53/53. Note Lord Halifax’s detailed defense of the British conduct of the negotiations to Sir Bernard Pares of 27 July 1939 in Halifax: Papers, FO 800/309; cf. D.D.B., 5, No. 93.

The Road to War

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being threatened by German “indirect aggression” through the Baltic States: “I agree with the S.[ecretary] of S.[tate] that we might accept any of the alternatives which do not appear to give Russia a right, covered by our guarantee, to interfere in the internal affairs of other states.’’367 Here, of course, was the fundamental issue: was the independence of the new nations of Eastern Europe to be protected or ended? If it was to be protected, London was willing to go a long way. They would eventually pressure Poland to agree in peacetime to the transit of Soviet troops if Germany attacked,36* but while Poland eventually agreed to a compromise on this point also,3 the Russian government was interested in participating in the destruction, not the defense, of those threatened by

Germany and had already so promised Berlin.37° The third factor contributing significantly to British perseverance in the search for an agreement with Moscow was the hope that the deterrent effect on Germany of the guarantee of Poland would be enormously enhanced by a British-French-Russian united front. If Germany faced the prospect that an attack on Poland would involve her in a wart against Britain, France, and the Soviet Union at the same time, surely Hitler would

think long and hard about the risks of such an adventure. In view of what is known about Hitler’s interest in an agreement with the Soviet Union, this perception of the British leaders cannot simply be dismissed as unrealistic even if it was never tested. If this was the British government’s view of the reasons for trying to secure an agreement with the Soviet Union, London’s perception of relations with Germany was very different. The government was certain that no one planned to attack Germany or even to provoke her. As the British were able to reassure themselves, Poland was being most cautious not to provide Berlin with any excuse for complaint;?”! and although in public the Germans pretended to the contrary, in secret Hitler himself thought the Poles so conciliatory and nonprovocative that he explained Polish behavior as caused by doubts of Britain’s firmness.>”? Even on the Danzig issue itself there was no cause for concern; as the British assured themselves by a special mission of General Ironside to Warsaw, the Polish government was exercising the utmost restraint in responding to German provocations in the Free City.*” Here too, whatever German propaganda trumpeted in public, in secret the major concern of the German government was how to stage incidents of sufficient gravity to force a Polish reaction.>”* There was, therefore, no

doubt in the British cabinet that Danzig was purely a German pretext for any acts that might be planned against Poland, that on this as on other matters no Polish provocation need be feared, and that, on the contrary, if Germany ever quit threatening the world 367. C 11524/3356/18, FO 371/23072, £.173. 368. Committee of Imperial Defence, Deputy 11506/3356/18, FO 371/23072.

Chiefs

of Staff Sub-Committee,

16 August

1939E

369. B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 150, 176, 198; Bonnet, Fin d'une Europe, pp. 289-90; Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 255-57.

370. Hofer, pp. 56-58.

371. See Aster, pp. 203-4, 407; cf. Margesson to Wennetr-Gren, 27 June 1939, B.D., 3d, 6:740.

kein 372. Halder’s account of Hitler’s comments on 14 August: “Dafiir dass von englischer Seite viel noch ware Polen Polens. Haltung die auch allem vor spricht ist, erwarten zu entscheidendes Handeln frecher wenn es sich auf England verlassen k6nne.” might be, and 373. On Ironside’s mission to Poland, in part to find out what Polish intentions about Danzig to let the Germans the resulting reassurance to London that the Polish leaders were being most careful not

Kennard minute, 3 July 1939, G provoke them into rash acts, see B.D., 3d, 6, Nos. 250, 319, 350, 361, 374, 397;

FO 371/23022; Tronside’s 9348/54/18, FO 371/23021; Foreign Office minute of 12 July 1939, C 9748/54/18, Committee on Foreign report of 28 July 1939, C 10949/54/18, FO 371/23024; 55th meeting of the cabinet consideration of government’s Polish the to alluded Kennard meeting this (at 27/625 CAB 1939, July Policy, 4

FO 371 /22974; Pownall Diary, 10 a plan to partition Danzig); Cabinet 35 (39) of 5 July 1939, C 9820/15/18,

Aster, pp. 212-13; Biddle Papers, p. 64; July 1939, p. 213; Tronside Diary, 4, 10, 18 July 1939, pp. 76, 77-78, 81-82;

Cabinet 39 (39) of 26 July 1939, C 10628/54/18, FO 371 /23024.

374. See above, n. 348.

756

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

with war, that subject could also be a topic for negotiation.*”> A war if it came would be

about the independence of Poland, whatever German

propaganda might say about

Danzig,3’° Naturally, if the British took a firm stand they would be accused of provoking

Germany, while if they did not, they would be damned for letting Berlin think that London would not honor its promise to Poland.3”’” The only hope seemed to lie in a stance of quiet firmness, which, especially if an agreement could be reached with Russia,

might restrain Germany enough so that in a calmer atmosphere negotiations might someday be resumed on such issues as might be of European concern.78 It was, in view of this policy, almost certainly a mistake for the British government to send Sir Nevile Henderson back to Berlin.3’? Recalled after 15 March, he was sent

back in late April; but Henderson’s inclinations and indiscretions could only undermine the import of the message he carried with him on returning to Berlin, namely, that Great Britain for the first time in her history was about to introduce conscription in peacetime.3®° Despaiting over the danger of war, petsonally affected by the clear signs that his own government had lost confidence in him,**! and knowing that he suffered

from the cancer that would kill him in 1942, Henderson cast about for ways to save the peace. These usually involved concessions by Poland to Germany, and Henderson’s arguing along these lines brought only rebukes on the subject and efforts to buck him up from London; but his proclivity for speaking his mind in Berlin hardly fitted with London’s effort to have the Germans recognize that any aggression would lead to a general war.3® In the last days before the outbreak of war, Henderson would succeed in making the British position clear, but a new ambassador might have found this easier.>*

Since the French Coulondre to no Lord Halifax did What direct

did make such a change, replacing André Francois-Poncet with Robert discernible effect, it may also be that it all made no difference. Certainly his best to coordinate the presentation of a firm posture to Berlin.** contacts there were between British and German official and unofficial

375. See Chamberlain’s statement in the House of Commons on 10 July, British Bluebook, No. 35; Lord Halifax to the Dominion High Commissioners, 11 July 1939, C 10101/15/18, FO 371/22975; Halifax to the Earl of

Bessborough, 20 July 1939, Hakfax Papers, FO 800/316; cf. B.D., 3d, 9, No. 323.

376. Cabinet 40 (39) of 2 August 1939, C 1095/54/18, FO 371/23024. As early as 27 July Philip ConwellEvans reported the comment of the German assistant air attaché in London that Germany would not be satisfied with Danzig but expected a fourth partition of Poland (C 10611/15/18, FO 371/22975). 377. The British failure to follow up vigorously on General Ironside’s advice that extensive financial aid be given to Poland probably reflected a reluctance to commit funds to what was seen as a surely losing cause but was dangerously short-sighted in disregarding the morale and political aspects of the issue, a point reflected in Hitler’s use of this on 14 and 22 August as one indication of Britain’s reluctance to honor the guarantee of Poland. See Ironside Diary, 18 July 1939, pp. 81-82; Biddle Papers, pp. 64-65, 67. 378. Note Halifax’s Chatham House speech of 29 June (British Bluebook, No. 25; G.D., D, 6, No. 593) and his letter to Ponsonby of 6 July 1939, Halifax Papers, FO 800/328. 379. Harvey Diaries, 6 April, 27 May, 9 July 1939, pp. 274, 293, 302. 380. Henderson, pp. 230-31; B.D., 3d, 5, Nos. 288, 289; G.D., D, 6, No. 272. For background, see Cabinets 18

(39) of 5April and 21 (39) of 19 April 1939, C 5027, C 6167/19/18, FO 371/22997; U.S. 1939, 1:171—72; B.D., 3d, 5, No. 227. 381. Cadogan Diary, 6 April, 22 May 1939, pp. 170, 182. 382. Aster, pp. 201-4; cf. Hungarian Documents, 4, Nos. 197, 222. Revealing are Henderson’s letters published in B.D., 3d, 5-7, to which should be added his letter of 9 May to Sir Horace Wilson and the latter’s effort of 12

May to get him onto firmer ground (Henderson Papers, FO 800/270, ff.72—75, 82-83). Compare the comment from the British embassy in Warsaw in B.D., 3d, 5, No. 301. Henderson’s former companion in utging concessions to Germany, Lord Lothian, had completely changed his views and now wanted a firm line taken; see his letters to Felix Frankfurter of 10 May, Lothian Papers, GD 40/17/382/316; to Vansittart of 11 May, GD 40/17/387/840; to T. C. P. Catchpool of 15 May 1939, GD 40/17/389/116. 383. For examples of Henderson’s weak presentation, see G.D., D, 6, Nos. 572, 671; 7, No. 66; but see also ibid., No. 114, and his letter to Lord Halifax of 1August, B.D., 3d, 6:719.

384. See Conwell-Evans’s warning to Lord Halifax on 12 July about the comments of Lord Brockett and the warning Lord Halifax sent to the latter on 13 July 1939, Halfax Papers, FO 800/316.

The Road to War

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tepresentatives only emphasized the incompatibility of the basic approaches of Chamberlain and Hitler. With the breach of Munich, Chambetlain’s confidence in Hitler’s word was go FAs Sidney Aster had expressed it, after 15 March there was a crisis of confidence) Duringthe next five and a half months prior to the outbreak of wat, ace once did hamberlain weaken in his distrust of Hitler. He repeatedly stated that ‘no undertakings by Hitler would be of any use.’ Hitler would have to preve in some concrete way, therefore, that he had finally abandoned the use of force.”38

In late April or early May, Ernst von Weizsacker and others in the Gerriian Foreign Ministry worked out a plan whereby Germany would restore the independence of Czechoslovakia except for the Sudetenland but receive some parts of Poland.38 Adam von Trott zu Solz took this project to England in the first week of June, though he appears to have made no reference at first to the suggestion about territorial concessions from Poland. In his report, which through Walter Hewel was submitted to Hitler, he ascribed the idea of a restored Czech state as the necessary basis for any Anglo-German agreement to Lord Lothian (who would from what we know have been sympathetic to it).°8’ He reported Chamberlain as insisting on a dramatic German step as the essential prerequisite to any serious discussion without specificity as to what that step had to be.38 When von Trott zu Solz returned to Germany, neither von Ribbentrop nor Hitler wanted to see him—this was certainly not the direction in which they wanted to move.3*? Chamberlain had made the same point about the need for a dramatic German action to a Swedish businessman, Axel Wenner-Gren, who tried his hand at mediation in the

summer.*? In correspondence and in person, the Swede tried to get G6ring to understand this point and eventually developed a detailed program which included the restoration of Czechoslovak

independence,

the end of concentration

camps,

and restored

religious freedom in Germany. It is certainly noteworthy that Goring, who himself would probably have preferred the maintenance of peace, commented in his written reply of 2 August on only one of the specific points mentioned: the restoration of Czechoslovakia’s independence.>”! Such an action, Goring asserted, was impossible for Hitler; there was no point in Wenner-Gren’s discussing his project with Hitler if the suggested program were to be the basis of discussion. On the contrary, a victorious German war with Poland was soon coming anyway and was no threat to England. As for Hitler’s having broken his word so that his promises could not be trusted, that too was a false assertion. 385. Aster, p. 217. Cf. Abshagen report to the German geschichte, ED 104.

Uberseedienst,

13 June 1939, Institut fir Zeit- )

386. Christopher Sykes, Tormented Loyalty: The Story of a German Aristocrat Who Defied Hitler (New York: Harper &

Row, 1969), pp. 236-38. 387. Ibid., pp. 239-40, 246-48, 252-55; G.D., D, 6, No. 497; Jones, 6 June 1939, pp. 436-37. with 388. Note Ismay’s similar comment to Robin M. A. Hankey (then in Poland) on 16 June 1939: “I agree no more make should we opinion, my in and principle, a but place a longer no is it Danzig; about you entirely that, and I concessions of any kind unless and until Hitler himself makes a real geste de rapprochement. 1f he did Ismay Papers, thought it could be trusted, I would go a very long way to meet him.” University of London,

IV/Han/20.

he merely con389. Sykes, pp. 256-58. Von Trott subsequently returned for another visit to England in which created confusion rather fused things (ibid., pp. 258-64). Suggestions by Carl Goerdeler at the end of May also

bordering on the idiotic than interest in London (C 8004/15/18, FO 371 /22973; Aster, p. 230). An approach

urge British concession was made by Albrecht Haushofer, who turned the history of Poland upside down to

Motive Jor a Mission [New York: (Haushofer to the Duke of Hamilton, 16 July 1939, James Douglas-Hamilton, vo St. Martin’s, 1971], pp. 91-95).

phraseology the prime minister used was 390. Chamberlain’s record of 6 June 1939 is in B.D., 3d, 6:736—38; the

sgeanees nl that “it was for Herr Hitler to undo the mischief he had done.” “Petition for Delisting submitted on 391. A photocopy of Goring’s letter is attached as exhibit 10 to the a copy of this brief, which suppleWenner-Gren’s behalf to the U.S. secretary of state on 30 January 1943; of the Park, PPF 3474. See also the discussion ments the documents in B.D., 3d, 6, appendix II, is in Hyde , B.D., 3d, 7, No. 46. mid-August in Henderson and Hassell von by issue Czechoslovak

758

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War IIT

There would be no dramatic step backward to reestablish confidence, quite the contrary. As Chamberlain himself had the day before inserted into a letter destined for Hitler, all depended on the existence of confidence and “there is no question whatever as to the fact that confidence here does not at the moment exist.”3°? The discrepancy between the successful creation of “political bases” for negotiations between Germany and the Soviet Union on the one hand, and the absence of confidence with no willingness to re-create it between Germany and England on the other, is perhaps the most striking characteristic of the diplomatic situation of the summer of 1939 and goes far to illuminate the configuration of Europe at the beginning of World War II. It is with the basic difference between England and Germany in mind that one can understand the semiofficial and unofficial soundings between the two countries that all led to nothing. If confidence in German pledges was absent from London, there were those in Germany who did think that the British pledge to Poland would be fulfilled and who hoped that signs of British willingness to see Germany settle her differences with Poland peacefully would lead to the adoption of a policy of peaceful change by Hitler. If he could be convinced that England would stand by a Poland attacked by Germany, but was willing to see concessions made to Germany in normal diplomatic negotiations, he might desist from his planned offensive. The German ambassador to London, Herbert von Dirksen, was a key figure in aiding and encouraging such attempts. Ironically, in earlier years as head of the eastern division of the German Foreign Ministry he had been an ardent advocate of German steps to revise the eastern border of Germany at Poland’s expense, but his continued hope for such a development did not blind him to the fact that an Anglo-German war would certainly follow a German attack on Poland. He therefore warned von Ribbentrop of the drastic change in British public opinion and official policy after 15 March, stressing the absolute certainty of a British declaration of war on Germany in accordance with the promise to Poland; simultaneously he pointed to those signs in London which indicated continued interest in a peaceful solution as a counter to that line of National Socialist propaganda asserting that England was determined to fight Germany under any handy pretext, a line alternating with the opposite contention that the English were sure to desert their allies at any opportunity."* In the face of von Dirksen’s reports, von Ribbentrop, who knew that putes was determined to attack Poland, continued to argue that England would not fight—and any

signs of British preference for a peaceful settlement of the German-Polish dispute were erroneously taken as proof of this position. The German foreign minister disregarded or obstructed all suggestions that Germany refrain from attacking Poland. The ambassador’s insistence had the opposite effect of what he intended. Far from convincing his superiors that peace was possible and that negotiations could succeed, it suggested that von Dirksen was not in sympathy with the basic thrust of German policy, namely, to destroy Poland regardless of whether or not England intervened. Von Dirksen was therefore recalled to Germany, where neither von Ribbentrop nor Hitler would receive him, where neither paid the slightest attention to his advice, and where he 392. Wilhelm Lenz and Lothar Kettenacker (eds.), “Lord Kemsleys Gespriche mit Hitler Ende Juli 1939,” Vierteliahrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 19, No. 3 (July 1971), 321. 393. The account of Helmut Metzmacher, “Deutsch-englische Ausgleichsbemihungen im Sommer 1939,” ibid., 14, No. 4 (Oct. 1966), 369-412, is very useful in spite of some questionable interpretations. There are additional details in Aster, chap. 9.

394. Dirksen’s views are reflected in his memoirs, in spite of many inaccuracies on details; in his papers, published by the Soviet government (D.M., 2); and in numerous reports printed in G.D., D, 6 and 7; see esp. 6, Nos. 564. 608, 645 (D.M., 2, No. 12), 710 (DM., 2, No. 14). On vatious ways of looking at the likelihood of British intervention in a German Polish war, see “Informationsbericht Nr. 74,” 7 July 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, f£.373-77; Biddle dispatch 1160 of 15 July 1939, State 760c.62/745; Kirk tels. 789 and

848 of 12 and 23 August 1939, State 760c.62/806, 897; Fritzsche, pp. 212-13; Enge/ Diary, 28 July 1939, p. 56.

The Road to War

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could only brood on his Silesian estate about the coming disaster." The burden of von Dirksen’s messages from London, that the British would fight if Germany attacked Poland but preferred a peaceful settlement, reached Berlin through a variety of channels but had no effect whatever because Hitler was uninterested in negotiations.*°° The very references to limits on German expansion, explicit or implicit in the discussions, simply ruled discussion out of consideration for a Hitler who wanted a free hand either with England’s acquiescence or after her defeat, but in any case without restraints on his plans.°”’ The informal contacts established by Helmuth Wohlthat partly on his own initiative and partly with Goring’s authorization similarly led nowhere, the precondition of British willingness to talk being invariably the abandonment of Hitler’s intention of attacking Poland.*°* The uproar caused in London by Robert Hudson’s leaks concerning these talks was matched by von Ribbentrop’s annoyance over their having occutted in the first place.*? The fear in some circles in London that the government was planning another Munich was matched by Hitler’s repeatedly expressed concern about compromise proposals, but actually the British government would make no concessions itself and would urge none on Poland under German threats, while the German government wanted not concessions but war. Goring, like the Italians, would have preferred a compromise settlement on the Munich model;*#” but all he heard from London through Wenner-Gren and another Swedish intermediary, Birger Dahlerus, was that England would fight rather than make or urge concessions, while Hitler, as Goring fully understood, wanted a wat with

Poland.*"! A special representative of von Ribbentrop, Fritz Hesse, the press adviser of the German embassy in London, even told Sir Horace Wilson on 20 August on behalf of Hitler and von Ribbentrop that all the informal contacts were meaningless since Hitler preferred to settle with Poland, a subject he would not discuss with England at all, and to

make any offer to England only afterwards. Hesse asserted that Hitler and von Ribbentrop 395. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 723, 752, 753; 7, Nos. 58, 138 (draft in D.M., 2, No. 27); B.D., 3d, 6, No. 533; D.M., 2,

Nos. 24, 25. When von Dirksen discussed the situation frankly with the Italian ambassador in Berlin, the Germans intercepted the report of the latter and von Ribbentrop reprimanded von Dirksen (D.M., 2, No. 26; D.D.I., 13, No. 44; G.D., D, 7, No. 115). Von Dirksen’s conclusion in his memoirs (p. 255): “During my term of office in London Hitler never once took the trouble to deal with British offers of negotiations—even if only

in pretence. He never even answered.” 396. See G.D., D, 6, No. 630; cf. “Informationsbericht Nr. 73,” 5 July 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/34, ff.365—71.

397. Henke, pp. 268-71.

398, On the Wohlthat talks, see, in addition to Metzmacher and Aster, G.D., D, 6, No. 380; Kennedy tel. 1031 of 20 July 1939, State 740.00/1935; Dalton Diary, 21, 24 July 1939; C 10521/16/18, FO 371/22987; R. A. B. Butler to Wilson, 2 August, and minute by Wilson, 4 August 1939, Premier 1/330; Memorandum on Myron note of 4 August Taylor conversation with Wohlthat on 21 July 1939, Hyde Park, PSF Palestine; Chamberlain both exaggerated 1939 on the document B.D., 3d, 7, No. 533, in Premier 1/330, f.1. Wohlthat and von Dirksen

reported that the conciliatory attitude of London in order to impress their superiors, but both accurately See also Germany’s refraining from aggression against Poland was the key to any Anglo-German negotiations. to Germany on Hofer, pp. 58-60. When reviewing the situation with von Dirksen before the latter returned confidence and leave, Sir Horace Wilson returned to the question of a concrete action by Hitler to restore No. 533). On 6, 3d, (B.D., Moravia” and Bohemia for rule home or autonomy of suggested “some form Churchill, 5:1077—78, and placing Hudson’s views, see his letter to Churchill of 30 June 1939 quoted in Gilbert,

him in the camp of the latter.

n with Hesse, 20 August 1939, Premier 399. G.D., D, 6, No. 743; cf. Memorandum by Wilson on a conversatio

1/331A. to have his ambassador return Note that at the end of July Géring warned the French assistant ait attaché to war

said that if Britain and France went to Berlin by mid-August, while Goring’s aide, General Bodenschatz,

over Poland, Stehlin’s job would end on 1 September (Stehlin, pp. 162-63). en,

see

n. 391, above;

on

Dahlerus,

see

his memoits,

Der seéxfe Versuch

(Munich:

On Wenner-Gr and Hofer. See also the notes in C 9288, C Nymphenburger Verlagshandlung, 1948), and the accounts by Aster 22976. and 371/22974 FO 1939, August 15 and June 30 18, 11573/15/ 401.

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

760

were both certain that Britain would indeed fight to implement the guarantee of Poland and that constant repetition of the warnings to Berlin to this effect only served to irritate Hitler.4°2 While Chamberlain and Halifax sadly recognized the accuracy of the former statements describing the uselessness of the efforts of vatious intermediaries to establish some basis for negotiations, they did not, as will be seen, heed Hesse’s advice that no

further warnings be sent to Germany. As word reached London that von Ribbentrop was about to fly to Moscow to sign a nonageression pact, the prime minister and his major advisers were conferring about a projected special letter of warning from Chamberlain to Hitler. On 18 August Vansittart’s sources had provided him with the date on which Germany planned to attack Poland as falling between 25 and 28 August, and on the following two days numerous drafts of a final warning to Hitler were worked over at 10 Downing Street and in the Foreign Office. At one time Henderson had suggested that such a letter might be delivered by General Ironside, who spoke fluent German, but the announcement of

the forthcoming Nazi-Soviet pact suggested that there was not time for such a mission.*°4 The letter was accordingly amended to include a reference to the expected pact’s having no effect whatever on the validity of the British guarantee and sent to Henderson to deliver to Hitler.4°° The cabinet was in full agreement on the text of the warning letter and the need for some immediate military preparations.‘ The British had long hoped that their warning to Hitler of 31 March would be reinforced by an agreement with the Soviet Union; it was now clear even to the most persistent optimist that this was not to be. If anyone thought that British policy had changed because of the Nazi-Soviet pact about to be signed, they were to be disabused, or, as the letter phrased it: “No greater mistake could be made.” The message continued: Whatever may prove to be the nature of the German-Soviet Agreement, it cannot alter Great Britain’s obligation to Poland which His Majesty’s Government have stated in public repeatedly and plainly and which they are determined to fulfill. It has been alleged that, iftHis Majesty’s Government had made their position mote clear in 1914, the great catastrophe would have been avoided. Whether or not there is any force in that allegation, His Majesty’s Government are resolved that on this occasion there shall be no such tragic misunderstanding. If the case should arise, they are resolved, and prepared, to employ without delay all the forces at their command, and it is impossible to foresee the end of hostilities once engaged. It would be a dangerous illusion to think that, if war once starts, it will come to an early end even if a success on any one of the several fronts on which

402. Minute by Wilson, 20°August 1939, Premier 1/331A; on this document, see the discussion in Henke, pp.

271-75. 403. A collection of drafts is in Premier 1/331A. For background, note Chamberlain’s comment at a meeting of the Committee of Imperial Defence on 25 February 1935 when, in connection with the discussion of the air pact then under consideration, he stressed the importance of the deterrent effect of letting an aggressor know

beforehand that a quick strike or knockout blow at the beginning of a war would not be the end of that war (C 1904/55/18, FO 371/18829, p. 4). 404. Note B.D., 3d, 7, No. 83.

405. Important for the sequence, especially the receipt in London of the news of the intended German attack, of the forthcoming German-Soviet pact, and the drafting and delivery of the letter, is Lord Halifax’s “A Record of Events before the War, 1939,” written in late September or October 1939, C 20648/15/18, FO 371/22990;

extracts

from

the diary of Sir Alexander

Cadogan,

forwarded

to Lord Halifax 28 October

1939, C

12122/15/18, FO 371/22978, now in Cadogan Diary, pp. 196ff. For the decision to have Henderson deliver the letter, see B.D., 3d, 7, No. 142. A good brief account in Hofer, pp. 165-66.

406, Cabinet 41 (39) of 22 August 1939, C 11924/15/18, FO 371/22977; C 11925/3356/18, FO 371/23073. The text of the public announcement is in B.D., 3d, 7, No. 140, n. 3.

The Road to War

Tat

it will be engaged should have been secuted.407 The veiled allusion to the idea that an early defeat of Poland by Germany would in no way mean a quick end to the war had been made much mote explicit in a warning sent to Rome on 19 August#® even before a copy of the 22 August letter to Hitler was handed to the Italian government in the hope that Mussolini would exert his influence on Hitler to restrain the German dictator or at least himself stay out of what would surely be a long war.*” The Italian leader would draw from the Nazi-Soviet pact some rather different conclusions, but he himself was very much impressed by the British attitude of firmness. Chamberlain had practically given up all hope for peace; the portion of his letter referring to a possible cooling off period to be followed by German negotiations with Poland sounds like a formality rather than the anticipation of a real possibility. As the prime minister told the American ambassador on 23 August, the situation was pretty hopeless, with war clearly imminent.*!! Whether the British warning would serve to deter Hitler was still something of an open question as far as London was concerned, but most of the British leaders were quite doubtful, for all the signs pointed to war. In making concessions to the Soviet point of view during the negotiations of the spring and summer of 1939 the London government had been influenced by the obvious eagerness of the French to secure Russian aid for Poland. As previously mentioned, the French government had reacted to the event of 15 March in a manner rather similar to that of the British. There was certainly no enthusiasm for war in Paris; there was instead a combination of resignation and determination. The resignation was to the apparent inevitability of war; the determination was to stand fast against any further concessions to Germany. German diplomats reported quite accurately on these attitudes, and they were equally evident to other observers.*!? Although there were some signs of weakness, symbolized in the government by the waverings of Foreign Minister Bonnet,*? Prime Minister Daladier was absolutely firm. Like Chamberlain, the French prime minister cattied the burden of Munich. As he told the German ambassador on 11 July, their first meeting since

15 March,

he had helped three and a half million Germans

to join

Germany only to have twice that many Czechs end up under German rule.*!* As far as he was concerned, there could be no return to policies Germany herself had repudiated. France was already allied with Poland. The question now facing the French was what to do to make that alliance operative. There were Franco-Polish talks on arms deliveries and other types of military cooperation,*'5 and at the end of the talks on 19 May a secret military agreement was signed. It provided for a major French offensive in the west to start on the fifteenth day of war if Germany concentrated her forces against Poland in the initial stages of a war.4!® Not only were there troubles about the new 407. Ibid., No. 145.

’

7 408. Ibid., No. 79. on British efforts with 409. Ibid., No. 190; D.D.L, 13, No. 167; U.S. 1939, 1:230-32. For earlier documents FO 371/23785, and Italy, see B.D., 3d, 5-7, passim, esp. 7, Nos. 160, 166, 192; FO comments in R 4399/1/22,

R 4517/57/22, FO 371/23808. Czechoslovakia asa 410. A draft Henderson had sent had explicitly called for the restoration of an independent once and for all definitely prerequisite for a change in British policy (“if the original ground for its initiation was : eles eliminated”), B.D., 3d, 7, No. 118.

discussed with Hankey the 411. U.S. 1939, 1:355-56. Note that at 3:45 p.m. on 23 August Chamberlain 3:413-14). Hankey, construction of a war cabinet (Roskill,

B.D., 3d, 6, No. 212; D.D.L, 412. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 188, 379, 409, 501, 602, 603; U.S. 1939, 1:177-78, 180-81; 12, No. 464. 8. 413. See U.S. 1939, 1:193-94; Bullitt tel. 993 of 23 May 1939, State 751.60c/14 414. G.D., D, 6, No. 658. bib 415. Ibid., No. 399; Gamelin, 2:413—23; Beck, p. 345. 45; Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 210-18. 151.60c/1 State 1939, May 19 of 965 tel. Bullitt 345—46; pp. 416. Beck,

762

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

political agreement that was to be signed thereafter,!7 but the French government appears to have had no intention whatever of carrying out its obligations under the military agreement. During the Anglo-French staff talks earlier that month, the British had asked what the French would do if Germany attacked Poland and stood on the defensive in the west while Italy remained neutral. General Lelong responded that this was “a thorny problem... and France could not attack Germany on land without long preparation.”418 This situation did not have the political repercussions in London that the French plans to invade Libya if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia had had in 1938—the British had taken their stand and would not budge. It did, however, disturb General

Ironside when he learned in July that the Poles had been lied to.*!? There was not much that the British, who had just begun to organize a continental army, could do about this,

but they may have understood that this French policy contained an element contributing to the desperate pressure from Paris for an agreement with Russia in order to secure help for Poland from the east. For some time the French urged the English to greater concessions to the Soviet point of view in order to obtain a treaty.42° Then, in June, the French were alarmed that Soviet demands for guarantees of the Baltic States against “indirect aggression” implied that the independence of the countries of Eastern Europe was to be terminated rather than protected.#! Nevertheless, they were so wortied about the need for helping Poland and for building up a strong eastern front against Germany that they pushed for further concessions and persuaded themselves that the Russians really wanted an agreement.4”? When the Russians followed up on their demand of June that agreement on a military convention precede the political treaty by insisting in August that Polish agreement prior to the outbreak of war to the transit of Soviet troops had to precede a military agreement, the French tried desperately to find ways to accommodate them—though the Russians had by then agreed to work out a pact with the Germans. The prospect of a new war with Germany was patticularly abhorrent to the nation that had borne the heaviest burden in the preceding conflict and was certain to face a new German onslaught practically unaided, but there were signs of resolution to accompany the search for Soviet aid. In spite of the most vehement protests, von Ribbentrop’s special personal representative in France, Otto Abetz, was expelled when he became too indiscreet.4*4 Partly to set the record straight, partly perhaps to salve his 417. U.S. 1939, 1:189-91, 279-80; Bullitt tels. 987, 1016, 1017, and 1032 of 23, 25, and 30 May 1939, State 751.60c/147, 149-51; Lukasiewicy Papers, pp. 188-95, 202-10, 218-23. The whole muddle is reviewed in Adamthwaite, pp. 319-23; Henryk Batowski, “Le dernier traité d’alliance franco-polonais (4 septembre 1939),”

Les relations franco-allemands, 1933-1939, pp. 353-62. 418. COS 900 of 3 May 1939, CAB 53/48. One is inclined to suspect that the French promised an offensive they had no intention of carrying out to avoid a defection by Poland, very much the way Germany had

promised Austria-Hungary an offensive southward ftom East Prussia before 1914 and had carefully refrained from enlightening her ally about the equally imaginary character of that operation. 419. Ironside Diary, 11, 26 July 1939, pp. 78-80, 84-85. On the other hand, the French and British did work out a unified command and additional details, see Pownall Diary, 5 June, 3, 10 July 1939, pp. 206-8, 210-11, 211-13.

The simultaneous troubles over British credits to Poland have already been mentioned; an account of this issue in relation to French credits is in Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 223-33.

420. U.S. 1939, 1:248—-51, 254-55; §.U., Nos. 316, 332, 371; B.D., 3d, 6 and 7, passim. 421. U.S. 1939, 1:266-71, 281-82, 282-84; Note S.U., Nos. 377, 378. 422. See U.S.

1939, 1:205, 213, 217. In France, as in England, the Russian

ambassador

could use those

especially favorable to an agreement with the Soviet Union to bring pressure on the government (J.U., No. 395). 423. A number of important French documents on this have been published by the Soviet government (presumably from copies made by the Germans and captured from the latter), §.U., Nos. 416, 418, 419, 424, 43035. See also Adamthwaite, pp. 335-38; Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 249-53; U.S. 1939, 1:225-26; Hore-Belisha Papers, 21 August 1939, pp. 215-16; Hofer, pp. 176-78. 424. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 640, 658, 664, 676, 690, 767; 7, Nos. 22, 49, 65; Bullitt tel. 1231 of 30 June 1939, State

The Road to War

168

own guilty conscience, Foreign Minister Bonnet wrote formally to von Ribbentrop on 1 July, reminding him of the French commitment to Poland which was untouched by the agreement reached when von Ribbentrop had been in Paris the preceding December,

and he upheld this line when the German foreign minister replied in unusually truculent language.#° The information that the French received after the Salzburg meetin, between Ciano and Hitler and von Ribbentrop indicated that the Germ ans had decided ded to go to war, but that Italy would stay out. The Italian government was known to prefer an international conference, but after Munich it was hard to see how France and Britain

could possibly agree to such a procedure unless Germany first evacuated Czechoslovakia, the same point that had been made from the other side of the Channel.426 The French continued to warn Berlin of their determination to honor the pledge to Poland.’2” The announcement that von Ribbentrop was going to Moscow to sign a nonaggression pact struck Paris like a bombshell.48 The prospects for France in a war with Germany now looked dim indeed—it had taken the combined might of France, England,

the United States, Russia, Italy, and Japan to defeat Germany in 1914-18—but there seemed to be no alternative to war in the opinion of most of those in the French government. It was expected that Hitler would attack Poland just as soon as the pact with Russia had been signed,*”? and this belief was not confined to Paris. In Moscow the war

Germany was about to begin had been the occasion for agreeing to divide the spoils with Hitler; Stalin had decided that encouraging Germany to move was preferable both to opposing Germany and to leaving her in doubt about the Soviet position. In Rome a German attack on Poland was assumed imminent. In London as in Paris the green light Hitler had received from Moscow was thought to be the almost certain prelude to German action. The country most directly affected by the spectacular turn of events was, of course, Poland. Though leaks and rumors about a possible German-Soviet agreement had reached Warsaw, the Poles had discounted them.*° In the final weeks of the diplomatic crisis, Soviet assurances of economic support for Poland if she were attacked by Germany alternated with information about a possible fourth partition of Poland.*! When the agreement was announced, the Polish government could point out to their Western allies the correctness of their own doubts about Soviet intentions—they had been asked to allow the Red Army into Poland at the very time that Moscow and Berlin were negotiating about an agreement obviously directed against them. As for adjustments in policy, there appeared to be no room for any at all. If the Russians stood aside when Germany attacked, little would change from what the Poles had expected anyway. If the Russians went beyond this to a breach of their nonaggression treaty with Poland, there was still very little that Warsaw could do about it. In the choice between suttender and a Seearias Seeee penis! Setar ees Soe

ieee

ea

OS

sie

eee

iv, Brammer, ZeSe MLO NS; 760c.62/660; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 24 July 1939, Bundesarch

£.86.

July in the French Yellow Book, No. 425. G.D., D, 6, Nos. 602, 669, 722 (this document of 25 July is dated 21

the latter commented on 1 168). When Lord Halifax sent copies of the correspondence to Chamberlain,

5, FO 371/23144); August that “the brutality of Ribbentrop’s language is very charactetistic” (C 10813/824/5 cf. Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 245-46.

the British learned that the attack on 426. U.S. 1939, 1:215-17. On 21 August the French (and Americans) like 760c.62/904). State 1939, August 21 of 1536 tel. (Bullitt Poland was scheduled for 25 August been

shown by the French may have 427. G.D., D, 7, No. 64; French Yellow Book, No. 194. The firmness , who wanted his superiors deterred from influenced by advice from German State Secretary von Weizsacker p. 328). war (see Coulondre’s report of 17 August cited in Weigsdcker-Papiere, pp. 172-76. 428. For a summary of the impressions in Paris, see Hofer,

429. U.S. 1939, 1:301-4; Adamthwaite, pp. 339-41.

430. Note Szymanski, p. 313; D.D.B., 5, No. 85.

150. 431. U.S. 1939, 1:196; G.D., D, 7, No. 42; Lipski Papers, No.

764

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

desperate fight, the experience of Poland in the years from 1772 to 1919 suggested that fighting was the only, even if hopeless, alternative. In what were generally recognized as the last days of peace, the major and minor powers alike looked with apprehension toward Berlin. If Hitler struck, as all expected, what should, what could, they do? Each country had to make its choice among alternatives fraught with enormous risks, not for this or that specific policy issue, but for its very existence and for the lives of its inhabitants.

Chapter 28

Hitler Gets His War

Wn

a green light from Moscow, Hitler was hopeful that he could both have his war

with Poland now and so upset Britain and France that they would not intervene in that conflict. For several days, German propaganda had been putting special stress on the strength of Germany’s fortifications in the west;! what could the Western Powers now possibly do for Poland? Procedures for coordinating the political situation in Danzig were well in hand, and instructions were given for the naval bombardment of the

Polish base at the Westerplatte in Danzig harbor that was to open hostilities.? These plans, like those for the German army and for German diplomats and agents in Poland were all based on one assumption: Poland would neither attack nor provoke Germany, and no contingency plans for such possibilities existed? Germany would strike at a moment of her own choosing, and, as previously mentioned, a fake Polish attack would

be engineered at the appropriate moment by the Germans themselves. The appropriate moment appeared to be at hand. In his eagerness for a war on Poland, Hitler had been willing to make the most extensive concessions to the Soviet Union; more even than Stalin thought to ask for, so that once von Ribbentrop’s interim report from Moscow showed that an agreement would be reached, Hitler was ready to move. Hitler was confident that the Chamberlain government would fall as a result of the diplomatic defeat England had suffered, and he always assumed that France would

1. See “Vertrauliche Informationen,” 18, 21 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/2, f£.71-72, t Soutty 86; Dertinger, “Bestellung fiir die Schriftleitung,” 18 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, ZiSoe

but 111-12. Much noise was also made about alleged Polish atrocities against the German minority in Poland, after the experience of 1938 no one took this seriously.

n, an obso2. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 138, 167, 188, 194, n. 2, 197, 225; TMWC, 34:448, 452-53. The Schleswig-Holstei

presumably lete warship used mainly for training, was substituted at the last moment for the cruiser Kénigsberg, the Scbleswzgto avoid any risk of losing the more valuable ship and to have the use of the bigger guns of at the end of Holstein. The visit of the Kénigsberg on 25 August had been announced to the Polish government June (B.D., 3d, 7, No. 209).

Rudolf Wiesner, was instructed 3. G.D., D, 7, No. 166. Note that the leader of the German minority in Poland,

to stage-manage the whole to leave Poland and was not to be used the way Henlein had been; Hitler preferred had learned from the 1938 proscenario directly (ibid., Nos. 195, 196). Was this another of the “lessons” Hitler s trip (D.D.F., 2d, 11, Nos. 151, cedure when the incidents of 13 September had helped bring on Chamberlain’ 171)? 1 September date by which German 4. The possibility that the right moment for war might well come before the and communicated in his behalf to the preparations were to be completed had long been in Hitler’s mind as 16 May 1939 (Hubatsch, Weesungen, p. armed forces. Admiral Raeder had so warned the naval staffs as early the Soviet Union (G.D., D, 7, No. 205) to Latvia of all yield to ion authorizat for request 19). Von Ribbentrop’s imminent. was Union Soviet also made it clear that an agreement with the

766

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

not move without England’s support.> On 23 August, even before von Ribbentrop and Stalin had signed the nonaggression pact and secret protocol, Hitler directed that the attack on Poland begin early on 26 August.® His final diplomatic preparations would be made in the two intervening days. Before these are discussed, it is important to note that on 23 and 24 August, at a time when the news of the German-Soviet pact was reverberating around the world,

Hitler still thought that the war with Poland might well be isolated. Neither the British cabinet announcement that the pact in no way affected England’s obligations to Poland not Chamberlain’s letter of 22 August absolutely convinced him that the English government would both stay in power and carry out its pledge to Poland.’ He did apparently have some doubts on the subject, but basically he thought that London was bluffing.’ If the English were serious, however, that was their misfortune; as he told Henderson on the 23d when discussing Chamberlain’s letter, if there was going to be a big war, he

much preferred fighting it at age fifty than at age fifty-five or even sixty.? The great military demonstration on Hitler’s birthday that year may have reminded others of German might, but it reminded Hitler of his age. On 24 August, Hitler left Berchtesgaden for Berlin and met von Ribbentrop on his retutn from Moscow. The two conferred at length. Von Ribbentrop reported on his trip, and the two reviewed the international situation. The foreign minister already knew about Chamberlain’s letter and still discounted the possibility of England’s entering the conflict, a point on which Stalin had not been nearly so certain.!° In their discussions that day, Hitler and von Ribbentrop apparently worked out the details of the last-minute diplomatic preparations. With war scheduled for 26 August, the next day would be the last day of peace and hence the final opportunity for bringing in allies on Germany’s side and eliminating help for Poland." Of the possible allies, Japan had obviously been eliminated by Germany’s pact with the Soviet Union. The signature of the pact was a shock to the Japanese, leading to the resignation of the Hiranuma cabinet, and a violation of the secret protocol to the Anti-

Comintern Pact. The German gdvernment would do what it could to calm down the agitated Japanese, especially by stressing their hopes of assisting with the improvement of Soviet-Japanese relations and by emphasizing the common enmity of Germany and Japan toward the Western Powers; but for the time being, a holding operation was indicated.!? The successful effort to involve Slovakia formally in war with Poland and the 5. Weixsatker-Papiere, 23 August 1939, pp. 159-60. Von Weizsacker, who spoke with Hitler repeatedly in these critical days because of von Ribbentrop’s absence in Moscow, predicted otherwise and also warned that Italy would not join Germany. 6. Halder Diary, 26 August 1939. 7. On the situation in Berlin before Henderson’s delivery of the letter, see Kirk tel. 874 of 23 August 1939, 9:00 p.m., State 760c.62/945; von Vormann notes in Institut fiir Zeitgeschichte quoted in Sykes, p. 283, and Hofer, pp. 1607-68; Kordt, Nicht aus den Aktien, p. 332. 8. Jodl diary, 24 August 1939, TMIWC, 28:390; cf. Lane (Belgrade) tel. 216 of 24 August 1939, 11:00 p.m., State

760c.62/989. 9. For the Hitler-Henderson meeting of 23 August and Hitlet’s reply, see G.D., D, 7, Nos. 200, 201; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 178, 200, 207, 208, 211, 213, 248. (Hitler had referred to his own age before; he now added an oath that

he had not been bluffing in 1938.) There was a meeting of Géring with Lipski on 24 August, but its import is unclear (B.D., 3d, 7, No. 263; Biddle Papers, p. 76; Lipski Papers, pp. 565-66, 590-92; cf. Irving, Breach of Security,

pp. 92-120).

