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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Appeasement wasn't so bad...
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
In the “North Korea” thread there was the following comment…
quote:
Originally posted by Francophile:
Brits are haunted by the words of Neville Chamberlain, in seeking to justify appeasement policy following the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia, that this was a far-away land about whose people we knew little.
I would like to clarify “Appeasement”. It was a legitimate and – at the time – a very rational policy for Britain to follow.
First of all, it must be put into its correct chronological context. In the 1920’s and 1930’s Britain was the most powerful country on the planet and the British Empire spanned the globe. Britain was not concerned with issues on continental Europe unless they had an impact on the Empire. This is a vital point, Britain’s sole foreign policy focus on the British Empire and little else.
It is tempting to view appeasement from our 21st century position but we cannot do that as it distorts the whole policy and its basis. We need to put our brains into the 1930’s and into a Britain that dominated the world with the British Empire.
Chamberlain’s priority was maintaining a peaceful global state. This was important for Britain with regard to her Empire in two ways…
1)It meant that expensive standing armies required to defend the Empire were not needed and the defence budget could be minimised. The Empire was a very expensive asset to defend.
2)Trade, which was the whole reason for the existence of the Empire, was better when the whole planet was stable and peaceful. Investment was easier to find and the economic situation was more favourable in the absence of conflict.
So when Germany started to overturn the Treaty of Versailles and Italy began its Mediterranean hegemony, the British Government assessed the impact on the Empire and determined that it impacted the Empire in a number of ways
1)The Suez Canal was threatened by the Italian Navy, Italy of course being a major ally of Germany.
2)Germany had lost her Empire at Versailles and there was an increased likelihood that a more belligerent Germany would look to regain them if they didn’t obtain European territories to replace them.
3)Germany was in league with Japan, who was a direct threat to India and other Asian possessions. Reducing the military links between Germany and Japan was needed to secure these Asian territories.
So the British Government made a decision that it was better to placate Germany in her European domination in order to maintain a more stable global situation which in turn protected the British Empire.
This policy was a logical one for the British Government of the time which was isolationist with regard to continental politics and only concerned with the stability of the British Empire.
So it is wrong to assume it was a policy of just giving Hitler whatever he wanted in order to avoid war. The policy was actually to contain Hitler to Eastern Europe, in order to protect the Empire. There was definitely a quid pro quo aspect to it. If Hitler had decided to blockade the Suez Canal in 1936, Chamberlain would most definitely have gone to war over that as it threatened the main trading routes to India and the Far Eastern Dominions.
The fact that the policy failed wasn’t because the policy was wrong or flawed. It was that the goalposts moved. Protecting the Empire was fine in 1936, but by 1939 German hegemony was deemed to be a threat not only to Eastern Europe, but to Western Europe and Britain herself. The mood changed to demanding that Hitler be halted in his conquests, and this overcame any concerns for the Empire.
The irony of course was that we went to war over the invasion of Poland, which Germany undertook to reclaim Danzig and the “corridor”, all of which were part of Germany (it was formerly Prussia) before they were stripped from them at Versailles. Britain opposed this at Versailles, and wanted Germany to retain Danzig and the surrounding areas. It was British policy all through the 20’s and 30’s that Germany had a right to Danzig and Britain would not intervene if Germany repossessed them. But by 1939 it became the final conquest. It became the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. We went to war over something we agreed with a decade earlier!
Appeasement has had a bad press. The very word sounds terrible, and the policy has been bastardised to a degree to ignore the focus on the British Empire, and instead it has become a weasel word for “giving in”. The word itself means “to bring peace”, and that was indeed what it was designed to do; to keep the trading routes and possessions of the British Empire peaceful.
The policy of appeasement had a sound, underlying basis, focused as it was on the Empire and Chamberlain’s reputation has been unjustly tarnished over the years. Recently Chamberlain’s legacy has been revised somewhat with more historians giving him credit for his actions. This is warranted and proper. He was a better man and better Prime Minister than history has painted him.
[ 16. December 2013, 21:01: Message edited by: deano ]
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
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anoesis
Shipmate
# 14189
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Posted
I don't have sufficient grasp of the politics of the time to comment specifically on any of the points made above, but the vilification of Chamberlain over 'appeasement' has always bothered me, too. It's easy to criticise such positions with hindsight, but it isn't in the least surprising to me that a generation of Britons who had seen, up close and personal, the effects of a major war, were looking around for solutions other than more war.
