1940-04-23 — Page 4

PAGE 4-HONGKONG TELEGRAPH

Sir Nevile Henderson

INSTALMENT TWO

How Hitler planned to win over British opposition to his Europcan plans until he was ready to attack the British Empire is explained to-day.

Sir Nevile was British. Ambassador in Germany from May, 1937, until September, 1930, and in this dramatic story, "My Two Years with Hitler," he in telling, "EXCLUSIVELY in the "Hongkong Telegraph," the historic sequence of events that led up to the war.

Yesterday he described his first meetings with litter, with the comment, "It was always my fate to fud him in a temper." Of Ribbentrop, whose influence. on Hitler he described as sinister, he wrote, "Ilistgry will attribute a large share of the blame for September, 1999, to him."

THE FIRST of my purely personal efforts to improve relations with the Nazi rulers of Germany had been a speech of friendship which I had made at a dinner given to me in May, 1937,

The second was my attendance at the Nuremberg Farty rally in September.

No British, French or United States Ambassador had hitherto gone to Nuremberg, on the ground that as a Party Day it would not be regarded as a purely official meeting.

For the first time, my French colleague, M. Francois-Poncet, Mr. Gilbert, the United States Charge d'Affaires, and myself, were authorised in 1937 by our respective Governments to attend the Rally.

Nobody who has not witnessed the various displays given

at Nuremberg during the week's Rally, or been subjected to the atmosphere thereat, can be said to be fully acquainted with the Nazi movement in Germany.

I attended a review of the Party leaders, 140,000 in number and representing at that time over two million members of the Party.

I was present at a rally of the Hitler Youth, 48,000 strong,

with 5,000 girls, and at sup per party to Herr Himmler's S.S. camp of 25,000 blackshirts. I had talks with Hitler himself. Neurath, Goering and Goebbels, as well no a number of other less important personages,

The displays themselves were most impressive. That of the party leaders (or heads of the party organisations in the towns and villages throughout the country) took place in the even- ing at eight p.m. in the stadium, or Zeppelinfold,

Drussed in their brown shirts, those 140,000 men were drawn up in six great columns with pasanges between them.

Hitler himself prrived at the far entrance of the stadium. Home four hundred yards from the platform; and, accompanied by several hundred of his fol lowers, marched on foot up the central page to his appointed place.

My Impression of Nuremberg

His arrival was theatrically notified by the sudden turning into the air of the 300 or more searchlights with which the sta- dum avas surrounded.

The blue-tinged light from these met thousands of feet up in the air at the top to make a kind of square roof, to which a chance cloud gave Added realism.

The effect, which was both solemn and beautiful, was like being inside a cathedral of ice.

At the word of command the standard bearers then advanced

4128 the

Невн Rudolph Fuchrer's deputy. to be sort of adopted son to In a sense, he seemed to me

Hitler, and on the outbreak of war he was named a second

fter Gooring in the order of succession to the leadership of the German nation.

In less troublous times he raight well have been named first, but his authority with the Army would scarcely have Been great enough in war time to hold the balance between the soldiers and the Nazi Party.

Tall and dark, with beetling eyebrows, a famous smile, and ingratiating manners, Hess was perhaps the most attractive looking of the leading Nazis.

He was not inclined to bo talkative, and in conversation did not convey the impression of great ability.

I would have summed him up us aloof and inscrutable, with a strong fanatical streak.

At the Youth Rally it was Von Shirach's speech which, in spite of its painfully adulatory. references to the Fuehrer, im- pressed me most.

One part of it surprised me when, addressing the boys, he said, "I do not know if you are Protestants or Catholica: but that you believe in God-that I do know."

to re-

I had been under the impres sion that all reference ligion was discouraged among the Hitler Youth,

Theoretically, however, in spite of the revolt against the sacred books of the Jews,` re- ligion was free to the Hitler Youth: but, where and when- ever it was possible to do so, it was in practice discouraged by various effective methods.

from out of sight at the far end. Sinister and

up the main line and over the farther tiers and up the four side Innes,

A certain proportion of theso standards hail electric lights on their shafts, and the spectacle of these five rivers of red and gold rippling forward under the dome of blue light, in complete silence. through the massed formations of brown shirts, was indescribably picturesque. ..I had spent six years in St. Petorburg before the war in the best days of the old Russian ballet, but in grandiose beauty I have never Been a ballet to compare with it.