10. G.D., D, 7, No. 200, n. 3. For the discussion of the letter by von Ribbentrop and Stalin on the night of 23—

24 August, see ibid., p. 190. For Maisky’s report that the British government would be compelled to fight if Poland did so, see S.U., No. 440.

11. Werzsacker-Papiere, 24 August 1939, p. 160. 12, Sommer, pp. 282-92. See G.D., D, 7, Nos. 183, 262, 329, 556; B.D., 3d, 9, No. 584. It is not clear whether the last-minute hints of the Japanese minister in Warsaw, Sakoh, about a possible exchange of Memel for

concessions

elsewhere had been authorized by Tokyo (Biddle tel. 231 of 30 August 1939, noon, State

Hitler Gets His War

767

failure to implicate Lithuania have already been mentioned. From Hitlet’s point of view, here were countries that could in 1939 play the role he had set for Poland and Hungary in 1938: participation in a combined attack on the prospective victim would both speed the process and assist in deterting possible supporters of the victim. An even more important role could be played by the other prospective ally on whom Hitler counted, namely, Italy. Hitler spent considerable time on 24 August preparing a letter for Mussolini to be hand-carried to Rome the following day—the day before the outbreak of war—by Hans Prank, who was called in from Danzig and briefed on the situation.!3 Mussolini was to be

informed of Hitlet’s belief that Poland had to be crushed promptly and was to be asked for the support that the text of the Pact of Steel specified. He was to be told that England was bluffing and that the Western Powers would not intervene. Now was the time

to

strike.

Hitler

decided

at the last minute

not

to send

Frank;

instead

von

Ribbentrop called Ciano in the middle of the night of 24-25 August to warn the Italians that war was imminent, and the letter was delivered by Ambassador von Mackensen on the 25th.'4 In it Hitler gave a short and not particularly accurate explanation of the agreement with Russia, stressing the impact of that agreement on Turkey and especially on Romania, which would now have to stay out of any hostile coalition. Hitler announced that hostilities could begin at any moment—not disclosing that the attack had already been ordered for the morning of the following day. It was clearly Hitler’s assumption that Mussolini would join Germany now that the agreement with the Soviet Union had altered the whole situation so greatly to the benefit of the Axis. Before the Italian reaction is examined, the other preparatory steps Hitler took on 25 August must be reviewed so that the orchestration of developments from Berlin can be understood. To reinforce the propaganda about the fortifications in the west, the German ministers in Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland were instructed to promise German respect for the neutrality of these countries and to threaten war and destruction if any of them failed to protect Germany’s rear by abandoning neutrality in favor of the Western Powers.!> The Belgians, because of their strategic position, were given both the most solemn assurances and the most dire threats, and were thereby inspired to renewed pledges of neutrality and frantic appeals for the maintenance of peace.'¢ Hitler wanted his newfound Soviet friends to assist in underlining the isolation of Poland—thereby discouraging the Western Powers from intervening—by gestures that would give public expression to the new diplomatic situation. For months there had been no Soviet ambassador in Berlin; and in view of the forthcoming campaign against Poland, a Soviet military representative in Berlin was also needed. Von Ribbentrop and Molotov had discussed this matter in Moscow,

and on 25 August the Russians were

requested most urgently to implement their agreement to dispatch these officials to Berlin immediately.!’ There would be considerable correspondence and discussion about on Poland’s eastern border in this issue and about German requests for Soviet pressure OID 6 me a tte Tal ile IETS PS IS TS LA OE 760c.62/1200). Frank’s account, but internal 13. Frank, p. 343. I have been unable to find external evidence corroborating

Frank at no time refers to Hitlet’s evidence suggests that it is generally reliable on this issue. The fact that is no evidence that Frank was told there since story his invalidate not earlier plan to send him to Moscow need

that Frank had indeed been in about that quickly discarded project. It is, however, clear on other evidence

Danzig at a legal meeting (B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 100, 183, 186).

August 1939. 14, G.D., D, 7, Nos. 263, 266; D.D.I, 13, Nos. 225, 245; Ciano, Diary, 25 15. G.D., D, 7, No. 272.

1939, p. 350. Documents on the appeal of 16. D.D.B., 5, Nos. 118, 120, 121, 126; Overstraeten, 26 August .

collections of diplomatic documents King Leopold and Queen Wilhelmina may be found in the major 17 GID, D; 7, No: 285.

768

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the following days as part of the general campaign to isolate Poland; and although taking a few days to comply, the Russian government did agree to help the Germans in this regard.'§ By that time, the Germans had, as will be explained, postponed the attack on Poland for a short time; but during those days, they continued to play the Soviet card. To the other powers, the Germans explained their insistence that the Soviet Union participate in any new settlement in Eastern Europe, and to the Russians they provided the main details of the last-minute negotiations.!° To obviate any negative repercussions of the bargain with Moscow, Berlin denied the existence of any secret protocol to the pact and coordinated its denials with Stalin.2° In other military and diplomatic ways Germany and the Soviet Union cooperated in the last days of peace and the first days of war,

though it would be two weeks before their new friendship could be “sealed in blood,” as Stalin expressed it, in common war against Poland.?!

Hitler’s agreement with the Soviet Union was to have served as a major argument in his dealing with England. In response to the firm speeches in Parliament of Neville Chamberlain and Lord Halifax on 24 August Hitler decided a further step was necessary.” He asked Henderson to see him on the 25th, and at their meeting at 1:30 p.m. offered England an alliance to be worked out after the settlement of the GermanPolish dispute. If England intervened in that dispute, the resulting war would weaken Britain, not Germany. Reminding the British government that the blockade weapon had been broken by the pact with Russia which not only eliminated any real eastern front but opened up vast trade opportunities, Hitler dangled before the British the prospect of an alliance with Germany and even an agreement on arms limitations as alternatives to another world war under circumstances far less favorable to the Western Powers than those of 1914. With its renewed promise to make no territorial demands in the west and to be moderate in German colonial requests, this offer was to be carried by Henderson

to London in person. This procedure was suggested by Hitler himself; it meant that according to the Fuhrer’s timetable the cabinet in London would have in front of them on the morning of 26 August Hitler’s alliance offer as they met to consider the German attack on Poland that would by thén already have been under way for several hours.” The purpose of this project should be obvious. As a whole catalogue of offers and promises had accompanied the remilitarization of the Rhineland, so a new collection would be placed before the British to accompany the invasion of Poland. Hitler had tried to pave the way for this offer two weeks before when he had arranged to fly the League high commissioner in Danzig, Carl Burckhardt, to the Obersalzberg for a conversation designed for British and French ears but including a special appeal to the English. Nothing much had come of that gestute.?4 Now that the hour Hitler had picked for war 18. Ibid., Nos. 360, 381-83, 387, 388, 413, 414, 424, 425, 446, 453, 456, 471, 480, 514, 532; “Bestellungen aus der Pressekonferenz,” 2, 3 September 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/14, ff.7, 16.

19. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 431, 440. 20, Ibid., Nos. 332, 339, 511, 550. The promise to deny the existence of the secret protocol was not only kept by Stalin but has been observed by Soviet historians since. 21. The text of Stalin’s message of 22 December 1939 is reprinted in Roman Umiastowski, Russia and the Polish Republic, 1918-1945 (London: Aquafondata, 1945), p. 182. The reference is to Red Army casualties in the fighting against Poland. Von Ribbentrop had begun urging a Russian advance on 3 September (G.D., D, 7, No. 567). 22. Texts of the British statements in British War Blue Book, Nos. 64, 65. On Hitler’s reception of the news of

this development in the morning of 25 August, see Kordt, Wabn und Wirklichkeit, p. 194; Schmidt, p. 449. 23. G.D., D, 7, No. 265; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 283, 284, 286, 288, 310, 312, 313. 24, On Burckhardt’s trip and meeting with Hitler, see B.D., 3d, 6, Nos. 36, 601, 604, 659; 7, Nos. 3, 4; Aster,

pp. 322-24; Burckhardt, pp. 338-49; Kuykendall (Danzig) tel. of 15 August 1939, 3:00 p.m., and Biddle tel. 174 of 16 August 1939, State 760c.62/823, 844. The meeting had, of course, preceded the signature of the pact with

Russia. Hitler had told Burckhardt that if the Western Powers would not give him a free hand in the east, he would first align himself with Russia to defeat the West and thereafter turn against the Soviet Union since he

Hitler Gets His War

769

was nearing, a more direct means of diverting the British had to be used. Hitler hoped that once again he would be allowed to move forward without a general war. As for the promises and commitments offered, these were all for the period after 2 German-Polish wat. Quite apart from their very dubious nature—new promises about future German territorial demands sounded almost as funny as an implied offer to send German troops to Malaya to defend Singapore against the Japanese—they were presumably intended to have the same fate as the offers of March 1936.25 As Hitlet’s explanations of 23 May and 22 August about a wat with the West as soon as the Polish question had been settled to his satisfaction show, there was nothing more substantial to the offer of an alliance than there had been to his 1936 offer to return to the League of Nations. The comparison between his earlier offer to settle the Polish question with the Soviet Union in accordance with the preferences of the latter and his insistence on total disregard for Britain’s preferences on the same question reveals all too clearly which offer was to lead to serious negotiations and which was purely a tactical ploy with no substantive significance, a contrast too many have ignored. All that counted was to discourage England from intervening in the war Hitler intended to start on the following morning.*° If the British were willing to spend the time that war lasted on negotiations about an alliance with Germany, that would be most agreeable to Hitler. If they were foolish enough to declare war, publication of his offer to the British would provide a fine ptopaganda line for the German

public. Hitler, however, anticipated that the British

would play into his hands, and so, later, when the London government refused to behave as he had planned, additional propaganda themes had to be devised.?’ After giving Henderson the alliance offer and sending him off to London, Hitler learned that the reply from Mussolini had not yet arrived.?® The French ambassador, Robert Coulondre, was to come later that afternoon, but here a problem in the German

timetable required a decision by Hitler. If the attack on Poland was indeed to be launched in the morning of 26 August, the final order to go forward with the attack had

to be issued by 3:00 p.m. on the 25th so that the regular units could move toward the border, the special sabotage units could start crossing the border, and all other lastminute steps could be taken as planned. Hitler had, as mentioned, written to Mussolini,

but by the 3:00 p.m. deadline—which of course had not been communicated to the Italians—still had received no answer. Hitler assumed that the answer would be favorable, or, if he had any doubts, decided to disregard them,” a point of some signifi-

cance for assessing Hitler’s preference for war. By the afternoon deadline he had issued his offer to England, which he had every reason to believe would be discussed in London on the following day. He had not yet got in touch with the French, but he had relucalready arranged to do so later that day, and he was always confident that British ee) ese el alsin ne Sires ce TE Fo elo ea summary needed the Ukraine. Burckhardt did not pass on this comment to the British and French. A useful

to Avert a Second World and evaluation in Herbert S. Levine, “The Mediator: Carl J. Burckhardt’s Efforts

War,” Journal ofModern History, 45, No. 3 (Sept. 1973), 453-55. 25. On this point, see above, pp. 195-96. separating England from 26. The phraseology in von Weizsicker’s diary is revealing: “Efforts are still aimed at done between 1 and 2 the Poles. Henderson is to receive a proposal corresponding [to this]}—something of the Polish quesp.m.—which by far-reaching and tempting offers for the time after an isolated settlement 160). Henke, PP: 287ff., comp. piere, (Weixsdcker-Pa latter” the in] involved [becoming from her tion is to deter by making the alliance go along pletely misconstrues the offer. He can do so only by inverting the chronology:

recall of the attack order from 25 August with, rather than come after the attack on Poland, and by moving the

; ; to 24 August (p. 290). di d not know of Hitler’s intention of 27. On 24 August Goring activated Dahlerus, who, unlike Goring, attacking Poland on the 26th. had been there from 28. Attolico was to be at the chan cellery at 2:30 p.m. (D.D.L, 13, No. 258). Henderson 1:30 to about 2:30. 29. Hofer, p. 237.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

tance to act would reinforce the known pacific preferences of France. Hitler was ready to move; as an eyewitness, the army representative on the spot, recorded, Hitler gave the order to go ahead at two minutes after 3:00 p.m., and this order was immediately transmitted to the high command of the army.>” The official mobilization order was also issued secretly that day with 26 August as the first day on the mobilization schedule.*! The whole machinery of government from the projected rationing procedures to the soldiers near the Polish border began its move toward 4:30 a.m. on 26 August when war was to start. As part of the effort to isolate the war, Hitler saw the French ambassador later in the afternoon of 25 August, asking Coulondre to inform Daladier that Germany did not want wat with France and had no claims against her, that the situation in regard to

Poland was intolerable, and that it was up to the French to decide whether they wanted a wat with Germany or not.** Here, too, the obvious purpose was to discourage French intervention in the war Hitler had already ordered started. His fair words would be before the French cabinet when it made its decision the next morning. It was his hope that the already recorded defection of Russia from the Franco-Soviet alliance, the anticipated defection of England that he himself thought he had assisted by the alliance offer, and the known pacifist sentiments within France would combine to keep the French government from a decision to honor its promise of aid for Poland. Hardly had Coulondre left the chancellery when Hitler learned that two of his assumptions about the situation were wrong: Mussolini responded that he would not join Germany in a wat at that time; and the news of the signature of the Anglo-Polish alliance treaty in the afternoon of 25 August showed that England was not adopting the course Hitler anticipated. Even Hitler could see that London was unlikely to break an alliance the day after signing it. What had happened, and what did Hitler decide to do about it? In Rome, the situation after Ciano’s return from the Salzburg meeting had been one of contradictory currents, with Ciano eventually being authorized by Mussolini to arrange another meeting with von Ribbentrop. Five hours after Ciano had called the German foreign minister to arrange that meeting, von Ribbentrop called back to tell Ciano that he was going to Moscow to sign a pact with Russia; the two foreign ministers agreed to have their meeting afterwards.*? For a moment, Mussolini and Ciano abandoned their certainty that the Western Powers would intervene. Under the immediate impact of what looked like a possible localization of war, they promptly turned to the idea that the Germans had been pushing: an Italian operation against Yugoslavia to run parallel with that of Germany against Poland.*4 Very quickly, however, first Cianovand then the Duce returned to their earlier view

that a German attack on Poland would lead to a general war. The public and private pronouncements from London and Paris carried conviction in Rome if not in Berlin.25 As Count Ciano told the German minister of finance, who happened to be in Rome on the morning of 23 August, he was certain that England and France would fight alongside Poland in spite of the announced German pact with Russia. The time was not yet correct 30. Von Vormann’s teport is quoted ibid., p. 274. 31. Halder Diary, 25 August 1939. The Germans hoped that by keeping their own mobilization secret, they could surprise the Poles more effectively, an expectation realized at least in part since the Poles, in order to avoid provoking Germany and in response to British requests, deferred their mobilization. 32. A summary in Hofer, p. 275. Coulondre replied that France would certainly honor her commitment to Poland, that the accounts of Polish atrocities to which Hitler referred were greatly exaggerated, and that after 15 March France had had no choice but to tighten het alliances. 33. Ciano, Diary, 21 and 22 August 1939, pp. 125-26; G.D., D, 7, Nos. 154, 190; Siebert, pp. 263-65. 34, Compate G.D., D, 7, No. 190, with Ciano, Diary, 22 August 1939, p. 126. Note also the reference in von Mackensen’s letter to von Weizsacker of 23 August 1939, G.D., D, 7, No. 226, p. 203; Siebert, pp. 266-68.

35. D.D.I, 13, Nos. 147, 153, 154, 167, 182; S.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 166, 171, 190, 192, 214, 215, 220.

Hitler Gets His War

Wal

for war since the Axis was not prepared for the long war that was to be expected. Even before the German treaty with the Soviet Union was actually signed, the Italian foreign minister was sure that even this great coup would not deter England and France and that Hitler was mistaken if he thought otherwise.>6 If Ciano was certain that a general war was imminent and that Italy should stay out, the Duce was waveting between his bellicose inclinations and his fear of appearing to betray his German ally on the one hand and his recognition of Italian unpreparedness, exhaustion of resources in fighting for four years in Ethiopia and Spain, and opposition to war on the part of almost all his advisers on the other.37 He authorized Ciano to work on a compromise formula under which Germany would receive Danzig as a down payment and other concessions in some sort of conference that, like the Munich one, he grace with his presence; but he would soon discover that neither side was

would

interested. The English did not trust Hitler to keep his word after his recent breach of the Munich agreement and did not in any case want to urge concessions on Poland in the face of German threats,** while a peaceful settlement was the last thing Hitler wanted.

The different view Italy took of the situation and the possibility that in the face of Western determination Italy might abstain from wat were known in London and Paris, and during the days after 23 August every effort was made to encourage this development.*? In line with a suggestion of French Prime Minister Daladier, President Roosevelt

also appealed to the Italians to use their influence for the maintenance of peace. With the defeat of the administration’s effort to have the neutrality law amended, neither this appeal nor a subsequent one to Hitler could have much effect; but in addition to focusing public attention on Germany’s determination to start a war, this American initiative did serve to remind the Italian government of the dangerous implications of a wider conflict.*° Into this situation came von Ribbentrop’s telephone call of the night of 24~25 August, as a result of which Ciano first succeeded and then failed to secure a decision by

Mussolini to stay out of the coming war for the time being. The “strong man” of Italy swung back and forth repeatedly; Hitler’s letter of 25 August reached him during the hours of alternating moods.! Now he had to decide on an unequivocal answer. He could promise Germany Italian assistance under circumstances Italy had not foreseen and Germany had kept secret until the last moment—even now the Germans did not reveal that war was to start fourteen hours after von Mackensen delivered Hitler’s letter. Or he could follow the advice of Ciano, the king, and many others by telling Hitler that for the time being, Italy would have to stay out. Ciano persuaded the Duce to follow the latter course; and with a heavy heart Mussolini wrote to Hitler, explaining that in view of the Mussolini, who 36. G.D., D, 7, No. 227; cf. ibid., Nos. 211, 212. The German minister of finance also met Schwerin von 118; No. Siége, (Saint would it that doubted but avoided be might war that hope expressed On this trip, see Lutz Krosigk to von Weizsacker, 26 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, R 2/24243, ff.15-17).

careful never to tell Schwerin von Krosigk, Memoiren (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1977), pp. 192-95. The Germans were beyond what the the Italians about the secret protocol to their pact with the Soviet Union since it went far pp. 277-18). (Siebert, Russia with rapprochement a in possible as discussed earlier had Italians Germans and ambassador, Sir Percy 37. Summary in Hofer, pp. 232-33. Note the analysis of the situation by the British that Italy would not Loraine, on 20 August (B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 96-97); by 2:30 on 23 August he was confident of the Italian military deficiencies in summary A 438. No. 7, D, G.D., Cf. 173). No. (ibid., Germany join Siebert, pp. 290-94. 38. Siebert, pp. 282-84.

24 August 1939, CAB 53/54. 39. Hofer, pp. 33-35. See also COS 965, “Attitude of Italy in War,”

revision, see “Vertrauliche Informa40. For German reaction to the defeat of the proposed neutrality law Roosevelt's appeal to the king of On £.62. 109/1, Z.Sg. ann, Oberheitm iv, tionen,” 19 July 1939, Bundesarch 639 of 23 August 1939, 11:00 tel. Bullitt to Welles 253-54; pp. Italy, see Hofer, pp. 234-35; Moffat Papers, a.m., State 760c.62/1009A; Langer and Gleason, pp. 188-90. 41. Siebert, pp. 295-98.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

wat coming much earlier than had been expected when the Pact of Steel was signed, Italy could not join until she had the equipment and the raw materials she needed.” The most important single factor leading to the Italian decision had been the certainty of both Mussolini and Ciano that Britain and France would fight alongside Poland; at 5:30 p.m.

the Italian answer was phoned to Attolico for transmittal to the impatient Germans. As soon as Hitler had finished his conversation with Coulondre, he learned of the Italian

teply. In view of his anticipation of Mussolini’s full support, Hitler was stunned. But this was not the only bad news: practically simultaneously with Mussolini’s letter Hitler received the news that England had signed an alliance with Poland. This symbol of the determination of England, of which the Italians had been convinced much earlier, finally suggested to Hitler that his calculations were not as accurate

as he had thought. The signature of the Anglo-Polish alliance at this moment was partly a deliberate answer to the German government’s possible doubts about England’s position and partly a coincidental matter of timing. The discussions for a formal Anglo-Polish pact had been continuing for some time, with much of the delay due to the desire of London so to phrase the treaty as to make it fit with the anticipated treaty of England with the Soviet Union. The Anglo-Polish was seen as subordinate to the Anglo-Soviet treaty text, and as the negotiations for the latter dragged on endlessly through the summer, those for the former were practically suspended.*¢ Now that it was obvious there would be no agreement with the Soviet Union at all, quick steps were taken to finalize the text of the Anglo-Polish one.*’ It was ready for signature on 25 August, the final stages having been hurried because of the obvious urgency of the international situation.*$ Public announcement of the signature at 5:35 p.m. on 25 August thus reached Hitler after he had given Henderson the alliance offer to take to England and had already issued the final order to attack Poland on the next day. Faced by the two unpleasant surprises, Italian defection and British resolution, both of which were surprises only because he had himself miscalculated, Hitler checked with the military to see whether the attack could still be called off. When the high command of the army responded that they thought this was possible, Hitler ordered the troops back to their stations around 7:30 p.m. Almost all the units could be recalled and the naval action at Danzig could also be stopped in time, but a number of incidents and pteparatory steps gave many the clear indication that war had indeed been scheduled for 42. G.D., D, 7, No. 271; Ciano, Diary, 25 August 1939, pp. 128-29. For von Mackensen’s report on Mussolini’s certainty that war would be general, see G.D., D, 7, No. 280. I cannot agree with Hofer (p. 279) that the British

decision to sign with Poland and the Italian decision to abstain from war were entirely independent of each other except in the narrowest and most technical way. Mussolini and Ciano would hardly have been so worried if they had thought there was a real likelihood that a German-Polish war could be isolated. Siebert’s opinion (p. 318) that the British would have been more conciliatory in the final days if they had not known of Italy’s intention to abstain is certainly incorrect; the miliary advantages for the Western Powers clearly pointed to an attack by them on Italy—as both sides knew. 43. Note Keitel’s comments in the Canaris diary for 17 August 1939, TMWC, 26:337; and von Ribbentrop’s

comments in von Weizsacket’s diary for 25 August 1939, Weizsdcker-Papiere, pp. 160-61. 44. There are conflicting reports as to which piece of news reached Hitler first; in any case there was little time between them. 45. See Lord Halifax’s comment to Bonnet on 20 May 1939, B.D., 3d, 5, No. 569, p. 609, 46. On these, see Cabinet 33 (39) of 21 June 1939, C 8907/27/55, FO 371/23129: Cabinet 41 (39) of 22 August 1939, C 12011/27/55, FO 371/23130; Cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, “Anglo-Polish Agreement, Memorandum by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,” 16 June 1939, CAB 27/627; B.D., 3d,

6, Nos. 521, 610, 613, 661; 7, Nos. 66, 206.

47. Cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy, “Anglo-Polish Agreement, Memorandum by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,” 24 August 1939, CAB 27/627; 61st meeting of the cabinet Committee on Foreign Policy,

25 August 1939, CAB 27/625. 48. The final wording still shows traces of the intended relationship of the Anglo-Polish to the Anglo-Soviet treaty; the text and secret protocol are in Cmd. 6616 of 1945. See also Hofer, pp. 170-72.

Hitler Gets His War

TS

26 August.*? The discussion of the outbreak of World War II has recorded the recall of the order to attack Poland without fully taking into account the implications of the circumstances for an understanding of Hitler’s actions in the final days of peace. It must be noted that Hitler had first asked the military whether a recall was even possible, a question that obviously implies his being prepared for the answer that it was already too late; whenever Hitler was certain in his own mind what ought to be done, he told rather than asked his generals. Hitler’s decision to go to war, thus, was a real one, not a diplomatic bluff, and he was quite prepared to stick with it in spite of the two pieces of bad news he had received, if the military situation demanded proceeding with it. Since the army’s leaders thought they could halt the German war machine in time, however, Hitler had a few days

for further diplomatic moves before striking. When the Fuhrer called off the attack on 25 August, he was by no means abandoning his intention of starting a war against Poland. He had originally called for the army to be ready by 1 September, had then moved up the date to 26 August because he wanted to start as early as possible; he explained to the high command of the army that in his opinion the latest feasible date on which they could start would be 2 September.*? After the latter date, the previously discussed weather problems would in Hitler’s opinion prevent victory in the one brief campaign that he wished to wage against Poland. When calling off the operation scheduled for 26 August, therefore, Hitler still felt he had

some leeway before the whole project would have had to be scrapped for 1939. As will be seen, he did not in the end use all the days he believed he had available to him but instead ordered the attack when by his own reckoning he could have safely postponed wat for one more day. This matter will be discussed later, but first the way Hitler used the days of postponement will be examined briefly.*! Hitler postponed the attack only because he had a few days to try to make his original diplomatic strategy work. As General Halder, the army chief of staff, learned on the 26th, Hitler had deferred action in the hope of still isolating Poland by separating Britain and Poland.®? The alliance offer would, he hoped, arouse sufficient doubts in

London or lead the English government so to explore the project that in the process Poland would be abandoned to her fate. Hitler still preferred to fight his wars with Poland and with the Western Powers in sequence rather than at the same time.** In a secret speech at the chancellery on 27 August he explained to some of the generals and to members of the Reichstag, who had originally been summoned to hear the war speech Hitler had also postponed, that war was indeed at hand. He was apparently concerned lest any of his associates conclude from what they might have learned about the events of 25 August that there would be no war. German closing of 49. Hofer, pp. 275-78; Engel Diary, 25 August 1939; Halder Diary, 25 August 1939. On the SS stopped what would have cables on 25 August, see G.D., D, 7, Nos. 331, 334, 335. A quick order to the

with Polish uniforms, been the premature murder of the concentration camp inmates whose corpses, provided 188). p. 1939, August 27 Diary, (Groscurth attack Polish fabricated were to be used in the 50. See Halder Diary, 30 August 1939. of an enormous literature, 51. The diplomatic maneuvers of 26 August—3 September 1939 ate the subject full treatment, which draws on important among which Hofer’s book stands out as the best. The most recent be made to retrace all the details which, will effort no here, given account the In new British material, is Aster’s.

of the nattative here is to show in my opinion, are of only secondary importance anyway. The main purpose

key participants. the main lines of policies pursued and to illuminate the choices made by 52. Halder Diary, 26 August 1939. 53. Engel Diary, 27 August

1939, p. 60; cf. “Bestellungen

Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, £.119.

aus

der Pressekonferenz,’”

26 August

1939,

pp. 79-80; Groscurth Diary, pp. 190-91; 54. Halder Diary, 28 August 1939; Domarus, 2:1276-77; Hassell Diary, contradictory, as some of the somewhat 1s Hitlet’s of speech this about evidence The Weizsdcker-Papiere, p. 161. as long as Danzig and the solution diplomatic a accept to s sources suggest that he expressed a willingnes

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Hitler’s negotiating strategy in these days was fairly simple. He checked promptly whether Mussolini’s letter declining to join immediately in a war unless Germany provided the needed weapons and war materials was a nominal or a real refusal. He asked what specifically Mussolini wanted, and when he wanted it, only to receive a long list that was partly designed—and looked as if it were designed—to be impossible of fulfillment within any reasonable period of time.°> As Hitler had explained to Mussolini, he himself was willing to risk war with the West in order to settle accounts with Poland.°° In the face of the Duce’s deep regret over his inability to join in the war, Hitler could only

express his acceptance of Italy’s position and ask that Rome at least keep up the pretense that Italy would fight because Hitler thought that this would contribute to his effort to keep the Western Powers

from intervening. If a general war did break out, he told

Mussolini that Germany would win first in the east and then in the west, either in the coming winter or in the following spring.*’ As for Mussolini, he was unhappy enough about Italy’s incapacity to participate in wart at that time that he tried to work out new peace plans and conference proposals during the last days of peace. Without reviewing these projects in detail, one could say by way of summary that his idea of starting negotiations by the cession of Danzig as a preliminary concession to Germany was not only unacceptable to the Western Powers and to Poland,** but was totally unacceptable to Hitler. From Berlin the Duce was discouraged from expecting any possibility of peace and from thinking that the Germans were at all interested in a negotiated settlement.*? As Hitler wrote Mussolini on 1 September, he did not want him to try to mediate. The Italian dictator did not return to a more belligerent position during these days of anxious negotiations as he had from time to time in the period before 25 August. The continued arguments of Ciano, Attolico, and other figures in the Italian government doubtless contributed to this, but it is also reasonable to assume that knowledge of

Hitler’s alliance offer to England had some part in keeping Mussolini in his less bellicose position. When Hitler had offered to return to the League of Nations in March 1936 right after Italy had left Geneva, there was great resentment in Rome.*! Now the Italians learned from London, not from their German ally, that Germany was offering to defend the British Empire—presumably against such powers as Italy!©2 As Hitler’s concentration on securing his immediate goal of an agreement with Russia had antagonized the Japanese, so now his single-minded absorption on trying to separate England from Poland created difficulties with Italy.°3 In the course of World War II, their aggressive ambitions would bring the three powers together once again, but hardly out of love for each other. Corridor were given to Germany. 55. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 277, 282, 298, 299, 301, 302, 308, 316, 317; Hofer, pp. 238-39; Siebert, pp. 304-7. Ciano

wrote in his diary that the list was “enough to kill a bull—if a bull could read it” (26 August 1939, p. 129). 56. Hitler’s letter of 26 August 1939, G.D., D, 7, No. 307. Halder cites von Brauchitsch as quoting Hitler on 28

August: “If it comes down to it, I will fight a two front war.” Ciano read Hitlet’s letter as having the same meaning (Diary, 27 August 1939, p. 130). 57. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 341, 344-46, 349, 350; Hofer, pp. 239-40.

58. Note G.D., D, 7, No. 351. The Vatican favored this idea; see Saint Siége, Nos. 128, 132, 133, 135, 136, 153,

165, 166, 170.

59. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 357, 411, 478; see also ibid., Nos. 395, 417, 418, 444, 467, 474, 500; D.D.B., 5, No. 142;

D.D.1., 13, Nos. 491, 507; Schmidt, p. 456. 60. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 504, 505, 507. 61. See above, p. 200.

62. In the original statement to Henderson, Hitler had inserted a reservation about his tie to Italy, but when Goring explained the project to Dahlerus for the enlightenment of the British government on 27 August, he explicitly referred to any Anglo-Italian conflict in the Mediterranean as leading to German support of England (Dahlerus, pp. 70-71). 63. Hofer, pp. 312-13. See esp. Ciano’s account in his Diary, 27 August 1939, pp. 130-31.

Hitler Gets His War

UD

When, partly in response to British and French appeals to restrain Germany and partly in hope of stopping a war from which he would have to abstain, Mussolini tried to halt the spreading conflagration after Germany’s attack on Poland, his effort would quickly collapse over the issue of German troops pulling back to the pre-hostilities border. From Germany’s point of view, any Italian proposal was of use only for possibly affording a few days of additional diplomatic confusion while the German army advanced so rapidly that the war in the east might look to the West as finished and hence not worth joining. But beyond that tactical objective, Berlin was as uninterested in Italy’s peace efforts after as before 1 September.® Hitler, who had recovered from the surprise of 25 August and continued to have a high regard for the Duce, reassured him on 3 September that any peace would have lasted only a short time, which England and France would have utilized so to strengthen Poland as to make any eastern campaign mote time-consuming; now was the best time to fight England and France, and in the final analysis Germany and Italy would have to work and fight together.% Given the evident intention of Mussolini to refrain from joining in the conflict immediately, Hitler could only, as mentioned, try to persuade Italy to keep this fact secret from the Western Powers. There is no evidence that it would have made any difference if he had succeeded in this, but in any case he did not. Late on 31 August, after Hitler had already given the second and final order to attack Poland but when neither Italy nor the Western Powers knew that he had done so, the Italians became so alarmed about the

possibility that the resolute British and French would strike at them while Hitler struck at Poland that Ciano by a carefully calculated indiscretion revealed the intention of Italy to stay neutral at that time.®” While Hitler awaited the British reply to his alliance offer, he also hoped to continue the process of discouraging France from war in support of Poland. Although he had made no proposal of an alliance to France, he had right after issuing the first order for wart given to Coulondre a message for Daladier that he then expected the French government to discuss on the morning of 26 August when hearing of the German invasion of Poland. As it was, Coulondre’s report reached Paris late on the night of 25 August, after Hitler had canceled the attack order. There a special meeting of the Committee of National Defense had been held on 23 August to assess the impact of the GermanSoviet pact on the French obligation to Poland. There had been unanimous agreement that France should stand by her obligations, that letting Poland down would only confront France with an even more serious situation the following year, and that there was really no alternative to honoring the commitment to fight.* There was thus a general expectation that war was to be expected, and with the possible exception of Bonnet’s hope for some action by Mussolini to restrain Hitler, there was little prospect of averting a general war.® French perception of the firm position of Britain undoubtedly played a part in contributing to firmness in government circles in Paris.” Strength, like weakness,

was mutually reinforcing. Under these circumstances, Daladier’s response to Hitler’s appeal was a dignified 64, The accounts of Hofer, Siebert, and Aster cover this abortive project. 65. See G.D., D, 7, Nos. 539, 541.

ae 66. Ibid., No. 565. Here a comparison of Loraine’s telegram 67. Ciano, Diary, 31 August 1939, pp. 134-35; B.D., 3d, 7, No. 621.

latter. with the dramatic account in Ciano’s diary supports the reliability of the the French military thought resistance 68. Text in Bonnet, 2:302-8; Hofer, pp. 217-19. It is worth noting that not assume a Soviet invasion of Poland). in the east would be prolonged into 1940 (though that calculation did Ds

British governments to go to war (GD, 69. U.S. 1939, 1:356—58. Even Flandin expected the French and actions of other countries if war came, probable the of s assessment and about news French On Nos. 258, 294). 116. No. 5, D.D.B., also see views, Bonnet’s see U.S. 1939, 1:307-8, 365-66. On

70. Note, e.g., U.S. 1939, 1:376.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

reaffirmation of French determination to honor the existing promise to defend Poland combined with an assurance that all existing problems were susceptible of peaceful tesolution. Daladier included a personal appeal of one veteran of the trenches to another not to initiate another conflict certain to be bloody and destructive.) As Coulondre reported sadly on his effort to reinforce Daladiet’s plea for peace in transmitting this letter, Hitler had already made up his mind to attack Poland.” Hitler’s reply to Daladiet’s letter was a reiteration of his determination to act against Poland combined with such arguments about the need to revise the peace settlement along the German-Polish border and his prior renunciation of any revision of Germany’s western border as he thought might influence the attitude of some French leaders and, when the documents were published on German initiative on 28 August, French public opinion as well.” Neither any of this, nor Hitlet’s reference to the fact that with the new German-Soviet pact Poland faced an entirely new situation and would never be re-created in its old form, nor his hint that French acceptance of a fait accompli by Germany could in the future as in the past make for a “peaceful” adjustment of supposedly unfair portions of the 1919 settlement had any effect in Paris. Peace was still desired there, but not at the ptice of a new surrender.” In London, the situation was similar. The alliance proposal was discussed there by a cabinet that had been kept briefed on the situation.” There was no sign of any inclination to give in to German threats.” When Hitler’s proposal was studied, therefore, with Henderson in attendance, the effort to try to separate England from Poland was immediately recognized. The significance of Hitler’s suggesting an Anglo-German agreement after Germany had dealt as she saw fit with Poland was also understood. In spite of Goring’s attempt to reinforce the impact of Hitler’s offer by using Dahlerus as an unwitting agent of pressure, the response prepared in London insisted on reversing the sequence of developments. First there would have to be a peaceful and fairly negotiated settlement of Germany’s differences with Poland, and only then could there be any serious consideration of other problems in Anglo-German negotiations. The English were indeed interested in good relations with Germany and did their best to emphasize that interest, but all such prospects would be illusory if a German use of force in relations with Poland led to the general war predicted as the certain result of such action in Chamberlain’s letter of 22 August.” The government in London, which had carefully kept the Dominions informed on the development of the crisis, now had the bulk of the Commonwealth in favor of its position.’”* Britain’s response to Hitler’s proposal was

71. French Yellow Book, No. 253; G.D., D, 7, No. 324; cf. B.D., 3d, 7, No. 343.

72. French Yellow Book, No. 261. No German record of this conversation appears to have sutvived. 73. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 354, 376; French Yellow Book, No. 267; Bullitt Papers, pp. 360-61. Of interest is Flandin’s

criticism of Hitler’s letter for making no reference to Polish independence or access to the sea (G.D., D, 7, No. 370), both points which even the most ardent advocate of concessions to Germany considered essential. 74. Hofer, chap. 6. 75. Cabinet 42 (39) of 24 August 1939, C 12123/15/18, FO 371/22978; G.D., D, 7, No. 287. 76. Henderson had telegraphed the text of Hitlet’s offer so that it was being examined in London even before the ambassador arrived there; see Halifax diary for 25-27 August 1939, C 20648/15/18,

FO 371/22990;

Cadogan Diary, 25 August 1939, p. 201. 77. The British deliberations are summarized in Hofer, chap. 7, and Aster, chap. 13. Drafts of an answer to

Hitler may be found in PREM 1/331. The cabinet discussions of 26 August (No. 43) and 27 August (No. 44) ate in C 12549/15/18, FO 371/22980, and C 12405/15/18, FO 371/22979. Messages from Carl Goerdeler

urging the British government to hold fitm wete also received at this time; see Minute by Mr. Jebb, 27 August 1939, C 12211/15/18, FO 371/22978; also C 12878, C 12789/15/18, FO 371/22981. 78. See FO 371/23961, passim; Canadian Documents, Nos. 999f£; Cabinet 43 (39) of 26 August 1939, C 12549/15/18, FO 371/22980. See G.D., D, 7, No. 261, for Mackenzie King’s appeal to Hitler of 25 August,

warning that Canada would join England in war.

Hitler Gets His War

TF

taken back to Berlin by Henderson on 28 August.” The alliance offer itself had not been taken seriously as a subject for detailed examination. Hitler’s suggestion as interpreted by Goring meant that Germany would support the British Empire against Italy, Japan, and the Soviet Union.8 An offet of that kind, coming from Italy’s ally, Japan’s Anti-Comintern Pact partner, and the Soviet Union’s newfound friend, did not inspire confidence in London. Instead, the British had

succeeded in securing Poland’s agreement to direct German-Polish negotiations on outstanding differences, and this agreement was officially communicated to Berlin in the British reply.8! The choice, as Lord Halifax informed the American ambassador in London, was clearly up to Hitler: he could have friendship with England, a fair deal for Poland, and no war, or, if he preferred, the destruction of Poland and a world war.®2

Hitler had already made his the British reply, von Brauchitsch as the date for beginning the war Hitler would still prefer to split

choice. On the day Henderson returned to Berlin with told Halder that Hitler had tentatively set 1 September and would inform him if there were to be any change. Britain and Poland but was determined to attack the

latter even at the risk of a wider war.*> At the time when the German army, therefore,

was in the last stages of a secret but full mobilization, which had begun on 26 August even though the attack order had been canceled, the Polish government was still being urged by the Western Powers to defer its mobilization lest the blame for the outbreak of war fall on Poland in any future discussion analogous to that about the sequence of mobilizations in 1914.54 When Hitler received the British reply on 28 August, he quickly saw that the projected alliance had not had the effect of driving a wedge between England and Poland as he had hoped and that another approach would be needed for the same purpose. He would now utilize the British statement of Poland’s readiness for direct German-Polish negotiations to demand the appearance of a Polish plenipotentiary in Berlin on 30 August, the day after so insisting to Sir Nevile Henderson.® If the Poles refused to comply with this repetition of the procedure used with Hacha in March, Hitler could blame his subsequent attack on Poland on the intransigence of the latter and hope that in such a situation Poland would be isolated. If, however, a Polish plenipotentiary did appear in Berlin on 30 August as demanded, the Germans would toss on the table such

demands as to assure a breakup of the negotiations on 31 August, with war starting on 1 September just the same and with all blame placed by German propaganda on the obstinacy of the Polish representative and government.*° As Hitler put forth the demand for an immediate Polish surrender, the German propaganda machinery was attuned to the situation. The wild German press campaign against England was to be toned down and there were to be no personal attacks on 79. Text in B.D., 3d, 7, No. 431.

authorities received 80. Ibid., No. 408. It should also be remembered that it was on 29 August that the London

No. 314; C 12341 /15/18, FO a slightly amended version of Hitler’s speech to the generals of 22 August (ibid.,

attract support for a 371/22979; see above, chap. 27, nn. 345-47). Nothing in Hitler’s speech was likely to reversal of England’s policy in London. of 28 August 1939, State 81. B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 354, 411, 420; Kennedy tels. 1223 of 24 August and 1293 760c.62/943, 1103; Hofer, p. 314. 82. Kennedy tel. 1278 of 27 August 1939, State 760c.62/1059.

83. Halder Diary, 28 August 1939; cf. Groscurth Diary, 27 August 1939, p. 187.

1939, State 760c.62/121 LU 84. Hofer, pp. 331-32; Biddle Papers, p. 83; Biddle tel. 232 of 30 August

S 932

see the report by Major-General A. 1:388. For the bad effect that this delay had on the Polish military effort,

31. Carton de Wiart of October 1939 in C 16886/27/55, FO371/231 493, 501, 502, 508. Hitler was, of course, not 85. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 384, 421; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 450, 455, 490,

lish dispute as a first step toward interested in exploring the idea of a peaceful settlement of the German-Po , relations. rman Anglo-Ge improving for 29 August. 86. This strategy is quoted in summary form in the Halder Diary

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Chamberlain.’ On the other hand, stories of Polish “atrocities” against Germans in Poland were to dominate the newspapers. Whether or not anybody inside or outside Germany believed in these atrocities was considered unimportant; the critical point was

to play them up.®8 While this was the German propaganda posture on 29 August, in the chancellery Hitler took the position among his advisers that he wanted a little war; that if the other powers joined in that would be their fault, but that in any case, a wat was

needed.®? Hitler was not to be disappointed this time. Beck wanted peace; and whatever the Polish underassessment of German might, overassessment of their own strength, and overconfidence in the power of their French and British allies, there was a clear understanding of the danger to Poland if war came. But as the British ambassador to Poland, Sir Howard Kennard, commented on the scheme Hitler had given Henderson, “they

would certainly sooner fight and perish than submit to such humiliation.’””° Beck was not another Hacha or von Schuschnigg. On the other hand, if Hitler thought that his new tactic would in any way influence London to abandon Poland, he was totally mistaken.”!

On the contrary, the British government immediately let it be known in Berlin that the demand for the appearance of a Polish plenipotentiary in Berlin on 30 August was quite unreasonable in their eyes, and they implicitly conveyed the same opinion to Warsaw by being careful not even to inform Poland officially of this preposterous demand until after the 30 August deadline had already passed. The British government was all in favor of a negotiated settlement arrived at in a neutral location by talks in a calm atmosphere and without threats of war; they were careful to urge both the Germans and the Poles to pursue such a course, but they would not badger the Poles into concessions as Henderson, for example, was urging.”