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the giant cheeseburger
Shipmate
# 10942
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Posted
I think it is a mistake to posthumously apply a peaceful motive (relying on the shaky assumption that the British oppression of their colonies could ever be called peaceful) to appeasement as deano's jingoistic tub-thumping in the OP does. The number one lesson from WW2 which the OP should have learned before is that nothing can ever be taken at face value.
A longer view would reveal it was probably more likely that the British and French knew quite well that a general war was inevitable, and they knew by then that they were asleep while Germany had industry on a war footing. Moving from there, appeasement turns out to be an understandable short-term tactic for the British and French to buy some time for their industrial output to get into gear.
It worked to some degree (thanks to Hitler committing the massive strategic error of giving up the initiative, and then a whole bunch of tactical errors in 1940) but it also failed, in that the time bought was not enough to stop the British and French getting their arses comprehensively kicked in the Battle of France.
It also raises the question as to what would have happened if Germany had not invaded Poland (or any other countries) after Czechoslovakia. The 1938-39 shift by the British and French towards putting their whole nations on a war footing suggests they were spoiling for a war regardless of whether Hitler gave them a casus belli*, and that it probably would have kicked off in 1940 or 1941 once the British arms buildup had progressed further.
Even if you do take the British politicians of the time at face value, the approach to appeasement as a delaying tactic still has serious merit as a comparison of German vs British/French industrial output in 1937-1940 would reveal.
* cause for war, to appease the forum hosts.
[ 17. December 2013, 03:27: Message edited by: the giant cheeseburger ]
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
I don't often agree with deano, but on this occasion I pretty much do. I'd add into what he says the suggestion that both Chamberlain and his predecessor Baldwin were very peaceable men: not nice men, necessarily (especially Chamberlain, but then niceness can be very over-rated), but men who believed that the world should be run in an orderly and unwasteful way - perhaps the fact that they were both, unusually for British Prime Ministers, successful manufacturing industrialists is relevant here. Men like that will go to war as a last resort but will ordinarily do everything they can to avoid the waste and destruction that war necessarily entails. Baldwin, I think, had something of a reputation or at least and image as a conciliator in domestic politics, and this may have affected his foreign policy: and Chamberlain, too, had made his name in domestic policy- a very good Minister of Health who was good at things like housing and local government finance, and a rather orthodox Chancellor but one who was, I think, regarded as a success or at least a safe pair of hands by many of his contemporaries.
In hindsight, would it have been better if we'd taken on Hitler sooner? Yes, if we could have done so succesfully. But that's quite a big 'if'. I think I'm right in saying that the German Army had orders not to proceed with the remilitarisation of the Rhineland if there had been the least opposition by Britain or France, but we weren't necessarily to know that (and don't forget, too, that an effective anti-Hitler policy required an effective continental ally, which I don't think we could be sure of for much of the 'thirties). I've long been intrigued by those stories of the German Army High Command putting out feelers to the FO looking for support for a coup- being ready to turn round the columns moving into Austria in '38 and head for Berlin instead - but again, I don't know how plausible or possible those overtures, if they existed, would have looked at the time. And although Chamberlain could no doubt be ruthless enough when he wanted to, asking any government to support a coup, and quite possibly then a civil war, against what was after all the sort-of elected and internally still popular government of a major European state is really quite a big ask.
So yes, for the reasons that deano gives and for those I've suggested, I agree that we are wrong in automatically vilifying the appeasement of the 1930s. Although some of the Munichois (Alec Douglas-Hume, RA Butler, Quentin Hogg) stayed around for a very long time, the anti-appeasers (Churchill, Eden, Bevin, plus I think historians like AJP Taylor) quite quickly established a received version of the international politics of the late thirties which portrayed appeasement as not only tactically but morally wrong. But then hindsight's lovely, isn't it?
I've long thought that we could do with a good new study of Chamberlain. As I suggested earlier, I think that his domestic and social policy are especially interesting and the latter could do with rehabilitating.
