History of the Second World War (3 page)

If he had really contemplated a general war, involving Britain, he would have put every possible effort into building a Navy capable of challenging Britain’s command of the sea. But, in fact, he did not even build up his Navy to the limited scale visualised in the Anglo-German Naval Treaty of 1935. He constantly assured his admirals that they could discount any risk of war with Britain. After Munich he told them that they need not anticipate a conflict with Britain within the next six years at least. Even in the summer of 1939, and as late as August 22, he repeated such assurances — if with waning conviction.

How, then, did it come about that he became involved in the major war that he had been so anxious to avoid? The answer is to be found not merely, nor most, in Hitler’s aggressiveness, but in the encouragement he had long received from the complaisant attitude of the Western Powers coupled with their sudden turn-about in the spring of 1939. That reversal was so abrupt and unexpected as to make war inevitable.

If you allow anyone to stoke up a boiler until the steam-pressure rises beyond danger-point, the real responsibility for any resultant explosion will lie with you. That truth of physical science applies equally to political science — especially to the conduct of international affairs.

Ever since Hitler’s entry into power, in 1933, the British and French Governments had conceded to this dangerous autocrat immeasurably more than they had been willing to concede to Germany’s previous democratic Governments. At every turn they showed a disposition to avoid trouble and shelve awkward problems — to preserve their present comfort at the expense of the future.

Hitler, on the other hand, was thinking out his problems all too logically. The course of his policy came to be guided by the ideas formulated in a ‘testament’ which he expounded in November 1937 — a version of which has been preserved in the so-called ‘Hossbach Memorandum’. It was based on the conviction of Germany’s vital need for more
lebensraum
— living space — for her expanding population if there was to be any chance of maintaining their living standards. In his view Germany could not hope to make herself self-sufficient, especially in food-supply. Nor by buying it abroad could she obtain what was needed, since that meant spending more foreign exchange than she could afford. The prospects of her obtaining an increased share in world trade and industry were too limited, because of other nations’ tariff walls and her own financial stringency. Moreover the method of indirect supply would make her dependent on foreign nations, and liable to starvation in case of war.

His conclusion was that Germany must obtain more ‘agriculturally useful space’ — in the thinly populated areas of Eastern Europe. It would be vain to hope that this would be willingly conceded her. ‘The history of all times — Roman Empire, British Empire — has proved that every space expansion can be effected only by breaking resistance and taking risks. . . . Neither in former times nor today has space been found without an owner.’ The problem would have to be solved by 1945 at the latest — ‘after this we can only expect a change for the worse’. Possible outlets would be blocked while a food crisis would be imminent.

While these ideas went much farther than Hitler’s initial desire to recover the territory that had been taken from Germany after World War I, it is not true that Western statesmen were as unaware of them as they later pretended. In 1937-8 many of them were frankly realistic in private discussion, though not on public platforms, and many arguments were set forth in British governing circles for allowing Germany to expand eastwards, and thus divert danger from the West. They showed much sympathy with Hitler’s desire for
lebensraum
— and let him know it. But they shirked thinking out the problem of how the owners could be induced to yield it except to threat of superior force.

The German documents reveal that Hitler derived special encouragement from Lord Halifax’s visit in November 1937. Halifax was then Lord President of the Council, ranking second in the Cabinet to the Prime Minister. According to the documentary record of the interview, he gave Hitler to understand that Britain would allow him a free hand in Eastern Europe. Halifax may not have meant as much, but that was the impression he conveyed — and it proved of crucial importance.

Then, in February 1938, Mr Anthony Eden was driven to resign as Foreign Minister after repeated disagreements with Chamberlain — who in response to one of his protests had told him to ‘go home and take an aspirin’. Halifax was appointed to succeed him at the Foreign Office. A few days later the British Ambassador in Berlin, Sir Nevile Henderson, called on Hitler for a confidential talk, in continuation of Halifax’s November conversation, and conveyed that the British Government was much in sympathy with Hitler’s desire for ‘changes in Europe’ to Germany’s benefit — ‘the present British Government had a keen sense of reality’.