On 30 August, the day on which Hitler expected that either there would be a Polish negotiator to be confronted with impossible demands or, lacking that, a split between

England and Poland, he set the schedule for the beginning of war. As already tentatively fixed on 28 August, the attack on Poland was now scheduled for the early morning of 1 September. If the talks with London made a further postponement necessary, the attack

could be shifted to 2 September; the army would be informed by 3:00 p.m. on the 31st if the situation called for another day’s wait. After 2 September the planned attack would have had to be canceled altogether.”* Very revealing, and sometimes overlooked in the literature on the subject, is the fact

not only that Hitler held to the 1 September date rather than allow the additional day of negotiations his own schedule permitted but that in the event he could see no reason even to await his 3:00 p.m. deadline on the 31st. The order to attack on 1 September reached the high command of the German army by 6:30 a.m. on 31 August, and by-11:30 a.m. it was also known there that Hitler had decided to attack although intervention of 87. “Vertrauliche Informationen,” 29 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/2, f£.128-29; Dertinger, “Anweisungen und Information,” 29 August 1939, Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/13, £123.

88. Dertinger, “Bestellungen aus det Pressekonferenz, 29.8.39, Anweisung Nr. 923 (Vertraulich),” Bundesarchiv, Brammer, Z.Sg. 101/12, £122.

89. Engel Diary, 29 August 1939, pp. 60-61. 90. B.D., 3d, 7, No. 512. See also Biddle tel. 201 of 25 August 1939, State 760c.62/998, and tel. 204 of 24 August 1939, State 760c.62/1021; Biddle Papers, p. 85.

91. For indirect evidence that Hitler may have thought this strategy would work, see the comments of Jodl, which von Brauchitsch repeated to Halder at 6:00 p.m. on 29 August, in the latter’s diary. Jodl’s conclusion about the general impression that England was “soft” in regard to a general war ptesumably reflects Hitler’s

views. 92. B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 504, 538, 539; Hofer, pp. 337, 341. 93. On Henderson’s last-minute efforts and motives, note Lipski Papers, pp. 569-70. 94. Halder Diary, 30 August 1939.

Hitler Gets His War

779

the Western Powers probably could not be avoided.95 War, even a general war, in other words was not the last resort when all avenues for negotiations had been explored to the last minute, but was rather perceived by Hitler as the desired procedure to be adopted at the earliest moment circumstances seemed to allow. By the afternoon of 31 August, Hitler had regained some hope of isolating the war with Poland he had already ordered. He thought that the moves now being made by the Soviets, in part at Germany’s request, together with the Italian pretense of joining in, as he also had asked, would contribute to deterring the Western Powers from intervening;

but he attributed the greatest possible impact to the publicity he intended to give the demands on Poland which he planned to present to the Reichstag the next day when he explained the outbreak of war which would have occurred earlier that morning.% What was this set of demands, the publication of which Hitler expected to have such an enormous effect both at home and abroad?®” While Hitler waited for the British tesponse to his insistence that a Polish negotiator appear on 30 August with full powers to agree to whatever Germany demanded, a set of proposals was prepared in Berlin by some of the officials in the Foreign Ministry and with some patticipation by Hitler himself.°8 Three points concerning this lengthy document are critical. In the first place, it was

phrased in such a fashion as to give the appearance of moderation so that it could serve as an excellent propaganda device to enrage the German public at Poland’s refusal to agree and simultaneously discourage England and France, or at least elements in each country, from going to war in support of Poland under such circumstances. In view of the few days Hitler believed he had left to start a war in 1939, the utilization of the demands for such propagandistic purposes required that they must assuredly not become the subject of actual negotiations which were certain to take time. Hence the second facet of the use of this document by Hitler was that it would not be given to the Poles either via the German embassy in Warsaw or the Polish embassy in Berlin. Although by a vatiety of routes the Poles learned unofficially about the document’s contents on 31 August, it was not officially handed to the Polish ambassador in Berlin until the evening

of 1 September when war had already started.” Whether the document would have been handed to a Polish negotiator had one appeared on 30 August is very doubtful, given what is known of Hitler’s plans for that contingency.! In any case, the third and equally critical requirement, if the document were to serve the purpose Hitler intended, was that it not be transmitted to the English either. There was always the “danger,” as Hitler had repeatedly said, that he would be confronted by a last-minute compromise proposal and pushed to the negotiating table as had happened at Munich. The obvious way to avoid the risk of having his proposal accepted or responded to by an alternative offer was to keep it secret, or at least not let it be fully known, until the supposedly generous offer Angriff’ (Ha/der 95. “Mitwirkung des Westens angeblich nicht zu vermeiden; trotzdem Fiihrerentschluss zum in WeigsdckerDiary, 31 August 1939). See also the subsequent comments of von Weizsacker about 30 August Papiere, p. 163. latter at 6:00 p.m. on 31 96. See Haldet’s account of Hitler’s comments to von Brauchitsch repeated by the of limiting the war to August (Halder Dian). It is, of course, possible that Hitler exaggerated his own hopes that the impression was that calm the doubtful von Brauchitsch; however, the comment attributed to Géring general war, really did still have some England would stay out suggests that Hitler, while aware of the risk of a to a desire to forestall new peace decision early Hitler’s attributes 327) (p. Siebert hopes of a small one (ibid.). moves by Mussolini. auf deutsches Volk und Welt.’ 97. Halder cites von Brauchitsch as quoting Hitler: “Grosste Wirkung

and contradictory evidence. Hitler’s comment 98. Hofer, p. 496, n. 73, summarizes the then available scanty in

a substantial role for Hitler himself quoted in the Groscurth diary for 29 August (p. 192 and n. 437) suggests Papiere, p. 162. The document itself is the preparation of the document. See also Lipski Papers, p. 601; Weixsackerin G.D., D, 7, No. 458. n,” p. 235, n. 76. 99. See Lipski Papers, pp- 569-70, 608-9; Krausnick, “Legende

in Berlin in D.D. B., 5, No. 152. 100. See also the perceptive summary by the Belgian minister

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

had expired. This last point explains both Hitler’s timing and von Ribbentrop’s conduct at his most stormy meeting with Henderson.

When Hitler gave Henderson his demand for the prompt appearance of a Polish plenipotentiary, he could not know precisely when the English reply would be delivered. Obviously under the circumstances the London government would move as quickly as possible, but there was no way of knowing whether the answer would be delivered the next day, 30 August, or on 31 August. If it arrived on the latter date, and especially if it came in the afternoon or evening, the attack on Poland would have had to be postponed

to 2 September; precisely because the English government was anxious to do everything possible to avoid war and therefore hurried its answer so that it was delivered in the night of 30-31 August, Hitler did not need the extra day and, being in a great hurry,

could start the war on 1 September. At the meeting in which Henderson presented the British reply at midnight on 30— 31 August, von Ribbentrop had his instructions from the Fuhrer. In a dramatic conversation Henderson read the British response, which pointed out the impossibility of acting as quickly as the Germans had demanded and called for calm, direct GermanPolish negotiations on the German demands in a manner recognizing the vital interests of both with arrangements made to avoid incidents in the interim.!°! The German foreign minister constantly interrupted, and, in accordance with Hitler’s instructions read but refused to give Henderson a copy of the German “generous offer” which he declared lapsed. The two men almost came to blows as Henderson, the most sincere and enthusiastic advocate of concessions to Germany, recognized that here was a deliberate effort to provoke war and cover aggression with a feeble alibi.!°* If Henderson was both angry and despondent, von Ribbentrop was extremely proud of himself for this performance. As State Secretary von Weizsacker concluded his diary entry for that day: “So now we again face wat. R.[ibbentrop] goes home beaming.””!% The various last-minute attempts to restart negotiations are of interest only insofar as they illuminate the concern of a number of individuals involved to leave no stone unturned in the search for peace amd Hitlet’s determination to let nothing interfere with his decision to attack Poland on 1 September regardless of what the Poles might or might not be persuaded to do diplomatically and even though the intervention of the Western Powers now looked practically certain. Shortly after noon on 31 August, Hitler formally signed the general directive for the attack on Poland early the next day, late in the evening of the same day von Weizsacker passed out the communiqué containing Germany’s proposals so that they could be broadcast that night, and on the 101. B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 543, 547. 102. Official records of this meeting are in G.D., D, 7, No. 461; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 570, 571, 574, 588. For Henderson’s comments, ibid., No. 628; his subsequent account is in his memoirs, pp. 284-87. The interpreter, Schmidt, has described it in his memoirs, pp. 455-60. Hofer has summarized the accounts of the meeting and

comments on it, pp. 338-39, 34448. On Hitlet’s instructions to von Ribbentrop not to let the text of the

demands out of his hands, see G.D., D, 7, No. 513; B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 682, 684; Hassell Diary, pp. 82, 84; testimony of von Ribbentrop, TMWC, 3:279; 10:317. The text of the German demands was sent to the

Getman embassy in London during the same night, but with the instructions to keep them secret (G.D., D, 7, No. 458). Schmidt (p. 460) quotes Hitler as saying subsequently: “I needed an alibi, especially with the German people, in order to show them that I had done everything to maintain peace. For that reason I made this generous proposal for settling the Danzig and Corridor question.” 103. “Damit stehen wir von Neuem vor dem Krieg. R. geht strahlend nach Hause” (Weixsacker-Papiere, p. 162). Von Weizsacker’s slightly elaborated subsequent account of the same events is printed ibid., pp. 162-63. 104. The Halder diary for 31 August can be used as a good control because the army had to know whether this time the attack order given that day was likely to be recalled again. It must be remembered that Halder and von Brauchitsch were among the very few who knew that Hitler had left himself the possibility of starting war on 2 September, so that after their experience of 25 August they had to be especially careful. Fot von Brauchitsch’s attitude of total resignation, see Weixsdcker-Papiere, p. 164; Hassell Diary, p. 75.

Hitler Gets His War

781

following day Hitler gave his speech to the Reichstag expatiating on the evils of Poland, the generosity of Germany, and the need for Germany to fight.!°5 When Hitler spoke, the faked incidents to prove a Polish attack on Germany had already been staged for propaganda exploitation, the guns of the Schleswig-Holstein had opened fire on the Polish garrison of the Westerplatte in Danzig, and German troops had everywhere crossed the border into Poland.!% The Poles, as the Germans had expected, fought to defend themselves; and though defeated in their homeland by the German army, which was joined on 17 September by the Red Army, the armed forces of the Polish state would continue to fight elsewhere until the German surrender of 1945. The only question on 1 September was whether or not Poland’s allies would go to war with Germany. Whatever hopes Hitler might still have had in this regard would be proved erroneous. If the German public hardly needed much convincing of the evils of a revived Poland and the desirability of seizing portions of it by force, there was no way of persuading England and France to abandon Poland to the tender mercies of a Hitler who had destroyed Czechoslovakia and whom they suspected, correctly as we now know, of turning on them as soon as he felt ready. The cabinet in London had been following the crisis carefully; both among the professionals in the Foreign Office and among the ministers themselves the nature of German diplomacy in the final crisis was fully understood.!°’ The cabinet had supported a firm line on 28 August and agreed on the following day that Hitler’s idea of having a Polish plenipotentiary appear on the 30th was out of the question, Chamberlain being especially firm in this regard.1°° When the cabinet met on 1 September, news of the German attack had already been received, and Chamberlain opened with a statement “that the Cabinet met under the gravest possible conditions. The event against which we had fought so long and so earnestly had come upon us. But our consciences were clear, and there should be no possible question where our duty lay.’”!® Neither the deficiencies in England’s military preparations!!° nor the basic pacific inclinations of the cabinet affected a consensus that England’s going to war was purely a question of timing. The projects launched by the German and Italian governments quite independently of each other in the next few days would receive the same response from London. The Germans still hoped to separate England from Poland in order to have an isolated war. The Italians hoped to stop the whole war to avoid having to defer their own participation in hostilities. When the German government sent a feeler in the evening of 2 September to invite Sir Horace Wilson to fly to Germany to meet Hitler and von Ribbentrop, Wilson responded that first German troops would have to withdraw from Poland, otherwise England would fight.!"! In response to the previously mentioned 105. G.D., D, 7, Nos. 482, 493; TMWC, 34:456-59; Domatus, 2:131 1-18. , 4. Erganzung,” 1 106. On the propaganda exploitation of the faked incidents, see “Vertrauliche Informationen in Danzig, see Kuykendall September 1939, Bundesarchiv, Oberheitmann, Z.Sg. 109/3, £.13. On developments

told on 5 September by the dispatch 239 of 11 September 1939, State 760c.62/1302. (Kuykendall had been planned for the preceding been had September 1 of events the that Janson, von Martin German consul general,

of the extent to week but had been postponed because of the prospect of talks with England, an indication which the German authorities in Danzig had had to be informed by Berlin.) 467 in C 12234 and 12338/15/18, 107. See the notes made in the Foreign Office on B.D., 3d, 7, Nos. 418 and

1939 on the outbreak of war was: FO 371/22978 and 22979. The Foreign Office reflection of 22 September dealing with the Archangel Gabriel’ “Hitler wanted his pretext and would have found it even if he had been (Minute by Sir Orme Sargent, C 14016/54/18, FO 371/23028).

FO 371/22979; Cabinet 46 (39) of 30 108. Cabinet 45 (39) of 28 August 1939, C 12451, C 12452/15/18, to Cadogan of 30 or 31 August Halifax of note the also See . 371/22980 August 1939, C 12552/15/18, FO territory in PREM 1/331A. 1939 about any discussion of peace taking place outside German 371/22982. 109. Cabinet 47 (39) of 1 September 1939, C 13238/15/18, FO pp. 388-89. See also Aster, chap. 14. diary, his in ain Chamberl on comment 110. Note General Ironside’s was also used by Hitler and Goring to try to separate 111. G.D., D, 7, No. 558; B.D., 3d, 9, App. IV. Dahlerus

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

soundings from Rome about a possible peace conference, the British cabinet took the same line: there would be no negotiations unless German troops withdrew from Poland and the status quo were restored in Danzig. Otherwise war was to be declared.'!? It is true that there was considerable confusion over the timing of an ultimatum to Germany, but in this the critical issue was coordination with France, not the intent to declare war

on Germany. In the event, a dramatic debate in the House of Commons obliged the government to move a few hours earlier than planned, to push the French on the issue of timing, and to declare war on Germany several hours before France. There were, wever, no policy differences in the debates in London.!!% Chamberlain took a clear stand and led his country into war. As a man of peace and social reform, such an action went against all his personal preferences and inclinations.'!4 Having struggled against war with persistence, dedication, and stubbornness, he accepted the need to go to war, as he saw it; but he took it very personally and might have done well to consider resigning so that others could take on a task he found necessary but entirely uncongenial. If he was shaken by having to make the terrible choice of war, it is difficult not to sympathize with him; perhaps his haggard appearance does him more credit than did von Ribbentrop’s beaming smile. At stake, as Chamberlain well knew,

were the lives and fortunes of millions; and if he agonized

that in a way Hitler never

did, that was hardly to be condemned

Furthermore, Chamberlain

in a public figure.

surely knew that after the terrible strain that the Worl

at, now beginning to be

referred to as World War I, had imposed on Britain, another such conflict would trans-

form his world beyond recognition. But if the terrible choice had to be made, he would make it. Nothing suggests that he saw the issues very differently from a young member of the Foreign Office, much later to become well known as Sir Gladwyn Jebb when representing Britain in the United Nations in the summer of 1950, who discussed the situation with the German chargé in London on the evening of 18 August 1939. When Theo Kordt emphasized that German economic expansion in Central and Eastern Europe was both essential and compatible with a very large measure of independence for the countries there, Jebb observed that “the example of Bohemia was not particularly encouraging.” As for a German attack on Poland, that would touch off a world war in which eventually “the Third Reich would very probably be smashed.” To Kordt’s assertion that only the Soviet Union and the United States would be victors in a general war, with England facing the prospect of becoming an American Dominion, Jebb responded that England “would infinitely prefer to be an American Dominion than a German Gau15 England from Poland at the last moment (Hofer, pp. 392-93).

112. Cabinet 48 (39) of 2September 1939, C 13239/15/18, FO 371/22982. 113. The matter has been reviewed exhaustively by Aster. An issue of importance that was not publicly discussed for obvious reasons at the time was that the British military had advised the shortest possible interval between an ultimatum and a declaration of war—because of concern over a surprise German air attack—while the French military wanted the /ongest possible interval in order to complete the process of mobilization (Cabinet 49 [39] of 2 September 1939, C 13240/15/18, FO 371/22982). For Hitler’s deliberate delays in

responding to diplomatic approaches in order to get the campaign in Poland moving forward, see Hofer, p. 388. 114. Robert Boothby, a critic of Chamberlain, commenting on the “transparent sincerity” of Chamberlain’s pacific inclinations as expressed at a Foreign Press Association speech on 14 December 1938, said that he had seen anything similar only in George Lansbury, the famous pacifist who long led the Labor party. Boothby

added: “His hatred of war burns him up ... One would not, at first sight, suspect the Prime Minister of being

an emotional man; but when the question of peace ot war arises, his passion knows no bounds. This is at once impressive, formidable, and dangerous” (Robert Boothby, I Fight to Live [London: Gollancz, 1947], p. 181).

115. B.D., 3d, 7:555-57. In his memoirs Sir Gladwyn refers to this conversation as having taken place in May,

but that is surely an error (The Memoirs of Lord Gladwyn (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1972], p. 90). All the Dominions except Ireland declared war on Germany.

Hitler Gets His War

783

The French government had followed the negotiations of the days after the exchange between Daladier and Hitler with a sense of the inevitability of war. They agreed with the position assumed by London in the negotiations, and when informed of Hitler’s ultimatum that a Polish plenipotentiary appear in Berlin on 30 August believed that the time limit was unacceptable, though they did urge that a plenipotentiary be sent.'!¢ It is true that Bonnet wanted to try the Italian conference proposal, but he was overruled by the cabinet meeting in the late afternoon of 31 August.!!7 The German attack on Poland left even Bonnet resigned to war. He did, however, join the military in

counseling a slow procedure for declaring war, hoping no doubt that the Italian project might still have a chance of success.'!8 There was some opposition to wat from two military members of the Conseil superior de guerre because the military prospects looked so gtim.'!? Nevertheless, the elements in the French government who opposed wat could only delay the process of moving toward it.'!29 The extra hours of delay were especially galling to the Poles, who wete naturally eager for maximum support from their French ally; but since the French had no intention of making any significant military moves in the fall of 1939 anyway, the delay in formal action affected morale but not the course of military operations. Prime Minister Edouard Daladier pulled his cabinet together in the face of what looked to them an impossible

situation: France could not abandon

Poland, but the

French knew that they would face alone a German army they believed would be larger than their own. After the horrendous disaster that the fighting of 1914-18 had meant for France, they now faced a repetition under vastly more difficult and dangerous citcumstances. Daladier had agteed to the concessions of 1938; he was not about to repeat that.!21 He appears to have felt more confident of French military strength than in the yeat before, especially in regard to the air force. Above all, however, he believed that

France had no choice but to fight, and it is surely an indication of Daladier’s attitude that he utilized the discrepancy between the British and the French ultimatum procedures at the last minute to move forward by twelve hours the French declaration of war.'” Though he was upset, as were all his associates, by the defection of Russia from any opposition to aggression, it may be that he remembered the most desperate crisis of the Third Republic since 1918. As prime minister he had faced the great riot of 6 February 1934, when the rightist leagues had tried to storm the Chamber of Deputies and when, as again now, the Communists had joined the opponents of the Republic. He had directed the French government’s victory of that day, though at the cost of numerous casualties and his own resignation; perhaps he thought that this crisis too could be surmounted, even if the cost would be infinitely greater. With a heavy heart but a firm hand he led a weakened and divided country into its new ordeal.'” 116. See U.S. 1939, 1:383-84; Hofer, p. 355; Adamthwaite, pp. 343-51. 117. U.S. 1939, 1:398-99; see also Lukasiewicz Papers, pp. 262-63.

118. U.S. 1939, 1:403—-4; G.D., D, 7, No. 538; Hofer, pp. 344-46, 383. 119. The

opponents

were

Generals

Charles-Matie

Condé

and

André

Gaston

Prételat; the evidence is

Princeton University Press, summarized in Robert O. Paxton, Parades and Politics at Vichy (Princeton, N,J.: could not break through in the 1966), pp. 65-66. Since Gamelin had claimed in 1936 that the French army 1, No. 334), it is easy to understand the Rhineland even before the Germans built any fortifications (D.D.F., 2d, -

doubts of 1939. as usual, in U.S. 1939, 1:408-10; cf. ibid., pp. 120. See the comments of Ambassador Bullitt, well informed ey 411-12; Hofer, p. 389. Yellow Book, No. 356. Note Daladiet’s French in is September 2 on Deputies of Chamber the to 121. His speech

he would resign rather than attend a second statement in declining Mussolini’s invitation to a conference that ‘aid

. “Munich” (B.D., 3d, 7, No. 604). a long time, has in my opinion not been 122. See Hofer, p. 391. This action of Daladier’s, though known for he Nay sufficiently utilized as a clue to his views. of Justice, taking Ministry the into Ministry Foreign French the of out 123. Note that he maneuvered Bonnet

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

All other countries were neutral in the conflict, adopting different strategies in the hope of staying out. At the two extremes were the United States and the Soviet Union. While the United States tried to stay out of war by a policy of aid to the Allies, the Soviet Union followed a policy of staying out by aid to Germany. As the war continued and spread, each escalated its own policy. America by more and more extensive aid to Germany’s enemies, especially England, Russia by ever greater assistance to Hitler. By the early summet of 1941 a great volume of war materials was being cartied across the Atlantic under the Lend-Lease Act passed in March, while simultaneously extra trains wete hauling war supplies for Germany from and across the Soviet Union under new German-Soviet trade agreements signed in April. Neither of the two giants would succeed in avoiding participation in the war; both neutrality policies would fail. Almost evety other nation also eventually participated, some as victims of attack, some as eager attackers themselves, some at the last minute to participate in the postwar world organi-

zation. A flood of blood and disaster of unprecedented magnitude had been let loose on the world. If the details of military operations and the localities of combat were often vastly different from those of World War I, the fearful anticipation that a new war would be as horrendous or quite likely even worse than the last proved to be all too accurate. Some of the developments in this great upheaval were initiated and directed by Hitler’s Germany, but many flowed from the reactions or initiatives of other countries. The concept Hitler had tried to implement, of a succession of wars, each started on his own initiative against victims of his choosing, each isolated from the other, but victory in

each one facilitating a German victory in the next, fell short of realization from the very beginning, when England and France declared war in support of Poland. The failure of

the French to mount an offensive in the west in September 1939 almost enabled him to return to his original concept. Germany attacked in the west in 1940 very much the way Hitler had intended after crushing Poland in an isolated war; and his agreement with the

Soviet Union enabled him to conduct the campaign in the west with all his forces on one front for the last tune in the whole war. But then his thrust was halted by England and soon thereafter the dimensions of the conflict were increasingly out of his control. Even as he marched his armies to their destruction at the hands of the Red Army by invading the Soviet Union, the United States loomed ever more menacing on the horizon; and

Japan’s advance in East Asia, urged by Germany as a means of diverting the United States from Europe, only contributed to. the eventual arrival of American troops on German soil. A critical element in Hitler’s inability to adjust to the altering world balance around him was the fact that he had set out to-change it dramatically himself and was prepared for his country to perish in the attempt rather than turn back. Though some may consider him insane for attempting to implement the doctrine of Lebensraum, it was the essence of his policies at all times. Even the reality of internal migration westward did not divert a determined Hitler from attempting to lay the foundation for an external migration eastward. On 1 February 1939 he had felt obliged to issue an edict to try to reverse the process of migration within the existing borders which was denuding Germany’s eastern provinces of their “Germanic” population.!24 But even such grudgingly admitted reality was not permitted to intrude upon his long-term aims. As Hitler had explained to his military commanders on 23 May, the object of war was not Danzig but the expansion of Germany’s Lebensraum.'25 Bonnet’s former portfolio himself, on 14 September. See also Lukasiewicz Papers, p. 329. 124. A study of “Hitlers Osterlass vom 1, Februar 1939” by Andrzej Brozek in Hiitter, Tradition und Neubeginn, pp. 367-76. 125. G.D., D, 7, No. 433.

Hitler Gets His War

785

The concept of revising the peace settlement of 1919 in Germany’s favor, which he had tidiculed in his writings, remained for him a foolish and rejected alternative even as he used it in his propaganda. If many contemporary observers and some subsequent historians failed to comprehend this, it was certainly always obvious to Hitler himself. In mid-October

1939, at a time when

Germany and the Soviet Union were urging the

Western Powers to make peace on the basis of an acceptance of what Germany and Russia had done to Poland, the Swedish

explorer Sven Hedin, a great admirer

of

Germany, visited Hitler. The Fuhrer explained that peace would be possible only if the British gave up “the foolish idea of a restoration of Czechoslovakia.”!26 The vital point dividing him from the Western Powers was not that of Germany taking over areas inhabited by Germans but rather the seizure by Germany of lands hitherto inhabited by other peoples who were to be enslaved or exterminated and replaced by Germans. Under the diplomatic and geographic citcumstances of the time, it so happened that the Czechs were the first and the Poles were the second of these peoples, but the process was both the key point in Hitler’s whole program and the galvanizing element in making his attack on Poland the occasion for a war wider than he preferred at that time.!2” It was precisely because Hitler understood all too well that his aims could be realized only by war that he plunged forward. Because he was always peculiarly conscious of his own mortality, and because he recognized that the limited material resources of the Germany he controlled in peacetime would assure him a head start in rearmament for only a few years before other nations caught up, he was in a hurry to start the first of his warts at the earliest possible moment according to his assessment of the diplomatic and military situation. Given the strides beginning to be made by the rearmament of England and France, one must even concede a certain mad logic to his belief that time was running against his cherished goal. In view of his preference for war, Hitler conducted his foreign policy in 1939 under the personal trauma of Munich. He had shrunk from war then—and attributed such cowatdice to everyone else—so he would not be cheated once again of the war he had always intended.!28 Just as his anger at having been deprived of war in 1938 made him all the mote determined to have it in 1939, so his postponement of the attack on 25 August left him all the firmer in an almost hysterical fixation to attack a few days later.!”” He would not back off again; his tirade to Dahlerus on 1 September in which he declared

himself ready to fight England for ten years if necessary'* surely reflects the views of a

dictator who had once balked before the great risk, had then tried to minimize it, and

was under no circumstances willing to pull back again. Without war, his whole program and his whole life made no sense to him. The war he started would destroy both. There is a grim irony in the fact that most of the precautions Hitler took to make

263, contains the 126. Sven Hedin, Ohne Axfirag in Berlin, pp. 51-56. The German record in G.D., D, 8, No.

same sentiment phrased “Czechoslovakia could not be discussed.” and the proposal to 127. In writing Chamberlain on 14 August about the situation in German-Polish relations

“inasmuch as Hitler’s send General Ironside to see Hitler, Halifax wrote that he saw little point in that project:

he really wants to annex whole line of thought seems to be the familiar one of the free hand in the East, and, if confess land in the East on which he can settle Germans to grow wheat, I 328-29). pp. Aster, in quoted 1/331, (PREM him” g accommodatin

I don’t see any way of

outbreak of war have been cited; he was to 128. Several statements of Hitler to this effect made before the

of 9 October 1939 (IM WC, repeat his own belief in the need for war after 1 September. See his memorandum 1939 (ibid., 26:329-30; Groscurth Diary, p. 37:468) and his speech to the army commanders on 23 November 14). the recall of the attack order on the military and ey Hofer, p. 276, summarizes the evidence on the effect of of a setback for Hitler and a weakening of his impression on Hitler’s associates as one of giving them the

matter. Though quite accurate in themselves, position. Miiller’s discussion (pp. 416-19) also examines this himself.

namely, the impact on Hitler these discussions omit what appears to me to be more important, 130. Dahlerus, pp. 125-26.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

sure there would be no diplomatic settlement of the 1939 crisis, no new Munich, were quite unnecessary. Not having agreed to the Munich agreement in good faith, he could never understand how anybody else could have; and hence although he recognized how deeply the Western Powers were chagtined by his destruction of that settlement, he never fully comprehended that their policies were now based on different assumptions. Chamberlain, in particular, was just as determined, though for opposite reasons, that there would be no new Munich; and even had he wanted it, the British Parliament would

never have allowed it after 15 March 1939. The Poles were certain to fight for their independence. If the conciliatory Beck was unwilling to accept subordination to Berlin, sutely other Polish leaders were if anything even less likely to consider submission a serious alternative. The tragicomedy of midnight 30-31 August was quite unnecessary, however

revealing for participant and historian; the danger of having his ostensible

demands granted, to which Hitler had succumbed in 1938, simply did not exist in 1939. Had von Ribbentrop handed the demands to Henderson officially, Hitler would still have had his war. As for the great propaganda operations, they were hardly any more effective or necessaty than the last-minute diplomatic ones. It was not necessary to persuade the German public of the need to fight Poland, and it was practically impossible to persuade them of the need to fight England and France. As for the outside world, all the reports of atrocities and incidents dreamed up by the fertile imagination of a Goebbels or a Heydrich were unlikely to persuade anyone who had lived through the German use of similar tactics a year earlier. Perhaps all this noise was necessary for Hitler’s self-induced excitement over the situation on Germany’s eastern border, steeling him against doubts that might otherwise have assailed a man who on occasion shifted tactics and procedures. Few others were affected; but then the great tragedy of 1939 was that no one else needed to be affected. Hitler alone made the key decision, though those who had contributed to creating such a situation in so important and powerful a country as Germany, as well as those who carried it out without hesitation, have their share of the

responsibility.

:

Chapter 29 Conclusion

quarter of a century after 1914 another world war had begun. Whatever the ambitions and hopes of other countries, no country other than Germany would or could initiate a second international conflagration. How had the defeated Germany of 1918 come to play such a role? By the winter of 1936-37 the initiative in Europe lay with Germany. Her rearmament had advanced to a stage where not only was no country interested in attacking her—that had been the case for many years—but the German government itself felt entirely confident that its territory was safe from attack. Whatever other planning was being worked on, no one in Berlin was spending any time on plans to defend the country. On the diplomatic scene, Germany had found an associate in Italy, was on good terms with both China and Japan in East Asia, and had either drawn the countries of East and Southeast Europe into her orbit or could be reasonably sure of their abstention from effective action against her. Germany’s relations with England, France, the Soviet

Union, and the United States were admittedly poor; but the former two were neither willing nor able to consider taking the initiative against Germany, while the latter two wete preoccupied with domestic concerns, the Great Purge in the Soviet Union, and the depression and New Deal in the United States. The real power relationships created in Europe by the peace settlement of 1919 were slowly emerging into the light from the obfuscations created by the propaganda of Germany, the delusions of others, and the fleeting ambitions of the newly independent states of East and Southeast Europe. Relatively less weakened by the Great War than any other European power, Germany stood forth not only powerful but ominously threatening. The power of Germany was directed by Adolf Hitler. Careful analyses by scholars have revealed internal divisions, organizational confusions, jurisdictional battles, institutional rivalries, and local deviations behind the facade of monolithic unity that the Third Reich liked to present to its citizens and to the world in word and picture.! The fact temains, however, that the broad lines of policy were determined in all cases by Hitler allowed himself. Where others agreed, or at least did not object strenuously, they were the policy of issues major on but the choice of going along or retreating into silence, could they that had, once some as Fiihrer went his own way. By 1937 few still imagined, as a savior control, direct, or at least temper the all-powerful leader who had been sought enthuand cheerfully had Germans of masses vast will for Germany and to whose energies of vast the direct will that would Whither own. their siastically surrendered L. Weinberg, “Recent German History: Some 1. A brief review of some of the literature is in Gerhard nd-Russland-Amerika: Festschrift fir Fritz Epstein Deutschla (ed.), Fischer Comments and Perspectives,” in Alexander

(Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1978), pp. 358-68.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

Europe’s most advanced industrial power, and how could anyone inside or outside Germany attempt to thwart the course he chose? Hitler was preparing for a series of wars each of which Germany would win by launching a quick campaign against an isolated enemy, with victory in each such war helping prepare for the next one by increasing Germany’s resources and terrifying others into submission or at least abstention from intervention. Ultimately this sequence would lead to world domination, a perspective most clearly recognizable in Hitler’s naval and architectural planning.* Before those more distant visions lay the great agricultural lands of Eastern Europe, controlled for the most part by the Soviet Union, while closest to Germany herself were the immediately adjacent countries of Central Europe. The precise details and sequence would have to be determined as the process went forward, but on several aspects of the approach Hitler appears to have had fixed views. The purpose of the wars was to acquire land for agricultural settlement by Germans. Any German population already in the conquered land would help replace the casualties incurred by conquest and possibly provide men for additional divisions in the German army. The non-German population might temporarily be used for their labor, but they would under no circumstances be “Germanized” culturally; on the contrary, their fate would be expulsion or extermination.‘ The demographic preparations for German population expansion had been inaugurated in the first months of the National Socialist regime. Programs to support earlier marriage and larger families for “healthy Aryans” on the one hand, and procedures requiring the sterilization of those supposedly carrying hereditary defects were both instituted in 1933. On the other hand, insistence that the Jews were the most immediate enemies of internal German racial purity as well as the greatest threat to external territorial expansion meant that the first measures against Jews would also form part of the activities of the new regime in its early months. The processes of consolidation at home and then of expansion abroad would lead to the escalation of both facets of the racial policy. Population growth was a key subject of German propaganda and the education system during the 1930s; the outbreak of war would see the inauguration of a vast euthanasia program thought too risky in peacetime but considered feasible under the cover of hostilities, as shown by the backdating to the first day of the war of Hitler’s late October 1939 directive for the murders of those considered not fit to live. Similarly, the campaign against the Jews escalated steadily in the years before the outbreak of war, and here too the identification of the most extreme measures with war itself was projected by a revealing shifting of dates. In this instance by postdating rather than backdating, Hitler would explain his program for the murder of Europe’s Jews by dating to 1 September the portion of his 30 January 1939 speech referring to the “destruction of the Jewish race in Europe” in the next war. As for the actual fighting of the wars themselves, Hitler intended that to go quickly, in sudden blows, avoiding the long stalemate of trench warfare in the previous conflict. The isolation of one war from another would facilitate speed: the ability of Germany to concentrate on one enemy or small group of enemies at a time, preferably alongside 2. The former is best explained by Diilffer; the latter by Thies. See also above, pp. 9-10. 3. Andreas Hillgruber has used the term Stfenplan or step-by-step procedure to describe Hitler’s concept; as the text shows, my view is somewhat different.

4. The experiments with mass, as opposed to individual, sterilization did not start until well into World War II. 5. The point is discussed in Martin Broszat, “Hitler und die Genesis der ‘Endlésung,”” Viertelhjahrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte, 25, No. 4 (Oct. 1977), 751, n. 22. Broszat’s suggestion that the misdating was intentional is supported by its repetition in the set of Hitler’s speeches edited by the head of his personal secretariat, Philipp Bouhler, Der grossdeutsche Freiheitskampf, 3 vols. (Munich: Ehet, 1940-44), 2:222: 3:197.

Conclusion

789

allies, would dramatically teverse the situation of the World War, in which Germany had been obliged to disperse her forces over several fronts against a host of enemies. The use of tanks and planes would also obviate any possible stalemate and its associated exhausting war of attrition. Unlike the artillery of the previous war, which had to be moved forward after each advance, airplanes could operate from the same forward bases

for considerable distances. While the use of planes would provide wings for the artillery,

tanks would add wheels, treads, and armor to the ground assault forces, enabling them to

move forward at a speed far greater than that of the slogging infantry in which Hitler himself had served. Germany built up a major air force and an array of armored vehicles, and Hitler personally urged on these developments. The expansion of Germany’s mechanized forces and air power of course served to increase the danger to Germany from a blockade in time of war unless she could secure adequate quantities of petroleum products by purchase from neighbors or by synthetic processes based on her own rich coal deposits. The German government had begun as eatly as 1933 with a program for a large-scale synthetic oil industry; and when the foreign exchange crisis of 1936 had suggested to some that a continued program of expanding armaments would bring serious problems, Hitler turned over the matter to Géring with instructions to let no financial or other obstacle stand in his way. Simultaneously, the vastly increased needs for steel would be met by the expansion of domestic sources, using domestic low-grade ores rather than greater ore imports. As for importing oil, that could be done at least in part by shifting purchases to Romania, which in the past had not been a competitive supplier to Germany because of high costs. In the case of synthetic oil made from coal and of steel made from what German industrialists derisively called “potting-soil,” the government simply guaranteed acceptance of whatever was delivered at whatever price was needed. The possibility of importing oil from the Soviet Union would play an important role in the German desire for an agreement with that country in 1939, but like synthetics and the imports from Romania, Hitler saw this as a

short-term expedient. The wars Hitler intended to wage would provide her with the oil resources she would need for later wars.° Similarly, the vast construction projects of the German navy looked to a future when Germany commanded not merely her own and her satellites’ resources but conquered lands, particularly in the Caucasus area, that would provide the fuel needed for Germany’s superbattleships of 56,000 tons.’ Hitler knew vety well that the construction of such huge ships would take years, which was precisely why he insisted on their early development. In the immediate future, more immediate goals would be attained, goals for which the army and air force units

Germany already had or could soon expect to have would be in his judgment entirely adequate. Either before or after the first isolated war he would seize Austria. Quite correctly he foresaw that the Austrian government would be reluctant to use armed forces to defend the country against a German invasion; all that was needed, therefore, was the acquiescence of Italy without whose participation no one could save the small the other country. The split between England and France on the one hand and Italy on and Germany of intervention joint the over Ethiopia had opened up this possibility, and once open possibility that kept War Civil Spanish Italy on the side of the rebels in the of an impressive Italy had won her war in East Africa. The prospect of gain at the side German govthe that signs while Berlin, of direction the in Mussolini Germany inclined the actually somewhat marginal Polish oil 6. For a discussion of the great emphasis placed by the Germans on and the Soviet Union, over this matter with the Soviet Union, see Weinberg, Germany fields and their negotiations

pp. 56, 57, 60, 70.

1 but the ke els of the fitst two had been laid down before 7. None of these monsters was ever completed,

September 1939 (Differ, p. 570).

790

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

ernment would agree to the transfer of the German inhabitants of South Tyrol across the Brenner border served to reduce the Italian government’s apprehension over having a strong Germany rather than a weak Austria on the other side of that border. The available evidence shows that Hitler intended to take advantage of Italy’s favorable attitude, as well as the likely disinterest of England and France as long as Italy

stood aside, to move to seize Austtia in the spring or summer of 1938. An incident was to be staged inside Austria that would provide the excuse for a military intervention that no one would resist. At first Hitler appears to have thought of arranging the murder of the German military attaché or the German ambassador in Vienna; subsequently he intended to have less spectacular but more widespread incidents within the country provoke the Austrian government into repressive measures against which appeals would be sent to Hitler and used as a pretext for invasion. In the event, the interaction between

events inside the two countries provided the occasion for German occupation of Austria without the need for staged provocations—though an appeal for troops was faked—but as an approach to action the procedure of using provoked incidents would remain an important part in Hitler’s tactical system. The first war, originally conceived as coming either before or after the annexation of Austria, was to be against Czechoslovakia. In this war, the Hungarians and Poles would be encouraged to join in, their ambitions for territory to be satisfied at the expense of the victim while their joining in would help deter aid for Czechoslovakia by making her appear in a helpless and hopeless position. The diplomatic isolation of the prospective victim of attack would be assisted by the manipulation of her massive German national minority, whose real and imagined grievances would be trumpeted to the world as signs that the new state created at Versailles deserved whatever fate befell her and was in any case undeserving of the great sacrifices that would be required for her defense. Those sacrifices were to be made to appear especially great by much noise about the German fortifications being built on Germany’s western frontier and by an alliance policy designed to confront England and France with dangers around the globe should they contemplate intervention. 8 It was for this reason that Hitler was so interested in discovering in early May 1938 that Mussolini had not only tolerated Germany’s annexation of Austria but had no particular objection to whatever Germany might want to do to Czechoslovakia either. Hitler thereupon immediately set out to arrange the attack on Czechoslovakia to take place later the same year, and although the May Crisis soon after caused him to make minor alterations in his procedures, the decision to go ahead had already been taken. The

alignment with Mussolini, in spite of the absence as yet of any formal alliance, would conjure up dangers for England and France in the Mediterranean—how could they expect to help Czechoslovakia by the sort of operation the Allies had mounted at Salonika in the World War with a possibly hostile Italy across their line of communication? Furthermore, the Western Powers would be confronted, Hitler hoped, by even

greater dangers in East Asia. The outbreak of war in the Far East in July 1937 had been most unwelcome to Germany, with her ties to both China and Japan. Berlin postponed a choice as long as possible; but once an attempt at mediation had foundered over Japan’s insistence on raising ever higher demands, Hitler took the side of Japan because it accorded with his own inclinations as well as the preferences of his favorite foreign policy adviser, Joachim von Ribbentrop, the new German foreign minister. All the rivalries that had characterized Germany’s East Asian policies in the earlier years of National Socialist rule ended abruptly as von Ribbentrop sacrificed Germany’s position in China and made a major effort to align Japan more closely with the Axis. It was Hitler’s and von Ribbentrop’s

Conclusion

791

belief that the closer such an alignment, the more effectively Great Britain could be

immobilized in Europe by threats from Japan to her colonial empire in Southeast and East Asia, with Germany immobilizing British policy in East Asia by the obvious threat from Germany against the home islands and from Italy to Britain’s Mediterranean lifeline. The exposed position of French Indochina would have a similar restraining effect seFrance, while, also in regard to France, German strength in Europe could only relieve apan. The Japanese, however, in 1938 as in 1939 were unwilling to pledge themselves to the risk of war with the Western Powers while still embroiled in hostilities on the mainland with China. Tokyo’s menacing pose indeed worried the British, but until Germany had won her great victory in the west in 1940, the lead among the multitudinous contending factions within the Japanese government was held by those opposed to the tisk of war with England and most likely the United States, as against those who would stake the future of the Japanese empire on the rising tide of Axis power. The endless debates over this issue would in 1938 leave everyone wondering which way the balance would tilt, and in 1939 would first encourage and then aggravate the Germans. If the possibility of threats in the Mediterranean and in East Asia would restrain Britain while Germany attacked Czechoslovakia, the effectiveness of the propaganda about millions of Germans within the intended target of the attack was to be reinforced in its impact on Britain by two further elements. The confusion over the nationality issue—it was being made to appear that the problem was the presence of Germans in the country when what really concerned Hitler was the presence of Czechs—would deter the members of the British Commonwealth from participation in war and would confront London with the choice between standing aside or coming in without several of the Dominions. The nationality issue would also provide the immediate occasion for war by setting the framework within which Germany would stage the incidents that Berlin could trumpet to the world as reason for the attack. Hitler was much impressed by the coincidental factors in the timing of the outbreak of the World War: the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand had led to war in the wrong year—earlier would have been better for Germany’—as well as at an unanticipated moment. Such accidental factors could not be allowed to recur; Germany would first decide when to strike and then arrange for the staging of appropriate incidents that would provide a pretext at the “right” time. Once again, as in the case of Austria, Hitler’s first thought was directly inspired by Sarajevo; perhaps the German minister in Prague could be assassinated. From this idea he shifted to having the army stage appropriate incidents involving the Getman minority inside Czechoslovakia, and in the final weeks of the crisis turned the task over to a special crew of Sudeten German thugs, organized into a Free Corps and assigned fixed quotas of incidents to be arranged on each segment of the border. The careful attention to the propagandistic aspects of starting a war came not only from an interest in deterring other powers from intervening but also from special condebate siderations of international and domestic policy. In the international arena, the of attention the drawn over the responsibility for the outbreak of the World War had so hosof initiation the g surroundin peoples and governments to the precise circumstances procedures in such tilities that Hitler was very much interested in conducting Germany’s would not be 1914 of approach German clumsy the a fashion that what he considered opposed to as sectetly, a in moment appropriate the at incidents of repeated. The staging . On the perspective publicly, ordered mobilization has to be seen in part from this but also question guilt” “wat domestic side, there was not only this concern about the IE ate Pe i for a late one, see Hitler’s talk of 26 June 1944 8. For an early expression of this view, see Mein Kampf, 1:155; quoted in Speer, Erinnerungen, p. 539, n. 6.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

the one over internal cohesion and morale. Since it had become an article of faith among National Socialists, all other German nationalists, and most certainly Hitler himself that

Germany had lost the war in 1918 because of the collapse of morale at home rather than defeat in battle, there was great interest in the solidity of public support for any future

wat. National Socialist indoctrination in the schools and propaganda in the media would ptepare the population for any sactifices that war would entail, but beyond this it was most important that the bulk of the people accept the justice of Germany’s cause, the absolute necessity of the resort to arms, and the certainty of victory this time as opposed to the memory of what had happened before. These considerations all meant that special attention had to be devoted to the whipping up of enthusiasm at home, picturing the specific situation leading to war as leaving Germany no alternative but resort to arms, making the most of the incidents fabricated to provide a pretext for attacking, keeping any war as short as possible, and both preparing for war and fighting war with as little imposition of restrictions and sacrifices on the home front as possible so that no memories of the privations leading to collapse in the previous great war might arise among the people. Everything would be reversed: the war would start under circumstances that appeared just to the Germans and to all others, it would be fought quickly, it would involve a minimum rather than a maxi-

mum of privation at home, and it would end with the victory of a unified, not the defeat of a divided, population. There was still another aspect to Hitler’s intention of fighting a series of wars that was present at the beginning of the period under review and became increasingly important thereafter. This aspect was a self-generated time pressure. Both material and personal considerations made Hitler think of war not only as an essential tool for the conquests he intended but as preferable sooner rather than later. The material consideration was simple. Once Germany had by her rapid rearmament gained a head start over her neighbors, the sooner she struck the greater the chances for success. The longer wat was postponed, the more likely it would be that rearmament programs inaugurated by others in response to the menace from Germany would catch up with and surpass that of the Third Reich. Lacking in her original borders the economic resources for the continued replacement of one set of weapons by more modern ones, Germany could either strike while she had an advantage over others or see the balance of strength shift to her potential adversaries. The very advantage of Germany’s head start would become a disadvantage as other powers brought into production on their greater economic bases more recently developed and more numerous weapons. Germany would therefore have to strike before such a situation developed, a point which Hitler made repeatedly to his associates and which indeed represents an essentially accurate assessment of the situation if Germany were to have even the slightest hope of succeeding in the preposterously ambitious schemes of conquest Hitler intended.? The personal element was simply Hitler’s own fear of an early death for himself or, alternatively, the preference for leading Germany into war while he was still vigorous rather than aging. Identifying Germany’s fate and future with his personal life and tole in its history, Hitler preferred to lead the country into war himself, lest his successors lack the will to do so. He also thought of his age as a factor of importance; it is impossible to ignore his tepeated extraordinary assertion that he preferred to go to war at the age of fifty to facing war when fifty-five or sixty years old.!° In this regard one enters a realm yet to be seriously and reliably explored by the psychohistorians, but one can hardly 9. Of the many references to this concern, the one quoted from memory by Speer, Erinnerungen, p. 178, may serve as an example. 10. B.D., 3d, 7, No. 248; G.D., D, 7, No. 200. See also chap. 25, n. 231, above.