The German, who has a highly daveloped herd instinct, is per- fectly happy when he is wearing a uniform, marching in step and singing in chorus, and the Nazi revolution has certainly known how to appeal to these instincts.

Hess the Inscrutable

As display 'of aggregate strength it was ominous; as a triumph of mass organisation combined with beauty it was superb.

The roview of the Hitler Youth was no less an object Jesson from an observer'a point of view, Standarda, music and singing again played a big part In the performance, and the fervour of youth was much in evidence. The speeches on that occasion were made by Titior, Heas and Daldur von Shirach, the leader of the Hitler Youth.

GOERING

threatens the BRITISH EMPIRE

ny

His own religion, with its German God was free, and that was all he cared for.

Furthermore, he could always make himself believe whatever he said.

National-Socialist

he conceived it

It was this kind of attitude which made ordinary conver- sation and argument with him, and his Imitator Ribben- trop, so difficult and unsatis- factory.

The supper in a great tent in Herr Himmler's S.S. Police Camp at Nuremberg was equally

Menacing Scene instructive in another sense.

The God of the Hohenzollerna had not saved Germany from de-` feat in 1918, and though God might still be worshipped, It anust be a purely German one, to whom Hitler was so closely allied as to be barely distin- guishable from the Deity Ilm- Holf.

Hitler himself in his speeches constantly roferred to the Almighty. He WAN not an ntheist, but merely pro-Hitler and anti-Christian.

In the course of one of my interviews with him we touched upon the subject of the religion. He was at the moment incensed against carinin English bishops for supporting the case of Pastor Niemoeller,

He would not, he shouted, brook any further Interferencé by English Churchmen in the religions affairs of Germany.

It was their meddling, le sald, which had caused him to give orders for Niemoller to be put in a concentration camp after he had been set at Iberty by the tribunal which had tried him for sedition,

If, he continued, any English bishops tried to come to Ger many they would be turned back at the frontier; and he concluded with the natounding statement that "Nowhere was religion freer than in Germany,” It was the sort of remark to which I never was able to find an anawor, nor would it have served any purpose if I had.

During suppor a number of songs were sung by a chorus of Black-shirts, and after it there was a tattoo for the lowering of the Swastika damp flag.

The music, as well as the bearing and drill of the specint colour party, was exceptionally good. The S.S. played a big part in ruling Germany for Hitler, and they wore picked men of powerful physique.

"But," as I wrote at the time, "the camp in the darkness, dim. ly lit by flares, with the black uniforms in the ailant back- ground tind the skull and cross- bones on the drums and trumpets lent to the scene a sinister and menacing impression. I felt, in- deed, as if I wore back in the days of Wallenstein and the Thirty Years' War in the seventeenth century.

Herr Hitler was more friendly to me personally on that occasion than on any of the others

on

which I saw him. He was on- doubtedly pleased at the atten- dance for the first time of the British, French, and American representatives, and he indicated that he attributed this innovation to my Initiative.

As it happened, I had had a long talk with Dr. Goebbels at lunch that day on the subject of our respective Presses, and I toki Hitler so There was nothing very now in that talk, and up to the Inst the Press problem re- mained insoluble, but Goebbels had, bean friendly and sensible. The "little doctor" was probably the most intelligent, from a puro

ly brain point of view, of all the Nazi leaders. He never speechi- fled; he always saw and stuck to the point; he Was an able debater and, in private conversa- tion, astonishingly fair minded and reasottable. Personally, whenever I had the chance, I found pleasure in talking to him.

In appearance and in charac- ter he was a typical little Irish ngitator, and was, in fact, pro- He bably of Cellic origin. came from the Rhineland ned and heen educated in a Jesuit school.

