Posted on 09/26/2008 5:21:17 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
I earnestly repeat that so long as negotiations continue, differences may be reconciled. Once they are broken off reason is banished and force asserts itself.
And force produces no solution for the future good of humanity.
The President thinks he is dealing with someone concerned with the future good of humanity.
I then posted Hitler's Godesberg memo in full, followed by a Times editorial on it. Lastly, the NFL standings. The Rams are 0-3. Sorry Cougar.
On the Monday following there was a sudden change for the worse. At 5 P.M. Sir Horace Wilson, accompanied by Ambassador Henderson and Ivone Kirkpatrick, First Secretary of the British Embassy, arrived at the Chancellery bearing Chamberlain's letter. They found Hitler in an ugly mood—probably he was already working himself down to a proper level for his Sportpalast speech three hours hence.
When Dr. Schmidt began to translate the letter, which stated that the Czech government had informed the Prime Minister that the Godesberg memorandum was "wholly unacceptable," just as he had warned at Godesberg, Hitler, according to Schmidt, suddenly leaped up, shouting, "There's no sense at all in negotiating further!" and bounded for the door.
It was a painful scene, says the German interpreter. "For the first and only time in my presence, Hitler completely lost his head." And according to the British present, the Fuehrer, who soon stamped back to his chair, kept further interrupting the reading of the letter by screaming, "The Germans are being treated like niggers ... On October first I shall have Czechoslovakia where I want her. If France and England decide to strike, let them ... I do not care a pfennig."
Chamberlain had proposed that since the Czechs were willing to give Hitler what he wanted, the Sudeten areas, a meeting of Czech and German representatives be called immediately to settle "by agreement the way in which the territory is to be handed over." He added that he was willing to have British representatives sit in at the meeting. Hitler's response was that he would negotiate details with the Czechs if they accepted in advance the Godesberg memorandum (which they had just rejected) and agreed to a German occupation of the Sudetenland by October 1. He must have an affirmative reply, he said, within forty-four hours—by 2 P.M. on September 28.
That evening Hitler burned his bridges, or so it seemed to those of us who listened in amazement to his mad outburst at the jammed Sportpalast in Berlin. Shouting and shrieking in the worst paroxysm I had ever seen him in, he venomously hurled personal insults at "Herr Benes," declared that the issue of war or peace was now up to the Czech President and that, in any case, he would have the Sudetenland by October 1. Carried away as he was by his angry torrent of words and the ringing cheers of the crowd, he was shrewd enough to throw a sop to the British Prime Minister. He thanked him for his efforts for peace and reiterated that this was his last territorial claim in Europe. "We want no Czechs!" he muttered contemptuously.
Throughout the harangue I sat in a balcony just above Hitler, trying with no great success to broadcast a running translation of his words. That night in my diary I noted:
. . . For the first time in all the years I've observed him he seemed tonight to have completely lost control of himself. When he sat down, Goebbels sprang up and shouted into the microphone: "One thing is sure: 1918 will never be repeated!" Hitler looked up to him, a wild, eager expression in his eyes, as if those were the words which he had been searching for all evening and hadn't quite found. He leaped to his feet and with a fanatical fire in his eyes that I shall never forget brought his right hand, after a grand sweep, pounding down on the table, and yelled with all the power in his mighty lungs: ”Ja!” Then he slumped into his chair exhausted.
William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, pp. 397-398
Well ... not necessarily. Roosevelt was probably canny enough to recognize Hitler for what he was. I guess the idea is that it never hurts to try....
In any event, the US at the time had neither sufficient military power nor strategic position to affect this, even had we wanted to. Isolationism was at its apex; Lindbergh and America First were a potent force.... there wasn't much Roosevelt could do besides talk.
It's still (as always ... thank you again) a great lesson for today. We've already avoided the first of Chamberlain's mistakes by actually placing our forces within striking distance of the "mad tyranny"; and in putting down the Iraq insurgency we've paid a price similar to what Britain and France would probably have paid had they dealt properly with Germany.
The next question -- to be resolved by the next president -- will be to decide whether or not to take more aggressive action toward Iran. We have options that Roosevelt did not.
Yeah, my Rams are doing pretty bad. This is only our second season in the NFL though so I’m not ready to fire the head coach yet.
Likewise, especially considering the conditions. The roar of the crowd and all. So that is how Shirer sounded during his broadcasts. Very interesting.
Bump.
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