Conclusion

793

overlook not only the evidence that in 1938 the decision to attack Czechoslovakia within the year came a few days after fear of cancer had induced him to write his last will but also the references to his personal age and role in the final war crisis of 1939. Here, too, One must accept a certain tragic accuracy in Hitlet’s perception; whether any other German leader would indeed have taken the plunge is surely doubtful, and the very warnings Hitler received from some of his generals can only have reinforced his belief in his personal role as the one man able, willing, and even eager to lead Germany and drag the world into war What, if any, were the prospects of halting or diverting this insistence on wat? From inside Germany, any such effort was enormously complicated by the massive support Hitler and his movement enjoyed. Though some were doubtful, the overwhelming majority of Germans were either enthusiastic or passive. In the absence of ftee elections the precise degree of approval the regime enjoyed is difficult to measure, but one has only to consider the attitude of the German public toward the Weimar Republic to be struck by the depth of support for the National Socialist government, a support which hardly cracked until the final days of World War II and even then would produce practically no signs of political disaffection of the sort widespread in Germany in the last weeks of World War I.'! It in no way denigrates the good sense and courage of those opposed to the Hitler regime—if anything it redounds to their credit—to note that they were a small minority, certainly in the years examined here. The quarrels and rivalries within the German state and the National Socialist party should not be allowed to obscure the wide consensus about basic assumptions and national goals, at least as understood by most. Certainly one of the most fateful aspects of Hitler’s Germany was that however extreme the real break with German tradition that characterizes his system, there were strands in it which in their initial stages built on prior traditions, preferences, and policies and appealed to a large proportion of those in the established hierarchies of the country. There might eventually be doubts about principle or practice or both in regard to the more extreme applications of these policies, but their early stages met with approval rather than opposition. Whether it was persecution of Jews or massive rearmament, resettlement of population groups or territorial expansion, the governing apparatus consisted mainly of men willing and even eager to go far enough along these routes for Hitler to commit them willingly or unwillingly to the rest of the way. This question of support or opposition was most critical with regard to the army. Hitler looked forward to the replacement of the higher officer corps by men entirely in tune with his personality, approach, and aims; but inside the army such men were as yet

few, far between, and not of sufficient seniority and experience, while the armed units of

the SS had still to produce a crop of division and corps commanders, to say nothing of even loftier qualifications.!2 Under these circumstances the time pressure under which Hitler believed himself, the insistence that war must come

sooner rather than later,

meant that in the period of rearmament and the first of his wars the existing senior been unleadership of the army was essential to him. He would always regret that he had had Hitler instead able to adopt Stalin’s procedure of destroying the higher officer corps; replacement the to proceed to had to check tendencies in that direction in June 1934 and rather than of the existing upper levels of the military hierarchy by measured and stealthy could be they them—but needed he meantime sudden and dramatic moves. In the “Die deutsche to this, as yet hardly explored, subjec t is in Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, introduction zur Politik: der Gewalt der Strategie der Von his in bruch,” Zusammen Za a inneren vom Impressi eichonen 4 Wosleahe Katastrop eaehe 1945; Friedenssicherang (Diisseldorf: Droste, 1977), pp. 176-86. J, and Ferdinand Schérner; in the Waffen-SS of 12. In the army one thinks of Heinz Guderian, Walter Mode Steiner. Felix and Eicke, Theodor Josef (Sepp) Dietrich,

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

exceedingly dangerous. They were the ones who held the weapons now being produced in ever greater numbers, and their prestige in the country made them the only conceivable alternative focus for the support of large segments of the German public. But the vast majority either agreed with Hitler’s early measures or deliberately closed their eyes to the direction in which he was moving, or both. And then, at the very moment when Hitler turned to steps which might arouse apprehension and even opposition, and in fact did have that effect on many higher officers, Hitler accomplished by a quick and

shabby maneuver much of what Stalin had brought about by a bloodbath. The Fritsch-Blomberg crisis of January—February 1938 gave Hitler vastly greater power over the army both by enhancing his personal position as the new minister of war and commander-in-chief of the armed forces and by placing at his side two men who wete slavish devotees of his will and on whom he could depend for obedience to any order however outrageous or criminal. In Wilhelm Keitel as his chief of staff as commander-in-chief of Germany’s armed forces Hitler found a man of great organizational ability and stupendous industry who combined boundless devotion to Hitler with a total lack of moral judgment. It is hardly a coincidence that it was on Keitel’s recommendation that Hitler turned to Walther von Brauchitsch to command the German army. As bereft as Keitel of moral judgment or courage, von Brauchitsch assumed and held the position of commander-in-chief of the German army under humiliating conditions which joined injustice to his predecessor with personal financial dependence on Hitler for divorce and remarriage. Impervious to appeals by his chief of staff from below or by the senior German military man, the aged Field Marshal August von Mackensen, from above,!3 the new commander-in-chief of the German army proved

a pliant, if nervous, tool of Hitler in the critical years from the planning of war on Czechoslovakia to the declaration of war on the United States. There might be objections within the armed forces, and within the army in particular, but any serious danger

to Hitler was contained for years by the fact that in the final analysis Hitler could always depend on the army’s commander-in-chief bending to his will. If Germany was not diverted ‘from the road to war by internal opposition, was there any prospect of doing so from the outside? Certainly there were hopes of accomplishing this. Many of the smaller countries believed, or tried to persuade themselves into believing, that if they left Germany alone, or assisted her when asked, or refrained from

assisting Germany’s enemies, they might be left alone themselves to pursue their domestic concerns and national aspirations in peace. For some of them this would prove to be the case, but only because the military exertions of others crushed Germany, not because of any special regard inspired in Hitler by their cooperative policies. Sweden, to take an important and conspicuous example, profited materially from her subservience to Germany and managed to stay out of the war; but if the iron deliveries and troop transit facilities provided by Sweden to Germany had resulted in the victory over England and the Soviet Union that Berlin anticipated from them, the swastika would eventually have flown over Stockholm as it did over Oslo and Copenhagen. The only major power having a common border with Germany in 1937 was France. Terribly weakened by the ordeal of the World War, the French had laboriously rebuilt their economy. But there appeared to be no way to regain the tenuous domestic solidarity that had emerged out of the upheaval of the Dreyfus affair in the decade before the war. Civil discord characterized the internal situation. The great riot of 6 February 13. The appeals of von Brauchitsch’s first chief of staff, Ludwig Beck, are examined in chap. 16; that of von

Mackensen of 14 February 1940 has been published in Miller, p. 675. For von Brauchitsch’s answer to the latter, saying that there was nothing to worry about since he had discussed the mass murders in Poland with Himmler, see ibid., p. 676.

Conclusion

795

1934 had been a warning of possible disaster; and for those who doubted the dangers, the civil war in Spain could long provide a reminder close at hand. As for the military situation, this was characterized by a curious mixture of hope and despair. The hope was that massive fortifications would not only shield the country against surprise attack but could also prevent any repetition of the disastrous impact of fighting inside France with its devastation and occupation of important areas. Such a defensive posture, however, though reinforced by the imagined lessons of the last conflict,!4 had the effect of writing off most of France’s allies. If only a lengthy buildup of French and British forces combined with the weakening of Germany by a renewed blockade could pave the way for any offensive action against Germany at some indefinite time after the outbreak of wat, the Germans could defeat unmolested and one at a time whatever allies France might have in East and Southeast Europe. If any prospective ally of France learned of this, would they continue their tie to France? If they did remain with their French alliance, would not Germany’s quick conquest of them strengthen rather than weaken Germany for the subsequent serious contest of arms in the west? Would not these prospects farther restrain the French until it was too late? There was yet another element in this picture which can be noted but not as yet explained. French intelligence had during the 1920s and early 1930s formed a reasonably accurate picture of Germany’s military situation. By 1936, however, the accepted estimates of German strength were so far ahead of reality as to border on the fantastic. This discrepancy between reality and the French imagination grew ever greater: by 1938 the French military leaders seriously claimed to believe that if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia with het main strength, she could still keep fifty divisions on guard against any French attack in the west—when the whole German army had not yet reached fifty divisions! The origins of these delusions remain to be explored; the results are all too obvious. As the French military viewed the prospect of renewed battle with Germany, they were immobilized by despair, an attitude they communicated first to their political leaders and then to their own soldiers." That French foreign policy was conducted under these circumstances with neither much hope nor great determination is not surprising. The very measures preparatory for a wat everyone hoped to avoid because of tragic memories of the last conflict only meant that any new war would necessarily be of long duration and hence more costly. Whether such a wat would come was left essentially to the initiative of others; whatever its cause and course, only a long war was seen as offering any hope for France, and only eventual

victory in such a long war might bring redemption to the allies of France as it had once brought redemption—and great enlargement—to Serbia. If Paris looked to London for leadership both to avoid war and to win if it were unavoidable, this was in large part due to the weakness of French institutions as well as of the French armed forces. From the perspective of London, the growing danger in Europe was obvious. Not so obvious was the answer to the question of whether and how war might be avoided. Inherent in the British government’s handling of that question were three assumptions of fundamental importance. First, it was assumed that any war with Germany would be terrible and long; it would be terrible because of the use of new types of weapons and long because of Germany’s head start in armaments. Only after initial German offensives ' 14, I have summarized this point above, p. 282. have been clati15. Once the origins of the extraordinary delusions about German strength in the later 1930s June 1940, willing to fied, it may become easier to understand why so many French military leaders were, after under no circumstances fight against England, against other Frenchmen, and against the United States—but 1938 referring to November late of estimate intelligence French a of 1978 in publication against Germany. The

461) makes the puzzle even more cona German army at that time of fifty-four divisions (D.D.F., 2d, 12, No.

fusing.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

had been halted and allied strength built up, could there be any hope of defeating a Germany weakened by blockade and of restoring to independent status whatever countties had been conqueted by Germany in the meantime. As this assumption implied, any new war was believed certain to be general and to involve England regardless of the precise location and circumstances of its beginning. In complete opposition to Hitler’s deduction from the experience of 1914-18, that Germany should fight separate wars against isolated enemies, the British concluded from the same experience that any future war would surely spread to all as the last one had, and that it was therefore most sensible to anticipate that England could not keep out. In other words, it was essential to try to prevent any war from starting in Europe because, like the one originating in distant Serbia, it would soon involve themselves. Tied to this belief that a European conflict would be general and would be a long one was the belief that no one had wanted such a thing in 1914 and that surely no one could possibly desire a repetition of that disaster. What few could imagine before 1914, all certainly knew after 1918. Accordingly, every effort had to be made to prevent a recurrence of a general war by trying to reconcile in some way whatever quarrels seemed most likely to lead to any war anywhere in Europe. Added to these assumptions were certain realities of the international situation within which London had to make its decisions. There was, first of all, the fact that

Britain and her empire were threatened not only in Europe by Germany but also by Japan in East Asia and by Italy along her Mediterranean supply route. The famous tenyeat tule, that no war against a major power was to be expected for ten years, had been abandoned in 1932 in response to developments in East Asia. Since then, the British

government had looked with great concern at a range of threats which could not all be dealt with simultaneously; moreover, action against one might so commit her in one part

of the world as almost to invite an attack against her elsewhere. Second, the British were very conscious of the fact that they had disarmed themselves after 1918. On land, they had unilaterally reduced the enormous army, which had borne the major share of the fighting in the final year and a half of the last war, to a force about the size of the 100,000 man army set by the peace treaty for Germany. At sea they had scrapped a large number of warships and limited new construction under a series of disarmament agreements with the United States and Japan, while in the air they had dismantled the world’s largest air force. Rearmament would take time. It would also, and here was the third reality, cost vast amounts of money for a country dependent on world trade for its life and accustomed by its role in earlier conflicts to thinking of its financial strength as a major arm of coalition warfare. It is true that this last point would change in a wat in which England was enabled to continue through the financial support of the United States; but it ought to be obvious that at a time when American international financial policy was set by the Johnson Act with its prohibition on lending England a penny in case of war, no one in the London government was prepared to gamble on the possibility of billions of dollars of a not yet invented Lend-Lease program. Rearmament was, therefore, concentrated on air defense first, naval defense second, and the very rudi-

mentary beginnings of rebuilding an army last, with a constant eye to the costs not only in absolute terms but also to their impact on the general trade position of a country still recovering slowly from the depression. Once inaugurated, rearmament would add some weight to the efforts to resolve difficulties by negotiations, especially if enough time was gained so that eventually the combined strength of England and France might serve to deter Germany from the risk of a wat which by British calculation would be sure to involve them all. The converse of Hitler’s view—the sooner the better—was the British one—the later the better—in the belief that if war were postponed sufficiently into the future it might never take place at

Conclusion

797

all. If, however, it did start in spite of the efforts to avoid it, these efforts themselves

would make the subsequently required sacrifices appear to the British public as unavoidable because of the obstinacy of others rather than incurred through rash actions of their own government, And at least the first stages of the rearmament program would then contribute to success in what in the absence of many of the allies of the last war and the recognized weakness of France was certain to be a hard test of strength. : The avoidance of any long and general war was, therefore, seen as certainly in Britain’s interest and susceptible of being shown as being in the interest of others as well. The use by German propaganda in general and Hitler in particular of real or imagined grievances from the peace settlement of 1919 was designed by Berlin to make possible the isolation of German actions, including the first of its series of wars, from interference

by others. Until there was clear proof, as opposed to dite warnings, to the contrary, this trumpeting of “grievances” was taken by the British government as a pointer in the direction of issues that might have to be settled by negotiations and concessions if they were not to lead to war. Perhaps others would agree to some changes if these were worked out in negotiations and if German demands were restricted to changes which left other countries their independence—except possibly Austria, which might not teally want it. The resulting improvement in the international atmosphere as well as the avoidance of wat would be in the interest of all, and such a happy prospect might be the more readily secured if the British themselves, as well as the French, made a contribution

to such a new general settlement by concessions to Germany in the colonial field, the area of German “grievances” from 1919 in which England and the Dominions had been the chief beneficiaries of the settlement. Originally formulated in the winter of 1935-36 by Sir Robert Vansittart, the idea of a general settlement with Germany, in which colonial and other economic concessions by the Western Powers would be exchanged for German acceptance of the status quo with possibly only minor alterations in Central Europe, eventually became almost an obsession with British leaders.'° If all contributed their share, Germany might be peacefully reintegrated into the European state system as a nation satisfied enough to cease being a menace to its neighbors, with those neighbors benefiting from the maintenance of peace and Germany

from concessions which, if not all she had wanted, were still

pteferable to the hazards of a new war. The eagerness of the British government to secure such a settlement was not confined to Prime Minister Chamberlain, though he played a major role in formulating and attempting to implement the policy. It was shared by all in the cabinet. Winston Churchill indicated that he would follow a similar policy were he in the government, and when Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden resigned, to be replaced by Lord Halifax, it was over the subsidiary issue of whether and how Mussolini might be detached from Hitler’s side rather than the fundamental one of the desirability of attempting an accommodation with Germany. It was, however, precisely such an accommodation that Germany did not want. Some historians have emphasized Hitler’s periodic expressions of hope for an agreement with England and disregard not only his at least equally frequent denunciations of England but, more significantly, his consistent rejection of any and all efforts to bring about an Anglo-German settlement. Having destroyed at the earliest opportunity the Locarno agreement with its provision for English protection against any future French action like the occupation of the Ruhr, Hitler was not about to become involved in any new settlement of a comprehensive nature. In regard to England as in regard to others Hitler naturally preferred subservience to defiance. He would have preferred that Poland submit rather than fight—though hardly out of great fondness for the Poles as German 16. The first stages of this project are described above, p. 191.

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Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

policy in occupied Poland ought now to have made clear to all. He would pursue his policy of external conquest and he would adhete to his policy of murdering Europe’s Jews; and the test he applied to other countries was whether they wete prepared to subordinate their policies and preferences to Germany’s policies on these matters at any given time. In prewar as in wartime Europe, that meant joining Hitler or at least not objecting to his actions in the conquest for space regardless of who might live in the affected area and what the preference of those people might be. This was the test he applied to Italy, to Japan, to the Soviet Union, to Hungary, to Poland, to Yugoslavia, and

to others whom at one time or another Hitler considered appropriate—if temporary— helpmates for his foreign policy aims of the moment. Similarly, once the machinery for murdering Europe’s Jews had been set in motion, the test he applied to the satellites of Berlin was their willingness—or reluctance—to turn over the Jews from their jurisdiction to the Germans to be killed. These tactical and temporary arrangements, however, must not be confused, as they sometimes are, with any serious willingness on Hitler’s part to accommodate his longterm aims and policies to the interests and preferences of any other power or interest. His concordat with the Vatican did not imply any regard for the maintenance of Catholicism any more than the transfer agreement for Jews emigrating to Palestine meant Hitler had become a Zionist. Innumerable other examples, from the agreement with Poland in January 1934 to the nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union in August 1939, could be added to the list. The only foreign leader and power with whom Hitler was prepared to make any real accommodation was Mussolini’s Italy; he saw a certain kinship in his relations with the Duce, and he believed that Italy’s expansionist ambitions could be harmonized with his own. But as would become obvious the moment the Italians suggested during World War II that Germany abandon her expansionist ambitions in Eastern Europe in order to arrive at a new accommodation with Stalin, Hitler’s regard for Italian aspirations in the Mediterranean would never be extended to the point where his own drive for Lebensraum in the east might be subordinated to it. And once Mussolini himself had been deposed by the Italians}; Germany would seize vast portions of northern Italy, not just the minuscule area of South Tyrol. It was because Hitler recognized quite correctly that the British proposals for a general settlement involved acquiescence by Germany in a Europe modified too slightly to resemble even remotely his vast ambitions that he evaded with great care every British attempt to involve him in negotiations for any such arrangement. Having denounced those in Germany whose ambitions were limited to revision of the Versailles settlement, which would leave Germany with borders essentially as inadequate as those of 1937, he was not about to be enticed into something very similar by foreign leaders; the noise about the 1919 settlement was to prepare not for its revision but for a total restructuring of Europe and the whole world. That meant war, not talk. The one time that Hitler eventually became entrapped in the negotiating process only reinforced his disinclination to accept the British approach. In the crisis over Czechoslovakia, Hitler found himself first entrapped by Chamberlain’s offer to come to Germany, an offer which he could hardly refuse without putting himself in the wrong at home and abroad, risking both a general war and a dubious home front. He had then tried desperately to avoid a negotiated settlement by activating Poland and Hungary and staging appropriate incidents, only to pull back at the last moment in view of Mussolini’s urging, contrary advice from his closest associates, a British warning, and a sense that the German public was not with him in this project. Having had to settle for what he had felt able to ask in public, rather than what he had wanted in private, left him angry and determined never to allow a repetition of such a process. Not only did English talk of further

Conclusion

799

rearmament after Munich remind him of the fact that the British policy of working for the peaceful settlement of disputes gave his prospective enemies more time to rearm, but the very fact that war had eluded him because of the diplomacy of others and his own hesitation reinforced his earlier preference for war. If the worldwide relief over the drawing back from hostilities in 1938 did not lead to the kind of detente which evolved after the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 it was because Hitler regretted that war had been averted rather than being alarmed that it had been so close. The British government had on this occasion found a way to avoid war but at great sacrifice of prestige for both England and France and of major territorial amputations for Czechoslovakia. If there really had followed a period of relaxation, then the road to a more peaceful Europe might have been open; but it soon became obvious that this was not the case. Although the rumors that Germany’s next move would be to invade Holland proved false, the fact that Berlin was dissatisfied rather than calmed down after Munich showed that war, not peace, was likely. The destruction of the Munich agree-

ment by Germany herself only underlined what many had suspected but until then no one could prove: the German grievances and demands were not related to any attempt to correct those grievances or satisfy the announced demands but were propaganda instruments designed to isolate one victim from future ones. It therefore became critical for other powets to counter that German strategy and only subsequently deal with specific issues, rather than the other way around. How did other major powers perceive the danger of war? The Soviet Union saw war as a natural and inherently inevitable concomitant of capitalist society, with which she considered herself in something of a war anyway; and she greatly preferred that capitalist nations fight among themselves rather than gang up on Russia. As for any threat from Germany, that was still at a distance as long as the Germans were still in the center of Europe, far removed from the Soviet Union. If others could be persuaded to fight Germany, that was all to the good; and it would weaken both parties to such a conflict

while leaving Russia aside, with even the possibility of gain from the confusion. Such a policy could work until Germany turned against a country that had a common boundary with Russia and thus opened up the possibility of an invasion route eastward. At that point the intentions of Germany would become critical. Stalin feared German strength and had repeatedly attempted to secure better relations with the Third Reich. Once Germany turned toward new goals after Munich he was all the more worried. If others would fight Germany, his country might escape participation in a wat which could possibly end his rule of the country as the last war had ended the rule of the Romanovs. If possible, therefore, Russia would stand aside from such a war entirely, or, if Germany needed encouragement to strike at others, Russia could perhaps provide that stimulus. When the Western Powers turned to the concept of a general front against German moves after 15 March 1939, therefore, the Soviet government was cautiously reluctant.

Since they had good reason for believing that Germany was attacking Poland only asa preliminary to fighting the West, the Russian government thought it had no interest in joining in such an endeavor. The focus in subsequent scholarship on the military issues in the talks between the Western Powers and Russia is a coincidence of timing rather than a matter of substance. The German timetable required an agreement with the Soviet Union in August and the issue then under discussion between Moscow, London, and

Paris happened to be that of allowing Russian troops into Poland. Had the Western Powers delayed their agreement to the Soviet demand for guarantees against indirect aggression, that would have been the subject when the negotiations broke off; had they secured full Polish concurrence on the troop transit issue, the negotiations would have the been focused on the next Soviet demand which, to judge by evidence in the record of

800

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

talks, was likely to be either Soviet bases in the Baltic States or the dispatch of British warships into the Baltic. The critical point was that in Stalin’s eyes Germany was prepared to pay a good price for Soviet aid, but that without the cooperation of the Soviet Union Germany might not go to war at all, since the Russians knew of Japan’s refusal to sign with Germany. Having an agreement with the Soviet Union offering cooperation in Eastern Europe and a breach of any blockade, Hitler felt sufficiently encouraged to move. The Japanese had needed no encouragement from Moscow to embroil themselves in a wat with China. It was, therefore, fully in accord with the defensive posture of the Soviet government in the 1930s to provide some assistance to the Chinese Nationalist government in its struggle against Japan. Inside Manchuria, the Russian government had been willing to appease Japan by the sale in 1935 of its interests to the Manchukuo puppet government the Japanese had established there. On the borders of the Soviet Far Eastern provinces and the Soviet client state of Outer Mongolia, however, the Russians bloodied rather than appeased the Japanese. This was all that was needed, given Japan’s involvement in wat with China. Thereafter, as long as Germany was primarily interested in having Japan threaten the Western Powers, the Soviet Union could readily contain or divert Japan. This combination of policies—assisting the victim of Japanese aggression in East Asia while siding with Germany in Europe—seemed to the leader of the Soviet Union the best way to preserve his rule of the country without external danger or with a minimum of risk. The calculation would prove disastrously mistaken and leave the Soviet Union exposed to attack under particularly dangerous conditions, but Stalin apparently preferred the risks of postponement with booty to those of alignment with the Western Powers in 1939. President Roosevelt’s warning that a Germany triumphant in Western Europe would then threaten the safety of the Soviet Union as well as of the United States was prophetic but in vain. The American president, like large parts of the American public, observed developments in Europe with growing concern. The whole direction of change appeared to challenge American beliefs, values, and hopes by pointing toward a world modeled on a dictatorial rather than a democratic pattern. The estrangement between Germany and the United States had moved with great rapidity after 1933; from the major countries with the best relations they had quickly become the major countries with the worst. Ideological and political factors predominated in this process, the specific problems at issue being of more symbolic than substantive importance. With much of the American public increasingly convinced that participation in the World War had been an aberration not to be repeated, and a president who strongly preferred to keep the United States out of war, the distaste and even repugnance for Germany that was developing in the United States had, however, little immediate practical effect. Having disarmed after the war very much the way England had, the country was in any case incapable of playing any significant direct role for years in any conflict Germany might start; and the president encouraged, rather than discouraged, the hopes of those who tried to reconcile Germany to a peaceful role in Europe.!” President Roosevelt, however, became increasingly convinced that only a 17. The point is conveyed by the titles of two important works on the subject: Arnold Offner’s American Appeasement: United States Foreign Policy and Germany, 1933-1938, and Francis Loewenheim’s “The Diffidence of Power—Some Notes and Reflections on the American Road to Munich.” The relationship of American disarmament after 1918 to American diplomacy before 1939 and during the war itself, as well as its impact on American strategy until 1944, has generally been ignored by European scholars dealing with the subject. The chronology is instructive: Germany begins building up her army in the spring of 1933; England in the spring of 1939; the United States in the fall of 1940.

Conclusion

801

strengthened England and France, preferably joined by other countries including the Soviet Union, could restrain Germany from wild adventures or defeat her if she could not be restrained. He therefore not only denounced Germany’s actions in public but began to help the rearmament of France, tried to educate the American public to the dangers ahead, and urged some steps toward America’s own rearmament. The failure of the administration’s attempt to revise the neutrality laws in a manner that would allow England and France to purchase munitions and weapons in the United States in time of war came simultaneously with Roosevelt’s failure to persuade Stalin that the best hope of safety lay in an alignment with the Western Powers. There was always the chance that a combination of success in both endeavors might discourage Germany from war altogether; but by the time Roosevelt’s foreign hopes were shattered by the Nazi-Soviet pact, his domestic hopes had already been dashed by congressional defeat of his neutrality law revision. Only appeals for peace and when those failed a call to refrain from bombing civilian targets emanated from Washington in the last days of peace and the first days of war. The answer from Berlin was simple and eloquent: one of the first German bombs landed in the grounds of the villa Ambassador Biddle had rented as a refuge for the clerks and women of the American embassy in Warsaw. It had originally not been a part of Hitler’s plan to attack Poland in 1939. After Munich, he intended to destroy what remained of Czechoslovakia, but that was not

expected to involve hostilities. His first war was to be in the west, destroying France and crushing England so that they could not interfere with his ambitions in Eastern Europe. Starting a war in the west, however, meant making sure of quiet in the east—just as the

earlier plan for an attack on Czechoslovakia had been accompanied by efforts to neutralize the West. The plan to make certain that all was quiet on the eastern front failed. The Hungarians fell into line, but the Poles simply would not do so, From October 1938

on, the German government tried to entice, coax, overawe, and bully the Poles into a

position of subservience to Germany, so that in alliance with Italy and Japan Germany could turn west without having to worry about Poland’s either requiring a diversion of German forces or taking advantage of German preoccupation elsewhere. As it became clear to Hitler that the Poles were not willing to give up their status as an independent country without a fight—and this rather than specific details of German-Polish relations was the key issue—he reversed his planned sequence of actions and with it the procedure for securing quiet on the other front. s He was now determined to fight Poland so that the total crushing of Germany’ be would Here west. the in eastern neighbor would make it safe for Germany to attack alliance with the lovely little war of which he had been cheated in 1938. The prospective and England threaten directly than rather deter to Italy and Japan would now serve d persecute poor, about campaign da propagan 1938 the of France. A repeat performance Powers, Western the by support c diplomati from Poland isolate to Germans would setve Slovakia, Lithuania, whose defeat in wat was now postponed until 1940 or 1941, while parts of Poland just to s themselve and even Hungary would be invited to join in and help booty in 1938. In ovak Czechosl the in share to as Poland and Hungary had been urged was willing Mussolini while alliance, an about hesitant practice, the Japanese proved still Union, Soviet action. The to commit Italy by treaty and fine words though hardly by in the Japan for substitute however, could from Hitler’s perspective make a perfect did West the with war if diplomacy of isolating Poland as well as relieving Germany Lithuthe neither but ready Slovaks the come. As for junior partners, Hitler would find would be more than made up by the anians nor the Hungarians willing, but again that participation of the Red Army in the conquest of Poland. of action he had followed in If in these respects Hitler tried to repeat the pattern

802

Hitler’s Foreign Policy, 1933-1939: The Road to World War II

1938, in others the approach was deliberately changed. In 1938, negotiations had continued throughout the year, and in the end Hitler had been unable to break loose from them into hostilities. There would, therefore, be no negotiations with Poland in the summer of 1939, and to make certain that there could be no unintentional and unwel-

come slippage into negotiations, the German ambassadors in Warsaw and London were recalled and forbidden to return to their posts in the last critical weeks. In 1938 Germany had in the end been forced by circumstances to settle for its propagandistically defensible ostensible demands. Hitler would take no chance on any repetition of such a development in 1939; demands

which would be used in German

propaganda to explain her

going to war were indeed formulated, but von Ribbentrop was personally instructed by Hitler under no circumstances to let these out of his hands. If there were again to be incidents at the proper time to provide a pretext for Germany’s attack, staging them would on this critical occasion be entrusted neither to the army nor to any possibly unreliable and inexperienced recruits from the German minority abroad. This time the German secret police apparatus itself would stage the incidents with Reinhard Heydrich, the head of the security service, personally issuing instructions. Hitler would have his wat, and this time no one would stop him, least of all the British who had tricked him out of it, as he thought, the year before. If they showed signs of hesitation, it would

make an attack on Poland look safe; if they demonstrated firmness, that only showed them determined to fight Germany in any case. The choice for war came first, and whatever others did would be interpreted or misinterpreted to support adherence to that decision and the procedures adopted to implement it. ° It had also actually been the hope of the British government that a reversal of their 1938 procedure might work to maintain peace once again. Then they had waited until the last possible moment to threaten Germany with a general war if Germany attacked Czechoslovakia, anticipating that the anxiety of Czechoslovakia and France over the question of whether they could count on English support would produce maximum concessions to Germany, while the anxiety of Germany lest England come in would induce Berlin to accept less than they would otherwise prefer to obtain. Now, in 1939, the British took their stand early rather than late, hoping both to rally others and to deter Germany by a show of strength and unity. Unable to persuade the Soviet Union to stand with them in this position, the British—and the France in their wake—stood their ground. Although Hitler had ordered war to begin as soon as he was sure that the pact with Russia was about to be signed, he found that it was still possible to call off the attack and try once more to separate the Western Powers from Poland. As soon as it was evident that this could not be accomplished, he ordered the attack to go forward regardless of the risks in the west and the knowledge that Mussolini would not as yet come in on Germany’s side. He was so impatient to start the war that he would not wait the one day that his own schedule still allowed for the initiation of hostilities in 1939; there could be

no question of calling off war altogether. It takes only one side to start a war. Only an internal coup could have kept Hitler from launching one; and the first serious attempt, the bomb

which went off in the

Munich beer hall in November 1939, was ironically the work of a loner and was frustrated by the fact that Hitler had cut short his stay in order to confer in Berlin on the forthcoming offensive in the west.!8 In November the war was already under way. In 18. Lothar Gruchmann (ed.), Autobiographie eines Attentaters: Johann Georg Elser (Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1970), p. 9. See also Anton Hoch, “Das Attentat auf Hitler im Minchner Birgerbraukeller 1939,”

Viertehabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 17, No. 4 (Oct. 1969), 383-413. All other Opposition projects up to this point had consisted of plans and talks, but no direct action. Warnings were issued inside and outside the country, but

Conclusion

803

August, when it counted, the German military leaders had been either enthusiastic or willing—the attack on Poland looked to many like the right thing to do, and the agreement with the Soviet Union appeared to be a stroke of genius assuring a one-front war. The German public was by all accounts dubious, and there was no repetition of the mass enthusiasm of August 1914 in Germany any more than in any other European country. ever, a new Burgfneden,

a new domestic consensus, in the one place where it counted in

the Germany of 1939: the top of her military hierarchy.’ Under these circumstances, the leader of Europe’s most powerful country could unleash the great disaster. In the oceans of tears and blood let loose upon the world millions and millions would drown. If the war did not follow the course Hitler and his associates and assistants preferred, that was due to the exertions of others and to their own mistakes. They would be able to take many initiatives and thus participate in shaping the contours of the war, but the only portion they could entirely control was the opening: the faked incidents in the German borderlands and the opening salvo from the guns of the Schleswig-Holstein. As German soldiers raced to seize the important railway bridge over the Vistula at Tczew, the Poles blew it up in their faces.

a a in March 1943. the first attempt to overthrow the Hitler regime took place prison diary (p. 48). On what must have been 22 or 23 19. Note also —. entry of 20 December 1946 in his

said that this time much blood would flow. Germany August 1939, Hitler after his first order to attack Poland he were not won. In 1946 Speer clearly recalled that neither

would fall to destruction with him if the war ns. himself nor anyone else had been repulsed by such expressio

Bibliography

Introductory Comments on Archives German Archives

Extensive portions of the German archives were microfilmed after World War II; the most comptehensive collection of such films is in the National Archives in Washington. These films are cited by their National Archives microcopy numbers. The National Archives also holds important original German documents collected for, but not used at, the Nuremberg trials as well as postwar interrogations of German officials. Related materials, now largely transferred to the National Archives, were used at what was then the Foreign Studies Branch of the Office of the Chief of Military History. There are some German documents in the Manuscripts Division and the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress. Microfilms from the Berlin Document Center are largely in the National Archives, but a group of materials from the NSDAP Hauptarchiv was filmed—though rather poorly—for the Hoover Institution. Among records held at the German Federal Archives in Koblenz that were not processed by the various filming operations those most important for this study are the collections of instructions for the German press, the papers of General Ludwig Beck (now at the Military Archives in Freiburg), and records of the Ministry of Finance. There are small groups of papers and numerous postwar interrogations at the Institut fir Zeitgeschichte (IfZ) in Munich. A microfilm of important papers of Field Marshal Erhard Milch is held by the Imperial War Museum in London. German records that fell into Soviet hands and were held in East Germany are cited by the file number of the Central Archive of the German Democratic Republic (DZA) at Potsdam in such cases where I have been able to obtain copies and are otherwise cited at second hand from publications by East German scholars. Italian Archives

‘

The Italian archives for the 1930s have not generally been available to scholars,! but an important group of papers was microfilmed by the Allies in World War II; these have been used at the National Archives where they are listed as mictocopy T-586. The other Italian films there (T-821) pertain mainly to the period of World War II and to prewar military affairs. The microfilm of Count Ciano’s papets contains no documents for the years before 1938.2 Czechoslovak Archives

The archives of Czechoslovakia were seized practically intact by the Germans, who had a team that prepared and sent to Berlin translations of many documents. Those translations that were found after the war in the German Foreign Ministry archives captured by the Western Allies were microfilmed; they are described in considerable detail in the data sheets covering them that were prepated by Fritz T. Epstein.3 This important collection includes both copies of diplomatic dispatches and telegrams and the summaries of petiodic briefing reports given by Kamil Krofta, Czechoslovakia’s foreign minister, to the section chiefs of the Foreign Ministry. These documents are cited as “Czechoslovak document in T-120” with container, serial, and frame numbers. The inter-

nal evidence as to their authenticity and the general reliability of the translations into German is now confirmed by the fact that those translations were used as the textual basis for the majority of the items in a collection of documents published under the auspices of the present government of

1. An important exception is John Coverdale; see his book listed below. 2. Howard M. Smyth, The Ciano Papers: Rose Garden (Washington: Howard M. Smyth, 1969), p. 60.

3. T-120, 1039/1809/411884—-927; 1143/2028/444168-183; 1316/2376/D 496875-880.

Bibhography

805

Czechoslovakia.4 Doctoring of the translated documents for political purposes had been left to von Ribbentrop’s propagandist, Friedrich Berber.5 American Archives

United States archives have proved extremely valuable in the preparation of this work. American diplomats in the 1930s were often extremely well informed—even if the government in Washington did little with their reports except file them. American diplomats often obtained information difficult or impossible to obtain elsewhere, and the Central Files of the Department of State as a

result contain important material on such matters as the Danzig question, the foreign policies of France and Poland, and developments in Austria. The papers of the special State Department mission to postwar Germany under DeWitt C. Poole are also useful. The records of the American War Department include in addition to what one might expect such special items as copies of papers of the German military advisers to Chiang Kai-shek. Recotds at the National Archives must be supplemented by important collections elsewhere. The Franklin D. Roosevelt papers at Hyde Park contain much of interest; the Henry Morgenthau, R. Walton Moore, and Claiborne Pell papers there were less important for this work. The Jay Pierrepont Moffat and William Phillips papers are at Harvard. At the Library of Congress I have consulted the papers of Wilbur J. Carr, Norman H. Davis, William E. Dodd, Cordell Hull, Breckinridge Long, and Laurence A. Steinhardt. The George S. Messersmith papers are at the University of Delaware. British Archives

The shift from a fifty- to a thirty-year rule has opened extensive British records to scholars, though it must be noted that many documents and whole files are being kept closed until 1990, 2015, and

even later. Most important for this project have been the voluminous papers of the Foreign Office at the Public Record Office; also used have been cabinet papers, prime ministet’s papers, the records of such cabinet committees as the Committee of Imperial Defence and the Committee on Foreign Policy, and the papers of Lord Halifax, Sir Nevile Henderson,

Sir John Simon, Sir

Alexander Cadogan, Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, and Viscount Runciman in the FO 800 series. At Cambridge University I have used the Baldwin and Templewood papers; at the Beaverbrook Library the Lloyd George papers; at the London School of Economics the Dalton papers; at King’s College the Ismay papers; and at the Scottish Record Office the Lothian muniments. Other Archives

archives have been The Soviet archives were closed when this book was written. Some French

similar to the made available to certain scholars, but there has been as yet no general opening

as other, archives American ot British. Publications of documents from Soviet and French, as well

ate listed in the bibliography. actually cited in No effort has been made to make this bibliography exhaustive. Only works general ideas, whose works other of selection small a with together this book are included, account. The the shaping in ce significan organizing concepts, or supplementary details were of real additional provide IV section in works secondary the of many and I bibliographies listed in section listings.

ee

39 1938: Tschechoslowakische diplomatische Dokumente 1937-19 4, Vaclav Kral (ed.), Das Abkommen von Miinchen ' taoue: Academia, 1968), p. 43. 3d ed. (Essen: Essener

im Spiegel der Prager Akten, 4 Friedrich Berber (ed.), Europdische Politik 1933-1938 in the footnotes where a document on microfilm d provide been have ferences Verlagsanstalt, 1942). Cross-re n. collectio can be compared with what appears in this

806

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I. Bibliographies, Guides, Archives Inventories, and Other Reference Works

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and National

Archives and Records Service. “Guides to German Records Microfilmed at Alexandria, Va.”

Washington: National Archives, 1958-. Bauer, Yehuda (ed.). Guide to Unpublished Materials of the Holocaust Period. Vol. 3. Jerusalem: Hebrew University, 1975. Bibliothek fiir Zeitgeschichte, Stuttgart (formerly the Weltkriegsbiicherei). Jahresbibliographie (formerly Bicherschau der Weltkriegsbiicherei). —. Kataloge der Bibliothek fir Zeitgeschichte. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1968. This printed card catalog, together with the annual supplements, constitutes the most useful bibliographic tool for twentieth-century European history. Billig, Joseph. A/fred Rosenberg dans l'action idéologique, politique et administrative du Reich hitlérien. Paris: Editions du Centre, 1963. Inventory of the Rosenberg papers at the Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaine, Paris. Das Deutsche Fiibrerlexikon 1934/1935. Berlin: Stollberg, 1934. Facius, Friedrich; Booms, Hans; Boberach, Heinz. Das Bundesarchiv und seine Bestande.