He was a slip of a man, but, in spite of his slight deformity, he had given proof of great courage when he fought the Communista In Berlin and won the capital for Hitler and Nazism.

When, however, he was on a publle platform or had a pen in his hand no gall was too bitter and no lie too blatant for him.

Baron von Neurath, whom I saw the following day, was more forthcoming than Hitler. He told me that he found his Fuhrer less resentful and more anxious for an understanding with Britain than he had been for a long time Just.

He did not, howover, en- courage me to think that Hitler would reopen the question of his visit to London.

I remember that I asked him, in the course of conversation, what were Germany's ultimate ninia,

His reply was, "Austria fa the first and last of our alma; the Sudeten German problem Is a matter for compromise and can be settled amicably, pro- vided the Czechs leave the Rus- sian orbilt and give true equality to their German sub jecta,"

Such a statement was, as I was to discover, a characteristic exam pló both of the half-truths in- dulged in whenever it was neces sary to dofing Gorman policy, and of the deceptive nature of GermLATI nssurances in gonornl.1.0., readiness to admit, an obvious objective, coupled with a positive declaration that, nothing more thereafter was aimed at,

Coering "I found more honest than Hitler... our talks were always on friendly terms."

Anschluss

in Austria

It was so far true that Austrin was, in fact, Hitler's Immediate objective.

Of that there was no shadow of doubt, and in commenting on the greator calmness of the 1937 Party Rully, I had reported, "Ger- many to-day feels, that she can not only afford to wait, but by walting will be yet stronger and more sure of her goal. And the big goal is German unity. that let there be no mistake either; and if we intend definite- ly to oppose it, we should lose no time in naking ourselves the first and capital question 'How'?" It was already quite evident that it would be futile to any "o" to the dictator without be ing prepared to go to war to enforce it.

The question of the Austrian Anschluss was also mentioned in a long conversation which I had with Gooring at this time.

He insisted that it was in- evitable, and told me that he had a few days before seen Herr Guldo Schmidt, the Aus- trian Minister for Foreign Affairs, and had bluntly told him that the sooner the Aug- trian Government accepted·ft as such, and without creating bad blood, the better it would be for all concerned.

Destroy the British Empire

As usual, Goering was very outspoken, and at times bell- icose. Yet our many talks, in spite of complete frankness on both sides, were never con- ducted on any but mutually friendly lines.

He suffered comparatively little from the personal resent- mants which so often inspired Hitler and Ribbentrop, and up to the last I was inclined to -belleve"in" the sincerity ar-his- personal desire for peace, and good relations with England.

He Infd stress, on this at Nuremberg, though at the same time he added that if the British Empire refused to collaborate with Germany, there would be nothing for the latter to do but to devote herself to the destruction of that, Empire instead of to its maintenance.

In this connection he men- tioned to me--and was the first German to do so the pos- sibility of the Reich being compelled to revise, the Anglo- German Naval Agreement.

I told him then, and again some months later, that such

a step would inevitably lead In the end once more to war

with Britain.

He regretfully admitted that this might be so, and added that it was against his advice that Hitler had insisted, when he did, on the conclusion of that Agreement.

Baron von Neurath once told me the same thing, the argu- ment of both of them being that Hitler should have kept the naval agreement as a trump dard up his sleeve for eventual use in a final bargain.

They were both more honest in this respect than Hitler since, from Goering's remark, I fancy that the contingency of repudiat- ing that trerty was already in Hitler's mind, and, judging by subsequent experience, I can only conclude that he nover Intended to observe its terma longer than it suited him.

It was dificult, or even materially impossible, for him 'to rebuild a navy at the same time that he was re-creating his Immensely formidable military and air machine, ond the solo oblect, in Hitler's mind, of the Naval Agreement was to disarm British opposi- tion to his schemes in Central Europe until such time as come to fruition and were realised.

they

Thereafter it would be the turn of the British Empire. It is impossible to-day to draw

any other conclusion. "TO-MÓRROW you will read of Goering's threat to bomb Britain.

Tuesday, APRIL 23, 1940.

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