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Oh, and on TGC's point about appeasement as a way of buying time- absolutely. I think that at the time, German propaganda about the potency of their armed forces took a lot of people in: a lot of the tanks, for instance, were very light Pzw Is and IIs, with the former not really being very much more than a light armoured car on tracks. But look at some of the kit that was still equipping, say, RAF front-line home squadrons in 1938: the Hawker Fury (a very good fighter of its type, but not really a match for the Bf109) and the Handley Page Heyford bomber, for example.
[ 17. December 2013, 04:35: Message edited by: Albertus ]
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:
It also raises the question as to what would have happened if Germany had not invaded Poland (or any other countries) after Czechoslovakia. The 1938-39 shift by the British and French towards putting their whole nations on a war footing suggests they were spoiling for a war regardless of whether Hitler gave them a casus belli*, and that it probably would have kicked off in 1940 or 1941 once the British arms buildup had progressed further.
Bullshit. It suggests they knew what Hitler really was.
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
I don't think it's right to villify Chamberlain. He acted in good faith and according to his lights.
However, there were those who'd long thought that a second bout with Germany was on the cards. I think it was the US General Pershing who was all for pushing onto Berlin in 1918 rather than arranging an Armistice lest they found themselves faced with the same situation in 20 years ...
I'm not sure that's anything more than military belligerence or the kind of thing 'Storming Norman' had in mind in wanting to steam onto Baghdad and effect regime change at the end of the First Gulf War.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. The Marsh Arabs would have certainly welcomed Norman's proposals ...
But that was a different conflict and different issues.
When I was growing up in South Wales there was a degree of ambivalence about Churchill that could spill over into outright hatred in some quarters. He was seen as a 'war-monger' and blamed for sending the troops in against the miners in the great Cambrian coalstrike of 1910. Contrary to urban myth, though, the troops didn't actually shoot anyone - on that occasion - and were only sent in as a last resort as the situation spiralled out of control.
There were fellas shot in Llanelli in 1911 but that was a different incident, nothing to do with Churchill and somehow the two things had become conflated in the popular imagination.
I later met a woman whose father had been beaten up 'by the redcoats' on the canal bank in 1910. He was harmless and not a rioter and had lost his arm in a colliery accident and so posed no threat. The 'redcoat' reference puzzled me until I later found out that some of the cavalrymen sent into the Rhondda had been mobilised so quickly that they were still in parade dress uniform.
It's interesting, though that many on the Left supported Churchill in 1940 because they'd been calling for intervention against Franco and also against Mussolini when he invaded Abyssinia.
There were even one or two Labourites who felt that Hitler was much maligned ... so these things didn't neatly divide along party political lines.
After so much time has elapsed now I'm not sure how helpful it is to debate the 'rights' and 'wrongs' of Chamberlain's policy. He did what he believed to be right in the context of how he saw things.
Sooner or later, though, conflict with Nazi Germany was going to be inevitable. We can say that with hindsight pretty clearly I think.
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by the giant cheeseburger:
I think it is a mistake to posthumously apply a peaceful motive (relying on the shaky assumption that the British oppression of their colonies could ever be called peaceful) to appeasement as deano's jingoistic tub-thumping in the OP does. The number one lesson from WW2 which the OP should have learned before is that nothing can ever be taken at face value.
Well my understanding comes from reading books by people who understand these subjects better than I. Just a couple are noted below and I think you will find that my summary – poor though it probably is – is reflected in these books. A small summary of the author’s qualifications are given, culled from (inevitably I suppose) Amazon and Wikipedia…
The Origins of the Second World War by A. J. P. Taylor
quote:
He served as a lecturer at the Universities of Manchester, Oxford, and London.
Taylor himself was recruited into the Communist Party of Great Britain by a friend of the family, the military historian Tom Wintringham, while at Oriel; a member from 1924 to 1926, he broke with the Party over what he considered to be its ineffective stand during the 1926 General Strike. After leaving, he was an ardent supporter of the Labour Party for the rest of his life, remaining a member for over sixty years
The Road to War: The Origins of World War II by Dr Richard Overy and Andrew Wheatcroft
quote:
Richard Overy is Professor in History at the University of Exeter. He is the author of books on the Second World War, the European dictatorships and the history of air power. His latest titles include Why the Allies Won (2nd edn 2006), The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia (2004) and The Morbid Age: Britain Between the Wars (2009). He is a fellow of the British Academy and winner of the Wolfson History Prize in 2005.