2d ed.

Boppard: Boldt, 1968. Great Britain, Foreign Office. Index to the Correspondence of the Foreign Office, 1937-1939. 4 vols. per year. Nendeln/Liechtenstein: Kraus Reprint, 1969. —, Public Record Office. The Records of the Foreign Office, 1782-1939. London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1969. Heinz, Grete, and Peterson, Agnes F. NSDAP Hauptarchiv: Guide to the Hoover Institution Microfilm Collection. Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1964.

Higham, Robin (ed.). A Guide to the Sources of British Military History. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972.

Kent, George O. A Catalog of the Files and Microfilms of the German Foreign Ministry Archives, 19201945. 4 vols. Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1962-72.

Laqueur, Walter (ed.). Fascism:A Reader's Guide. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976. Létzke, Helmut. Ubersicht iiber die Bestande des Deutschen Zentralarchivs Potsdam. Berlin (East): Riitten & Loening, 1957. Neuburger, Otto. Official Publications of Present-Day Germany. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1944.

x

Robinson, Jacob, and Friedman, Philip. Guide to Jewish History Under Nazi Impact. New York: YIVO, 1960. Very wide bibliographic coverage. Schulthess europaischer Geschichtskalender. 1933-1936. Smyth, Howard M. Secrets of the Fascist Era. Carbondale, Ill: Southern Illinois University Press, 1975. Important on the fate of the Italian archives. Statistisches Jahrbuch fir das Deutsche Reich. 1933-1941 /42. Toynbee, Arnold J. (ed.). Survey of International Affairs. 1937-1939. London: Oxford University Press, 1938-40.

Weinberg, Gerhard L., et al. Guide to Captured German Documents. Montgomery: Ait University, 1952. Supplement. Washington: National Archives, 1959. Wiener Library. From Weimar to Hitler, Germany 1918-1933. 2d ed. London: Vallentine, Mitchell,

1964. Wolfe, Robert (ed.). Captured German and Related Records: A National Archives Conference. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1974. Papers on many aspects of the fate of the German archives. II. Publications of Documents, Speeches, etc. A. Major collections, organized by country

AUSTRALIA Documents on Australian Foreign Policy, 1937-1949. Vol. 1, 1937-1938. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service, 1975. Includes documents from British as well as Australian archives. Cited as Australian Documents.

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AUSTRIA Beitrage xur Vorgeschichte und Geschichte der Julirevolte, Vienna: Bundeskommissariat fir Heimatdienst 1934, Red-White-Red Book. Vienna: Austrian State Printing House, 1947. BELGIUM

Documents diplomatiques belges, 1920-1940. Vols. 4 and 5, La politique de sécurité extérieure, 1936-1940. Brussels: Académie royale, 1965-66. Cited as D.D.B. CANADA

Documents on Canadian External Relations. Vol. 6, 1936-1939. Affairs, 1972.

Ottawa:

Department

of External

FRANCE

Documents diplomatiques francais, 1932-1939. 2d series, 1936-1939. Vols. 3-12. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1967-78. Cited as D.D.F.

Les Evenements survenues en France de 1933 a 1945: Temoignages et documents recueilles par la commission d'enquéte parlementaire. 9 vols. Paris: Presses Universitaires, 1947.

Le Livre jaune francais: documents diplomatiques, 1938-1939. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1939, Cited as French Yellow Book.

GERMANY Documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1945. German edition: Akien zur deutschen auswartigen Politik 1918-1945. Series C, 1933-1937, is cited from the English-language edition, Washington: Gov-

ernment Printing Office, 1957-. Series D, 1937-1941, is cited from the German-language edition, Baden-Baden: Imprimerie Nationale, later P. Keppler, 1950-70. For the period covered by this book, only vol. 6 of Series C remains to be published. Cited as G.D. Documents and Materials Relating to the Eve ofthe Second World War. 2 vols. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1948. Cited as D.M. Documents secrets du ministére des affaires étrangére de l’Allemagne. 2, Hongrie: La politique allemande, 1937— 1943. 3. La politique allemande en Espagne, 1936-1943. Translated by Madeleine and Michel Eristov. Paris, 1946.

United States Office of Military Government for Germany, Finance Division. “Report on the Investigation of the Deutsche Bank.” 4 vols. OMGUS, 1946. Annex. OMGUS, 1947.

Zweites Weissbuch der deutschen Regierung. Basel: Birkhauser, 1939. Cited as German White Book.

GREAT BRITAIN

Stationery Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939. 3d series, 1938-1939. 9 vols. London: H.M. Office, 1949-55. Cited as B.D. Britain and Documents concerning German-Polish Relations and the Outbreak. of Hostilities between Great as British War Blue Book. Germany on September 3, 1939. New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1939. Cited

course of certain Diplomatic Parliamentary (Command Papers): Cmd. 5143. Correspondence showing the 1936. Miscellaneous No. March to 1934 June Discussions directed towards securing a European Settlement, 1936. Office, Stationery M. H. 3 (1936). London: Le HUNGARY i kiad6, Akadémia Budapest: 1-4, Vols. 5. Diploméaciai iratok magyarorszdg kiilpolitikdjahax 1936-194 In cases . document each of s summarie anguage German-l contain 1962-66. These volumes in the indicated is that language, Western where the full document has appeared elsewhere in a Documents. Hungarian as Cited . collection this from cited is t footnote where the documen Aussenpolitik (1933-1944). Budapest: Allianz, Hitler-Horthy-Mussolini: Dokumente ur ungarischen Akadémiai kiad6, 1966. Cited as Aldanz.

Press, 1965. The Confidential Papers ofAdmiral Horthy. Budapest: Corvina

ITALY Libreria dello stato, 1952-. Cited as I Documenti diplomatic italiani. 8th series, 1935-1939. Rome: D.D.L. d by Malcolm Muggeridge. Translated by Stuart Ciano, Galeazzo. Ciano’s Diplomatic Papers. Edite Papers. Hood. London: Odhams, 1948. Cited as Ciano,

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PORTUGAL Dex anos de politica externa (1936-1947). Lisbon: Impresa Nacional, 1961—. Documents on 1936 only about the Spanish Civil War. UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS The major Soviet collection of diplomatic documents, Dokumenty vneshney politiki SSSR, reached 1937 too late for consideration in this work. The USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs has published: Soviet Peace Efforts on the Eve of World War II (September 1938—August 1939). 2 vols. Moscow: Novosti, 1973. Cited as S.U.

Soviet Documents on Foreign Policy, 1917-1941. Edited by Jane Degras. 3 vols. London: Oxford University Press, 1951-53. “The Struggle of the U.S.S.R. for Collective Security in Europe during 1933-1935.” Edited by M. Andreyeva and L. Vidyasova. International Affairs (Moscow). Vol. 9 (1963), No. 6, 107-16; No. 7, 116-23; No. 8, 132-39; No. 10, 112-20.

UNITED STATES Foreign Relations of the United States. Washington: Government Printing Office. All volumes for the years covered by this book have appeared together with several supplementary volumes. The latter include the title of the main series in their titles except for: Peace and War: United States Foreign Policy 1931-1941. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1943. The main series is cited as U.S., followed by the year or title of supplement. Peace and War, United States Foreign Policy 1931-1941. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1943, Important documentary collections from the Roosevelt papers ate: F.D.R.: His Personal Letters, 1928-1945. Edited by Elliot Roosevelt. 2 vols. New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1950.

Franklin D. Roosevelt and Foreign Affairs, January 1933—January 1937. Edited by Edgar B. Nixon. 3 vols. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969.

THE VATICAN Aictes et documents du Saint Siége relatifs a la seconde guerre mondiale. Vol. 1. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1965. Cited as Saint Siége. * Der Notenwechsel zwischen dem Heiligen Stuhl und der Deutschen Reichsregierung. Vol. 1. Von der Ratifizierung des Reichskonkordats bis zur Enzyklika “Mit brennender Sorge.” Mainz: Matthias-Grinewald-Verlag, 1965. B. Other documents and collections, organized by editor Adam, Magda (ed.). “Documents relatifs a la politiqué etrangeré de la Hongrie dans la période de la ctise tchécoslovaque (1938-1939),” Acta Historica, 10, Nos. 1-2 (1963), 89-116; Nos. 3-4 (1964), 373-91. Allen, William S. (ed.). The Infancy of Nazism: The Memoirs of Ex-Gauleiter Albert Krebs, 1923-1933. New York: Franklin Watts, 1976.

Anordnungen des Stellvertreters des Fiibrers. Munich: Eher, 1937. Askew, William C. (ed.). “Italian Intervention in Spain: The Agreements of March 31, 1934 with the Spanish Monarchist Parties.” Journal ofModern History. 24, No. 2 (June 1952), 181-83. Auerbach, Hellmuth (ed.). “Eine nationalsozialistische Stimme zum Wiener Putsch vom 25. Juli 1934.” Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte. 12, No, 2 (April 1964), 201-18. Baynes, Norman H. (ed.). The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, April 1922—August 1939. 2 vols. London: Oxford University Press, 1942. Berber, Friedrich (ed.). Exropaische Politik 1933-1938 im Spiegel der Prager Akten. 3d ed. Essen: Essener Verlagsanstalt, 1942. Boepple, Ernst (ed.). Ado/f Hitlers Reden. Munich: Deutscher Volksverlag, 1934. Bond, Brian (ed.). Chief ofStaff: The Diaries ofLieutenant-General Sir Henry Pownall. Vol. 1, 1933-1940. Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1973. Cited as Pownall Diary.

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Braunthal, Julius. The Tragedy of Austria. London: Gollancz, 1948. Contains a collection of documents edited by Paul R. Sweet: “Mussolini and Dollfuss, An Episode in Fascist Diplomacy.” Bragel, Johann W. (ed.). Stalin und Hitler: Pakt gegen Europa. Vienna: Europa-Verlag, 1973. Bullitt, Orville (ed.). For the President-Personal and Secret: Correspondence between Franklin D. Roosevelt and William C. Bullitt. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1972. Cited as Bullitt Papers. i apyte (ed.). Ohne Maske: Hitler-Breiting Geheimgesprache 1931. Frankfurt/M: Societats-Verlag,

Cannistraro, Philip V., et al. (eds.). Poland and the Coming of the Second World War. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1976. Cited as Biddle Papers. Deuerlein, Ernst (ed). Der Hitler-Putsch, Bayerische Dokumente zum 8./9. November 1923. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962. —. “Hitlers Hintritt in die Politik und die Reichswehr.” Viertelabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte. 7, No. 2 (April 1959), 177-227. Dilks, David (ed.). The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan, 1938-1945. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1972. Cited as Cadogan Diary. Dodd, William E., Jr., and Dodd, Martha (eds.). Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 1933-1938. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1941.

Domaras, Max (ed.). Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen, Verlagsdruckerei Schmidt, 1962.

1932-1945.

2 vols. Neustadt a.d. Aisch:

Emessen, Theodor R. (ed.). Aus Gérings Schreibtisch. Berlin: Allgemeiner Deutscher Verlag, 1947.

Important documents held in the German Democratic Republic. France, Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique. Les Relations militaires franco-belges de mars 1936 au 10 mai 1940. Paris: Editions du Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique, 1968. Gajan, Koloman, and Kvaéek, Robert (eds.). Germany and Cxechoslovakia, 1918-1945: Documents on

German Policies. Prague: Orbis, 1965. Germany, Foreign Ministry. Axssenpolitische Dokumente 1936. Heft 2. Aussenpolitische Vorgange im zweiten Halbjahr 1936. Berlin: Reichsdruckerei, 1937. A copy of the “For official use only” publication is in the Institut fir Zeitgeschichte, Munich. —. Zueites Weissbuch der Deutschen Regierung. Basel: Birkhauser, 1939. —. Weissbuch 7. Dokumente zum Konjlikt mit Jugoslawien und Griechenland. Berlin: Eher, 1941. Gérlitz, Walter (ed.). Generalfeldmarschall Keitel, Verbrecher oder Offixier? Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1961. Cited as Keitel Papers. Gruchmann, Lothar (ed.). Axfobiographic eines Attentaters, Johann Georg Elser. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1970. Heiber, Helmut (ed.). Hitlers Lagebesprechungen: Die Protokollfragmente seiner militarischen Konferenzen, 1942-1945. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962. Hess, Rudolf. Reden. Munich: Eher, 1938. 1974. Cited as Hill, Leonidas (ed.). Die Weizsacker-Papiere, 1933-1950. Frankfurt/M: Propyldéen, nt m : Weizsacker-Papiere. Osterreichische Der Hochverratsprozess gegen Dr. Guido Schmidt vor dem Wiener Volksgericht. Vienna: Staatsdruckerei, 1947. Cited as Guido Schmidt Trial.

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te Weinberg, Gerhard L. (ed.). “Die geheimen Abkommen zum Antikominternpakt.” Vzertelabrshef 193-201. 1954), (April 2 No. 2, Zeitgeschichte, fir (Dec. 19/535). _ “fitler’s Private Testament of May 2, 1938.” Journal of Modern History, 27, No. 4 415-19. of Modern History. —., “National Socialist Organization and Foreign Policy Aims in 1927.” Journal ; 428-33. 1964), 36, No. 4 (Dec. ed Document.” Whealey, Robert H. (ed.). “Mussolini’s Ideological Diplomacy: An Unpublish ani 432-37. 1967), (Dec. 4 No. 39, Journal ofModern History. Acta Historica, 6, Nos. 3-4 Zsigmond, Laszl6é (ed.). “Ungarn und das Miinchener Abkommen.”

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Berle, Adolf A. Navigating the Rapids, 1918-1971. Edited by Beatrice Bishop Berle and Travis Beal Jacobs. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1973. Bialer, Seweryn (ed.). Stalin and His Generals: Soviet Military Memoirs of World War II. New York: Pegasus, 1969. ‘ Bleyer-Hartl, Hans. Ringen um Reich und Recht: Zwei Jahrzehnte politischer Anwalt in Osterreich. Berlin: Traditions-Verlag, 1939. Bliicher, Wipert von. Gesandter zwischen Diktatur und Demokratie: Erinnerungen aus den Jabren 1935— 1944, Wiesbaden: Limes, 1951. Blum, John Morton (ed.). From the Morgenthau Diaries. 3 vols. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959-67. Bohlen, Charles E. Witness to History, 1929-1969. New York: Norton, 1973.

Bonnet, Georges. De Washington au Quai d’Orsay. Geneva: Les Editions du Cheval Ailé, 1946. Boothby, Robert. I Fight to Live. London: Gollancz, 1947. Brautigam, Otto. So hat es sich zugetragen: Ein Leben als Soldat und Diplomat. Wirzburg: Holzner, 1968. Not as revealing as the diary in the Manuscripts Division of the Library of Congress. Brinon, Fernand de. Frankreich-Deutschland 1918-1934. Trans, by Albert Koerber. Essen: Essener Verlagsanstalt, 1935. —. Mémoires. Paris: L. L. C., 1949.

Burckhardt, CarlJ.Meine Danziger Mission, 1937-1939. Munich: Callwey, 1960. Cerruti, Elisabetta. Ambassador's Wife. New York: Macmillan, 1953.

Chamberlain, Neville. The Struggle for Peace. London: Hutchinson, 1939. Speeches edited by Arthur Bryant. Chatfield, Admiral Sir Ernle. The Navy and Defence. 2: It Might Happen Again. London: W. Heinemann, 1947.

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The Ciano Diaries, 1939-1943. Edited by Hugh Gibson. Garden City, N.Y.:

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—. Tagebiicher, 1937-1938. Translated by Hans Mollier and Maximilian Wiesel. Hamburg: Kriger, 1949. Cited as Ciano, Diary. Since there ate various editions in different languages, the date is given in all citations from the two published sections of the Ciano diary. Comnene, Nicolas M. Preludi del grande dramma. Rome: Edizioni Leonardo, 1947. Cot, Pierre. Le Procés de la république. 2 vols. New York: Editions de la Maison Frangais, 1944. This important defense by a former cabinet member includes some documents. Coulondte, Robert. Von Moskau nach Berlin. Bonn: Athenaum, 1950. Dahlerus, Birger. Der letzte Versuch. Munich: Nymphenburger Verlagshandlung, 1948.

Daniels, Josephus. Shirt-Sleeve Diplomat. Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1947, Davies, Joseph E. Mission to Moscow. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1941.

Davignon, Jacques. Berlin 1936-1940: Souvenirs d’une mission. Brussels: Editions universitaires, 1951. Diels, Rudolf. Lucifer ante portas, es spricht der erste Chef der Gestapo. Stuttgart: Deutsche VerlagsAnstalt, 1950.

Dietrich, Otto. 12 Jahre mit Hitler. Cologne: Atlas, 1955. Dirksen, Herbert von. Moskau-Tokio-London: Erinnerungen und Betrachtungen zu 20 Jahren deutscher Aussenpolitik, 1919-1939. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1950. Dodd, William E. Jr. and Martha (eds.). Ambassador Dodd’s Diary. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1941, Duff Cooper, Alfred (Lord Norwich). O/d Men Forget. New York: E..P. Dutton, 1954. Duréansky, Ferdinand. “Mit Tiso bei Hitler.” Politische Studien, 1 (1956), 1-10. Eden, Anthony (Earl of Avon). Facing the Dictators, 1923-1938. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1962.

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Feis, Herbert. 1933, Characters in Crisis. Boston: Little, Brown, 1966. Fitz Randolph, Sigismond-Sizzo. Der Friihstiicks-Attaché aus London. Stuttgart: Hans Riegler, 1954. Flandin, Pierre-Etienne. Politique francaise, 1919-1940. Paris: Editions nouvelles, 1947. Francois-Poncet, André. Ads Botschafter in Berlin 1931-1938. Trans, by Erna Stiibl. Mainz: Florian

Kupferberg, 1949. —. Souvenirs d’une ambassade a Berlin. Paris: Flammarion, 1946. Frank, Hans. Im Angesicht des Galgens. Munich: Friedrich Alfred Beck, 1953.

Frick, Wilhelm. Die Nationalsozialisten im Reichstag. Munich: Eher, 1928 and 1932. Fromm, Bella. Blood and Banquets, A Berlin Social Diary. New York: Harper, 1942. Gamelin, Maurice. Senir. 3 vols. Paris: Plon, 1946. Documents as well as memoirs.

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Heinkel, Ernst. Stiirmisches Leben. Stuttgart: Mundus-Verlag, 1953. Helfferich, Emil. 1932-1946 Tatsachen, Ein Beitrag zur Wahrheitsfindung. Jever (Oldenbourg): Gk Mettcker & Sohne, 1968. Henderson, Nevile. Failure of a Mission: Berlin, 193 7-1939. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1940.

Hentig, Wernet Otto von. Mein Leben eine Dienstreise. Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1962. Herriot, Edouard. Jadis. 2: D’une guerre a l'autre, 1914-1936. Paris: Flammarion, 1952. Hesse, Fritz. Das Spiel um Deutschland. Munich: Paul List, 1953.

Haushofer und Hildebrandt, Rainer. Wir sind die Letzten; aus dem Leben des Widerstandskampfers Albrecht : seiner Freunde. Neuwied/Berlin: Michael, 1949. 1964. Athenaum, Bonn: 1918-1941, Bexiehungen etische Hilger, Gustav. Wir und der Kreml: Deutsch-sowy Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf. 2 vols. Munich: Eher, 1933 edition.

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Krebs, Albert. Tendenzen und Gestalten der NSDAP. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1959. Krivitsky, Walter G. In Stalin’s Secret Service. New York: Harper, 1939. Krogmann, Carl Vincent. Es ging um Deutschlands Zukunft, 1932-1939. Leoni: Driffel, 1976. Kroll, Hans. Lebenserinnerungen eines Botschafters. Cologne: Kiepenheuer, Witsch, 1967. Labougle, Eduardo. Mision en Berfin. Buenos Aires: Guillermo Kraft, 1946. Lang, Serge, and Schenck, Ernst von (eds.). Memoirs of Alfred Rosenberg. Trans. by Eric Posselt. Chicago: Ziff-Davis, 1949. Langoth, Franz. Kampf um Osterreich: Erinnerungen eines Politikers. Wels: Welsermihl, 1951. Laroche, Jules. La Pologne de Pilsudski, souvenirs d'une ambassade 1926-1935. Paris: Flammarion, 1953. Lawford, Valentine. Bound for Diplomacy. London: John Murray, 1963. Leith-Ross, Frederick. Money Talks: Fifty Years ofInternational Finance. London: Hutchinson, 1968. Leonhard, Jakob. Als Gestapoagent im Dienste der Schweizer apap Zurich: Europa-Verlag, 1946. Liddell Hart, Basil H. Memoirs. London: Cassell, 1965. Lindbergh, Charles A. The Wartime Journals of Charles A. Ipadi New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1970. Lindemann, Fritz. Im Dienste Chinas, Erinnerungen aus den Jahren 1929 bis 1940. Peking: Selbstverlag,

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—. Vor dem Abgrund, 1930-1933, Reichsbankprasident in Krisenzeiten. Berlin: Propylaen Verlag, 1964. Macmillan, Harold. Winds of Change, 1914-1939. New York: Harper & Row, 1966. Magistrati, Massimo. “La Germania e l’impresa italiana di Etiopia (Ricordi di Berlino). Revista di Studi politict internazionali. 17, No. 4 (Oct—Dec. 1950). 563-606. —. L'taha a Berlino (1937-1939). Verona: Mondadori, 1956. Maisky, Ivan M. Who Helped Hitler? London: Hutchinson, 1964. Manstein, Erich von. Aus einem Soldatenleben. Bonn: Athenaum, 1958.

Marcus, Ernst. “The German Foreign Office and the Palestine Question in the Period 1933— 1939.” Yad Washem Studies in the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance, 2 (1958), 179-201. Memoirs written in 1946, Massigli, René. La Turquie devant la guerre: Mission a Ankara, 1939-1940. Paris: Plon, 1964. Memoirs including excerpts from documents in the author’s files. Meinertzhagen, Richard. Middle East Diary, 1917-1956. London: Crescent Press, 1959.

Mili¢evic, Vladeta. Der Kénigsmord von Marseille, Bad Godesberg: Hohwacht, 1959, Molotov, Vyacheslav H. The International Situation and Soviet Foreign Policy. Moscow, 1939. Miller, Vincenz. Ich fand das wahre Vaterland. Berlin (East): Deutscher Militarverlag, 1963. Nadolny, Rudolf. Mein Beitrag. Wiesbaden: Limes, 1955. Nicolson, Harold. Diaries and Letters, 1930-1939. New York: Atheneum, 1966.

Noél, Léon. L ‘aggression allemande contre la Pologne. Paris: Flammarion, 1946. Overstraeten, Robert von. Albert I—Léopold III: Vingt ans de politique militaire belge, 1920-1940. Bruges: Desclee de Brouwer, 1949. Papen, Franz von. Der Wabrheit eine Gasse. Munich: Paul List, 1952.

Paul-Boncour, Joseph. Exntre deux guerres. 2. New York: Brentano’s, 1946. Pelényi, John. “The Secret Plan for a Hungarian Government in Exile in the West at the Outbreak of World War I.” Journal ofModern History, 36, No. 2 (June 1964), 170-77, and note following p. 243,

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Peterson, Maurice. Both Sides of the Curtain. London: Constable, 1950. Phillips, William. Ventures in Diplomacy. London: John Murray, 1952. Price, George Ward. I Know These Dictators. New York: Holt, 1938. Raeder, Erich. Mein Leben. 2 vols. Tiibingen: Schlichtenmayer, 1956.

Rauschning, Hermann. Die Revolution des Nihilismus. Zurich: Europa-Vetlag, 1938. —. The Voice ofDestruction. New York: Putnam, 1940. Rheinbaben, Werner Freiherr von. Viermal Deutschland. Berlin: Argon-Verlag, 1954. Ribbentrop, Joachim von. The Ribbentrop Memoir. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1954. Rieckhoff, Herbert Joachim. Trumpf oder Bluff? 12 Jahre deutsche Luftwaffe. Geneva: Interavia-Verlag, 1945. Rintelen, Anton. Erinnerungen an Osterreichs Weg. Munich: Bruckmann, 1941. Rintelen, Enno von. Mussolini als Bundesgenosse: Erinnerungen des deutschen Militdrattachés in Rom, 19361943. Tubingen: Rainer Wunderlich, 1951.

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Schwerin-Krosigk, Lutz von. Memoiren. Stuttgart: Seewald, 1977. Schuschnigg, Kurt von. Austrian Requiem. Trans. by Franz von Hildebrand. New York: Putnam, 1946. —. My Austria. Trans, by John Segrue. New York: Knopf, 1938. Schweppenburg, Leo Geyr von. Erinnerungen eines Militarattachés, London 1933-1937. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1949. Selby, Sir Walford. Diplomatic Twilight, 1930-1940. London: John Murray, 1953. Seraphim, Hans-Giinther (ed.). Das politische Tagebuch Alfred Rosenbergs 1934/35 und 1939/40. Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1964.

Shirer, William L. Berlin Diary 1934-1941. New York: Knopf, 1942. Simon, Sir John. Retrospect. London: Hutchinson, 1952. Speer, Albert. Erinnerungen. Berlin: Propylaen, 1969. —. Spandauer Tagebiicher. Berlin: Propylaen, 1975. Spier, Eugen. Focus: A Footnote of the Thirties. London: Oswald Wolff, 1963. Stehlin, Paul. Temoignage pour l'histoire. Paris: Robert Laffont, 1964. Strang, William (Lord Strang). Home and Abroad. London: André Deutsch, 1956. Strasser, Otto. Ministersessel oder Revolution. Berlin: Kampf-Verlag, 1930. Reprinted in his Aufbau des deutschen Soxialismus (2d ed.; Prague: Heinrich Grunov, 1936). Szembek, Jean. Journal, 1933-1939. Paris: Plon, 1952. A selection from the original in Polish. Cited as Szembek Diary. 13, No. Szymanski, Antoni. “Als polnischer Militarattaché in Berlin, 1932-1939.” Politische Studien,

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Vansittart, Robert. Bones of Contention. New York: Knopf, 1945.

——. The Mist Procession. London: Hutchinson, 1958. Hermagorasbriiderschaft, 1967. Vauhnik, Vladimir. Memoiren eines Militarattachés. Klagenfurt:

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Wiedemann, Fritz. Der Mann der Feldherr werden wollte. Dortmund: Blick & Bild Verlag, 1964.

Wilson, Hugh R. A Career Diplomat: The Third Chapter, the Third Reich. Edited by Hugh R. Wilson, Jr. New York: Vantage Press, 1960.

—. Diplomat Between Wars. New York: Longmans, Green, 1941.

Wimmer, Lothar C. F. Expériences et tribulations d’un diplomate austrichien entre deux guerres, 1929-1938. Translated by Charles Reichard. Neuchatel: Editions de la Baconniéte, c. 1946. Useful for diplomatic reports in addition to those printed in Guido Schmidt Trial, pp. 544-56. Winkler, Franz. Die Diktatur in Osterreich. Zurich: Orell Fissli, 1935.

Zay, Jean. Carnet secréts de Jean Zay (de Munich a la guerre). Edited by Philippe Herriot. Paris: Editions de France, 1942. Important though published by a vehement enemy of the author. Zieb, Paul W. Logistische Probleme der Kriegsmarine. Neckargemiind: Vowinckel, 1961. Ziehm, Ernst. Aus meiner politischen Arbeit in Danzig 1914-1939. 2d ed. Marburg: Herder-Institut, 1960. Zuylen, Pierre van. Les mains libres: Politique exterieure de la Belgique, 1914-1940. Paris: Desclee de Brouwer, 1950.

IV. Secondary Works Abel, Karl-Dietrich. Presselenkung im NS-Staat. Berlin: Colloquium Verlag, 1968.

Abendroth, Hans-Henning. Hitler in der spanischen Arena. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schéningh, 1973. Very important study. Abshagen, Karl Heinz. Canaris, Patriot und Weltbiirger. Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1950.

Absolon, Rudolf. Wehbrgesetz und Wehrdienst, 1935-1945. Boppard: Harald Boldt, 1959. —. Die Wehrmacht im Dritten Reich. 1: 30. Januar 1933 bis 2. August 1934. Boppard: Harald Boldt, 1969. Adam, Colin Forbes. The Life ofLord Lloyd. London: Macmillan, 1948. Adamthwaite, Anthony. France and the Coming of the Second World War, 1936-1939. London: Frank Cass, 1977. Author had some access to the French archives.

Addington, Larry H. The Blitzkrieg Era and the German General Staff, 1865-1941. New Branswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1971. Adler, Selig. “The War-Guilt Question and American Disillusionment, 1918-1928.” Journal of Modern History. 23, No. 1 (March 1951), 1-28. Adli, Abolfazl. Aussenhandel und Aussenwirtschaftspolitik, des Iran. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1960. Adolph, Walter. Kardinal Preysing und zwei Diktaturen: Sein Widerstand gegen die totalitare Macht. Berlin: Morus, 1971.

Aigner, Dietrich. Das Ringen um England: Das deutsch-britische Verhaltnis, die offentliche Meinung 1933— 1939, Tragodie xweier Volker. Munich: Bechtle, 1969. Often cited, but hopelessly unreliable.

Anderson, Mosa. Noe/ Buscton: A Life. London: Allen Unwin, 1952. A full defense of appeasement from the record of a Labor peer. Andrews, Eric Montgomery. Iso/ationism and Appeasement in Australia: Reactions to the European Crises, 1935-1939.

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Australian documents. Aretin, Karl Otmar Freiherr von. “Kaas, Papen und das Konkordat von 1933.” Viertehiabrshefte fir Zeitgeschichte. 14, No. 3 July 1966), 252-79. Armstrong, John A. The Politics of Totalitarianism. New York: Random House, 1961. —. Ukrainian Nationalism, 1939-1945, 2d ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1963. Assmann, Kurt. Deutsche Schicksalsjahre. Wiesbaden: Brockhaus, 1950. Aster, Sidney. “Ivan Maisky and Parliamentary Anti-Appeasement 1938-39.” In Alan J. P. Taylor (ed.), Lloyd George: Twelve Essays, pp. 317-57. London: Hamish Hamilton, 1970. —. 1939: The Making of the Second World War. London: André Deutsch, 1973. Very useful and based on extensive work in British archives and private papers. Baer, George W. The Coming of the Italian-Ethiopian War. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967.

Bagel-Bohlan, Anja E. Hitlers industrielle Kriegsvorbereitung, 1936 bis 1939. Koblenz: Wehr & Wissen, LS 7D:

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Baldwin, Agthut Windham. My Father: The True Story. London: Allen & Unwin, 1955.

Bankwitz, Philip C. F. Maxime Weygand and Civil-Military Relations in Modern France. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967. ee Irmgard. Die Vaterlandische Front: Geschichte und Organisation. Vienna: Buropa-Vetlag,

Bariéty, Jacques. “Léon Blum et l’Allemagne, 1930-1938.” In Les relations franco-allemandes, 19331939, pp. 33-55. Paris: Editions du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1976. Absolutely essential for an understanding of Blum’s foreign policy. Barnett, Correlli. The Collapse of British Power. New York: William Morrow, 1972. Full of interesting and controversial ideas. Bartos, James. Betrayal from Within: Joseph Avenol, Secretary-General of the League ofNations, 1933-1940. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969. Batowski, Henryk. “Polnische diplomatische Akten aus den Jahren 1938/39.” Jabrbiicher fir Geschichte der UdSSR und der Volksdemokratischen Lander, 8 (1964), 425-45. A helpful introduction. —. “Le Voyage de Joseph Beck en Roumanie en octobre 1938.” Annuaire polonais des affaires Internationales, 1959-1960, pp. 137-60. Warsaw:

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am 22. August 1939.” Vierteliahrshefte fiirZeitgeschichte, 16, No. 2 (Aug. 1968), 120-49; 19, No. 3 (July 1971), 294— 304. Bay, Achim. Der nationalsozialistische Gedanke der Grossraumwirtschaft und seine ideologischen Grundlagen. Erlangen-Nutrnberg Diss. Nuernberg, 1962. Beck, Earl R. Verdict on Schacht. Tallahassee: Florida State University Press, 1955.

Bell, Leland V. In Hitler’s Shadow: The Anatomy of American Nazism. Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press, 1973. Beloff, Max. The Foreign Policy ofSoviet Russia. 2, 1936-1941. London: Oxford University Press, 1949.

ben Elissar, Eliahu. La diplomatic du IIe Reich et les Juifs (1933-1939). Paris: Juilliard, 1969. Bennecke, Heinrich. “Die Memoiren des Ernst R6hm.” Politische Studien. 14, No. 148 (1963), 17988. Bennet, Benjamin. Hitler over Africa. London: T. Werner Laurie, 1939. Contains an appendix of

German documents seized at the National Socialist headquarters in Windhoeck in July 1934. Bensel, Rolf. Die deutsche Flottenpolitik von 1933 bis 1939. Beiheft 3 der Marine-Rundschau. Frankfurt/M: Mittler, 1958. Berend, Tibor Iv4n, and Ranki, Gyérgy. “German-Hungarian Relations Following Hitlet’s Rise to Power.” Acta Historica. 8 (1961), 313-46. Bernardini, Gene. “The Origins and Development of Racial Anti-Semitism in Fascist Italy.” Journal ofModern History, 49, No. 3 (Sept. 1977), 431-53. thre Bernhardt, Walter. Die deutsche Aufriistung 1934-1939, Militarische und politische Konzeptionen und Einschatzung durch die Alhierten. Frankfurt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1969. Second Bialer, Uri. ““Humanization’ of Air Warfare in British Foreign Policy on the Eve of the World War.” Journal of Contemporary History, 13, No. 1 (Jan. 1978), 79-96. fide 1954. Bierschenk, Theodor. Die deutsche Volksgruppe in Polen. Kitzingen: Holzner, Racist Nationalism and Bigler, Robert M. “Heil Hitler and Heil Horthy! The Nature of Hungarian 1974), 251— Its Impact on German-Hungarian Relations.” East European Quarterly, 8, No. 3 (Fall 2: of Leopold Il and Belgian Binion, Rudolph. “Repeat Performance: A Psycho-Historical Study is more convincing, work Kieft’s 213-59. (1969), 2 No. 8, Theory, and History .” Neutrality zur nationalsoxialistischen Beitrag Ein 945: 1933-1 Birkenfeld, Wolfgang. Der synthetische Tretbstoff cha 1964. midt, Mustersch : Gottingen litik, Riistungspo Wirtschafts- und Houghton Mifflin, 1966. Birkenhead, Earl of, Halifax: The Life ofLord Hakfax. Boston: Columbia University Press, 1977. York: New Style. ng Negotiati nal Internatio Blaker, Michael. Japanese der diplomatischen Gesprache Spiegel im Bleyer, Hans. “Die ungarlandische Deutschtumsfrage r (1875-1965). Munich: Steinacke Harold fir rift Gedenksch In Berlin.” zwischen Budapest und Oldenbourg, 1966, pp. 297-327.

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Clifford, Nicholas R. Retreat from China: British Policy in the Far East, 1937-1941. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1967. Cohen, Michael J. “Appeasement in the Middle East: The British White Paper on Palestine, May 1939,” Historical Journal, 16, No. 3 (Sept. 1973), 571-96. —. “British Strategy and the Palestine Question, 1936-1939.” Journal of Contemporary History, 1, Nos. 3-4 (July—Oct. 1972), 157-83. Colton, Joel. Léon Blum, Humanist in Politics. New York: Knopf, 1966. Colvin, Ian. Chief ofIntelligence. London: Gollancz, 1951. —. None So Blind: A British Diplomatic View of the Origin of World War II. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1965.

Compton, James V. The Swastika and the Eagle: Hitler, the United States and the Origins of World War II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1967. Conway, John S. The Nazi Persecution of the Churches, 1933-1945. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1968. —. “The Vatican, Great Britain, and Relations with Germany, 1938-1940.” Historical Journal, 16,

No. 1 (Jan. 1973), 147-67. Coox, Alvin D. The Anatomy of a Small War: The Soviet-Japanese Struggle for Changkufeng-Khasan, 1938. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1977. Very detailed. Coverdale, John F. Italian Intervention in the Spanish Civil War. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1975. Author had access to Italian archives. Cowling,

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Crowley, James B. Japan’s Quest for Autonomy: National Security and Foreign Policy, 1930-1938. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966.

Daim, Wilfred. Der Mann, der Hitler die Ideen gab. Munich: Isar, 1958. Dallek, Robert. Democrat and Diplomat, The Life of William E. Dodd. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968. Dallin, Alexander. German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945. New York: St. Martin’s, 1957.

d’Amoja, Fulvio. Declino e prima crisi dell’Europa di Versailles, Studio sulla diplomazia italiana ed europea, 1931-1933, Milan: D. A. Giuffré, 1967. Important for use of the Aloisi papers. Deakin, Frederick W., and Storry, G. R. The Case ofRichard Sorge. London: Chatto & Windus, 1966.

Debicki, Roman. The Foreign Policy ofPoland 1919-1939. New York: Praeger, 1962. Dekel, Efraim. Shai: The Exploits ofHagana Intelligence. New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1959. Delfiner, Henry. The Vienna Broadcasts to Slovakia: A Case Study in Subversion. New York: Columbia University Press, 1974. Delzell, Charles F. (ed.). The Papacy and Totalitarianism Between the Two World Wars. New York: Wiley, 1974. —. “Pius XII, Italy and the Outbreak of War.” Journal of Contemporary History, 2, No. 4 (1967), 137— 61. Denne, Ludwig. Das Danzig-Problem in der deutschen Aussenpolitik 1934-39. Bonn: Réhrscheid, 1959. Dennis, Peter. Decision by Default: Peacetime Conscription and British Defence, 1919-1939. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1972. Detwiler, Donald S. Hitler, Franco und Gibraltar: Die Frage des spanischen Eintritts in den Zweiten Weltkrieg. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1962. Deuerlein, Ernst. Das Reichskonkordat. Diisseldorf: Patmos-Verlag, 1956. Der deutsche Imperialismus und der Zweite Weltkrieg. 2. Berlin (East): Riitten & Loening, 1961. An important collection of studies. Deutsch, Harold C. Hitler and His Generals: The Hidden Crisis, January—June 1938. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1974. Diamond, Sander. The Nazi Movement in the United States, 1924-1941. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell

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Divine, Robert A. Roosevelt and World War II. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1969. Doherty, Julian C. Das Ende des Appeasement. Berlin: Colloquium Verlag, 1973. Dolezel, Stephan. “Deutschland und die Rest-Tschechoslowakei (1938-1939): Besatzungspolitische Vorstellungen vor dem deutschen Einmarsch.” In Karl Bosl (ed.), Gleichgewicht, Revision und Restauration, pp. 253-64.

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;

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ons of the Spanish Civil War. The Esch, P. A. M. van det. Prelude to War, The International Repercussi Hague: Mouton, 1951. a Press, 1963. Eubank, Keith. Munich. Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahom Hermann Rinn, 1956. Munich: 1. Vol. . Gewissens des t Vollmach Die ion. Publikat sche Europai e

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Helmreich, Ernst C. “The Arrest and Freeing of the Protestant Bishops of Wiirttemberg and Bavaria, September—October 1934.” Central European History, 2, No. 2 (June 1969), 159-69. Helmtreich, Jonathan E. Belgium and Europe: A Study in Small Power Diplomacy. The Hague: Mouton, 1976. Henke, Josef. England in Hitlers politischen Kalkul, 1935-1939. Boppard: Boldt, 1973.

Henrikson, Goran. “Das Niirnberger Dokument 386-PS (das ‘Hossbach-Protokoll’).” Lund Studies in International History, 2 (1970), 151-94. Herzfeld, Hans. “Zur Problematik der Appeasement-Politik.” In Geschichte und Gegenwartsbewusstsein: Festschrift fiir Hans Rothfels, pp. 161-97. Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1963. Hiden, John. Germany and Europe, 1919-1939. New York: Longmans, 1977. A useful introduction. —. “The Weimar Republic and the Problem of the Auslandsdeutsche.” Journal of Contemporary History, 12, No. 2 (April 1977), 273-89. Hilberg, Raul. The Destruction ofthe European Jews. Chicago: Quadrangle, 1961. Hildebrand, Klaus. Deutsche Aussenpolitik 1933-1945: Kalkil oder Dogma? Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 19713 —. Vom Reich zum Weltreich: Hitler, NSDAP und kolonlale Frage, 1919-1945. Munich: Fink, 1969.

Hill, Leonidas. “Three Crises, 1938-39.” Journal of Contemporary History, 3, No. 1 (jan. 1968), 113— 44. Reviews the conttibution of the Weizsacket papers to the Munich, Prague, and Polish crises. Hillgruber, Andreas. Deutsche Grossmacht- und Weltpolitik im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Dusseldorf: Droste, 1977. A useful collection of the author’s previously published pieces. Note “Der Faktor Amerika in Hitlers Strategic 1938-1941,” pp. 197-22. —. Hitler, Konig Carol und Marschall Antonescu: Die deutsch-rumdnischen Beziehungen 1938-1944. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1954.

—. Hitlers Strategic: Politik und Kriegfiibrung 1940-1941. Frankfurt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1965. A most important study. Hilton, Stanley E. Brazz/ and the Great Powers, 1930-1939: The Politics of Trade Rivalry. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1975. Based on extraordinary use of Brazilian (as well as U.S., British, and

German) archives. Hirszowicz, Lukacz. The Third Reich and the Arab East. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1966. The History of the Times. 4: The 150th Anniversary and Beyond, 1912-1948, Part II. London: The Times,

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—. Der ungarische Revisionisms und die Zerschlagung der Tschechoslowakei. Tibingen: Mohr, 1967. Cited as Hoensch, Ungarische Revisionismus. Hoepke, Klaus-Peter. Die deutsche Rechte und der italienische Faschismus. Diisseldorf: Droste, 1968. Hofer, Walter. Die Entfesselung des Zweiten Weltkrieges: Fine Studie iiber die internationalen Bexiehungen im Sommer 1939. 3d ed. Frankfurt/M: S. Fischer, 1964. Hohne, Heinz. Codeword “Direktor”. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1971. Pertains to

Soviet espionage in Germany. Holtje, Christian. Die Weimarer Republik und das Ostlocarno-Problem, 1919-1934. Wurzburg: Holzner, 1955.