As the documents show, these events precipitated Hitler’s action. He thought that the lights had changed to green, allowing him to proceed eastward. It was a very natural conclusion.

Hitler was further encouraged by the accommodating way that the British and French Governments accepted his march into Austria and incorporation of that country in the German Reich. (The only hitch in that easy coup was the way many of his tanks broke down on the road to Vienna.) Still more encouragement came when he heard that Chamberlain and Halifax had rejected Russian proposals, after that coup, to confer on a collective insurance plan against the German advance.

Here it should be added that when the threat to the Czechs came to a head in September 1938, the Russian Government again made known, publicly and privately, its willingness to combine with France and Britain in measures to defend Czecho-Slovakia. That offer was ignored. Moreover, Russia was ostentatiously excluded from the Munich conference at which Czecho-Slovakia’s fate was settled. This ‘cold-shouldering’ had fatal consequences the following year.

After the way that the British Government had appeared to acquiesce in his eastward move, Hitler was unpleasantly surprised by their strong reaction, and the partial mobilisation, which developed when he ‘put the heat’ on Czecho-Slovakia in September. But when Chamberlain yielded to his demands, and actively helped him to impose his terms on Czecho-Slovakia, he felt that the momentary threat of resistance had been in the nature of a face-saving operation — to meet the objections of the large body of British opinion, headed by Mr Winston Churchill, which opposed the governmental policy of conciliation and concession. He was no less encouraged by the passivity of the French. As they had so readily abandoned their Czech ally, which had possessed the most efficient Army of all the smaller Powers, it seemed unlikely that they would go to war in defence of any remnant of their former chain of allies in East and Central Europe.

Thus Hitler felt that he could safely complete the elimination of Czecho-Slovakia at an early moment, and then expand his eastward advance.

At first he did not think of moving against Poland — even though she possessed the largest stretch of territory carved out of Germany after World War I. Poland, like Hungary, had been helpful to him in threatening Czecho-Slovakia’s rear, and thus inducing her to surrender to his demands — Poland, incidentally, had exploited the chance to seize a slice of Czech territory. Hitler was inclined to accept Poland as a junior partner for the time being, on condition that she handed back the German port of Danzig and granted Germany a free route to East Prussia through the Polish ‘Corridor’. On Hitler’s part, it was a remarkably moderate demand in the circumstances. But in successive discussions that winter, Hitler found that the Poles were obstinately disinclined to make any such concession, and also had an inflated idea of their own strength. Even so, he continued to hope that they would come round after further negotiation. As late as March 25 he told his Army Commander-In-Chief that he ‘did not wish to solve the Danzig problem by the use of force’. But a change of mind was produced by an unexpected British step that followed on a fresh step on his part in a different direction.

In the early months of 1939, the heads of the British Government were feeling happier than they had for a long time past. They lulled themselves into the belief that their accelerated rearmament measures, America’s rearmament programme and Germany’s economic difficulties were diminishing the danger of the situation. On March 10 Chamberlain privately expressed the view that the prospects of peace were better than ever, and spoke of his hopes that a new disarmament conference would be arranged before the end of the year. Next day Sir Samuel Hoare — Eden’s predecessor as Foreign Secretary and now Home Secretary — hopefully suggested in a speech that the world was entering ‘a Golden Age’. Ministers assured friends and critics that Germany’s economic plight made her incapable of going to war, and that she was bound to comply with the British Government’s conditions in return for the help that it was offering her in the form of a commercial treaty. Two ministers, Mr Oliver Stanley and Mr Robert Hudson, were going to Berlin to arrange it.

That same week
Punch
came out with a cartoon which showed ‘John Bull’ awaking with relief from a nightmare, while the recent ‘war scare’ was flying out of the window. Never was there such a spell of absurdly optimistic illusions as during the week leading up to the ‘Ides of March’, 1939.

