Why Britain is at War by Harold Nicolson & Harold Nicolson

Author:Harold Nicolson & Harold Nicolson
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780141961743
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2010-07-22T16:00:00+00:00

4

Having by these means obliged the Czechs to surrender their own defences, and thereby their own liberty, Mr. Chamberlain, accompanied by Sir Horace Wilson (industrial adviser to His Majesty’s Government) flew to meet Herr Hitler at Bad Godesberg. It will be remembered that it was in this same hotel that the Führer in 1934 had plotted the murder of Röhm and his associates. On arrival at Bad Godesberg, Mr. Chamberlain was met by “a totally unexpected situation.” He had imagined that Herr Hitler would feel deeply grateful to him for having forced the Czechs to surrender their defences and their frontiers. Herr Hitler now stated that the Anglo-French plan was out of date and presented further demands which were of so outrageous a nature that they came as “a profound shock” to Mr. Chamberlain. He consented none the less to transmit these demands to Prague. The Czech Government rejected these Godesberg demands as “absolutely and unconditionally inacceptable.” The British Cabinet, on Mr. Chamberlain’s return to London, also regarded the Godesberg ultimatum as something which no independent Government could accept and which the British Government could not ask them to accept. Mr. Chamberlain therefore despatched Sir Horace Wilson to Berlin with a personal message to Herr Hitler.

The Führer received Mr. Chamberlain’s industrial adviser in his Wilhelmstrasse office. Sir Horace Wilson, in his gentle voice, began to read aloud the message with which he had been entrusted. The Führer slapped his thigh in rage, crossed his arms in a gesture of incontrollable impatience, swung himself sideways in his chair, gazed at the ceiling as if appealing to Wotan and Thor and Odin to crush the industrial adviser to His Majesty’s Government, and uttered the one word “Schluss!” That word is the German equivalent of “Shut up.” Again Sir Horace Wilson tried to deliver his message. The Führer raved and screamed. It was, he said, a matter of days, nay of hours, nay of minutes. He refused to delay for a moment longer. The conditions in the Sudeten territories had become unbearable. His personal honour and the honour of the whole German nation was now involved. “I shall,” he screamed, “tear the Czechs into little pieces. They must be smashed, smashed, smashed.”

Sir Horace Wilson returned to London. The Führer then announced that unless the Godesberg terms were accepted by 2.0 p.m. on Thursday, September 29th, that is in two days’ time, Germany would be obliged to take military action.

The intelligent reader will at this stage be asking himself: “But what exactly was the difference between the Anglo-French plan and the terms embodied in the Godesberg ultimatum? The difference was as follows. The Anglo-French plan provided:

(a) That all areas containing a 51 per cent German majority should be handed over to Germany.

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