1940-05-08 — Page 4

PAGE 4.-HONGKONG TELEGRAPH

Sir Nevile Henderson INSTALMENT

HITLER POSTPONES the WAR

With the Soviet pact in his pocket Hitler became jubilant and truculent. He was prepared to show the world what his army and air force would do if he did not get his way in the Polish dispute.

To-day Sir Nevile Henderson, Britain's Ambassador in Berlin until the outbreak of war, tells how dramatic moves to save the peace were made by Britain, and how Hitler, with preparations for an invasion of Poland apparently complete, hesitated.

AT the moment

on August

A

22 when Herr von Ribben- trop was preparing to fly to Moscow, I received instruc - tions to convey without delay. a personal letter from the Prime Minister to Herr Hitler.

An interview was arranged for me with Hitler for the fol- lowing day at Berchtesgaden, and I left Berlin at 9.30 a.m. on August 23.

I reached Salzburg about mid- day, and had my Brst audience with ler at Berchtesgaden at 1 1.ກາ.

of the The three main points Prime Minister's letter were:-

(1) Insistence on the determina- tion of Ifts Majesty's Government to fulfil their obligations to Po- land.

(2) Their readiness, if a peace atmosphere could be created, to discuss all-the-problems_at_issue_ between our two .countries, and

(3) Their anxiety, during a period of truce, to see imediate direct discussion Initiated be- Germany and Poland in tween regard

to the reciprocal treatment of minorities.

Hitler's reply, which was no less uncompromising than I had anti- cipated, was to the effect that Great Britain's determination support Poland could not modify his polley.

Fuehrer gives me his reply

10

...He was prepared to accept even a long war rather thun sacrifice and national interesis Germas honour, and if Great Britain per- sisted In her own measures mobilisation he would at onco order the mobilsation of the whole of the German forces.

of

At my first interview with him on that day, itler was in a mood of extreme excitability. His Innritage as regards the Poles and the British responsibility for Polish attitudo was violent, re- criminatory and exaggerated.

He referred, for instance, lo 100,- 000 German refugees from Poland, at least five figure which was times greater than the reality,

At my second interview, when he handed me his reply, he had re- covered his colm but was not less obdurate. Everything was Eng- *land's fault.

She had encouraged the Czechs last year and she was now giving a blank cheque to Poland. No longer, he told me, did he trust Mr. Chamberlain,

He preferred war, he said, when he was fifty to when he was fifty- five or sixty.

He had himself always sought and believe in the possibility of. Friendship with England.

He now realised, he sald, that those who had argued the contrary had been right and nothing short of change in British policy a complete towards Germany could ever con- vince him of any sincere Britich desire for good relations.

My last remark to him was that I could only deduce from his lan- quago that my mission to Ger many had failed and that I bitter- ly regretted it,

I flow back from Berchtesgaden to Berlin the same evening.

I had, in fact, little hope that either the Prime Minister's letter ur my own language to Hiller, how- ever direct and straightforward, would give him pause.

The Russian pact had, I felt,, created in his opinion a situation

Sir Nevile Henderson

certainly not averse to putting them to the test so far as Poland way concerned.

Asked to fly

which was favourable to his de- to London

signs and I believed his mind to be definitely made up.

Though he spoke in a Neronic vein of his artisite tastes and of his lunging to satisfy them, I derived the impression that the corporal of the last war was even more anxi- ous to prove what he could do an a conquering Generalissimo In

ext.

or

the

Germany What the world might suffer was of no consequence so long as his lust to show what he, as leader of Germany, could do was satisfied.

More than once he repented to me that, if he had been Chancellor In 1914, she would of Germany never have lost that war in 1918,

Nevertheless the visit to Berch- tesgaden may after all have post- poned the disaster for a week.

Ribbentrop few buck to Ger- many with the signed Russo-Ger- Inon Agreement and Hitler return- ed to Berlin on the night of August 24.

I have, as I have mentioned earlier, some reason to believe- though I cannot confirm it-that the order for the German Army to advance into Poland was ac- tually Issued for the night of August 25.

otherwise to find It is dimeult Justification for the various orders and arrangements which came into force on August 20 and 27.

In the afternoon of August 25 itself, all telephone communication between Berlin and London and Paris was unexpectedly cut off for several hours.

Why he hesitated

The celebrations at Tunnenberg were cancelled on the 26th, and the Party Rally at Nuremberg on August 27; all naval, military and air attaches at Berlin were refused permission to leave the city with- out prior authority being obtained from the Ministry of War.

All German airports were closed from August 20, and the whole of Germany became a prohibited zone for all aircraft except the regular civil lines. All internal German air services were also suspended.

Moreover, as from the 27th a system for the rationing of food-.

and stuffs

other commodities Into throughout Germany came force.

That this latter and-for, the pubilo depreming measure should have been adopted prior to

can the outbreak of war scarcely be explained, except on the assumption that war should actually liavo broken out on August 20.

be, as I The fact may well Imagine it was, that Hitler had had in consequence of the Prime Minis- ler's letter one Inst hesitation and countermanded the orders to his army, whereas the other arrange- ments were allowed to proceed un- checked.

