The Hitler–Hess Deception. Martin Allen

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      On 3 September 1939, an utterly dejected Neville Chamberlain, worn out and disillusioned by his failure to deal with the dictator of Germany, stood before his colleagues in the House of Commons. He had seen his hopes for European peace blown away by the dry, hot wind of war. History is harsh, and Chamberlain’s twenty-five years of honest public service would be forgotten in an instant. His name would forever be linked to the appeasement of Nazism, the pandering to a dictator who was plunging Europe into war even as he addressed the House.

      A hush descended amongst the MPs, and Chamberlain began to speak, his sonorous tones echoing around the chamber as he declared:

      When I spoke last night to the House I could not but be aware that in some parts of the House there were doubts and some bewilderment as to whether there had been any weakening, hesitation, or vacillation on the part of His Majesty’s Government. In the circumstances, I make no reproach, for if I had been in the same position as hon[ourable] members not sitting on this Bench and not in possession of all the information which we have, I should very likely have felt the same.

      After informing the House that the British Ambassador in Berlin had delivered an ultimatum to the German government demanding that German armed forces ‘suspended all aggressive action against Poland and were prepared to withdraw their forces from Polish territory’, Chamberlain went on to disclose that: ‘No such undertaking was received from [the German government] by the time stipulated, and, consequently, this country is at war with Germany.’

      Finally, Chamberlain opened up slightly, expressing his own feelings of personal failure: ‘This is a very sad day for all of us, and to none is it sadder than to me. Everything that I have worked for, everything that I have hoped for, everything that I have believed in during my public life, has crashed into ruins. There is only one thing left for me to do; that is, to devote what strength and powers I have to forwarding the victory of the cause for which we have to sacrifice so much. I cannot tell what part I may be allowed to play myself; I trust I may live to see the day when Hitlerism has been destroyed and a liberated Europe has been re-established …’⁵

      Chamberlain’s wish was not to be fulfilled – he would be dead in little over a year.

      In Berlin, Britain and France’s determination to stand by Poland and declare war on Germany left Hitler stunned. However, he quickly convinced himself and his intimates at the Chancellery that ‘England and France had obviously declared war merely as a sham, in order not to lose face before the world.’ Having given the Poles an assurance of protection, they could do little else. Hitler asserted that ‘there would be no fighting’,⁶ and ordered Germany’s forces in the west not to provoke the Allies, but to remain strictly on the defensive. ‘Of course we are in a state of war with England and France,’ Hitler would confide to his dinner guests a few days later, ‘but if we on our side avoid all acts of war [against France and Britain], the whole business will evaporate. As soon as we sink a ship and they have sizeable casualties, the war party over there will gain strength.’⁷

      However, events in Britain were about to deal a bad hand of cards to Hitler: within a short time of the British declaration of war, he received news that Winston Churchill had been appointed First Lord of the Admiralty, and joined the War Cabinet. An eyewitness recalled that on hearing the news, Hitler ‘dropped into the nearest chair, and said wearily “Churchill is in the Cabinet. That means that the war is really on. Now we have war with England.”’⁸

      Regardless of the British and French declarations of war, and Hitler’s fear of a conflict in the west that he did not want, Germany maintained her relentless attack on the ever-weakening Polish forces. On 17 September Poland’s determination to fight off the German invaders turned to anguish when Soviet Russia attacked her rear, and as the Red Army poured into eastern Poland, Polish resistance began to disintegrate. A mere ten days later, on 27 September, Warsaw fell to the German army, and the following day saw what was left of Poland partitioned between Germany and Russia. Technically, Poland had ceased to exist.

      Despite the military posturing that now took place on the Franco–German border, between the British and French armies on the one side and Germany’s forces on the other, a sort of peace did appear to settle uneasily over Europe. This was the time of the ‘phoney war’, described in Germany as the Sitzkrieg, the sitting war.

      It was during this period that Hitler developed hopes that some form of accommodation could be found to end the conflict, with Germany retaining her conquests, and the Allies, having made their protests and metaphorically waved their fists at a belligerent Germany, backing down and agreeing to peace.

      On 6 October, the fighting in Poland having finished and there being only a minimal level of conflict in the west, Hitler made his first public appeal for peace, giving an unrepentant yet placatory speech to the Reichstag. To many in the west, Hitler’s speech sounded like mere rhetoric. But, unbeknownst to the Reichsleiters and Reichsministers seated before him, the Führer had been making a concerted behind-the-scenes effort to negotiate an accord with Britain.

      Ten days prior to Hitler’s appearance at the Reichstag, he had had a confidential meeting in his office at the Chancellery with a man named Birger Dahlerus, a prominent Swedish businessman who was also a close friend of the British Ambassador in Oslo, Sir George Ogilvie Forbes. Dahlerus informed Hitler that Ogilvie Forbes had told him that ‘the British government was looking for peace. The only question was: How could the British save face?’

      ‘If the British actually want peace,’ Hitler had replied, ‘they can have it within two weeks – without losing face.’⁹ He informed Dahlerus that although Britain would have to be reconciled to the fact that ‘Poland cannot rise again’, he was prepared to guarantee the security of Britain and western Europe – a region he had little interest in, for despite some concerns about German access to the North Sea, German expansion into western Europe was not part of the Karl Haushofer plan for the Greater Germany.

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