Hoggan, David L. Der erzwungene Krieg. Tubingen: Verlag der Deutschen Hochschullehrerzeitung, 1961. —. Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf: Die Geschichte der SS. Essen: Bertelsmann, 1969. Holmes, Blair R. “Europe and the Habsburg Restoration in Austria, 1930-1938.” East European Quarterly, 9, No. 2 Summer 1974), 173-84. Homze, Edward L. Arming the Luftwaffe: The Reich Air Ministry and the German Aircraft Industry, 19191939. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1976. A most useful work. Hoptner, Jacob B. Yugoslavia in Crisis, 1934-1941. New York: Columbia University Press, 1962. Author had access to some Yugoslav materials. Hory, Ladislaus, and Broszat, Martin. Der kroatische Ustascha-Staat, 1941-1945, Stuttgart: Deutsche

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Verlags-Anstalt, 1964. Howard, Michael. The Continental Commitment: The Dilemma of British Defence Policy in the Era of the Two World Wars. London: Temple Smith, 1972. Hutter, Joachim, et al. (eds.). Tradition und Neubeginn: Internationale Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte im 20. Jahrhundert. Cologne: Heymann, 1975. Hughes, Judith M. To the Maginot Line: The Politics of French Military Preparations in the 1920's. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971. Hughes, William R. Indomitable Friend: The Life of Corder Catchpool, 1883-1952. London: Housman, 1964. Humbel, Kurt. Nationalsozialistische Propaganda in der Schweiz, 1931-1939. Bern: Haupt, 1976. Hutchinson, Bruce. The Incredible Canadian. Toronto: Longmans, Green, 1953. On Mackenzie King.

Huter, Franz (ed.). Sa#dtirol: Eine Frage des europdischen Gewissens. Munich: Oldenbourg, 1965. Institut fir Zeitgeschichte. Gutachten des Instituts fiir Zeitgeschichte. Vol. 1. Munich: Selbstverlag, 1958. Jackel, Eberhard. Frankreich in Hitlers Europa. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1966. Jacobs, Travis Beal. “Roosevelt’s ‘Quarantine Speech.” The Historian, 24 (Aug. 1962), 489-99. Jacobsen, Hans-Adolf. Nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik 1933-1938. Frankfurt/M: Alfred Metzner,

1968. —. Von der Politik der Gewalt zur Politik der Friedenssicherung. Dusseldorf: Droste, 1977. Collection of papers. Jager, Jérg-Johannes. Die wirtschaftliche Abhangigkeit des Dritten Reiches vom Ausland dargestellt am Beispiel der Stahlindustrie. Berlin: Berlin Verlag, 1969. James, Robert Rhodes. Churchill:

A Study in Failure, 1900-1939. New York: World Publishing Co.,

1970. Jarausch, Konrad. The Four Power Pact 1933. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1965.

Jedlicka, Ludwig, and Neck, Rudolf (eds.). Osterreich 1927 bis 1938. Munich: Oldenbourg, 1973. Jetzinger, Franz. Hitlers Jugend. Vienna: Europa-Verlag, 1956. Johnson, Chalmers. An Instance of Treason, Oxuki Hotsumi and the Sorge Spy Ring. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964. Johnson, Niel M. George Sylvester Viereck, German-American Propagandst. Urbana, Ill: University of Illinois Press, 1972.

Johnston, Verle B. Legions of Babel: The International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1967. Jonas, Manfred. Isolationism in America, 1935-1941. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1966. A

very fine study. “Prophet Without

Honor: Hans Heinrich Dieckhoffs Reports from Washington.” MidAmerica, 47 (July 1965), 222-33. Jones, F. C. Japan's New Order in East Asia: Its Rise and Fall 1937-45. London: Oxford University —.

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Jong, Louis de. The German Fifth Column in World War II. Trans. by C. M. Geyl. Chicago: University ' of Chicago Press, 1956. Studies Joseph, Richard A. “The German Question in French Cameroun, 1919-1939.” Comparative 65-90. 1975), jan. 17 in Society and History, Kahn, David. The Codebreakers. New York: Macmillan, 1967.

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Kochan, Lionel. “Russia and Germany 1935-1937, A Note.” Slavonic and East European Review. 40 (1962), 518-20. —. Russia and the Weimar Republic. Cambridge: Bowes & Bowes, 1954. Kochwasser, Friedrich. Iran und Wir: Geschichte der deutsch-iranischen Handels- und Wirtschaftsbexiehungen. Herrenalb/Schwarzwald: Horst Erdmann, 1961. Koerner, Ralf Richard. So haben sie es damals gemacht: Die Propagandavorbereitungen zum Osterreichanschluss durch das Hitlerregime 1933-1938. Vienna: Gesellschaft zur Forderung wissenschaftlicher Forschung, 1958.

Komjathy, Anthony T. The Crises of France’s East Central European Diplomacy, 1933-1938. New York: Columbia University Press, 1976. Kordt, Erich. Wahn und Wirklichkeit: Die Aussenpolitik des Dritten Reiches. 2d ed. Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1948. Krausnick, Helmut. “Legenden um Hitlers Aussenpolitik.” Vierteljabrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, 2, No. 3

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German-Czech soundings in the 1930’s).” Ceskoslovensky Casopis Historicky. 14 (1966), 887-96. —. “Zur Beziehung zwischen der Tschechoslowakei und den Westmachten vor dem Miinchener Diktat.” Acta Unwersitatis Carolinas, Philosophica et historica, 1968, pp. 209-33.

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Laurens, Franklin D. France and the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis, 1935-1936. The Hague: Mouton, 1967.

Laurent, Pierre Henri. “The Reversal of Belgian Foreign Policy 1936-1937.” Review of Politics. 31, No. 3 (July 1969), 370-84. Lee, Bradford A. Britain and the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1939: A Study in the Dilemmas of British Decline. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1973. Leitner, Hans Erwin. Das haben wir damals nicht gewusst. Eschwege: Werra-Verlagsgesellschaft, 1949.

Good for atmosphere. Lenzing, Hilke. Die deutsche Volksgruppe in Danemark und das nationalsozialistische Deutschland (1933— 1939). Dissertation. Bonn, 1973. Leonhardt, Hans L. Nazi Conquest ofDanzig. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942. Leverkuehn, Paul. Posten auf ewiger Wache. Essen:

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Levine, Herbert S. Hitler’s Free City: The History of the Nazi Party in Danzig, 1925-39. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973. —. “The Mediator: Carl J. Burckhardt’s Efforts to Avert a Second World Wat.” Journal of Modern History, 45, No. 3 (Sept. 1973), 439-55. Lewy, Guenter. The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964. Liang, Hsi-Huey. The Sino-German Connection: Alexander von Falkenhausen between China and Germany, 1900-1941. Amsterdam: Van Gorcum Assen, 1978.

Li, Lincoln. The Japanese Army in North China, 1937-1941. Tokyo: Oxford University Press, 1975. Liu, Chih-pu. A Mikitary History ofModern China, 1924-1949. Princeton: Princeton University Press,

1956. Liu, James T. C. “Getman Mediation in the Sino-Japanese War, 1937-1938.” Far Eastern Quarterly, 8, No. 2 (Feb. 1949), 157-81. Loebsack, Wilhelm. Danzigs Gauleiter Albert Forster. Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1934. Loewenheim,

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American Road to Munich.” Rice University Studies, 58, No. 4 (Fall 1972), 11-79. —. “An Illusion that Shaped History: New Light on the History and Historiography of American Peace Efforts before Munich.” In Some Pathways in Twentieth Century History: Essays in Honor of Reginald Charles McGrane, edited by Daniel R. Beaver, pp. 177-220. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1969. Louis, William Roger. British Strategy in the Far East, 1919-1939. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. Luza, Radomir. Austro-German Relations in the Anschluss Era. Princeton, N,J.: Princeton University Press, 1975.

York: The Transfer of the Sudeten Germans: A Study of Czech-German Relations, 1933-1962. New os New York University Press, 1964. Edinburgh: University Macartney, Carlyle A. October Fifteenth: A History of Modern Hungary. 2 vols.

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1937-39: An IntroMacDonald, C. A. “Economic Appeasement and the German Moderates, ductory Essay.” Past and Present, 56 (Aug. 1972), 105-35. Books, 1977. Mack Smith, Denis. Mussolini’s Roman Empire. New York: Penguin Macleod, Iain. Neville Chamberlain. New York: Atheneum, 1962.

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Freiburg: Rombach, 1975. Ceechoslovak, Republic, 1918-1948. Mamatey, Victor, and Luza, Radomir (eds.). A History of the \ Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1973. 1977. Very Sijthoff, W. A. Geneva: 0. 1938-194 roumain, Marguerat, Philippe. Le [IIe Reich et le pétrole helpful work. gh: Oliver & Boyd, 1964. Macwic Arthur. Clifford Allen, the Open Conspirator. Edinbur d University Press, 1946. Stanfor d: Stanfor . Dilemma Danzig The Mason, John Brown.

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828 Mason, Timothy Westdeutscher Mastny, Vojtéch. and Moravia.”

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Papers 1965, pp. 127-53. New York: Columbia University Press, 1965.

—. The Czechs Under Nazi Rule: The Failure of National Resistance, 1939-1942. New York: Columbia University Press, 1971. Maure, Robert. “The British Decision for Alliance with Russia, May 1939.” Journal of Contemporary History, 8, No. 3 (July 1974), 3-26. McCann, Frank D., Jr. The Brazilian-American Alliance, 1937-1945. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1973. McCarthy, J. M. “Australia and Imperial Defence: Co-operation and Conflict 1918-1939.” Australian Journal ofPolitics and History, 17, No. 1 (Apr. 1971), 19-32. McKale, Donald.

The Swastika outside Germany. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1977.

History of the AO, the foreign section of the National Socialist party. McLachlan, Donald. Room 39:.A Study in Naval Intelligence. New York: Atheneum, 1968.

McRandle, James. The Track ofthe Wolf. Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 1965. Meier-Welcker, Hans. Seeck¢. Frankfurt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1967.

Meinck, Gerhard. Hitler und die deutsche Aufristung, 1933-1937. Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1959. —. “Der Reichsverteidigungsrat.” Webnvissenschafiliche Rundschau. 6, No. 8 (Aug. 1956), 411-22. Meier-Dérnberg, Wilhelm. Olversorgung der Kriegsmarine, 1935 bis 1945. Freiburg: Rombach, 1973. Merkes, Manfred. Die deutsche Politik im spanischen Bungerkrieg 1936-1939. 2d ed. Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1969. Much improved over 1st ed. but hardly definitive. Meskill, Johanna M. Hitler and Japan: The Hollow Alhance. New York: Atheneum, 1966. Metzmacher, Helmut. “Deutsch-englische Ausgleichbemthungen im Sommer 1939.” Véerte/Jabrshefie fiir Zeitgeschichte, 14, No. 4 (Oct. 1966), 369-412. Meyers, Reinhard. Britische Sicherheitspolitik 1934-1938. Diisseldorf: Droste, 1976. Extremely helpful. Michaelis, Meir. Mussolini and the Jews: German-Italian Relations and the Jewish Question in Italy, 1922— 1945. London: Oxford University Press, 1978. Middlemas, Keith. The Strategy of Appeasement: The British Government and Germany, 1937-1939. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1972. Middlemas, Keith, and Barnes, John. Ba/dwin. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1969.

Miege, Wolfgang. Das Dritte Reich und die Deutsche Volksgruppe in Rumdnien 1933-1938: Ein Beitrag zur nationalsozialistischen V olkstumspolitik. Frankfurt/M: Peter Lang, 1972.

Miller, Jane K. Belgian Foreign Policy between Two Wars, 1919-1940. New York: Bookman, 1951. Milward, Alan S. The German Economy at War. London: Athlone Press, 1965. Minart, Jacques. Le drame du désarmement francaise (ses aspects politiques et techniques): La revanche allemande, 1918-1939. Paris: La Nef, 1959. A very useful study of French disarmament policy and its implications. Moltmann, Giinter. “America’s Reaction to the November 1938 Pogrom.” Wiener Library Bulletin, 16, No. 4 (Oct. 1962), 70-71. —. “Franklin D. Roosevelts Friedensappell vom 14. April 1939: Ein fehlgeschlagener Versuch zur Friedenssicherung.” Jahrbuch fiirAmerikastudien, 9 (1964), 91-109. Morley, James W. (ed.). Deterrent Diplomacy: Japan, Germany, and the USSR 1935-1940. New York: Columbia University Press, 1976. Contains translations of important Japanese studies. Mosse, George L. The Crisis of German Ideology, The Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich. New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1964. Motter, T. H. Vail. The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia. Washington: Government Printing Office,

1952. Mueller-Hillebrand, Burkhart. Das Heer 1933-1945. 1: Das Heer bis zum Kriegsheginn. Darmstadt: Mittler, 1954. Miller, Klaus-Jirgen. Das Heer und Hitler: Armee und nationalsozialistisches Regime 1933-1940. Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1969. Myake, Masaki. “Die Achse Berlin-Rom-Tokio im Spiegel der japanischen Quellen.” Mitteilungen des dsterreichischen Staatsarchivs, 21 (1968), 408-45. Useful discussion of the Japanese sources. Mysyrowicz, Ladislas. Avtopsie d'une défaite: Origines de Veffrondrement militaire francais de 1940.

Lausanne: Editions Age d’Hommes, 1973. Namier, Lewis. Diplomatic Prelude, 1938-1939. New York: Macmillan, 1948.

—. Europe in Decay. London: Macmillan, 1950. —. In the Nazi Era. London: Maemillan, 1952. Naylor, John F. Labour's International Policy: The Labour Party in the 1930's. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1969. anal waged The Foreign Policy of France from 1914 to 1945. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, Neumann, H. J. Arthur Seyss-Inguart. Graz: Styria, 1970. Newman, Simon. March 1939: The British Guarantee to Poland. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976.

Niclauss, Karlheinz. Die Sonyetunion und Hitlers Machtergreifung, Eine Studie iiber die deutsch-russischen Bexzehungen der Jahre 1929 bis 1935, Bonn: Rohrscheid, 1966. Nicolson, Harold. King George V. London: Constable, 1952. Niedhart, Gottfried. “Appeasement: Die britische Antwort auf die Krise des Weltreichs und des internationalen Systems vor dem Zweiten Weltkrieg.” Historische Zeitschrift, 226, No. 1 (Feb. 1978), 67-88. Good survey of the literature and interesting ideas. —. Grossbritannien und die Sowjetunion 1934-1939: Studien zur britischen Politik der Friedenssicherung zwischen den beiden Weltkriegen. Munich: Fink, 1972. —. (ed.). Kriegsheginn 1939: Entfesselung oder Ausbruch des Zweiten Weltkriegs? Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1976. Collection of pieces. Nieh, Yu-Hsi. Die Entwicklung des chinesisch-japanischen Konfllktes in Nordchina und die deutschen Vermittlungsbemiihungen, 1937-38. Hamburg: Institut fir Asienkunde, 1970. Noguéres, Henri. Munich ou Ja drole de paix. Paris: Robert Laffant, 1963.

Offner, Arnold A. American Appeasement: United States Foreign Policy and Germany, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969. —. “Appeasement Revisited: The United States, Great Britain, and Germany,

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1933-1940.” Journal

ofAmerican History, 64, No. 2 (Sept. 1977), 373-93. —. “William E. Dodd: Romantic Historian and Diplomatic Cassandra.” The Historian. 34 (Aug. 1962), 451-69. Oprea, I. M. Nicolae Titulescu’s Diplomatic Activity. Trans. by Andrei Bantas. Bucharest: Academy of the Socialist Republic of Romania, 1968. Orlov, Dietrich. The Nazis in the Balkans. Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh University Press, 1968. Ovendale, Ritchie. “Appeasement” and the English Speaking World: The United States, the Dominions and the Policy of “Appeasement,” 1937-1939. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1975. Overy, R. J. “Transportation and Rearmament in the Third Reich.” Historical Journal, 16, No. 2 (June 1973), 389-409. A new look at Astobabnen and Volkswagenwerk. and Paikert, Geza C. The Danube Swabians: German Populations in Hungary, Romania and Yugoslavia 1967. Nijhoff, Hague: The Hitler’s Impact on their Patterns. Press, 1966. Paxton, Robert O. Parades and Politics at Vichy. Princeton, N,J.: Princeton University Important for the French army. 1937. Berlin (East): Peck, Joachim. Kolonialismus ohne Kolonien: Der deutsche Inperialismus und China documents. Akademie-Verlag, 1961. Contains important and the Onset of Pelz, Stephen E. Race to Pearl Harbor: The Failure of the Second London Naval Conference World War II. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1974.

Perman, Dagmar H. The Shaping ofthe Czechoslovak: State. Leyden: Brill, 1962. te. 3, No. 2 (April 1955), Pese, Walter Werner. “Hitler und Italien.” Vierteliahrshefte fir Zeitgeschich 113-26. 6. Tubingen: Niemeyer, Petersen, Jens. Hitler-Mussolini: Die Entstehung der Achse Berlin-Rom 1933-193 1973. Jiirgensen and Reimer Hansen —. “Italien in der aussenpolitischen Konzeption Hitlers.” In Kurt my z, TOTS Wachholt er: Neumunst 206-20. pp. r, (eds.), Historisch-politische Streiflichie Boston: Christopher Publishing House, Peterson, Edward N. Hjalmar Schacht, For and Against Hitler.

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Crisis.”

Index

Italic page numbers indicate the reference is in a footnote. Colonial territories are listed under the names used at the time rather than the current names of

independent states.

Abetz, Otto, 93,136,457, 762

Albania, 95, 450, 597, 672, 675, 715, 776, 735-36 Alexander (king of Yugoslavia), 94, 154, 179, 450

513-14, 517-18, 540-42 Anti-Comintern Pact, 262, 266-67, 269— 70, 295-96, 376, 408-9, 414, 415-18, 421, 425, 430, 440, 480, 502, 597, 651, 653, 657, 664, 666, 668, 669, 671, 674, 695, 716, 736, 743, 766, 777 Antonescu, Victor, 252 AO (Auslandsorganisation). See under NSDAP APA (Aussenpolitisches Amt). See under NSDAP Arabs and Germany, 256-57, 470-74

Alexandretta, 469, 736

Arcziszewski, Mierostav, 772

Aloisi, Pompeo, 37, 153, 184, 208, 260, 261

Argentina

Altenburg, Gunther, 82-84, 263, 496,

Armed Forces Office (see a/so Germany —Wehrmachtamt), 264

Abshagen, Karl Heinz, 572, 605 Abyssinia (see a/so Ethiopia), 393, 394

Adam, Wilhelm, 31, 32, 572-73, 602 Addison, Sir John, 532

Afghanistan, 225, 255, 413, 473 Aga Khan, 374, 557

Air Pact, 163, 172. Alba, Duke of, 407

508, 515, 615 Anderson, Sit John (Viscount Waverly), 678 Anfuso, Filippo, 208, 260, 267, 497, 498 Anglo-German Naval Agreement (1935), 119, 138, 165-70, 218, 281, 308 (1937), 308, 676 Anglo-German Society (Group), 159, 605 Anglo-Italian Agreement (1937), 396 (1938), 388, 516, 596, 670, 671, 683 Angola, 378, 386 Anschluss. (see also Austria —and England;

—and France; —and Germany; —and Italy)

and and and and

England, 365, 392-93 German economy, 514 Hungary, 457-61 Poland, 440-42, 486, 500

and United States, 477 and Yugoslavia, 393, 449, 452, 455,

514 plebiscite of 10 April 1938, 481-82,

and Germany, 57, 482-83

Arnim, Achim von, 247 Arone, Pietro, 742 Astakhov, Georgei, 174, 718, 722-25,

746, 747 Astor family, 201 Astor, Michael, 378, 610 Astor, Waldorf, 393, 575 Atherton, Ray, 767, 298 Attolico, Bernardo, 184, 193, 261, 396,

428, 597-98, 629, 630, 632, 711, 774, 715, 717, 725, 739-42, 744, 769, 772, 774 Aufklérungs-Ausschuss HamburgBremen, 34

Australia (see a/so Dominions), 296-97, 609-10, 678 Austria (see a/so Habsburg restoration), 6, 313,333, 336, 365,379, 385, 389, 492 and Czechoslovakia, 206, 488, 494, 501

and England, 365, 494, 500-501, 507— 9, 511-12, 546, 678 and France, 385, 488, 494, 500, 507-9,

838 51179531 and Germany (see a/so chap. 23), 71-86, 153-54, 164, 183-85, 193, 203, 206— 11, 279, 282, 311, 313-18, 321, 345, 379, 382, 385, 389, 393, 439-40, 449, 484-522 and Hitler, 6, 18, 71-72, 74, 76, 77, 79, 80, 81, 84, 85, 91, 154, 182, 185, 210, 211 and Hungary, 90, 179, 207, 493, 507,

510 and Italy, 163-64, 486, 490-92, 498, 500, 503, 507-10 Austrian legion, 76, 80, 85, 153, 182 Christian Socials, 72, 73 Fatherland Front, 488, 496, 510 Freiheitsbund, 208

Greater German party, 72 Heimwehr, 72, 76, 78, 79, 82, 84, 207 National Socialists (see a/so NSDAP), 487, 492, 495, 496-97, 501, 504, 510-11, 513 Social Democrats, 72, 75, 76, 78 Socialists, 488, 510 Avon, Earl of (see also Eden, Sit

Anthony), 297 Axis. See Germany —and Italy Bad Godesberg (see a/so Chamberlain, Neville), 615, 624, 625 Badoglio, Pietro, 772 Baer, Emil, 727 Baker, Newton D., 107 Balbo, Italo, 598 Baldwin, Stanley, 30, 133, 139, 157, 168, 185, 201, 270, 212-14, 326, 332, 334— 37, 338, 359-60, 368 Balearic Islands, 315, 399, 410, 486, 545 Baltic Sea, 305 Baltic States (see a/so Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), 144, 703, 747 Barcelona, 404, 407, 411 Bardolff, Carl von, 208 Bargeton, Paul, 277 Barthou, Louis, 144, 145, 154, 156 Basque area, 399, 400, 411

Bastianini, Giuseppe, 259 Baudouin, Paul, 683 Bauer, Max, 97 Bazovsky, Peter, 177

Index

Beck, Josef, 48-50, 52-53, 55, 57, 60, 142, 145-46, 150-51, 164, 789, 194— 95, 199-200, 236, 238-39, 244, 372, 313, 321, 391, 420, 433-35, 438, 444, 453, 455-56, 459, 461, 466, 569, 590, 615-16, 627, 646, 649-52, 653, 656— 58, 663-68, 686, 694-96, 707, 705-8, 711-12, 726, 733-34, 778, 786, 794 Third Europe project, 433, 438-42, 530, 593, 665 Beck, Ludwig, 130, 140, 176, 267, 311, 316, 378, 323, 328, 511, 524, 542, 562— 63, 567, 576-80, 587 Paris visit, 312 Behn, Sosthenes, 129, 478 Behrens, Hermann, 216 Belgian Congo, 378, 386 Belgium, 158, 200, 215, 219, 348-51, 382, 387, 444, 544, 610, 626, 685, 725, 736— 38, 767 and demilitarized zone, 191, 197, 203 and England, 345, 348-51, 685, 724, Hey) and France, 348—51, 54445, 610, 626, Toe, and Germany, 348-51, 355, 356, 573, 728, 736—38, 767 and League of Nations, 350-51 foreign policy shift (1936), 219-21 Rexist movement, 220

Benes, Eduard, 39, 163, 177, 245-50, 254, 348, 381, 533-37, 556, 558, 559, 560, 561, 570, 582, 584, 587, 590, 603, 607-8, 617, 619-23, 627, 634, 635, 658, 772 “Fourth Plan”, 571, 603-6, 609, 611, 620 Berchtesgaden (see a/so Chamberlain, Neville), 562, 565, 576, 584, 672, 613— 18, 623-25, 627, 629, 632, 634, 639, 647, 650, 652, 654, 713, 766 Berger-Waldenegg, Egon, 489 Bernhardt, Johannes, 224-26, 227, 264, 397-98, 401-3, 409 Bernheim case, 434 Bernstorff, Johann Heinrich, 11 Bessarabia, 251, 346, 465, 553, 750

Biddle, AnthonyJ. Drexel, Jr., 444, 657, 667, 726, 766, 768, 801 Bilbao, 399, 400

Index

Bingham, Robert W., 298 Bismarck (ship), 308, 580, 748

Bled Agreement (23 August 1938), 455, 466

Bleyer, Jacob, 18, 92 Blitzkrieg, 272, 301, 564 Blomberg, Werner von, 53, 136, 141, 152, 161, 200, 268, 274, 288, 309-12, 315— 16, 376, 318, 319-25, 367, 389, 395, 403, 411, 415, 420-21, 459, 495-96, 537, 541, 577, 794 and Czechoslovakia, 176 and disarmament conference, 37, 128 and Far East, 102, 263, 264, 267, 268 and Rhineland remilitarization, 193, 201 and Spain, 224, 225, 230, 231 Blum, Léon, 210, 213, 218-19, 243, 327, 340, 343, 344, 351, 353-57, 359, 361, 365, 485, 544, 550, 551, 554, 620 and Czechoslovakia, 351, 54446, 551, 620 and Germany, 337, 338, 340, 343, 344, 354, 361, 365 and Italy, 485 and U.S.S.R., 351-52

speech of 24 January 1937, 355 Bodenschatz, Karl-Heinz, 780, 276, 303, SRITISISOLZ IOVIR39 Boehm-Tettelbach, Hans, 586

Bohle, Ernst Wilhelm (see a/so NSDAP — AO), 224, 490 Bomer, Karl, 565 Bonnet, Georges, 551, 559, 687, 689, 701, T6129 7685 775; 783 and Czechoslovakia, 561, 569, 570, 587, 590, 607, 606, 610, 620, 621 Bonyinge, Robert W., 121, 122 Boothby, Robert, 586, 782

Boris (king of Bulgaria), 467 Bottcher, Viktor, 652, 657 Botticher, Friedrich von, 106, 726 Brack, Victor, 176 Bratianu, Georges, 252, 464, 659, 661 Brauchitsch, Walther von, 322, 323, 542, 562, 576-80, 599, 612, 633, 677, 717, TAS ATIAT, 778, 779,780, 194 Braun, Eva, 519

Brazil, 124, 293, 475, 479-83 and Germany, 293, 479-82

839

German minority, 480 Integralists, 481 Bredow, Ferdinand von, 734 Brehmer, Dr. Wilhelm von, 136 Brinkmann, Rudolf, 727 Brinon, Fernand de, 134-36, 156 British Commonwealth (see also Dominions), 296, 610, 791 British Legion, 169, 627, 700 British West Indies, 386 Brockett, Lord, 756 Brunet, René, 620 Brussels Conference (1937), 369, 374, 418, 419 Bulgaria, 95, 707, 780, 181, 225, 250, 254, 467, 468, 658, 660, 694, 698, 728, 734, 736 and England, 734 and France, 468, 658 and Germany, 466-68, 658, 734-35 and Romania, 467, 658, 694, 698, 734 and U.S.S.R., 734

and Yugoslavia, 466 rearmament, 467, 734-35

Bullitt, William C., 106, 113, 316, 339, 344, 351, 355, 357, 494, 532, 569, 589, 606, 688, 701, 712, 732, 733, 761-63, 783 Bulow, Bernhard Wilhelm von, 49, 66, 68, 69, 74, 76, 100, 128, 131, 137, 143— 45, 147, 150-51, 154, 778, 184, 189, 194, 196, 214 Biilow-Schwante, K. A. Vicco von, 753, 473, 519 Bund Deutscher Osten, 148

Burckel, Josef, 513, 541, 542 Burckhardt, CarlJ.,240, 372, 374, 436— 39, 445, 574, 609, 653, 654, 657, 737, 768 Burgenland, 459-60 Butler, R. A. B., 249, 388, 529

Cadogan, Sir Alexander, 361, 370, 384,

535, 546, 549, 551, 574, 575, 611, 617— 19, 623-26, 684-87, 698, 703, 708, 760, 781 Calinescu, Armand, 734

Cameroons (see a/so Dominions), 218, 307, 340, 343, 344, 383, 386, 554 Canada (see also Dominions), 107, 201,

840

Index

475, 547, 609-10, 776 Canaris, Wilhelm, 224, 225, 227, 230, 260, 445, 594, 599, 628, 647, 668, 740, 741, 743, 748, 751, 772 Carls, Rolf, 227

Carol (king of Romania), 180, 252, 463— 66, 648, 659-61 Carpathian German Party, 777 Carpatho-Ukraine, 318, 590, 593, 595, 616, 634, 642-49, 651, 656, 659-64, 691, 693, 698, 706, 707, 714, 722 Carroll, Berenice A., 271, 307 Cazalet, Victor, 552

Cerruti, Vittorio, 33, 47, 67, 132, 183-85, 261, 409, 502 Ceylon, 96, 97

Chamberlain, Neville, 133, 186, 205, 270, 219,330,395 and Czechoslovakia, 535, 547—50, 552,

557-60, 568, 574-75, 584-87, 605— 6, 608, 617, 630, 631, 632, 633, 637, 684, 696, 757-58 and France, 291, 360

and Germany (chaps. 17 and 18 passim), 336, 338, 340, 342, 345, 515, 618, 625, 637, 677, 678, 679, 683, 687, 698-700, 703, 724, 756, 757-58, 760-61, 768, 781-82, 786 and Italy, 360, 371 ‘ and Poland, 699, 708, 709, 761 and rearmament, 326—30, 682, 683

and U.S.S.R., 360, 703-4, 709, 720, 721, 754 and United States, 368, 388, 682 general views, 332, 333-34, 343, 370— 74, 381, 384, 698, 702, 782 meeting with Hitler at Bad Godesberg, 615, 624-25, 630, 634 meeting with Hitler at Berchtesgaden, 608, 613-18, 627, 647, 654 speech of 17 March 1939, 697, 698, 699 speech of 8 April 1938, 552 Changkufeng (Lake Khasan) incident, 429 Chatfield, Lord, 337, 704, 753 Chautemps, Camille, 359, 380, 387, 393 Chiang Kai-shek, 62, 97-100, 103, 105, 263-66, 270, 295, 413-15, 418-21, 423-25, 427

Chicherin, George, 720 Chile and Germany, 225, 287, 487, 483 Chilston, Lord, 600 China

and Germany (see also chap. 20), 96— 105, 263-67, 269, 270, 295-96, 324— 25 and Hitler, 266 and U.S.S.R., 415, 419, 448, 707 Canton regime, 98, 100, 263 German military advisers, 97-100, 263, 266, 270, 415, 423, 424 Hopei-Chahar council, 264 Chinese Eastern Railway, 429 Christie, Graham, 535, 569, 632

Christlich-Soziale Arbeitsgemeinschaft (CSA), 68 Churchill, Winston S., 138, 199, 202, 226, 326, 330, 334, 335, 373, 545, 556, 560, 582, 585, 586, 610, 638, 770, 797 Chvalkovsky, Frantisek, 640, 641 Ciano, Edda, 208 Ciano, Galeazzo, 416, 466, 490, 493, 494, 495, 503, 509 and Czechoslovakia, 530, 598-99, 631

and England, 376 and Germany, 376, 484, 493, 494, 495, 498, 502, 516, 517,518, 714, 717— 18, 739, 742-43, 767, 770-72, 774, 775

at Salzburg meeting, 739, 740-43, 747, 763 and Hungary, 732 and Poland, 665, 667, 717, 739 and Spain, 406 and Tripartite Military Alliance, 426— 31, 669-75 and U.S.S.R., 778, 722 and Yugoslavia, 451, 493, 714, 770 Cincar-Markovié, Aleksander, 658, 735, 736 Clerk, Sir George, 155 Clive, Sir Robert, 544 Cliveden, 559, 670 Coar, John F., 112, 113 Codreanu, Cornelius, 463, 464, 660 Collier, Laurence, 69, 602 Colonial question, 42, 43, 104, 123, 191— 92, 215-19

Index

841

Colvin, Ian, 708 Comintern, 62, 175, 227, 243, 267, 270, 554, 661-63, 480 Comnen, Nicolae Petrescu-, 277, 464, 465, 607 Condé, Charles-Marie, 783 Condor Legion, 228-29, 396, 397, 400— 402, 403, 406, 408, 409, 410, 489 Congo Basin Treaties, 386 Conwell-Evans, Philip, 362, 605, 606, 756 Corbin, Charles, 191 Cot, Pierre, 38, 67 Coulondre, Robert, 600, 677, 756, 769, BIOs P1267 LRG Cox, James M., 107 Craig, Malin C., 688 Craigie, Sir Robert L., 168, 426 Cranborne, Lord, 388 Croatia, 449, 450, 454 Croatian nationalism, 449-50, 714

538-39, 542, 583, 592, 616-17, 621-— 22, 628, 634, 636, 661 and Italy, 314, 517-21, 522, 530, 543, 597-600, 629

Cryptography and codes, 296, 333, 418,

May Crisis, 515, 527, 542-44, 558, 561-70, 574, 582, 584, 591 Munich Conference, 631, 635-38, 639-41, 644, 658, 659, 684, 689 Skoda works, 637, 646

465, 514, 670, 749, 752, 753 Csaky, Istvan, 732 Cudahy, John, 147

Czechoslovakia. (see a/so Little Entente;

and League of Nations, 248 and Poland, 236, 239, 244, 352, 440, 442-45, 524, 530, 542, 561, 569, 590-92, 595, 607, 615-16, 621-22, 627, 634, 636, 642, 649-57 and Rhineland remilitarization, 199, 203, 243 and U.S.S.R., 164, 245, 351-54, 527, 535, 544, 550, 551-54, 590, 599— 602, 678, 626, 635, 706 and Yugoslavia, 530, 735 army, 35

army and fortifications, 560, 565, 566 Hungarian minority, 590, 592, 593, 616

International: Commission (on boundaries), 634, 640, 647

Sudeten area; Sudeten Germans;

Sudeten German party) Activist parties, 528, 533 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 249, 661 and Austria, 206, 493, 501 and Dominions, 297 and England, 244-45, 365, 381, 470, 532, 540, 542, 546, 554, 564, 567— 68, 581, 603, 622—23, 625—26, 634, 635, 644, 678, 683-85, 696, 752, 756-575-759, 785 and France, 199, 244, 346, 348, 349, 351-52, 380-82, 383, 386, 525, 531— 35, 540, 542, 544-46, 551, 554, 560— 61, 564, 567-68, 569, 583, 586, 601, 603, 605-7, 610-11, 618, 622-29, 631, 634, 635, 637, 644, 701, 763

and Germany (see also chaps. 24 and 25), 19, 86-89, 175, 176-78, 243-50, 940411; 313-18, 336, 339,342,344, 346, 380-82, 393, 428-30, 439-40, 462, 466, 639, 664-65, 693 and Hitler, 19, 88, 91, 245, 248-49. and Hungary, 91, 178,244, 250-51, 445, 457-58, 459, 520, 524, 530,

Dachau, 737 Dahlerus, Birger, 759, 769, 774, 776, 781, 785

Daily Herald, 721 Daitz, Werner (see also NSDAP —APA), 90-91, 101, 103, 777, 140, 156

Daladier, Edouard, 134-35, 544, 550,

555, 557, 559, 687; 688, 771, 775, 783 and Czechoslovakia, 557, 561, 588, 610-11, 619, 623, 631, 633, 761 and Germany, 701, 761, 770 and Poland, 707 Dalton, Hugh, 327, 333, 573, 618, 624, LO20TAO Daluege, Kurt, 490 Dampierre, Robert de, 346-47 Danubian Pact, 155, 163, 172

Danzig (see also Germany —and Poland), 13, 42, 43, 49-57, 59, 68, 148-51, 194, 236, 239-41, 261, 279,333, 386,.432— 40, 442, 504, 505, 549, 574, 591, 592, 616, 650-53, 656-58, 664, 666-67, 686, 695-96, 712, 714, 727, 730,-739, 740, 742, 752, 765, 787, 784

842 Jewish population, 436, 438, 439, 652

Daranyi, Kalman, 251, 455, 456, 457, 459-61, 643, 644, 648, 649, 652 Darlan, Jean F. X., 346 Darré, R. Walther, 273, 306 Davies, Joseph, 553, 601

Davignon, Jacques, 220 Davila, Charles A., 465

Davis, Norman H., 107, 108, 202, 368 Davis, William Rhodes, 483 Dawson, Geoffrey, 378, 554, 605 de Gaulle, Charles, 226, 303 Degrelle, Léon, 220

Delbos, Yvon, 213, 344, 348, 354, 359, 380, 381, 387, 443, 454, 465, 485, 494, 531, 592,536, 537,938, 961 Denmark and Germany, 737 DEROP (Deutsche Vertriebsgesellschaft fiir russische Olprodukte A.G.), 63 Deterding, Sir Henry, 140 Deutsche Stiftung, 445

Index

364—65, 381, 383, 475, 500, 526, 536, 548, 568, 605, 625, 626, 630, 682, 685, 699, 708, 724, 756, 776, 782, 791, 797 D6nitz, Karl, 309 Draganov, Parvan, 467, 746

Duff Cooper, Alfred (Lord Norwich), 202, 213, 556, 605, 617, 612, 618, 626 Duke of Windsor (see also Edward VIII), 334 Durango (Spain), 400 Eastern Locarno Pact, 88, 134, 135, 151, L¥25173 Ebbutt, Norman, 375, 378

Ebro (battle), 406 Eden, Sir Anthony (Earl of Avon) (chaps. 17 and 18 passim), 297, 372, 319, 353, 355, 494, 500, 546, 610 1934 trip to Berlin, 137, 159

1935 trip to Berlin, 161 1935 trip to Moscow, 163, 768

1935 trip to Prague, 245

Deutscher-Kolonial-Dienst, 216

1935 trip to Warsaw, 163, 164

Deutschland (ship), 617

478, 681 Diels, Rudolf, 788

and and and and and

Dienststelle Ribbentrop (see also Ribbentrop, Joachim von), 138-39, 246, 262, 267, 413, 417 Dietrich, Otto, 27, 321, 334, 378, 490

Leamington address (1936), 346 Prague, 163

bombing incident, 362—63, 400, 470 Dieckhoff, Hans Heinrich, 722, 795, 294,

Dirksen, Herbert von, 52, 54-55, 105,

264, 267-68, 321, 324, 362, 389, 419, 420, 423, 502, 506, 573, 575, 580, 582, 697, 758, 759 Disarmament, 342, 346, 368, 385, 391 limitations on ait warfare, 385

Disarmament conference (see also Germany —rearmament and Hitler, Adolf), 32-44, 126-32 Djuvara, Mircea, 464 Dobler, Jean, 788

Dobruja, 467, 734 Dodd, William E., 69, 107, 110, 113-24, 145, 196, 248, 369, 478, 479 Dollfuss, Engelbert, 84, 72-85, 90-91, 118, 141, 153, 185, 289, 485, 487, 488, DTD. Dominions, 201, 296-99, 343, 345, 362,

Czechoslovakia, 532, 536 France, 213 Lord Halifax, 373, 379 Nevile Henderson, 332, 333 Rhineland remilitarization, 197, 198 and United States, 368-71

resignation, 387, 388-89

Edward (Prince of Wales, subsequently Edward VII), 169, 195, 202 Edward VII (king of England), 334 Edward VIII, Duke of Windsor, 326;

334-35 Egypt, 255, 329, 410, 473 Eichmann, Adolf, 76 Hisenlohr, Ernst, 245, 537, 570 Elbe River, 214-15, 490 Eltz-Riibenach, Freiherr von, 28

Engerau, 644 England, 33, 46-47, (see also AngloGerman Naval Agreement; Ethiopia; London Naval Conference; Rhineland

remilitarization; Ribbentrop, Joachim von; World Economic Conference) air fotcést57) 287; 3292305510557,

Index 588, 609, 612 Air Ministry, 139, 557 air-raid defense, 329, 547, 612, 637,

678 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 365, 376, 408 and Austria, 75, 78, 154, 206, 365, 392, 493-95, 500-501, 507, 509-12, 546, 678 and Belgium, 346, 349, 350-51, 685, CAM Ys and Bulgaria, 734 and China, 478 and Czechoslovakia, 244-45, 365, 380-82, 470, 531, 532, 540, 542, 546, 554, 564, 567-68, 581, 603, 616, 622—23, 625-26, 634, 645, 678, 683-84, 685, 696, 752, 757, 759, 785 guarantee of, 381, 536, 550, 583, 611, 618, 620-22, 624, 632, 683— 84 and Czechoslovak-Polish relations, 347, 591 and Danzig, 657, 686, 755—56, 782 and Dominions, 381, 605 and France, 197—200, 290-91, 328, 329, 330-31, 338-45, 347, 363, 379, 386-88, 391, 544-45, 547, 554, 568, 576, 587, 606—7, 618, 620, 627, 672, 678, 683, 686, 699, 700, 702, 708, 710, 761, 776, 783 staff talks, military cooperation, 546, 710

and France (see a/so Ethiopia, Little Entente, Rhineland remilitarization) staff talks, military cooperation, 387, 545, 550, 556, 609, 753, 762 and Germany, 157-62, 164-69, 211— 14, 290-91, 293, 301, 308, 313-14, 317, 318, 365, 420, 421-22, 494, 508-10, 514, 546, 553, 558-59, 564, 573, 583-84, 585, 612, 640, 662, 673, 677-87, 696-702, 716-19, 729, 741-42, 753, 755-61, 771, 775-83 Anglo-German declaration, 635, 639, 672, 679 war warning to, 392, 547, 554, 557, 564-65, 568, 583-86, 604-10, 612, 626, 627, 632, 700, 702, 760— 61

843 and Greece, 451, 468, 678-79, 700, WAS and Hitler, 165-66, 168-69 and Holland, 685 and Hungary, 460, 462, 622, 627 and Italy, 209-11, 315, 329, 330, 333, 337, 370-71, 388-89, 394-95, 410, 491, 493-95, 509, 516, 520, 546, 596, 626, 630-31, 669, 673, 683, 685, 714) 761, 771=72, 775,781, 782 and Japan, 296, 329-30, 415-16, 422, 425-27, 429, 670, 672-73, 716-19, 724, 740, 743 and Lithuania, 68-69 and Memel, 654 and Near East, 470

and Poland (see a/so Ironside, Edmund —trip to Warsaw), 440, 442, 444,

549, 590, 591, 627, 649, 665, 667, 684, 686, 695, 699, 701, 707-9, 711, /LOMISOMIOD, SOP OO LA 11D, 776-78, 781-83 alliance, 770, 772 guarantee, 709, 711, 755, 758, 760 staff talks, 753

and Romania, 465, 466, 660, 661, 678— 79, 697-700, 702, 707, 715, 719, 733 and Spain, 399-401 and Turkey, 451, 468-69, 678-79, 700, 736 and U.S.S.R., 347, 352, 353, 365, 410-— 11, 550, 600-602, 611, 626, 685, 689-91, 699, 703-4, 707-10, 718— 25, 752-55, 760, 772 and United States, 327, 331, 339, 359— 61, 366, 391, 392-93, 548, 556, 606, 685, 710, 726, 744 Trade Agreement (17 November 1938), 360, 368, 371, 681 and Yugoslavia, 333, 347, 450, 451, 454, 700, 735 army, 290, 327-28, 545, 609, 683, 710 cabinet, composition, 679, 770 chiefs of staff, 329-30, 383, 387, 547, 612,629 colonial question, 297—98, 337, 366,

370, 380-82, 383, 554-55, 559, 679— 80, 682 conscription, 327, 678, 683, 710, 727,