But it was not the horrors of war or the thought of dead Ger- mans which deterred him.

Ho had unlimited confidence in the magnificent army and air force which he had recreated, and he was

armaments,

15.

return to London during that week,

why I

I had been asked by some German newspaper correspondents had forgotten my buttonhole.

I told them that I had not for- gotten, but that I considered it to be inappropriate at a moment of The story hod such grave crisis,

around und I regarded Meissner's remark as alguliicant.

Was Hitler then preoccupied us to what the answer of His Majesty's Government would be?

Kot

But it was probably merely Meissner's Own wishful thinking

or preoccupation.

I wore my carnation again tho next day, but, that time, as I was leaving after my interview, I told Melssner that feared that I would never

wear one again in Germany.

[Copyright to all countrica. Reproduction in whole or in part strictly prohibited.]

TO-MORROW:

My midnight scene with Ribbentrop Two amazing interviews-Pistol at Po- land's head-My warning to Halifax.

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of limitation Majesty's Government pointed out that, whereas a just settlement of the Polish question might open the way to world peace, fallure to do so would finally ruln the hopes of better understanding between our countries

und might well plunge the whole world into war.

In tivo months, he told me, the I did most

the East would be ended

wat in and he would then, he said, hurt one hundred and sixty divisions against the Western Front, if Eng- land was so unwise as to oppose his plans.

His hesilation was due rather to one final effort to detach Britain from Poland.

Be that as it may, at about 12.45 on August 25, I received a message to the effect that Hitler wished to receive me at the Chancellery at At that meeting he 1.30 .. mude to me the verbal communi- already been cation which has published in the White Paper on the outbreak of war.

Briefly put. litier's proposals therein-dealt with two groups_of_ questions: (a) the immediate neces- sity of a settlement of the dispute between Germany and Poland, and (b) an eventual offer of friendship or alliance between Germany and Great Britain.

over

an

Hliler, at My Interview, with which Herr von Ribbentrop' and Dr. Schmidt were also present, Insted on this occasion hour.

The Chancellor spoke with calm. le de- and apparent sincerity.

as a last scribed his, proposals effort, for conscience sake, to secure good relations with Great Britain, and he suggested that I should fly to London myself with them..

I told his Excellency that. while I was fully prepared to consider his course. I felt it my duty to tell him quite clearly that my country could not possibly go back on is word to Poland.

the

However anxious we were for a belter understanding with. Ger- many, we could never reach one negotiated except on the basis of a settlement with Poland,

Whatever may have been

this

Anal underlying motive of Resture on the part of the Chan- cellor, it was one which could not be ignored, and with Lord Halifax's consent, I flew to London carly the following morning (August 26), on

German

plane which was cour- put at my disposal. teously

by Hls Two days were spent

giving Majesty's Government in the fullest and most careful con- sideration to Hitler's message, and on the afternoon of August 28 I flew back to Berlin with their reply.

His Majesty's Government pro- posed the Inflation of direct dis- cussions between the Polish and German Governments,

the adoption of immediate steps to re- Reve the tension in the matter of the treatment of minorities.

dנות

Furthermore, they undertoux -to use all their Influence with a view to contributing towards a solution which might be satisfactory to which would. both parties, and they hoped, prepare the way for the negotiation of that wider and more complete understanding be. tween Great Britain and Germany which both countries desired.

Finally, after a reference to

These extracts are taken from the book by Sir Nevile Henderson en- titled "Failure of a Mission,” pub. lished by Messrs... Hodder' the Stoughton, Ltd.

of the talking

11

Could any reply have been more

Or straightforward? precise mode it easy for Hitler to avoid the calamity of war, if he bed really wished to do so.

At 10.30 p.m. on August 20, 1 was nt the received by Herr Hiller Reichschancery and handed to him this British reply, together with a German translation.

Hitler was once again friendly and reasonable, and appeared to be not dissatisfied with the answer which had brought to him. He however, that he must observed, study it carefully and would give men written reply the next day.

Our conversation lasted for well over an hour, und it was nearly. 1 got back to the midnight before

Embassy.

It was, I think, the only one of my interviews wlth Hitler at which it was I who did most of Possibly for this the talking.

reason there is no account of it in the German White Paper whtel was published after the auibreak of the war.

I used every argument which could think of to include him to see reason end to come down on

ide of peace. the side

I might mention Incidentally that both on that evening and the next, when I visked Hitler again and was handed his reply, nothing was left undone to enhance, or to impress me with, the solemnity of the occasion,

From the Embassy to the Reichs- chancery is a mere three or four hundred yards, but as Berlin was undergoing a week of trial black- outs, the Wilhelmstrasse was complete darkness.

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In

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A considerable but quite expres- sionless crowd had collected in the

entrance square, opposite the the courtyard, into which my car had to drive. Though the people were silent, they gave me no sensa- tion of hostility.

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I had always worn a dark red carnation in Berlin except during the three eritieni days of the week which preceded Munich.

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