Andrew Wheatcroft is the author of many pioneerign books on early modern adn modern history, including The Ottomans (1993) and The Enemy at the Gate (2008). he is based in Dumfriesshire adn is Professor and Director of the Centre for Publishing Studies at the University of Stirling.
What are your qualifications in the subject Cheeseburger? I would like to know so that we can measure your thoughts and ideas against the men quoted above to see how they stack up.
I used the quote about AJP Taylor’s left-wing credentials to counter the argument that I was “tub-thumping” and jingoistic about it. I’m afraid even left-wing historians such as AJP Taylor were broadly in agreement with the roots of the appeasement policy.
I have left out a lot of detail course as I felt the OP was long enough (whole books have been written about appeasement), but yes, appeasement also bought time. Chamberlain was not blind to the inevitability of war and assumed (and planned for) a war against Germany in 1939 or 1940 and he was pretty much on the nose with that. Appeasement did enable Britain to undertake a rearmament push, and that may well have been a beneficial side-effect of the policy, but it wasn’t the prime driver for appeasement. Protection of the Empire was the prime driver. Time to complete rearmament was at best a secondary consideration.
I think Chamberlain’s vilification comes from the British public’s changing view of Hitler after Munich. Before Munich appeasement was widely supported for the reasons I gave in my OP, but after Munich the public moved towards wanting to halt Hitler faster than did Chamberlain.
He clung to appeasement after Munich longer than the public and this led to his poor reputation after the war, but as the architect of what was arguably a successful policy that would be expected. He actually did keep the peace until no longer viable, protected the British interests of the time, and prepared for the war he saw coming. If he kept faith with a policy that brought all those things until the very last, then surely that is only to be expected.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
Deano, while I generally agree with your overall approach, I do take issue with your characterisation of GB as the most powerful country on earth in the 20s one 30s. WW I saw that title clearly pass to the US, with its larger and growing population, an increasing standard of living, a powerful manufacturing base supported by a much larger and more varied mining industry, and a strongly developed farming sector. There was also a much higher general standard of living, shown in better overall health.
Of course all was not sweetness and light, and life was tough for many people especially in the Great Depression, but the booming economy of the 20s missed out the severe decline in GBs previous manufacturing advantage accompanied as that decline was by the depression in 1919-20 and other recessions continuing for the remainder of the decade.
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Francophile
Shipmate
# 17838
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Posted
Deano
For the avoidance of doubt, my reference in the North Korea thread to Chamberlain and appeasement was not meant to be a comment on the rightness or wrongness of the policy of appeasement. The reference was to highlight the fact that a certain discomfort is still felt over Chamberlain's words following the Czechoslovakia invasion about a faraway land etc. I would expect that today's politicians would choose their words more carefully. Whether appeasement wad right or wrong, Chamberlain's words were a crass way of justifying the policy.
On appeasement itself, I am no historian so I have no opinion to offer. Except that most (all?) historians seem to agree that it bought time for rearmament so was fortuitous as things turned out.
[ 17. December 2013, 09:43: Message edited by: Francophile ]
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Yam-pk
Shipmate
# 12791
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Posted
The concept also seems to have been - superficially at least- very popular policy - the unoffical League of Nations "peace ballot", the Fulham by-election ("won on no issue but the pacifist one," according to Baldwin) in the early 30's, and the vote by the Oxford Union (for the motion "This house will in no circumstances fight for king and country") just three random examples.
Couple that to the latent - and not so latent - anti-semitism and anti-communism amongst many parts of the Conservative party establishment, and the lingering memory of the slaughter of WWI, and reasoning behind it becomes clearer.
It was only after Munich, humilated by the invasion of Czechoslovakia, that Chamberlain was (probably) forced to reverse the policy in relation to Poland, in order to save face as much as anything else.
And, for all his credit for being faresighted in his prophecies against Nazi Germany, at the time these assertions were doubtlessly viewed as yet another of Churchill's errors of judgement on top of his attitude Indian independence, and his support for Edward VIII during the abidcation crisis.