756

844

Index

Conservative party, 335 Czechoslovakia, guarantee of, 582, 605 economic issues, 337, 359 Foreign Office, 301, 308, 329, 332-34, 339, 340, 345, 350, 361, 369, 378— 79, 387, 510, 532, 535, 536, 544, BAT; 5519-560) 572, 582,585,597, 600, 605, 618, 629, 680, 752, 754, 761, 781 general views, 361, 568 foreign policy, 290-91, 328-30, 364— 67, 686, 752, 795-97, 802 foreign trade, 293, 678-79, 687 Labor party, 133, 327, 335, 610, 678, 620, 621, 678, 683, 702, 710; 719 Liberal party, 327, 683, 710 navy, 308, 329, 609, 626, 628 policy, 329, 340, 349, 372, 379, 382, 384, 387, 391, 392, 547-48, 551-52, 555, 556, 568, 569, 585, 605, 610, 611, 612, 618-19, 622-26, 629, 682, 683, 697, 700, 708, 770, 753, 755— 56, 760, 776, 781, 782 press, 378, 385, 391 rearmament, 326—30, 338, 368, 384, 550, 678, 684 Rosenberg visits, 30-31 view of war, 365-67, 393, 547-48,

703-5, 706, 753

f

Epp, Franz Ritter von, 72, 74, 675, 727

Estonia, 156, 292, 733 and Germany, 750 and U.S.S.R., 750 Ethiopia, 122, 154-55, 163, 170-71, 182, 183, 784, 185, 186, 187, 192, 2027209) 2105224923202370259 289, 298, 370, 485, 492, 520, 771, Eupen-Malmédy, 220, 356, 737

176, 200, 2261, 789

Faber du Faur, Moriz von, 393, 395 Fabre-Luce, Robert, 734 Fabricius, Wilhelm, 659 Fabry, Phillip W., 5 Falkenhausen, Alexander von, 99, 700, 263, 264 Faupel, Wilhelm, 230-32, 395, 396, 400, 403, 404, 405

Ferdinand Heye, 1014 Ferrostaal A. G., 256 Fey, Emil, 82, 84

Fierlinger, Zdenék, 600, 607 Finland

and Germany, 750 and U.S.S.R., 703, 706, 750 Fischel, Hermann von, 363 Fitz Randolph, Sigismond-Sizzo, 573, 628 Flandin, Pierre-Etienne, 797, 198-201, 205, 213, 701; 775/776 Flick, Friedrich, 147 Forster, Albert, 51, 56, 59, 68, 77, 149, 151, 237, 238, 240, 241, 276, 321-22, 436-38, 441, 504, 505, 573-74, 609, 652, 653, 654, 730, 752

trip to England, 573-74, 582 Four-Power Pact, 39, 42-44, 58, 130, 131 Four-Year Plan, 120, 125, 780, 192, 218, 225, 240, 242, 262, 271-77, 280, 304— 7, 309, 312, 322, 397, 403, 413, 467, 489, 527, 578, 731, 735 France (see a/so Ethiopia, Little Entente, Rhineland remilitarization), 31, 33, 197, 281-83, 289-91, 331 air force, 290, 330-31, 346, 382, 387, 557, 588, 635, 683, 688 and Austria, 75, 78, 154, 206, 207, 206-7

and Belgium, 348-52 and Bulgaria, 468, 658 and Czechoslovakia, 199, 244, 387, 531-32, 533, 540, 543, 551, 561, 564, 567-69, 569, 587, 601, 603, 606, 610-12, 622-29, 637, 634, 635, 637, WOOL 763

345-48, 54446, 583, 618, 644,

and Danzig, 657, 701 and disarmament conference, 126, 129 and England, 168, 171, 189, 197-200, 219, 290-91, 328, 329, 330-32, 338— 45, 347, 363, 379, 386-88, 391, 545, 547, 554, 568, 576, 587, 606-7, 609, 618, 672, 678, 683, 686, 699, 700, 702, 708, 710, 761,776, 783 and Germany, 36-37, 39, 43, 48, 59, 131-37, 153, 155-57, 172-73, 189, 195, 212; 213, 20943072873115313— 1453185826, 331, 3371339240) 344. 354, 421-22, 508-9, 554, 564, 588, 612, 635, 639, 671-72, 673, 677, 687-89, 700-702, 729, 741-42, 756,

Index

761-63, 769-71, 775-76, 783 Franco-German declaration (December 1938), 635, 656, 671— 72, 687 wart scare overt Spanish Morocco (January 1937), 355, 396, 564, 565 and Greece, 715 and Halifax visit, 374, 375, 379 and Hitler, 6-8, 14-16, 24, 91, 134, 157, 160, 228 and Hungary, 622

and Italy, 154-55, 763, 170, 172, 182, 186, 192, 209-11, 314, 394-95, 410, 485, 498, 516, 545, 596, 626, 631, 671, 673, 675, 683, 688, 715, 776, 717, 739-A0, 771, 775 and Japan, 716, 723-24 and Little Entente, 346—48, 351, 450-

51, 465 and Poland, 48-49, 59-60, 145-46, 199-200, 349, 351, 352, 434, 440, 443, 444, 590-91, 622, 627, 649, 665, 686, 687, 709, 753, 761-64, 775-76, 783 military cooperation, 763 and Romania, 199, 465, 466, 545, 659, TaLoy foo and Spain Spanish Civil War, 354-56, 359, 405, 408 and Turkey, 468—69, 736

and U.S.S.R., 64-65, 172-74, 352-54, 410, 449, 552-54, 561, 600-602, 627, 687, 689, 701, 703-4, 707, 725, 752-55, 761-63 and United States, 339, 366, 367, 387, 479, 557, 682, 688, 726 and Yugoslavia, 346-47, 450, 451, 452,

545 army, 330, 346, 531, 545—46, 578, 588— 90, 626-27, 688, 701, 783 army and military planning, 35, 190— 91, 197, 198, 204, 282-83 colonial question (see also Schacht,

Hjalmar —colonial question), 380— 82, 383, 554-55 foreign policy, 346, 382, 393, 635, 704, 794-95 Popular Front, 359 rearmament, 345-47, 387

845

Franco, Francisco (see also Spain —Civil War), 221-33, 259-60, 269, 277, 280, 289, 307, 315, 354, 394-412, 448, 486, 489, 494, 728, 740, 751 Francois-Poncet, André, 133, 136, 188— 89, 196, 218, 277-289, 305, 313, 344, 345, 355, 356, 397, 490, 508, 559, 586— 87, 608, 611, 629, 631, 687, 756 and Czechoslovakia, 559, 567, 564, 586, 587-88, 617, 628-29, 633 general views, 356 Francqui, Emile, 369 Frank, Hans, 72-74, 146, 194, 202, 208, 260, 321, 322, 490, 492, 500, 502, 597, 607, 748, 767 Frank, Karl Hermann, 570, 603 Frauenfeld, Alfred, 182 Free Corps (post-World War I Germany), 21, 624, 791 Freisler, Roland, 74 French Equatorial Africa, 386 French Indochina, 791 Frére, Maurice, 356 Frick, Wilhelm, 567, 732 Friends of the New Germany, 114-15, 475, 476 Fritsch, Werner von, 140, 176, 189, 231— 32, 309, 311, 315-16, 318-20, 395, 527, 537, 576-77 Fritsch-Blomberg crisis, 319-25, 577 Fritzsche, Hans, 697 Fuerholzer, Edmund, 265—66, 266 Fuller, Samuel R., Jr., 113, 123, 218, 217— 18, 479 Funck, Hans von, 403 Funk, Walther, 30, 306, 379 Gafencu, Grigore, 661, 733, 734 Gambia, 343, 345, 386 Gamelin, Maurice, 190, 198, 239, 372, 351, 537, 544, 545, 546, 555, 556, 564, 587, 589, 617, 626, 783 Gandhi, Mohandas K., 373, 378 Gauché, Maurice, 797, 531

Gazeta Polska, 152 Gdynia, 42, 446, 667 Gedye, G.E.R., 208

Gehl, Jiirgen, 211 Gemzell, Carl-Axel, 779

Geneva Convention (1922), 434

846

Index

Germany, —and Germany, Anglo-

Georg Thomas, 270, 273, 301

George II (king of Greece), 468 George V (king of England), 759, 191,

195, 283, 334, 353 George VI (king of England), 274, 334, 353, 494, 637 Gerl, Franz, 568 German East Africa, 32, 297, 343, 374,

378, 386 German News Agency (DNB), 83, 375 German Southwest Africa, 217, 297, 390 German-American Bund, 475-77, 478,

680 German-Polish Society, 592 Germany. (see also Anglo-German Naval Agreement; Colonial question; Eastern Locarno Pact; Hitler, Adolf; NSDAP;

Rhineland remilitarization) 30 June 1934 purge, 80, 84, 118, 141,

153, 288,321,677 Abwehr (see a/so Canaris, Wilhelm),

585, 646 agriculture, 306 ait force (see also Condor Legion and rearmament), 287, 288, 303-4, 308,

309, 317, 329, 411, 542, 551, 567, 578-80, 610, 676, 729, 735 and Afghanistan, 255 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 105 and Arabs, 256—57, 470

“

and Argentina, 482-83 and Austria (see also chap. 23), 71-86, 154, 182-86, 206-11, 311, 313-18, 521 ,345,13:79, 382,385, 389302, 439-40, 449 and Belgium, 219-20, 348-51, 356, 573, 728, 736-38, 767 and Brazil, 293, 479-83 and Bulgaria, 253-54, 466-68, 658,

728, 734-35 and Carpatho-Ukraine, 646, 722

and China (see also chap. 20), 97-100, 103-5, 263-66, 295-96, 324 and Czechoslovakia (see also chaps. 24 and 25), 86-89, 176-77, 243-50, 310-11, 313-18, 336, 339, 342, 344, 345, 380-82, 429, 439, 462, 466, 639, 664-65, 693 and Denmark, 737

and England (see a/so England —and

German declaration, and Halifax, Lord —and Germany, visit to, and Hossbach Conference), 132-34, 148—51, 157-62, 164-69, 193, 211— 14, 219, 235, 262, 269, 290-91, 293, 301, 303, 308, 313=14,.317;319, 421-22, 494, 508-10, 514, 546, 554, 558-59, 564, 573, 583-86, 612, 639, 662, 673, 677-87, 696-701, 716-19, 729, 741-42, 753, 755-61, 771, 775— 82 and Estonia, 292, 733, 750 and Ethiopia, 170, 171, 182 and Finland, 750 and France, 35-39, 43, 48, 59, 131, 133-37, 153, 155-57, 172-73, 188, 189,019 502125213 930352 307-8931, $1314 318,326, 331, 3306339, 340, 344, 354, 421-22, 508-10, 554, 564, 588, 635, 639, 662, 671-72, 673, 677, 687-88, 700—702, 716-19, 729, 741-42, 761-64, 770-71, 775— 76, 783 and Greece, 95, 181, 254, 468 and Holland, rumors of German invasion plans, 685, 767 and Hungary, 89-93, 177-79, 250-51, 456-62, 464, 514, 538-39, 593-96, 612, 615-17, 628, 632, 643, 661-63, 693,714,728, 731233 and Iran, 256, 473 and Iraq, 255, 470, 471

and Italy (see also chap. 23), 18, 33, 41— 42, 14,80,,85, 13.132, 153254, 182-86, 192-93, 194, 206-11, 213, 216, 227, 228, 232, 258-62, 289, 296) 3126 3155320, 3473680975, 380, 394-95, 399, 410, 427-28, 465, 471, 473, 484-522, 543, 562-63, 594, 596-600, 629, 644, 647, 669— 75, 678, 691, 714-18, 738-43, 761, 767, 770-72, 774-75, 781 military cooperation, 738-39 and Japan (see also chap. 20), 97, 99, 216, 258, 261, 264-70, 295-96, 324, 375, 390, 413-31, 669-74, 716-19, 724, 743-44, 766 and Latin America, 12425, 291-92, 479-83

Index

and Latvia, 292, 750 and League of Nations, 32, 56-57, 76, 130-31, 135-36, 148, 172, 195-96, 200, 216, 261, 279, 365 and Lithuania, 67—69, 261, 442-46, 654-55, 694, 731, 750 and Manchukuo, 324, 421, 423, 677 and Mexico, 292, 483 and Palestine, 256

and Poland, 14-15, 31, 42, 48-61, 145-53, 160, 164, 194-95, 236-41, 289, 314, 352, 393, 433-45, 524, 526, 530, 590-93, 615-16, 624, 628, 632, 646, 649-58, 663-69, 694, 703— 4, 707-9, 711, 717, 718, 726, 750, 763, 765, 773, 776, 780-81, 786 and Portugal, 307 and Romania, 94—95, 180-81, 251-53, 462-66, 658, 659-61, 693-94, 697— 99,707, 728, 733-34, 767 and Saudi Arabia, 470-71

847 54, 289, 346, 347, 364, 449-56, 460 61, 514, 658, 714, 728, 735-36 army (see a/so military planning), 287— 89, 302-3, 307-8, 310, 318-25, 330, 525, 542, 566-67, 576-78, 581, 586, 595, 602, 603, 607, 612, 615, 628, 636, 637, 640, 642, 646, 677, 712, LOPEZ 76S, hay alee 1 ORF Oo, 803 Catholics, 4446 church struggle, 302, 477 colonial question, 297-98, 306-7, 377,

313,,333$337, 676 conscription, 161

consolidation of N.S. regime (Gleichschaltung), 25-26, 50-51,

140-41 domestic situation, 288-89, 301-3,

515-16, 578, 607-8, 628, 633, 677, 7133722, 730, 757, T7907 91=92 economy (see a/so Germany —foreign

and Scandinavia, 731

trade, —Four-Year Plan), 26-28,

and Sino-Japanese war (see a/so chap. 20 passim), 324-25, 413-31

191-92, 271-76, 301, 304, 317, 337, 338, 383, 543, 578-79, 580, 727, 729; T32,-785

and Slovakia, 665, 693-95 and Southeast Europe, 93, 95, 181,

OAT 255261 and Spain (see also chap. 19) Spanish Civil War, 211, 221-33, 260, 287, 289, 292, 307, 314, 394— 412, 728 and Sweden, 305, 728, 731 and Turkey, 95, 181, 203, 255, 468-70, 728, 736-37, 767 and U.S.S.R., 32, 52, 54, 61-67, 101, 142-45, 168, 173-75, 241-43, 268, 269, 280, 289, 307, 311, 314, 339, 342, 343, 344, 352-54, 409, 442, 446-49, 552, 591, 599-602, 646, 662, 673, 689-91, 706, 709-10, 772, 718-25, 733, 744-51, 758, 767-68, 784, 799-801 and Ukraine, 70 and Union of South Africa, 201 and United States, 93, 106-25, 281, 293-95, 339, 475-79, 514, 579, 680— 82, 688, 716, 726, 784, 800-801 and Vatican, 44-46, 279, 294, 302, 514, 518,702,739 and Yugoslavia, 93-94, 179-80, 253—

foreign exchange, 108~11, 116, 120,

148, 158, 241-42, 264, 272, 273 Foreign Ministry, 29, 31, 41-42, 46, 57, 59, 98, 99, 103, 120, 121, 139, 149, 153, 156, 174, 183, 196, 203, 215, 224, 231-32, 241, 262, 268, 270, 279, 306, 320-22, 413, 414, 417, 435, 437, 438, 470-73, 479, 497, 518, 520, 539, 647, 714, 718, 757, Fie) foreign trade, 225, 292-93, 295, 304-6, 397-98, 399, 415, 425, 450, 451-52, 458, 463, 466-69, 476, 480, 482, 659, 671, 674, 681-82, 689, 694, 722225, 731,;°/33-35, 138; 196, 745, 749 Forschungsamt, 679, 640 Four-Year Plan, 304-8, 309, 312, 397,

403, 413, 467, 489, 578, 731, 735 generals, 23-25, 80, 94, 140, 149, 203, 279 German-Austrian Agreement of 11 July 1936, 486-87, 488, 491 High Command of the Armed Forces (OKW) (see a/so Germany —army,

848

Index

and Keitel, Wilhelm), 322, 576, 646 industrialists, 25, 29

Jews (see also Germany —pogrom of November 1938), 434, 471-74, 477, 479, 521, 655-56, 788 persecution of, 33, 45, 112, 114,

119, 219, 256-57 military planning, 175-76, 196, 212, oad Ministry of Economics, 306 Ministry of War (see also FritschBlomberg crisis), 98, 788, 222, 226,

231, 263, 309, 413, 417 National Defense Council (Reichsverteidigungsrat), 127, 676 naval aviation, 308, 676

navy, 28, 31, 139-40, 156, 165-70, 2125 2889292; 301; 307-9; 3123314, 317, 401, 542, 567, 579-80, 676, 727) 730 Z-Plan, 676, 727

Olympic games, 287 opposition to Hitler (see a/so Goerdeler, Carl), 323, 568, 578, 583-87, 594, 598, 603, 604, 609, 610, 612, 633, 636, 684, 713, 751, 753, 757 pogrom of November 1938, 515, 655— 56, 677, 680-81, 682 Polish minority, 435, 438-41, 592,°667 press and propaganda, 34, 108, 135— 36, 146, 213, 218, 241, 243, 250, 261, 276,300,301; 317, 3745389, 415, 420, 424, 434, 435, 436, 441, 445, 447, 529, 535, 538, 547, 562, 572, 581, 596, 607-8, 615, 620, 627— 28, 637, 640, 642, 652, 657, 658, 660, 671, 677, 680, 681, 682, 687, G21). 703, 707, TU33 722272357130; 742, 747, 755, 758, 765, 769,777, 779, 786 Propaganda Ministry, 83, 137-38 Protestants, 46-47, 118, 119 racism, 22, 96, 256

raw materials, 100-105, 108-9, 140, 218, 225, 263, 264, 272-73 rearmament (see a/so Germany —army, and Hitler —concept of war), 25, 27-28, 32, 39, 61-62, 98, 108-9, 127-28, 130, 139-41, 145, 156, 161, 175—76, 232, 242, 265, 272, 275,

276, 280, 287, 301, 309, 326 Reichsarbeitsdienst, 572 Reichsnahrstand, 306

Reichswerke Hermann Goring (see also Germany —Four-Year Plan), 305 support of Hitler, 21-22, 131, 280 trade unions, 22

Wehrmachtamt (Armed Forces Office), 310 Westwall (Siegfried Line), 318, 351, 526, 527, 531, 543, 544, 545, 566, 572-73, 577, 580, 584, 589, 602, 742,713 9765 Gibson, Hugh, 478 Gilbert, Prentiss, 682 Glaise-Horstenau, Edmund von, 208, 210; 5059513.

Glaubensbewegung Deutsche Christen, 46 Gleiwitz provocation, 540, 748, 752, 765,

TT IRTRN Goebbels, Joseph, 30, 57, 57, 85, 129-30, 146, 192, 247, 256, 307, 319, 378, 513, 573, 628, 629, 691, 786 Goerdeler, Carl, 274, 276, 373, 318, 552, 585, 586, 632, 684, 685, 723, 757, 776 Goga, Octavian, 95, 252, 457, 464, 465 Gold Coast, 386 Goémbé6s, Julius, 12, 18, 79, 31, 73, 75, 79, 89-92, 95, 178, 207, 248, 251, 456-57, 489 1933 meeting with Hitler, 90, 91 1935 meeting with Hitler, 178 Goring, Herbert, 242, 447 G6ring, Hermann, 13, 25, 28, 33, 101, 297,313) SIO 23229323, B61, S88 R677, p27 and air force, 303-4, 317, 579, 676 and Austria, 74, 83, 85, 372, 489-92, 497, 500, 501, 503, 505, 508, 511, 512 and China, 295, 413-14, 417, 424 and Czechoslovakia, 246, 248, 315-16, SIZ, 4922515, SIAR II NSAG, 57.2, 578, 594, 628, 629, 632, 757 and disarmament conference, 37 and economic matters, 218, 225, 253, 261, 273-77 and England, 362, 364, 365, 371-73, 575, 578-80, 679, 629, 757, 759-60, 769, 774, 7716, 779, 781

Index possible trip to, 379, 384, 574-75 and Far East, 265, 268 and Four-Year Plan, 304-8 and France, 356 and Hungary, 178, 251, 459, 461, 594, 596,642 and Italy, 41, 73, 184, 228, 261, 48996, 504, 517, 597, 598, 599, 717, ta IQ and Japan, 413-14, 417, 424, 744 and Poland, 433, 437, 438, 441, 459, 509, 592, 616, 632, 650, 651, 757, 759-60 and Poland and Danzig, 51, 147, 150, 151, 152, 760, 164, 175, 194, 236, 238, 241 and Romania, 252, 463, 660 and Spain, 222, 224, 225, 231, 397, 398, 402, 489 and Turkey, 736 and U.S.S.R., 242, 719 and United States, 120, 121, 122, 476 and Vatican, 44 and Yugoslavia, 94, 178, 179, 253, 455, 461, 735 Grabowski, Witold, 434 Granville, Edgar, 158 Grazynski, Michal, 147, 148 Greece, 95 and England, 451, 468, 678-79, 700, 715 and France, 715

and Germany, 468 Greenwood, Arthur, 709 Greiser, Arthur, 56, 149, 151, 152, 237— 39, 240, 327, 436, 437, 652, 694, 714, 722 Grobba, Fritz, 257 Groener, Wilhelm, 97 Groscurth, Helmuth, 594, 603, 606, 607, 627, 628, 637, 779 _ Grueger, Franz, 109 Grundherr, Werner von, 655 Guadalajara, battle of, 399, 412, 486, 492

Guderian, Heinz, 303 Guernica, 304, 400 Guse, Giinther, 578, 579, 580 Haavara Agreement, 472-74 Habicht, Theo, 73-81, 83, 85, 512

849 Habsburg family, 209-10 Hitler’s views of, 19 possible restoration of, 160, 179, 207, 209, 247, 311, 449, 487-88, 492, 493, 510-11 Hacha, Emil, 642, 692, 695, 777, 778 Hack, Friedrich Wilhelm, 267, 268 Haile Selassie, 170, 187 Haldane, Lord, 374, 383 Halder, Franz, 428, 607, 677, 710, 729, 748, 755, 7173, 774, 777, 778, 779, 780 Halifax, Lord, 212-13, 316, 333, 366, 373, 385, 388, 392, 514, 528, 534, 536, 545, 574 and Czechoslovakia, 546-51, 559-61, 568, 569, 573-75, 587, 583-84, 585, 604, 605-6, 608, 618-19, 625, 629, 632 and Danzig, 549, 686 and Eden, 373 and Germany, 682, 687, 697, 698-700, 700, 704, 756, 760, 768, 777, 787, 785 visit to, 370, 373, 374-77, 396, 419, 502, 536 and Poland, 549, 704,708, 787 and rearmament, 678 and Romania, 699, 701, 704 and U.S.S.R., 690, 709, 710, 720, 721, 753, 754 general views, 339, 373-74, 704 Hammerstein, Kurt von, 23 Hanfstaengl, Ernst, 11, 12, 13, 12-13, 30, 65,0 Te 107118 Hankey, Sir Maurice, 528, 547, 737, 761 Hansen, Erich, 595, 640

HAPRO (Handelsgesellschaft fiir industrielle Produkte m.b.H.), 263-64, 265, 413, 424 Hartenstein, Hans, 720 Hassell, Ulrich von, 31, 32, 31-32, 32, 41, 42, 41-42, 42, 154, 183, 193-94, 194, 195) 206) 237, 2322595 2615295 9296; 320, 324, 490, 497, 493, 495, 502, 506, B27, De Haushofer, Albrecht, 246, 247, 246-47, 247, 248, 249, 296, 416, 628, 655, 675, VOY. Haushofer, Karl, 312

Headlam-Motley, Sir James, 528

850 Hedilla, Manuel, 404 Hedin, Sven, 424, 700, 785

Heinkel 177 (plane), 309 Heinkel, Ernst, 28 Heligoland, 272 Henderson, Sir Nevile, 318, 323, 332,

333, 345, 362, 363, 364, 365, 372-73, 375, 3761381; 3825385, 38673915 392) 446, 514, 585, 760 and Czechoslovakia, 549, 551, 552, 559, 568, 572, 582, 605, 608, 633— BALTITSTOM and Germany, 687, 696, 756-57, 766, NOBSTTOAId iy 180 and Poland, 756-57, 778 appointment, 332, 756 general views, 332-34, 336, 388 meeting with Hitler 3 March 1938, 385, 391-93, 679 Henlein, Konrad, 87-89, 176-77, 185, 245, 249-50, 517, 524, 532, 534-36, 538-44, 546, 552, 555, 556, 560, 564, 565, 566, 569-71, 574, 582-84, 603-8, 612, 614, 675, 660, 765 Karlovy Vary (Carlsbad) speech (24 April1938), 539; 555, 5597566).569, 603 Herriot, Edouard, 67

Index Hirota, Koki, 419

Hirsch, Helmut, 294 Hisma (Compafiia Hispano-Marroqui de Transportes), 226, 263-64, 397-405 Hitler, Adolf, 297, 361-62, 371, (see also Danubian Pact, Eastern Locarno Pact,

and Gomb6s, Julius) and army. (See Germany —army) and Austria (see a/so Hossbach Conference), 6, 18, 71-72, 459, 490,

492, 496-97, 505-13, 515 meeting with von Schuschnigg, 385,

389 and Belgium, 351, 356, 727, 737, 738 and Brazil, 482

and Bulgaria, 734-35 and Carpatho-Ukraine, 642, 646-49,

651, 654, 660, 663-64 and China, 19, 266, 295, 390, 414, 415, 417 and colonies, 215—18, 339, 345, 374, 377, 382, 391-92, 674-76, 727 and Czechoslovakia (see a/so Hossbach Conference), 19, 87, 88, 91, 244,

247-50, 517, 518, 522, 523-26, 539— 43, 562-64, 565-67, 573, 576, 586, 595—96, 604, 605, 606, 614, 624, 627, 636-37, 636-37, 639-42, 662, 663, 664, 684, 691, 757, 785

Hertzog,J.B. M., 297, 298, 390 x Herwarth von Bittenfeld, Hans Heinrich, Wes Hess, Rudolf, 9, 84, 88, 103, 115, 157, 207, 224, 307, 312, 388, 476, 500, 502, 504, 508, 568, 572

662-63, 664, 684, 785 and Danzig, 727, 784 and disarmament conference, 31—39, 129, 130-32, 279

Hesse, Fritz, 759

and England (see also Hossbach

Hewel, Walter, 9, 727, 274, 757 Heydrich, Reinhard, 490, 748, 786, 802 Heye, Ferdinand, 101-4

Heye, Helmuth, 578 Hildebrand, Klaus, 276, 356, 382, 390, VLE Hilger, Gustav, 774

Himmler, Heinrich, 471, 490, 497, 505, 664, 678, 716 Hindenburg (dirigible), 294 Hindenburg, Paul von, 25, 29, 31, 33, 34, AV SO RIE) 53 (IS GSNST G7 Mis 1 041, 153, 320, 324, 626 Hiranuma, Kiichiro, 724, 766

Hirohito (emperor of Japan), 673

Munich agreement, 636-37, 639-42,

Conference), 15-16, 17, 159, 162,

166, 168-69, 186, 194, 228, 260, 262, 331, 334-36, 339, 362-63, 365— 67, 372, 376-77, 379-80, 382, 390, 421-22, 428, 514-15, 516-17, 566, 573, 576, 579-81, 606-7, 612-13, 627, 632, 637, 640, 652, 668-69, 674-77, 680, 691, 695-96, 713-14, 725, 727-28, 748, 751-53, 755, 756— 60, 765—66, 768-69, 772, 773, 777— 78, 781, 785-86 and France (see a/so Hossbach Conference), 6-8, 15-16, 24, 91,

134, 157, 159, 228, 282, 394-95, 566, 576, 606-7, 632, 639, 652, 668—

Index

69, 671, 674-77, 691, 713-14, 727— 28, 748, 751-52, 765-66, 768-71, 775-17, 779 and generals, 23-25, 140, 279 and Holland, 727

and Hungary, 18-19, 18-19, 91, 160, 251, 455, 457, 459-62, 595-96, 616— 17, 637, 643, 647-49, 662-64, 668— 69, 693, 732 and Italy (see also Mussolini, Benito), 16-18, 40-41, 183-84, 208, 484-85, 495-96, 498-99, 512-13, 516, 518, 521-22, 543, 598-99, 607, 629, 674, 691, 714, 716, 727, 728, 738, 751, 767, 771, 774 visit to Rome, 500, 503, 516-22, 543-44 and Japan (see a/so Hitler —and Tripartite Military Alliance), 19-20, 102, 105, 266, 267, 268, 270, 390, 413, 415, 417, 419-24, 428, 725, 727, 728, 732, 743-44

and Jewish emigration, 473 and Latvia, 750 and League of Nations, 10, 32, 130-32,

161, 195—96, 372, 502, 769, 774 and Lithuania, 67, 235, 445, 654-55, 693 and Memel, 654-55, 694 and motorization, 303 and Poland, 14-15, 49-60, 146, 148, 150-53, 235—38, 240-41, 279, 393, 432-42, 443, 444, 616, 637, 642-44, 647-58, 662-69, 693-96, 710-14, 725-31, 741-42, 747, 748, 751-52, 755-56, 760, 765-67, 770, 773, 776— 78, 781 and Rhineland remilitarization, 188— 89, 193-94, 196, 200-201, 204 and Romania, 252, 464, 659-61 and Saudi Arabia, 471 and Slovakia, 643-45, 654

and Spain, 221, 225, 226, 229, 231-33, 280 Spanish Civil War (see also chap. 19), 728,751 and Tripartite Military Alliance, 426, 669, 717, 725, 728, 743-44 and Turkey, 736 and U.S.S.R., 13-14, 61-63, 66, 142—

851 43, 175, 276, 280, 430, 448-49, 647— 48, 668-69, 718, 722-29, 742, 744— 51, 765, 767, 768 and United States, 20, 106-7, 109-10,

113, 119, 294, 428, 475-79, 677, 725-26, 727, 732 and war, '9)10515520,21,31, 58,91), 129, 140, 176, 196, 263, 271, 275-76 and Yugoslavia, 19, 94, 741-42 Bolshevik Revolution, 14

church policy, 46 concept of war, 300, 365-66, 562-63,

580-81, 728, 741, 784 dictatorship, 21, 24, 45

diplomats, 10, 13, 29, 31, 138, 232, 279 economic views (see a/so Four-Year

Plan), 26—27 general views (see a/so Hossbach Conference), 5—22, 23-24, 26, 74,

76, 77, 80, 81, 84-85, 91, 99, 129, 154, 160, 162, 182-83, 185, 211, 279, 288, 298, 300-301, 331, 335, 356-58, 371-73, 376-77, 392-93, 439-40, 459-60, 473-74, 484, 525, 580-81, 639-40, 668-69, 677, 71011, 727, 784-86, 787, 801-3 Hitler’s Four-Year Plan Memorandum,

274-76 Hitlers zweites Buch, 10, 11, 17

Holland, war scare January-February 1939, 685 Jews. See racial doctrines Lebensraum, 24, 216

Mein Kampf, 9, 13, 17 memorandum on fortifications, 526,

S73 opposition to. (see Germany — opposition to Hitler) personal life, 312-14, 519, 580-81,

613, 637, 714, 735, 766, 785 racial doctrines, 6—8, 13, 19, 20

Social Democratic Party, 22 speech of 1 September 1939, 779, 781 speech of 12 September 1936, 276 speech of 12 September 1938, 446, 573, 592, 606, 607, 610 speech of 14 October 1933, 135

speech of 15 September 1935, 234 speech of 17 May 1933, 54, 113, 128 speech of 18 March 1938, 576

852 speech 422, speech 234 speech speech speech 380

Index of 20 February 1938, 389, 390, 439, 444, 508, 509, 515 of 21 May 1935, 164, 167, 183,

of 21 November 1937, 372 of 23 March 1933, 64 of 23 November 1937, 372,

speech of 26 September 1938, 627, 652, 653 speech of 27 August 1939, 773

speech of 28 April 1939, 719, 725-26 speech of 30 January 1934, 79, 143 speech of 30 January 1937, 277, 350, 555 speech of 7 March 1936, 197, 217, 235, 246

speech of 7May 1938, 519 speech of 8 October 1938, 680

speech of October 1937, 372 talk to generals on 13 June 1938, 577 talk to generals on 14 August 1939, 748, 751-52, 755, 756 talk to generals on 22 August 1939, 637, 710, 751-52, 756, 777 talk to generals on 23 May 1939, 727, 784 talk to generals on 23 November 1939, 710 : talk to generals on 28 May 1938, 566, 575

talk to officers of 10 February 1939, 677, 710-11 talk to press of 10 November 1938, 607-8, 677 trade unions, 22 Versailles Treaty, revision of, 9, 55, 91, 127, 214-15

view of Habsburgs, 19 view of Negroes. See racial doctrines view of Slavic people, 13-14 view of treaties, 10, 58 Hoare, Oliver, 574 Hoare, Sir Reginald, 734

Hoare, Sit Samuel (Lord Templewood), 122,167, 168)185)18619223568553, 551, 574, 608, 611, 617, 754 Hoare-Laval Plan, 122 Hodgson, Sir Robert, 407, 411 Hodza, Milan, 493, 537, 544, 570, 582,

619, 620, 622, 634, 643 Hoesch, Leopold von, 157 Hoggan, David, 5 Hohen-Aesten, Sergius Wiegand von, 88 Hohenlohe, Princess Stephanie, 769, 574 Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Prince Max von, 169, 250 Hohler, Sir Thomas, 627 Holland

war scare January—February 1939, 685, 697 Hoover, Herbert, 33 Hore-Belisha, Leslie, 290, 328, 546, 555, 605 Horstenau, Edmund Glaise von, 488 Horthy, Miklés, 78, 250, 260, 274, 444, 457, 461, 462, 594, 595, 643, 663, 668, 693

Hossbach Conference (5 November 1937);(793, 200, 225, 23132, 335) 376, 379, 395, 439, 459, 503, 514, 537 Hossbach, Friedrich, 789, 231, 232, 313, 316, 323, 541 Hotblack, Elliot, 301, 318 Hotta, Masaaki, 670 Hudson, Robert S., 690-91, 720, 746, 759 Hueber, Franz, 207 Hugenberg, Alfred, 65, 89, 90, 111 Hull, Cordell, 110, 111, 112, 114, 117, 1179, 120, 124, 294, 298, 370, 476, 479, 483, 724

Hungary, 346, (see also Gombos, Julius; Hitler, Adolf; Rome Protocols) and Anschluss, 440-41, 457-61 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 662-63, 668 and Austria, 90, 154, 178, 207, 251, 493, 507, 509-10 and Carpatho-Ukraine, 645, 656, 661, 663, 693 and Czechoslovakia, 91, 177, 244, 250, 445, 457-58, 459, 520, 524, 530, 538-39, 542, 583, 593, 616-17, 621— 22, 628, 634, 636, 661 and England, 460, 462, 622, 627 and France, 622 and Germany, 89-93, 177-79, 250, 251, 455-62, 463, 514, 538-39, 593— 96, 612, 615-17, 624, 628, 632, 643, 661-64, 693, 714, 728, 731-33

Hungarian state visit of August

Index

1938, 455, 460, 462, 59496

and Italy, 498, 593, 594, 597, 629, 631, 644, 647, 662, 663, 714, 775, 731, 132,733: and Poland, 440, 443-45, 461, 530, 592-93, 616, 677, 643, 645, 650-52, 656, 662, 663, 665, 732-33 and Romania, 178, 180, 457—60, 464, 594, 627, 659, 661, 663—64, 694, 698, 732, 733 and Slovakia, 643-44, 645, 663, 693 and U.S.S.R., 645, 662, 663 and United States, 460, 732 and Yugoslavia, 178, 179, 250, 443, 449, 451, 453-56, 459-61, 594, 622, 658, 663, 715, 735 Arrow Cross movement, 462 border revision, 42, 251 German minority, 89, 91, 92, 178, 251, 456, 458, 463, 662 rearmament, 457, 594-95, 667 Hurtwood, Lord Allen of, 159, 392, 634

Husayni, Haj Amin al-, 471 Huss, Pierre, 760 I. G. Farben, 95, 777, 140 I. G. Kattowitz-Laura, 147, 236 Ickes, Harold, 294, 295 Imperial Conference, 1937, 297, 298, 314,

345, 526

Imrédy, Béla, 316, 461-62, 594-95, 59798, 667 India, 296, 335, 373-74, 378 Ingersoll, Ralph, 370 Innitzer, Theodor, 513, 514 In6niti, Ismet, 722, 749

Inskip, Sir Thomas, 201, 213, 330, 626 International Labor Organization, 730 Tran, 256

and Germany, 473 Trg, 255, 2795471 and Germany, 470, 471 Ironside, Edmund, 319, 330, 678, 755,

760, 762, 781, 785 trip to Warsaw 1939, 755, 756 Istvan, Csaky, 661-63

Italy. (see also Ethiopia; Hitler, Adolf; League of Nations; Mussolini, Benito; Rhineland remilitarization; Rome

Protocols)

853 and Albania, 597, 672, 675, 715, 735, 736 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 295, 296, 376, 415-18, 502 and Austria, 72, 75-82, 85, 153-54, 193, 206-11, 262, 280, 484-86, 488, 490-92, 498, 500, 502-4, 507-10 and China, 415-16 and Czechoslovakia, 314, 518-21, 522, 530, 543, 597-99, 628 and England, 164, 168, 186, 192, 210, 23222595260,1262) 31593305334, 337, 370-71, 387-89, 393, 394-95, 410, 491, 493-95, 509, 516, 520, 546, 596, 627, 630-31, 669, 673, 682-83, 685, 714, 761, 771-72, 775, 781 and France, 154-55, 763, 170, 172, 182, 186, 194, 197, 209-10, 314, 393, 394-95, 409, 485, 498, 516, 545-46, 596, 626, 631, 671, 673, 675, 683, 688, 715, 716, 717, 739— 40, 771-72, 775, 781 and Germany, 33, 41-42, 78-81, 85, 131, 132, 152-54, 182-86, 192-95, 205-7213; 216) 227,2289232, 257— 61, 289, 296, 312, 315, 320, 347, 363, 375, 380, 394-95, 399, 410, 427-29, 465, 471, 473, 484-522, 543, 562-64, 594, 596-99, 629, 644, 647, 669-75, 678, 691, 714-18, 738— 43, 761, 766-67, 770-75, 781 and Hungary, 498, 593, 594, 597, 629, 632, 644, 647, 662, 663, 714, 7715, 731, 732, 740 and Japan, 261, 415-18, 428, 596, 597, 669-75, 714-19 and League of Nations, 192-93, 194, 261 and Lithuania, 69, 235, 261 and Poland, 261, 665, 717, 727

and Spain, 228-32, 260 and Spanish Civil War, 394-95, 399, 408, 409, 411-12, 530, 596, 629, 740 and Turkey, 736

and U.S.S.R., 242, 314, 721, 740, 745 and Yugoslavia, 179, 204, 254, 260, 262, 346, 449-51, 456, 461, 493, 503, 597, 599, 714, 735, 741-42, 770

854 anti-Semitic laws, 521, 597 Ethiopian war, 289, 298, 393

foreign trade, 674 Jaeckh, Ernst, 306, 316, 334 Jansa, Alfred, 277 Janson, Martin von, 787

Japan, 168 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 105, 262, 2672295 and England, 296, 329-30, 415-16, 422, 425-27, 429, 670, 672-73, 716— 19, 724, 739-41, 744 and France, 716, 724 and German colonies, 342, 389-90 and Germany, 97, 99, 100-105, 216, 258, 261, 264-70, 29496, 324, 375, 413-31, 669-73, 716-19, 724-25, 743-45, 766 and Italy, 415-18, 428, 596-97, 669— 75, 715-19 and League of Nations, 32, 216 and Lithuania, 69 and Poland, 727, 744, 766 and U.S.S.R., 142, 268, 269, 314, 429— 30, 448, 669-73, 716, 719, 724, 743— 44,749 and United States, 369, 428, 670, 673, 719, 724, 744 3 Hitler’s views of, 19-20

Jebb, Sir Gladwyn, 337, 776, 782 Jeschonnek, Hans, 676 Jewish question (see a/so Germany —Jews, persecution of), 108, 473 Jodl, Alfred, 310, 312, 323, 389, 561, 581, 599, 602, 603, 607, 778 diary, 547, 566, 587 Johnson, Hershel, 389

Jones, Thomas, 139, 201, 202, 212, 334, 368 Jouvenel, Bertrand de, 195 Jung, Rudolf, 79 Jianger, Ernst, 21

Junkers Works, 700 Kameradschaftsbund, 87 Kandelaki, David, 173-74, 242, 448 Kanya, Kalman de, 79, 455, 456, 457, 459-62, 510, 596, 612, 661, 662 Karmasin, Franz, 777

Index

Keitel, Wilhelm, 6, 200, 309-12, 317, 322, 323, 507-8, 538, 541-44, 561-63, 565— 66, 580, 595, 599, 602, 607, 631, 647, 668713, 715, 738, 772; 194 Kennan, George F., 642 Kennard, Sir Howard, 433, 443, 444, 597, 686, 688, 755, 778 Kennedy, Joseph, 514, 777 Kenya, 385 Keppler, Wilhelm, 101-2, 273, 497, 507, 504, 505, 570, 514 Keresztes-Fischer, Lajos, 595 Kerrl, Hanns, 74 Kesselring, Albert, 303

Keynes, John Maynard, 58, 528 Khinchuk, Leo, 64 Kiep, Otto K., 265

King, John Herbert, 752 King, Mackenzie, 298, 371, 776

Kionga, 378 Kiosseivanov, George, 735, 746 Kirk, Alexander, 745 Kirkpatrick, Sir Ivone, 376, 684

Kismayu, 739 Klein, Hans, 98-100, 263-65 Kleist, Bruno Peter, 648, 665, 691-92, 746 Kleist-Schmenzin, Ewald von, 584-86 Knickerbocker, H. R., 29 Knirsch, Hans, 79, 87 Koch, Erich, 69, 253, 445, 452

Konigsberg (ship), 765 Konoye, Fumimaro, 419, 420 Konradi, Arthur, 660

Kopp, Federico Colin, 482 Kordt, Erich, 757 Kordt, Theo, 586, 609, 782 Kostring, Ernst, 447-48, 745 Kovno trial, 234, 445 Krestinskii, Nikolai, 66 Kriebel, Hermann, 700, 265—66, 321, 322 Krofta, Kamil, 245, 247, 253, 325, 337, 533, 537-39, 570, 603

Krupp firm, 98 Krupp steel works, 312, 499 Kung, Hsiang-hsi, 295

Labougle, Eduardo, 482 Laboulaye, André Lefébre de, 60 Lacroix, Victor de, 245, 533, 544, 587,

Index

588, 620 LaGuardia, Fiorello, 294 Lamoureux, Lucien, 687

Langenheim, Adolf, 224 Latin America, 124

and Germany, 291-92, 479-83 Latvia and Germany, 292, 750 and U.S.S.R., 750 Laval, Pierre, 354, 492 and Germany, 155, 156, 165, 172 and Italy, 154, 179, 186 and Poland, 145 Le Tellier, Pol, 588, 737