Meantime the Nazis had been fostering separatist movements in Czecho-Slovakia, to produce its breakdown from within. On March 12 the Slovaks declared their independence, after their leader, Father Tiso, had visited Hitler in Berlin. More blindly, Poland’s Foreign Minister, Colonel Beck, publicly expressed his full sympathy with the Slovaks. On the 15th, German troops marched into Prague, after the Czech President had yielded to Hitler’s demand to establish a ‘Protectorate’ over Bohemia and to occupy the country accordingly.

The previous autumn, when the Munich agreement was made, the British Government had pledged itself to guarantee Czecho-Slovakia against aggression. But Chamberlain told the House of Commons that he considered that Slovakia’s break-away had annulled the guarantee, and that he did not feel bound by this obligation. While expressing regret at what had happened, he conveyed to the House that he saw no reason why it should ‘deflect’ British policy.

Within a few days, however, Chamberlain made a complete ‘about-turn’ — so sudden and far-reaching that it amazed the world. He jumped to a decision to block any following move of Hitler’s and on March 29 sent Poland an offer to support her against ‘any action which threatened Polish independence, and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist’.

It is impossible to gauge what was the predominant influence on his impulse — the pressure of public indignation, or his own indignation, or his anger at having been fooled by Hitler, or his humiliation at having been made to look a fool in the eyes of his own people.

Most of those in Britain who had supported and applauded his previous appeasement policy underwent a similarly violent reaction — sharpened by the reproaches of the ‘other half’ of the nation, which had distrusted the policy. The breach was cemented, and the nation reunited, by a general surge of exasperation.

The unqualified terms of the guarantee placed Britain’s destiny in the hands of Poland’s rulers, men of very dubious and unstable judgement. Moreover, the guarantee was impossible to fulfil except with Russia’s help, yet no preliminary steps were taken to find out whether Russia would give, or Poland would accept, such aid.

The Cabinet, when asked to approve the guarantee, was not even shown the actual report of the Chiefs of Staff Committee — which would have made clear how impossible it was, in a practical sense, to give any effective protection to Poland.* It is doubtful, however, whether this would have made any difference in face of the prevailing mood.

* I was told this soon afterwards by Mr Hore-Belisha, then Secretary of State for War, and also by Lord Beaverbrook, who had heard about the matter from other members of the Government.

When the guarantee was discussed in Parliament it was welcomed on all sides. Mr Lloyd George’s was a solitary voice when he warned the House that it was suicidal folly to undertake such a far-stretched commitment without first making sure of Russia’s backing. The Polish Guarantee was the surest way to produce an early explosion, and a world war. It combined the maximum temptation with manifest provocation. It incited Hitler to demonstrate the futility of such a guarantee to a country out of reach from the West, while making the stiff-necked Poles even less inclined to consider any concession to him, and at the same time making it impossible for him to draw back without ‘losing face’.

Why did Poland’s rulers accept such a fatal offer? Partly because they had an absurdly exaggerated idea of the power of their out of date forces — they boastfully talked of a ‘cavalry ride to Berlin’. Partly because of personal factors: Colonel Beck, shortly afterwards, said that he made up his mind to accept the British offer between ‘two flicks of the ash’ off the cigarette he was smoking. He went on to explain that at his meeting with Hitler in January he had found it hard to swallow Hitler’s remark that Danzig ‘
must’
be handed back, and that when the British offer was communicated to him he saw it, and seized it, as a chance to give Hitler a slap in the face. This impulse was only too typical of the ways in which the fate of peoples is often decided.

The only chance of avoiding war now lay in securing the support of Russia — the only power that could give Poland direct support and thus provide a deterrent to Hitler. But, despite the urgency of the situation, the British Government’s steps were dilatory and half-hearted. Chamberlain had a strong dislike of Soviet Russia and Halifax an intense religious antipathy, while both underrated her strength as much as they overrated Poland’s. If they now recognised the desirability of a defensive arrangement with Russia they wanted it on their own terms, and failed to realise that by their precipitate guarantee to Poland they had placed themselves in a position where they would have to sue for it on her terms — as was obvious to Stalin, if not to them.