[ 17. December 2013, 10:51: Message edited by: Yam-pk ]
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Hawk
Semi-social raptor
# 14289
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gee D:
Deano, while I generally agree with your overall approach, I do take issue with your characterisation of GB as the most powerful country on earth in the 20s one 30s. WW I saw that title clearly pass to the US
I'm not sure that's accurate, especially with the use of the word 'clearly'. Maybe in hindsight historians can point to that period as the US' coming of age, but while the foundations for America's later domination were certainly being put in place pre-1940's, at the time I think it's fair to say that the British Empire was generally still considered to be the main superpower of the World by the majority of commentators and public.
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
I think it depends on your criteria. Britain had AIUI been surpassed industrially and economically by the USA and I think Germany before the Great War. OTOH, in terms of generally behaving like a World Power, with what that implies in terms of projection of diplomatic and military power, the UK was surely still aheadd of the USA between the wars. The Americans threw their weight about quite a lot- more than they like to remember- but mostly in the Caribbean, Central / South America, and bits of the Pacific. Diplomatically, the USA was isolationist. Overall the UKhad far greater global reach, more bases(because a bigger empire), and I think rather larger armed forces.
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CL
Shipmate
# 16145
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Posted
quote:
In the 1920’s and 1930’s Britain was the most powerful country on the planet...
Patently untrue.
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Yam-pk
Shipmate
# 12791
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Posted
Even in the 20s-30s the UK was ONE of the most powerful countries on the planet - certainly in the top 4. Demonstrably true.
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Yes, who were the rivals? France, I suppose. USA economically very strong but otherwise a regional superpower only; USSR still getting its act together, Japan developing rapidly but not really getting off the ground in terms of projection of power until early 30s and even then still a regional superpower only; China not going to do anything much on the world stage for at least another 40 years. Germany and Italy never in the same league.
The UK and France were on the way down; the USA and USSR were on the way up; but the directions hadn't crossed yet.
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
The US Navy had begun to surpass the Royal Navy by the 1930's. The US had more aircraft carriers and better aircraft to fly from them, more and better submarines and an equal surface fleet. The Pacific was a "big ship" war while the Battle of the Atlantic was a small-ship war.
One of the least-remembered bits of WWII is that Operation Drumbeat in which the U-boats launched an aggressive campaign right off the US East Coast was an utter disaster for the USN. The Royal Canadian Navy had to take them in hand and teach them the basic of running convoys and how run effective anti-submarine warfare.
It was the last time that the US Navy had an inferior position in anything.
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Was that the campaign off Cape Hatteras?
And wasn't the RCN was the world's third-biggest navy by 1945, albeit with nothing larger than a light cruiser, as befitted the nature of, as you say, the Atlantic War?
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
I surprisingly also agree with deano on this.
North Korea isn't a target for invasion because it has nukes, at least in part, and also has China. Iraq had neither nukes nor a powerful friend so invasion, as planned by Cheney, Rumsfeld and friends long before Sept 11 attacks was okay.
In "The Nightmare Years", William Shirer reports that Chamberlain had the complete support of the House of Commons, the King and the people when he returned from Munich. (Shirer was CBS reporter stationed in Berlin and wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.) That action did give Hitler the idea that no-one would really go to war over Poland, especially after a quick conquest, and he also believed Britain would agree to peace in exchange for him ignoring its empire and being given a free hand on the continent. The secret agreement with Russian to divide Poland changed all of that. Britain had the chance, according to Shirer, who reviewed the communications with Russia, and also noted their frustration at not getting an agreement with Britain. This encouraged Stalin and Molotov to open discussions with Germany which moved very quickly. I take from this that appeasement was only one of many factors involved.
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Sober Preacher's Kid
Presbymethegationalist
# 12699
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Albertus:
Was that the campaign off Cape Hatteras?
And wasn't the RCN was the world's third-biggest navy by 1945, albeit with nothing larger than a light cruiser, as befitted the nature of, as you say, the Atlantic War?
It was off the entire US East Coast, particularly New York, and paralyzed the coastal trade in 1941.
The RCN was the fifth largest navy, third largest Allied navy, and as you said was entirely a destroyer, frigate and corvette outfit.