League of Nations (see a/so Ethiopia), 11, 40, 78, 164, 171, 289, 333, 339, 342, 380, 381, 418, 434, 494, 502, 544, 601, 662, 721-22, 736 and Belgium, 350-51 and Danzig, 50, 55, 149, 236-40, 436— 40, 657, 666, 667, 686 and Dominions, 296 and Germany, 32, 54, 76, 126, 129-31, 135-37, 144, 148, 157, 172, 193, 195—96, 200, 216, 261, 279, 337, 365, 769, 774 and Italy, 192-93, 194, 261

and Japan, 32, 216 and U.S.S.R., 144 Hitler’s views of, 25, 32 mandates system, 343, 386

mission in Hungary, 456, 457 NSDAP view, 10 Lecca, Radu, 252

Leeper, Sir Reginald, 708

855 Levetzow, Werner von, 482

Ley, Robert, 730 Libya, 155, 329, 545, 739, 762 Liddell Hart, Sir Basil, 589 Liebitzky, Emil, 497, 510 Liechtenstein, 695 Lindbergh, Charles, 568, 587, 610, 627 Lindemann, Fritz, 264 Lindsay, Sir Ronald, 370 Lippert, Bernhard, 753

Lipski, Josef, 43, 56, 57-60, 145-46, 152, 238, 241, 252, 433, 437, 438, 439, 597, 592, 612, 616, 628, 647, 651, 652, 656— 57, 686, 708, 777, 712, 713, 725, 766 Lithuania, 67-69, 152, 234-36, 261 and Germany, 442-46, 653-55, 694, 731, 750 and Poland, 441-42, 654, 655, 731 and U.S.S.R., 448, 553, 655 Little Entente, 40, 43, 87, 92-93, 177, 178, 180, 190, 197, 204, 206, 207, 244, 252-54, 260, 346-47, 351, 352, 393, 449-51, 453-58, 460-62, 465-66, 470, 524, 530, 553, 583, 593-95, 622, 645, 658, 735 Litvinov, Maxim, 142, 144, 243, 353, 552, 553, 561, 600, 689, 703, 706, 707, 770, 719-22 Ljoti¢é, Dimitrije, 253, 452 Lloyd George, David, 215, 219, 752 Lloyd, Lord, 585 Lob, Wilhelm, 264 Locarno Agreements. (see a/so Belgium; Rhineland remilitarization) and Germany, 38-39, 164, 188-89, 213

Léger, Alexis, 558, 733

and Stresa meeting, 163

Leipzig (German cruiser)

NSDAP view of, 10, 188

supposed incident, 66, 237-39, 363, 375, 400 Leith-Ross, Sir Frederick, 338, 339, 355, 361 Leitner, Hans, 120

Lelong, Albert, 762 Leopold (king of the Belgians) (see also Belgium), 348, 388, 544, 671, 737, 767 Leopold, Josef, 487, 496, 497, 507, 504, 508 LeRond, Henri, 580 Lersner, Kurt Freiherr von, 737 Lester, Sean, 750, 237-41, 436

Lochner, Louis, 757

London Naval Conference (1935-36), 197, 211-12 Londonderry, Lord, 397, 700 Loraine, Sir Percy, 470, 777 Lorzer, Bruno, 303 Lothian, Lord, 159, 200, 201, 202, 213, 297, 332.335 336,345,361; 36253775 378, 3815 392,551; 682)756, 157 Lubiénski, Michal, 666, 772 Liidecke, Kurt, 11-13, 16, 18, 79, 29-30 Ludendorff, Erich, 310

Luftwaffe (see also Germany —air force),

856

-

303 Lukasiewicz, Juliusz, 557, 597, 601, 708 Luther, Hans, 27-29, 106, 108, 112, 122, 478 Luxembourg, 35, 737, 767

Lytton Commission, 32 MacDonald, James Ramsay, 30, 39-40, 43, 133, 157, 168, 212 MacDonald, Malcolm, 298, 699, 724 Maéek, Vladko, 449 Mackensen, Hans Georg von, 780, 251, 321, 376, 391, 420, 421, 457, 497, 499, 502, 516, 517, 579, 537, 541, 637, 683, 767, Fl, P72, 194 Maginot Line, 204, 346, 347, 349, 367, 547, 626, 677 Magistrati, Massimo, 784, 260, 495, 507, 502, 517, 740 Maisky, Ivan M., 554, 602, 690, 706, 707, 709, 710, 719, 721, 722, 754, 766 Majorca, 315, 399, 520

Malaga, 399 Mallet, Victor, 585, 586 Manchukuo (see a/so Manchuria), 101-4, 324-25, 420-25, 429, 502, 662-63, 671, 720, 745, 800 Manchuria, 32, 63, 96, 100-105, 264, 265, 289, 414, 425, 723, 744, 800 : Mann, Henry, 129 Manstein, Erich von, 789, 323, 587 Markau, Karl, 727, 122, 476 Marras, Luigi, 597 Masatik, Hubert, 537, 641-42 Masaryk, Jan, 253, 388, 546, 557, 560, 611, 619, 620, 624, 625 Masirevich, Constantin de, 133, 178, 457 Mason-Macfarlane, Frank, 560, 708 Massey, Vincent, 201, 590, 625 Massigli, René, 198 Mastny, Vojtéch, 88, 759, 246-49, 537, 539, 561, 585, 640, 641

Maz, Le (Paris), 135 Matsuoka, Yosuke, 707, 277 Maurice, Sit Frederick, 169

May Crisis (see also Czechoslovakia), 396 Mayer, Ferdinand, 121 Mecsér, Andras, 91 Mefo-bills, 28, 272 Memel, 67-70, 213, 234-36, 247, 261,

Index 333, 336, 442, 445-46, 547, 654-55, 686, 693, 694, 700, 730, 766 Menemencioglu, Numan, 254, 468 Merekalov, Aleksei, 447, 690, 718-19 Merkes, Manfred, 227, 229, 230, 237, 232, 398 Messersmith, George S., 72, 107, 122-23, 154, 159, 314, 332, 479, 489, 507 Metaxas, Jean, 468 Mexico and Germany, 292, 482-83 Meyer, Richard, 703, 150 Miklas, Wilhelm, 82, 512 Mikoyan, Anastas, 689-90 Milch, Erhard, 778, 490 Ministry of War, 99 Moffat, Jay Pierrepont, 113-19, 760, 165,

298, 564, 680-82 Mola, Emilio, 227 Molotov, Vyacheslav M., 162, 173, 243, 689, 718, 720—25, 727, 728, 747-50, 752, 754; 767 speech of 31 May 1939, 725 Moltke, Hans Adolf von, 52, 53, 57, 58, 59-60, 435, 438, 649-50, 656, 657, 667, 707, 711, 712, 742 Moltmann, Ginter, 9 Monnet, Jean, 688 Montreux Conference and Convention, 203, 254-56, 469 Moravska Ostrava (Mahrisch-Ostrau), 603 area, 650, 664 incidents, 603, 604 Morell, Theodor, 587 Morgenthau, Henry, 360, 367 Morreale, Eugenio, 261

Mozambique, 378 Muff, Wolfgang, 504 Mundelein, George, 294 Munich Conference. See under Czechoslovakia Mushakoji, Kintomo, 262 Mussert, Anton Adriaan, 487 Mussolini, Benito, 12, 32, 312, 485, 633,

717, (see also Four-Power Pact; Italy; Rome Protocols) and anti-Semitism, 33 and Austria, 72-73, 75, 77, 85, 206, 209, 262, 488, 490-92, 496, 498,

Index 9025510; 51245134516 and Croatia, 179 and Czechoslovakia, 597-99 and England, 388, 409, 516, 596 and France, 485, 738 and Germany, 131, 195, 200, 203, 208, 258, 484, 494, 516-22, 596, 597, 629, 714, 716, 738, 743, 766-67, 7710-74 visit to, 492, 494-95, 497-501 and Greece, 732 and Hitler, 16, 17, 29, 41-42, 43, 18384, 208, 259, 260

and Japan, 416 and Poland, 739 and Spain, 224, 227, 228, 230 Spanish Civil War, 394, 396, 399, 409, 412, 485-86

and Tripartite Military Alliance, 669

857 268 and France, 135, 278, 355, 356 and Hungary, 778, 251, 459, 461, 494 and Italy, 783, 235, 260-62, 494-95 and Poland, 434, 437-39, 441 and Poland and Danzig, 52-53, 57-58, 239, 240, 261 and Rhineland remilitarization, 193, 1965197201 and Romania, 252, 466, 494 and Spain, 224, 227, 229, 231-32, 396 and the disarmament conference, 37, 38, 573126;129=30 and the World Economic Conference, 65 and U.SS.R:,'52)] 63,1143 and Yugoslavia, 453, 461 Balkan trip of 1937, 364, 452, 453, 467

and Yugoslavia, 743, 770

Neuwirth, Hans, 647 New Guinea, 390 New Hebrides, 343, 386

Ethiopian venture, 155, 163, 171, 183, 186, 208, 258

New Zealand (see a/so Dominions), 296— Di

general foreign policy, 40

News Chronicle, 535, 536, 708 Newton, Basil, 558, 619 Niclauss, Karlheinz, 143 Nigeria, 386 Nin, Andrés, 404 Nine-Power Pact, 415 Noé, Ludwig, 574 Noél, Léon, 554, 597 Nomonhan incidents, 723, 743, 744 Non-Intervention Committee, 362, 371, 400, 494 Norway, 225, 277, 308, 562

and U.S.S.R., 718

meeting with Hitler at Venice, 46, 80— 81, 84

Nadolny, Rudolf, 27, 31, 37, 38, 42, 128, 130, 131, 143-44, 302 Naujocks, Alfred, 748 Nautu, 390 Ne€as, Jaromir, 620, 627 Neuhausen, Franz, 180, 253, 403, 452,

735 Neumann, Ernst, 68, 446, 574, 642, 654, 655, 663 Neurath, Constantin von, 29, 31, 34, 47,

134, 143, 161, 783, 186, 214, 294, 307, 313, 315-16, 377, 320, 324~25, 345, 372, 376, 382, 387, 419, 457, 494-95, 502 and Austria, 80, 85, 488, 490, 492-93, 497, 498, 506 and Belgium, 350 and China, 415, 420-21 and Czechoslovakia, 88, 248, 249, 537, 568, 632 and England, 345, 390-91

proposed visit to, 359, 362-66, 498 and Far East, 32, 100, 102, 264, 267,

NSDAP (see also SA and SS), 496 AO (Auslandsorganisation), 104, 124, 221-22, 230, 292, 413, 473, 480, 482, 537 APA (Aussenpolitisches Amt), 72, 29— 31, 90, 94, 117, 140, 147, 156, 169, 172, 174, 180, 242, 253, 255, 256, 413, 463, 470, 473, 646 APA APA APA APA APA APA APA

and and and and and and and

Afghanistan, 255 Austria, 76 Croatians, 94 Far East, 101 France, 172-73 Memel, 68 Romania, 95, 180, 252

858 APA and Yugoslavia, 253 Austrian branch, 71-82, 85, 153, 182, 2O9»2 14 Colonial Policy Office, 216, 674-76 financing of, 20, 25 Hitler Youth, 445

NSK (Nationalsozialistische PresseKortespondenz), 375 Reichstag delegation, 10

Wehrpolitisches Amt, 775 Nuremberg trial, 308, 376

Nye, Gerald, 122 Nyon Conference, 371, 372, 411, 416, 448

Index and the Saar, 137 and Vatican, 4445 memoirs, 26 Pares, Sir Bernard, 754 Pariani, Alberto, 597, 598, 631, 715

Paris International Exposition of 1937, 344 Paul (Prince Regent of Yugoslavia), 180, 364, 450, 451, 455, 456, 659, 735, 736, (32 Paul-Boncour, Joseph, 135, 550, 554 Pavelié, Ante, 94, 450

Peek, George, 116 Peel Commission, 256, 471

Perkins, James, 778 O’Malley, Sir Owen, 333

O’Ryan, John F., 112 Oberlander, Theodor, 148 Oberlindober, Hanns, 247 Oder River, 214-15

Oderberg (Bohumin), 649 Ogilvie-Forbes, Sir George, 375, 677, 713

Olga (princess of Yugoslavia), 748 Olympic games (1936), 219, 274, 287 Orlov, Admiral V. M., 353 Orlov, Alexander, 404 Ormsby-Gore, William, 388 Oshima, Hiroshi, 266-69, 417, 421, 424— 27, 428, 429, 430, 670, 672, 673, 724 Osusky, Stefan, 43, 163, 348, 380, 545, 559, 570, 588, 591, 601, 620, 623 Ott, Eugen, 24, 267, 268, 421, 424, 428, 671, 716, 728 Oumansky, Constantine, 726, 749

Pabst, Waldemar, 71, 72, 99 Pacelli, Eugenio (Pope Pius XT1), 44, 45, 46, 514, 556, 702, 739 Palairet, Michael, 511 Palestine, 256, 329, 471-74, 759, 798 Papée, Kasimierz, 50 Papen, Franz von, 27, 40, 44-45, 53, 65, 73381, 85, 86,92, 134).137,/153,'154, 183, 185, 1.93) 196,.207-11, 315,321, 324, 332, 377, 390, 441, 487, 493, 49697, 501, 504-7, 736 and Austria, 73, 85-86, 153-54, 183, 185-86, 207—9, 210, 211, 499 and France, 737 and Hungary, 92

Perth, Earl of, 633 Peter, Franz, 183, 211

Petit Parisien, Le (Paris), 135 Pfeffer von Salomon, Franz, 121—22, 476 Phillip, Prince of Hessen, 227, 229, 260, 502/513, 516) 5172590 nG30"631 Phillips, William, 123 Phipps, Sir Eric, 133, 160, 172, 196, 316, 332, 334, 339, 340, 344, 369, 453, 569, 587, 624 Picasso, Pablo, 304 Pilsudski, Josef, 48—50, 60, 145, 146, 152, 164, 194, 238, 433, 434, 592 Pirow, Oswald, 298, 675, 680 Pius XI, 45, 46, 204 Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli), 514, 702, 739 Planetta, Otto, 84 Pless, Prince, 147 Poland, 244 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 651-54, 657, 665, 666, 668, 674

and Austria (see Anschluss —and Poland). and Czechoslovakia, 236, 239, 244, 352, 440, 442-45, 524, 530, 542, 561, 569, 590-91, 595, 607, 615-16, 621-22, 627, 634, 636, 642, 649-50 and England, 440, 442, 444, 549, 590, 591, 627, 649, 665, 667, 684, 686, 695;:699,'701, 7079; 711y 726,727, 753, 754-56, 759, 771, 776-78, 781— 82 and Four-Power Pact, 42 and France, 42, 48-49, 59-60, 142, 145, 152, 164, 194, 199-200, 236,

Index 349-52, 434, 440, 443, 444, 525, 590-91, 622-23, 627, 649, 665, 686, 701, 709, 753, 761-64, 775-77, 783 and Germany, 14-15, 31, 43, 48-61, 145-53, 160, 164-65, 194-95, 23642, 289, 314, 352, 393, 440, 433-45, 525, 526, 530, 590-93, 615-16, 624, 628, 632, 647, 649-50, 663-69, 694, 703-4, 707-9, 711, 717, 718, 726, 750, 763, 773, 777, 780-81, 786 and Hungary, 440, 443, 444, 461, 530, 592-93, 616, 617, 643, 645, 651, 656, 662, 663, 665, 732-33 and Italy, 261, 665, 717, 727 and Japan, 744, 766 and Lithuania, 441-42, 654, 655, 731 and Munich, 649, 657 and proposed Western Pact, 337, 438 and Rhineland remilitarization, 194— 95, 199-200, 236 and Romania, 440, 443, 590, 646, 702, 716, 733—34 and Slovakia, 644, 665, 693-94, 695, T3 and U.S.S.R., 48, 59-60, 142, 152, 351-53, 444, 552-53, 561, 590, 591, 600, 607, 645, 662, 665, 689, 703-4, 707-9, 718, 720-22, 750, 754, 763, 781 Polish-Soviet Declaration of 27 November 1938, 645, 665, 689 and United States, 649 army, 36 Corridor, 42-43, 49, 67, 129, 143, 146, 147, 150, 152, 194, 236-37, 241, 261, 280, 379, 336, 433, 442, 445, 462, 616, 651, 652, 653, 657, 664, 666, 667, 686, 695, 696 German minority, 147-48, 239, 433— 35, 438-40, 650, 655, 667, 730, 753, VOSMITS military, 667, 695, 696, 703, 770, 777, 781 Pope Pius XI, 46 Popitz, Johannes, 627 Portugal, 378, 382, 387 Potemkin, Vladimir, 353, 710, 718, 721— 23 POUM, 404 Pownall, Sir Henry, 589, 709

859 Prételat, André Gaston, 783 Preu, Major, 98 Price, George Ward, 201 Primo de Rivera, Miguel, 224

Prinz Exgen (ship), 594 Prittwitz und Gaffron, Friedrich Wilhelm von, 29 Prunas, Renato, 503 Puhl, Emil, 120 Puttkammer, Jesko von, 580 Raczynski, Edward, 772 Raeder, Erich, 24, 36, 139-40, 166, 170, 212, 277, 301, 307-9, 313, 316, 317, 323, 567, 578, 579, 580, 676, 730, 765 Ratz, Jeno, 594, 595 Raumer, Hermann von, 267, 417, 422 Rauschning, Hermann, 9, 23, 55—60, 68, 74, 129, 149, 151-52, 445 Rechenberg, Bernhard G. von, 478, 479 Reichenau, Walter von, 98, 99, 264, 310, 320, 322, 328, 507, 586, 640 Reichsbank, 27

Reichsverteidigungsrat.

See Germany —

National Defense Council Reinthaller, Anton, 153 Renondeau, Gaston, 303 Renzetti, Giuseppe, 16-17, 29, 40-41, 73, 81, 183-84, 517, 744 Reynaud, Paul, 559 Rheinbaben, Werner Freiherr von, 728

Rheinmetall-Borsig, 98 Rhine River, 214-15, 348, 589 Rhineland remilitarization, 123, 156, 164, 171, 172175,. 186-205, 208, 213.1235, 236, 243, 331-32, 345 Ribbentrop, Joachim von, 778, 134, 13839, 213, 315, 319, 321, 324-25, 33940, 372, 382, 391-92, 469, 481, 538, 578, 613, (see also Anglo-German Naval Agreement) and Anti-Comintern Pact, 296, 375, 376, 407-8, 668 and Austria, 392 and Belgium, 758, 220 and colonial matters, 276, 217 and Czechoslovakia, 247, 605, 609,

624, 628, 631, 642, 648 and England, 159, 161, 169, 211, 212, 2145219)2285335)0899575;.7 16;

860

Index

718, 757, 758, 765-67, 780-81 in London, 332, 334, 335, 339, 367, 364, 375-76, 392, 514-15, 546 and France, 134, 139, 156, 228, 716, TVILTGS and France (see a/so Ethiopia, Little Entente, Rhineland remilitarization) Paris visit of December 1938, 635, 685, 763 and Hungary, 594, 595, 612, 662 and Italy (see also Ciano —Salzburg meeting), 376, 416, 502, 518, 597— 98, 740, 766-67, 772 and Japan, 262, 266-67, 269, 270, 375, 413, 416, 421, 426, 597, 744 and Poland, 746, 239, 441, 651, 653, 656, 657, 663-64, 666, 669, 695, 708, 718, 727, 741, 742, 747, 758, 760, 780 and Rhineland remilitarization, 193, 202 and Romania, 659 and Saudi Arabia, 471 and Slovakia, 644, 693, 695 and Tripartite Military Alliance, 426— 31, 669-75, 716-19, 724, 728, 744 and U.S.S.R., 430, 689, 695, 718-19, 722-23, 724, 727, 728, 744, 746, 747, 767 ; trip to Moscow in August 1939, 747-51, 765-67 and United States, 726 and Yugoslavia, 461 as disatmament commissioner, 775, 138 Rieckhoff, Herbert Joachim, 304 Rieth, Kurt, 82, 83, 84, 85 Rintelen, Anton, 81-84 Rintelen, Enno von, 522

661, 664, 707 and Czechoslovakia, 552-53, 590, 645, 646, 659 and England, 465, 466, 660, 661, 678— 79, 697-98, 702-3, 707, 715, 719, 733 and Four-Power Pact, 43 and France, 199, 251, 253, 465, 466, 54566595 7155733 and Germany, 94-95, 180-81, 251-53, 462-66, 658, 659-61, 694, 697-98, 707, 728, 733-34, 767 and Hungary, 178, 180, 457—59, 464, 593, 627, 659, 661, 663, 694, 698, MOVRZIZ, £92 and Poland, 443, 590, 646, 702, 776, 733-34 and Rhineland remilitarization, 199, 204 and U.S.S.R., 180-81, 251, 252, 346, 351-53, 462, 465-66, 552-53, 600, 659, 733 German minority, 463, 660 Iron Guard, 464, 465, 466, 660 Rome Protocols (March 1934), 79, 207, 261, 495

Rio Tinto copper mines, 399

settlement 1936 and 1938, 368, 388, 389, 392-93 speech of 5 October 1937, 369 Rosenberg, Alfred, 11, 13, 29-31, 87, 129, 158, 324, 413, 646, 648, (see also NSDAP —APA)

Ripka, Hubert, 582 Ritter, Karl, 707, 119, 274, 481, 482, 655, 675 Roatta, Mario, 743

Robinson, Joseph, 722 Rohm, Ernst, 319 Romania, 346, 351-53, 701, 733, (see also

Little Entente) and Bulgaria, 467, 658, 694, 698, 734 and Carpatho-Ukraine, 646, 659, 660,

Rome Protocols Powers (Italy, Hungary, Austria), 489, 501 Roos, Hans, 151 Roosevelt, Franklin D., 30, 33, 106-7, 110, 113=15, 778, 123, 197, 217, 295, 298, 319, 339, 362, 367, 465, 478, 479, 514, 630, 681-82, 688-89, 771

and Japan, 744 and Munich, 630, 633 and Poland, 649, 731 and U.S.S.R., 726, 749 appeal of 14 April 1939, 725-26

proposals for a new European

and Hungary, 251 and Italy, 41 and Romania, 95, 251, 252 and Ukraine, 69 London trips, 30-31, 33, 65

Index Rosenbruch, Gustav, 264 Rosso, Augusto, 723 Rost van Tonningen, Mednoud Marinus, 78 Rosting, Helmer, 50 Rothermere, Lord, 738 Rover, Karl, 567

Rowak (Rohstoffe- und WarenEinkaufsgesellschaft), 225, 226, 263, 264, 397, 398, 467 Ruanda-Urundi, 343, 386, 388

Rudnay, Lajos de, 375, 460 Rumbold, Sir Horace, 33, 132 Runciman, Lord, 542, 582, 587, 603-4, 611, 617-18, 624

Ruthenia (see a/so Carpatho-Ukraine), 459 Rydz-Smigly, Edward. See Smigty-Rydz, Edward SA (Sturmabteilung), 36, 84, 129, 140,

190 Saar territory, 45, 47, 76, 136, 137, 152, 154, 156, 160 Sakoh, Shyui Chi, 766 Sanctions. See Ethiopia Sanjurjo y Sacarell, José, 223 Sargent, Sir Orme, 372, 332, 334, 365,

453, 574, 583, 586, 587, 605, 623, 625, 633, 713, 781 Sass, Theodor von, 68 Saud, Ibn, 470, 471 Saudi Arabia and England, 470 and Germany, 470-71 Sayre, Francis, 122 Schacht, Hjalmar, 25, 28, 272-76, 295, 298, 305-7, 361, 398, 448, 685 and Bulgaria, 254 and China, 99, 264 and colonies, 215, 217-19 and Danzig, 56, 150 and Greece, 254 and Poland, 150, 194

and Turkey, 255 and U.S.S.R., 173-74, 242 and United States, 108-14, 116, 11920, 121 and Yugoslavia, 253 negotiations on colonial issue, 337-46, 354-58, 361, 365, 366, 372, 378, 387

861 Schairer, Reinhold, 723 Scheele, Alexander von, 226 Scheliha, Rudolf von, 691, 705, 723, 746, Why) Scheubner-Richter, Max Erwin von, 18 Schindler, Max J., 54, 752 Schirach, Baldur von, 490 Schleicher, Kurt von, 27, 322, 428

Schleswig-Holstein (ship), 781 Schmidt, Guido, 247, 248, 488-90, 494, 497, 508 Schmidt, Paul, 614 Schmundt, Rudolf, 324, 579, 541, 563, 565, 566, 624 Schnee, Heinrich, 32, 216 Schniewind, Otto, 579 Schnurre, Karl, 689, 722, 723, 745, 748 Scholz, Herbert, 283 Schoénerer, Georg von, 19 Schulenburg, Friedrich Werner von der, 174, 184, 447, 689-90, 722-23, 723, 727, 745, 747, 749, 750 Schultze-Naumburg, Paul, 7 Schuschnigg, Kurt von, 84, 153, 183, 185, 207, 209, 389, 459, 486-88, 490, 492— 93, 496, 499, 501, 505

meeting with Hitler 12 February 1938, 385; 389; 5056539 plebiscite project, 508-11, 516 Schweickhard, General, 226 Schweppenburg, Leo Geyr von, 739 Schwerin von Krosigk, Lutz, 28, 307, 777 Schwerin, Gerhard von, 684 Seeckt, Hans von, 97—99, 103, 320 Seldte, Franz, 41, 247 Seyss-Inquart, Arthur, 496, 501, 505, 508, 510-13 Shanghai, 700, 266, 295, 321, 414, 416, 418 Sherrill, Charles H., 279 Shigemitsu, Mamuro, 429 Shiratori, Toshio, 670, 673

Siemens, Leopold, 609 Simon, Sir John, 30, 43, 133, 158, 165, 167, 574, 605, 608, 677, 699 and disarmament conference, 38, 131 at Stresa, 164

Berlin trip, 119, 159, 161-62, 163, 166, 216

Sino-Japanese war (see also chap. 20 and

Index

862 Brussels Conference), 369, 677

German mediation attempt, 418-20, 421 Skoda works. See Czechoslovakia Slavik, Juraj, 627 Slovakia, 443, 459, 461, 590, 595-96, 616, 640, 642-45, 648-49, 654, 655, 665, 692; 693+95,.706, 7 tly 723; 7315733; 766, 801 Slovak autonomist movement, 461, 524, 527, 593 Smigly-Rydz, Edward, 199, 238, 239, 433, 442, 443, 456, 597 Snowden, Lady, 574 Social Democrats, 72 Solomon Islands, 390 Solothurn (firm), 98 Soong, T. V., 98-99 Sorge, Richard, 268, 691, 705

South Tyrol (see also Germany —and Italy), 16-17, 312, 484, 491, 493, 498, 503, 513, 516-17, 519-20, 522, 597, 674, 675, 716, 738, 742 Southeast Europe Society, 27 Sozialistische Volksgemeinschaft (Sovog), 68 Spain. (see also Nyon Conference; England; France; Italy)

and Anti-Comintern Pact, 408-9, 668 and England, 399-401, 408 and France, 400-401 and Munich crisis, 406—7 Carlists, 222, 404

Civil War (see also chap. 19), 289, 292, 314, 354-55, 359, 362 and German intervention, 211, 221—

33, 260, 289 and Italian intervention, 289

International Brigades, 395 possible German-French mediation, 355 Falange, 223, 404-5 Non-Intervention Committee, 362, 397, 400, 494 POUM, 404 Spanish Morocco, 223, 224, 396 crisis of January 1937, 355, 396, 402, 564, 565

Speer, Albert, 274 Sperrle, Hugo, 229, 403, 405, 507

Srbik, Heinrich Ritter von, 208, 513 SS (Schutz-Staffel), 82, 84, 247 Stablhelm, 115, 247 Stalin, Joseph V., 5, 173-75, 243, 270, 289, 345, 404, 430, 448, 449, 459, 460, 553, 601-2, 689-91, 703-7, 718, 720— 22, 726, 745-46, 754, 763, 765-66, 768, 793, 794, 798-801 and England, 689-91, 719-22, 749, 754-55, 766-67 and France, 720—21, 749, 754 and Germany, 289, 449, 601-2, 703-7, 718-21, 746-51, 754-55, 763-64, 768 and Latvia, 750 and Poland, 748—50 speech of 10 March 1939, 690, 704, 706, 718 view of war, 705—6 Stallforth, Frederico (or Federico), 121, 476 | Stanley, Oliver, 687, 696, 699 Stapf, Otto, 789 Statace, Achille, 672 Starhemberg, Ernst Rudiger von, 82, 207 Steed, Wickham, 370, 568 Stehlin, Paul, 589, 759 Steinacher, Hans, 312, 535, 537 Steinhardt, Laurence A., 726, 749 Stilwell, Joseph, 478 Stoddard, Lothrop, 30 Stohrer, Eberhard von, 324, 402, 405 Stojadinovic¢, Milan, 180, 346, 347, 393, 451-56, 503, 658-59 Streccius, General, 700

Stresa meeting, 163-64, 165 Strong, H. C. Travell, 560 Strunk, Roland, 237 Sudeten area, 87, 333, 549, 552, 581, 605, 607, 613, 614, 617, 620, 622, 625, 632, 634, 635, 686 Sudeten German Free Corps, 603, 614, 617

Sudeten German party (front), 79, 86-88, 177, 243, 244-45, 247, 248, 249, 524, 534, 535, 536, 552, 558, 570-71, 603, 604, 608 Sudeten Germans, 317, 381, 382, 387, 440, 520, 526, 527-32, 543, 547, 550, Dod, S55 (5577559 N56805 75,7 582283,

Index 587-88, 592, 604, 619, 620, 621, 635, 640 Suetsugo, Nobumasa, 430 Sugimura, Yotaro, 295, 340, 345

Sung Che-yuan, 264 Surits, Iakov Z., 706, 754 Suvich, Fulvio, 77, 78, 81, 136, 184, 195, 209, 210 Sweden and Germany, 140, 166, 305, 728, 731 Switzerland

and Germany, 767 Syria, 469

Syrovy, Jan, 634 Szembek, Jan, 52, 148, 237, 239 Sztdjay, Dome, 457, 515, 538, 567, 562, 640, 732

Tanganyika, 297, 343, 378, 381, 383, 385, 386 Tass. See U.S.S.R. —Tass news agency Tatarescu, Gheorghe, 464 Tatarescu, Stefan, 95 Tauschitz, Stephan, 332 Tavs, Leopold, 504 Taylor, AlanJ. P., 5 Tczew (Dirschau), 748, 803 Teleki, Pal, 455, 731-33, 739, 740 Temperley, Arthur, 132-33 Templers, 472 Teruel, 405 Tésin (Teschen), 352, 443, 524, 590, 595, 601, 615, 616, 643, 647, 649, 650, 666 Thailand, 293 Theben, 644 Thermann, Edmund, 51 Thoma, Wilhelm Ritter von, 403 Thomas, Georg, 264, 274, 275, 307 Thomsen, Hans, 120 Thyssen, Fritz, 101, 103, 147 Tien Fong, 263 Tientsin, 743 Tientsin incident, 740 Tilea, Viorel V., 694, 697, 698 Times, The (London), 159, 375, 378, 554,

605, 606, 677 Tippelskirch, Kurt von, 445 Tirpitz (ship), 308, 580, 773

Tiso, Josef, 644 Titulescu, Nicolae, 95, 181, 204, 250, 251,

863 252, 462, 463, 466 WodtyFaita5265 56755729573, 652 Toggenburg, Count von, 677 Togo (former German colony), 340, 343, 344, 383, 386 Togo, Shigenori, 425, 426, 670 Tolomei, Ettore, 17 Tonningen, Rost van, 487 Toynbee, Arnold J.,201-2, 535, 536, 680 Transylvania, 94, 251, 457, 464, 465, 467 Trautmann, Oskar, 99, 700, 173, 419,

420, 423, 424 Trauttmannsdorff, Maximilian Karl zu, 247-49 Trendelenburg, Ernst, 274 Trianon, Treaty of, 42, 92, 346, 454, 457, 659

Tripartite Pact (1940), 390 Tripartite Stabilization Agreement (1936), 124 Trott zu Solz, Adam von, 757

Troubridge, Thomas H., 308 Tukhachevsky, Mikhail, 353 Turkey, 95, 254-56 and England, 451, 468-69, 678-79, 700, 736 and France, 468-70, 736 and Germany, 468-70, 728, 736, 767

and Italy, 736 and U.S.S.R., 749, 767 U.S.S.R., 726 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 267 and Baltic States, 703 and Bulgaria, 734-35 and Carpatho-Ukraine, 645, 662, 706 and China, 414-15, 418-19, 447-48, 707 and Czechoslovakia, 164, 245, 352-53,

527, 535, 544, 550, 551-54, 590, 599-602, 618, 626, 635, 706 and England, 347, 352-53, 365, 41011, 550, 600-602, 611, 626, 685, 690, 700, 703-4, 707-10, 718-25, F52=555 1602 and Estonia, 750 and Finland, 703, 706, 750 and France, 64-67, 142, 144, 164, 172— 74, 242, 352-54, 410, 449, 552-54, 561, 600-602, 627, 687, 689, 701,

864 703-4, 707, 718, 725, 752-55, 761— 63 and Germany (see also Hitler, Adolf — and U.S.S.R.), 52, 54, 61-67, 101, 142-45, 168, 173-75, 241-43, 269, 280, 289, 307-8, 311, 314, 339, 342, 343, 344, 351-54, 409, 442, 446-49, 552, 591, 599-602, 646, 662, 673, 689-91, 706, 709-10, 772, 718-25, 733, 744-51, 758, 767-68, 784, 799— 801 and Hungary, 645, 661-63 and Italy, 243, 314, 721, 740, 745 and Japan, 143, 268, 269, 314, 428-31, 448, 669, 672-73, 716, 719, 724, 743-44, 749 and Latvia, 750 and League of Nations, 144 and Lithuania, 655 and Poland, 59-60, 64-65, 67, 145, 352-53, 444, 552—53, 561, 590, 591, 600, 607, 645, 662, 665, 689, 703-4, 708-9, 718, 720—22, 750, 763, 781 Polish-Soviet Declaration of 27 November 1938, 645, 665, 689 and Polish-Lithuanian dispute, 448, 553 and Rhineland remilitarization, 199

and Romania, 180-81, 251, 252, 346, 351-52, 462, 465-66, 552-53, 600, 659, 733, 734 and Slovakia, 706 and Spain (see also chap. 19), 229, 230, 243 and Spanish Civil War, 404, 410, 447-48 and Turkey, 749, 767 and United States, 726, 749 armed forces, 601—2 Comintern, 175, 243 navy, 242 purge, 352-53, 354, 430, 447-48, 689 Red Army, 447-48, 703 Red Navy, 353, 354

revision of peace treaties, 64 Tass news agency, 66, 718, 721

Trans-Siberian railway, 101

Udet, Ernst, 303 Ukraine (see also Carpatho-Ukraine), 60, 152, 444, 685

Index Ukrainian nationalism, 645—49 Ukrainian nationalists, 69-70 Ukrainian question, 656, 730 Ultra secret, 753 Union of South Africa, 201, 297—99, 390, 558, 609-10 United States aircraft industry, 387, 681, 688

and Anglo-German Naval Agreement, 168 and Anti-Comintern Pact, 480 and disarmament conference, 39, 113, 115 and England, 327-28, 330-31, 339, 359-61, 366—71, 391, 392, 548, 556, 606, 685, 710, 744

Trade Agreement (17 November 1938), 361, 368, 371, 681 and France, 339, 366-67, 387, 478-79, 556-57, 681-82, 688-89, 726 and Germany, 93, 106-24, 281, 293— 95, 339, 475-79, 514, 680-82, 688, 716, 725—26, 784, 800-801 and Hungary, 460, 732 and Japan, 369-70, 428-30, 670-71, 673, 719, 724, 743-44 and Munich, 630, 633, 636, 684 and Poland, 649 and Spanish Civil War, 410

and U.S.S.R., 725-26, 749

German sabotage in, 121 Hitler’s view of, 20

Latin American policy, 481, 483 National Socialist activities in, 114-15, 119 neutrality laws, 297, 327—28, 360, 682, 688, 725-26, 771 Nye Committee, 122

public opinion, 33 rearmament, 688 Upper Silesia, 58, 147, 194, 236, 239 Ustasha, 94, 450, 451

Valera, Eamon de, 702 Valle, Giuseppe, 631 Vansittart, Sir Robert, 30, 132, 219, 378, 319, 332, 337) 338, 353; 3656384494

703, 760 and Czechoslovakia (Sudeten issue), 532,536, 557,560) 569157 30574,

Index

582, 583, 585, 591, 604, 617, 632 and Halifax visit, 374, 375, 379 and United States, 369, 370 Vargas, Getulio, 480-82, 629 Vatican, 44-46, 279 and Germany, 294, 302, 514, 518, 702, 739, 774 Veesenmayer, Edmund, 570 Veltjens, Josef, 222-23, 224, 303, 397 Vereinigte Stahlwerke, 305 Versailles, Treaty of, 34, 103, 214, 220, 278, 291, 302, 308, 336, 354, 437, 438, 442, 462, 515, 528, 602, 620, 634, 667, 116,785 revision of, 42, 43, 48, 300 revision, Hitler’s view of, 9-10, 55, 91, 427, 152, 214-15 Victor Emmanuel III (of Italy), 519, 771 Vienna award of 2 November 1938, 644, 646, 656, 670 Vilna, 67, 441, 459, 655, 750

865

747-48 Welczek, Johannes von, 793, 355, 404,

606 Welles, Sumner, 274 Wennet-Gren, Axel, 757, 759

Western Pact, 331, 339, 348, 365, 382, 438 Westerplatte, 42-43, 50, 730, 765, 781 Wetzell, Wilhelm, 97, 99 Weydenhammer, Rudolf, 82 Wiechmann, Hans, 437-38 Wiedemann, Fritz, 72, 295, 476, 478, 574,

579, 682, 685 trip to London, 574, 580, 582, 598, 604 Wiesner, Rudolf, 765 Wietersheim, Gustav Anton von, 602

Wigram, Ralph, 767

Vuillemin, Joseph, 588

Wilberg, Helmuth, 223, 225-27 Wilhelmina (queen of The Netherlands), 737, 767 Wilson, Hugh, 249, 324, 478, 564, 629, 682 Wilson, Sir Horace, 385, 574, 608, 677, 625, 626-28, 631, 691, 756, 759, 781— 82 Wimmer, Lothar, 376 Windsor, Duchess of (Wallis Simpson), 335

Wagner, Eduard, 694

Windsor, Duke of (see also Edward VHD), 169

V olkischer Beobachter (Munich and Berlin), Boot, 251. 252.457 Volksbund fur das Deutschtum im Ausland (VDA), 92, 312

Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle (Vomi), 445 Volksdeutsche Rat, 88, 247

Waldeck und Pyrmont, Prince Josias von, 78 Wang Ching-wei, 266, 743 War. See under Hitler Warlimont, Walter, 227, 231-32, 641, 757 Watt, Donald C., 168 Weizsacker, Ernst von, 237, 335, 429, 430, 497, 498, 572, 520, 542, 613, 766, 779, 780 and Czechoslovakia, 543, 562, 564, 571, 584, 598, 609, 628, 632, 636, 640-41, 757 and England, 364, 376-77, 390, 374, 578, 584, 609, 671, 680, 773, 742, 757, 766 and France, 671, 742, 763

Woermann, Ernst, 334, 564, 644, 649,

656 Wohlthat, Helmuth, 466, 574, 660, 661, 694, 697, 698, 746, 759 Wolff, Otto, 700 World Economic Conference (London 1933), 65, 75, 107-8, 111 World Raw Materials Conference (Geneva 1937), 306 World War I, 290-91, 300-301, 302, 303, 310, 326, 328, 329, 332, 334, 346, 349, 354, 355, 357, 365, 366, 383, 406, 412, 556, 584, 589, 595, 598, 602, 607, 612, 633, 703, 706, 743, 760, 784, 791-92 World War II, 352, 353, 366, 395, 397, 401, 471, 484, 784

and Hungary, 612

Wysocki, Alfred, 53-54, 56, 64, 443

and Poland, 641, 649, 657, 712-13, 730, 747-48, 757 and U.S.S.R., 718-19, 724-25, 728,

Yellow Peril, 5, 19, 96, 97 Yugoslavia. (see a/so Little Entente)

866 and Bulgaria, 254, 467 and Czechoslovakia, 530, 735 and England, 333, 347, 450, 451, 454, 700, 735 and France, 179, 253, 254, 346-47, 450, 451, 453-54, 545 and Germany, 93-94, 179-80, 244, 253-54, 289, 346, 347, 364, 449-56, 460-61, 514, 658-59, 714, 728, 735— 36 and Hungary, 177-80, 250, 443, 449, 452, 453, 455, 459, 593-94, 622, 658, 663,715) 735 and Italy, 179, 204, 254, 260, 262, 346, 450-51, 456, 461, 493, 503, 597,

Index 599, 714, 735, 741-42, 770 and Rhineland remilitarization, 199, 204 and United States, 735 Anschluss of Austria, 460, 487 Bor copper mines, 253 German minority, 452 Hitler’s view of, 19 Zbot movement, 253, 452 Zeeland, Paul van, 356, 360-61 Zeitzler, Kurt, 563 Zernatto, Guido, 496, 504, 505, 507 Ziehm, Ernst, 51, 55

Praneyor

HIP LER’S POREIGN

POLICY

1933°1939

“THE DEFINITIVE WORK ON HITLER'S FOREIGN POLICY AND THE ORIGINS OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR.” GEORGE 0. KENT The Washington Post

“SURELY THE DEFINITIVE STUDY OF ITS SUBJECT.” LUCY S. DAWIDOWICZ

“An excellent and useful ete)

R.A.C. PARKER

a

Queens College Oxford

“Plainly and simply a superb piece of research within the best traditions of American scholarship. this is a beautifully connected account which brings the entire period into focus.” LOUIS L. SNYDER

Commentary

“The result of a decade’s research and analysis, the text offers as much interpretation as fact, and both are well synthesized in a facilely written narrative style.” GERARD E. SILBERSTEIN

“Social and intellectual history of diplomacy at its best.”

City College CUNY

“Weinberg combines both long familiarity with the source materials for his study,

VOJTECH MASTNY New Leader “Diplomatic history of the highest order...certain to leave all

which include captured German Foreign Office documents, with a keen ability to sort out the important from the trivial.” FREDERICK QUINN

Foreign Service Journal

American Historical Review

the competitors far behind.” W. CARR

University of Sheffield

“(Hitler's Foreign Policy] must be regarded as one of the most important works ever produced

“A monumental, significant study.”

on the origins of the Second World War.”

CHARLES SNYDOR, JR. Chapel Hill Newspaper

PAUL M. KENNEDY

Times Literary Supplement

GERHARD L. WEINBERG arrived in the United States in 1940 as a refugee from Nazi Germany. Professor emeritus at North Carolina and a resident scholar at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, he is the author, editor or co-author of many important books, among them A World At Arms and Hitler’s Second Book and innumerable articles, chapters, and other publications. In 2009 he was awarded the Pritzker Prize for Military History for his outstanding achievements. Dr. Weinberg lives with his wife in North Carolina.

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