Admiral Ernest King did the US no favours in Operation Drumbeat. He thought that escorts should close with U-boats and destroy them, leaving their convoys unprotected. He also thought that an escort had to be a destroyer. The RCN said no, anything will do (witness some of the corvettes the RCN had) and the purpose of escorts is to ward off attack. Escorts had to stick with the convoy to protect them. A U-boat deprived of a target is just a large tin can that wastes fuel.
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NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.
Posts: 7646 | From: Peterborough, Upper Canada | Registered: Jun 2007
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Kwesi
Shipmate
# 10274
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Posted
Deano quote:
Appeasement has had a bad press. The very word sounds terrible, and the policy has been bastardised to a degree to ignore the focus on the British Empire, and instead it has become a weasel word for “giving in”. The word itself means “to bring peace”, and that was indeed what it was designed to do; to keep the trading routes and possessions of the British Empire peaceful.
The policy of appeasement had a sound, underlying basis, focused as it was on the Empire and Chamberlain’s reputation has been unjustly tarnished over the years. Recently Chamberlain’s legacy has been revised somewhat with more historians giving him credit for his actions. This is warranted and proper. He was a better man and better Prime Minister than history has painted him.
Odd, then, that Churchill, the arch-imperialist, should have been so opposed to the policy. If Britain had been so concerned about its possessions, is it not also strange it should have acquiesced to the invasion of Manchuria (1931), and Ethiopia (1935)? And was it not remiss that despite such developments Britain did nothing to resist the remilitarisation of the Rhineland (1936)? In other words, both Baldwin and Chamberlain had ample warning about the threat from the dictators long before the Czech crisis and did little to resist it or make preparation so to do. The failure to rearm was manifested in the military defeats of 1940.
Appeasement of the dictators and Japan has had a bad press. and rightly so. Quite frankly, the notion that Britain had a cunning plan to outflank them is revisionist nonsense. That appeasement was not without its reasons: fear of another war; belief that Germany had been subject to too harsh terms at Versailles; a greater fear of bolshevism than fascism and so on, does not exonerate political leaders who left their nation exposed to a Nazi invasion and all that would have resulted. Furthermore, Lord Halifax and his ilk were all for doing a deal with Hitler even after the balloon had gone up. Chamberlain's foreign policy was an unmitigated disaster!
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Tommy1
Shipmate
# 17916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Yam-pk:
Couple that to the latent - and not so latent [...] anti-communism amongst many parts of the Conservative party establishment
Do you think that anti-communism is a bad thing?
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The Rhythm Methodist
Shipmate
# 17064
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Posted
Originally posted by Deano:
quote:
The policy of appeasement had a sound, underlying basis, focused as it was on the Empire and Chamberlain’s reputation has been unjustly tarnished over the years.
If the sound, underlying basis of appeasement was a desperate attempt to buy time - due to the government's steadfast refusal to heed Churchill's urgent pleas (over the preceding five years) to re-equip and upgrade the military - then perhaps you have a point.
With regard to Chamberlain's reputation, the opprobrium hardly does him justice. He and his colleagues must bear considerable responsibility for the early reverses of the war, and for the resultant allied casualties. Had they been less inclined towards false economies, things may have gone very differently.
They may have gone very differently even after Britain found itself ill-prepared (despite all the warnings) but Chamberlain even failed at the dishonourable game of appeasement: having embarked upon that route, it was an act of insanity to then declare war over the invasion of Poland. Even a cursory reading of "Mein Kampf" would have told Chamberlain in what direction Hitler's ambition lay. He could have watched Germany and the Soviet Union fight a war of attrition, while Britain re-armed. History has been too kind to Mr Chamberlain.
Posts: 202 | From: Wales | Registered: Apr 2012
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Kwesi
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# 10274
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Posted
Tommy1 quote:
Do you think that anti-communism is a bad thing?
Surely, the question was whether it was a good or bad thing in its influence on British foreign policy in the 1930s. If such considerations resulted in a failure to recognise the threat from Hitler and the Axis powers then clearly it was. Any idiot should have realised that the Soviet Union was in no state to threaten anybody in the 1930s, while Germany, Italy and Japan constituted a "present danger".
More problematic, one might suggest, was the unwillingness of the UK, and France + plus the indifference of the USA, to defend democracies such as the Spanish Republic and Czechoslovakia.
Posts: 1641 | From: South Ofankor | Registered: Sep 2005
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Rhythm Methodist:
...it was an act of insanity to then declare war over the invasion of Poland. Even a cursory reading of "Mein Kampf" would have told Chamberlain in what direction Hitler's ambition lay. He could have watched Germany and the Soviet Union fight a war of attrition, while Britain re-armed. History has been too kind to Mr Chamberlain.
No. You have chosen to ignore significant aspects of the actual history. The act of insanity was refusal to make a treaty with the Russians, which Russia sought and the British (and French) diplomats hesitated at. This is a competence issue of the British Foreign Service, not Chamberlain's.
The British diplomats in their dithering were still pursued by the Soviets through March 1939 and into the summer and even longer. You could almost blame the Russians for trying too hard. Though they finally came to their senses and gave up. Only after the failure of the British to exercise diplomacy, did Russia turn to Germany. This is not appeasement of Germany by Chamberlain, it is a failure to treat with Russia. The Moscow talks in 1939: a missed chance.
quote:
from above link
[T]he Soviet Union proposed a three-party agreement on mutual assistance, based on equal share of responsibility and necessity to prevent aggression in any region of Europe. The new Triple Entente could have become an obstacle to Hitler`s expansion.
We should also blame the French, Édouard Daladier in particular, who bullied the Czechs. And Georges Bonnet who repeatedly sought a deal with the Germans. Bonnet's renouncement of the French-Czech treaty of 1924 was probably much more key than Chamberlain's "appeasement". quote:
above link
Bonnet believed that the best course for France in 1938 was to pressure the Czechoslovak government into conceding to German demands to prevent a Franco-German war.[25] If the Czechoslovaks refused to make concessions, that refusal could be used as an excuse for ending the Franco-Czechoslovak alliance....In the view of Bonnet and Daladier, these tactics allowed them to carry out their foreign policy goals while providing them with a cover from domestic critics by presenting their foreign policy as the result of British pressure.
Would you really have wanted Britain to part company with the French who would agree to Germany's demands and for Britain to oppose Germany, i.e., declare war over Czechoslavkia without France? Because that's what would have happened. Or they could all dance together which is what they did, a anglo-franco-jig -- but who was leading the dance? I think we could easily blame the French, which is uncool because Germany kicked the bejesus out of them a year later.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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The Rhythm Methodist
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# 17064
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Posted
no prophet - I am well aware of the Soviet overtures to the British government....which they rightly shunned.
I guess it depends on whether you imagine that the Soviet system was something worth preserving (and aligning oneself with)or if you believe it was not significantly better than the Nazis who threatened it.
Personally, I would have seen the end of Soviet despotism at the hands of a (then) seriously weakened and overstretched Nazi regime, as a desirable result. It would have allowed Britain to re-arm while its principle enemy was depleting itself on the eastern front.
As for the Foreign Office: while I recognise Chamberlain as an incredibly weak PM, I would still say foreign policy is still his ultimate responsibility.
Posts: 202 | From: Wales | Registered: Apr 2012
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Eirenist
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# 13343
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Posted
A bit of a tangent, perhaps, but concerning British policy during the Spanish Civil War, the historian Antony Beevor observes (The Struggle for Spain', p.151) that the actions of the Royal Navy were 'extraordinary for a non-interventionist power'. He cites the provision of communications facilities for the Nationalist (i.e. rebel) General Kindelan to enable him to communicate directly with Rome, Berlin, and Lisbon, and the movement of the battleship 'HMS Queen Elizabeth' to prevent the bombardment of the Nationalist-held port of Algeciras by the Republican (i.e.Government) warship 'Jaime I').
One must remember that the senior ranks of the Royal Navy at the time were obsessed with the fear of a Bolshevik-inspired mutiny among the lower deck, and that control of the 'Jaime I' had been seized by her crew from her Nationalist-inclined officers. Nor should one ignore social (class) ties or the influence of the British press, then, as now, overwhelmingly and rabidly right-wing in tone.
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'I think I think, therefore I think I am'
Posts: 486 | From: Darkest Metroland | Registered: Jan 2008
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