Posted on 03/15/2009 6:09:29 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
That night he slept in Hradschin Castle, the ancient seat of the kings of Bohemia high above the River Moldau where more recently the despised Masaryk and Benes had lived and worked for the first democracy Central Europe had ever known. The Fuehrer's revenge was complete, and that it was sweet he showed in the series of proclamations which he issued. He had paid off all the burning resentments against the Czechs which had obsessed him as an Austrian in his vagabond days in Vienna three decades before and which had flamed anew when Benes dared to oppose him, the all-powerful German dictator, over the past year.
As for Ruthenia, which had formed the eastern tip of Czechoslovakia, its independence as the "Republic of Carpatho-Ukraine," proclaimed on March 14, lasted just twenty-four hours. Its appeal to Hitler for "protection" was in vain. Hitler had already awarded this territory to Hungary. In the captured Foreign Office archives there is an interesting letter in the handwriting of Miklos Horthy, Regent of Hungary, addressed to Adolf Hitler on March 13.
YOUR EXCELLENCY: Heartfelt thanks! I cannot express how happy I am, for this headwater region [Ruthenia] is for HungaryI dislike using big words a vital question. . . . We are tackling the matter with enthusiasm. The plans are already laid. On Thursday, the 16th, a frontier incident will take place, to be followed Saturday by the big thrust.
As things turned out, there was no need for an "incident." Hungarian troops simply moved into Ruthenia at 6 A.M. on March 15, timing their entry with that of the Germans to the west, and on the following day the territory was formally annexed by Hungary.
Thus by the end of the day of March 15, which had started in Berlin at 1:15 A.M. when Hacha arrived at the Chancellery, Czechoslovakia, as Hitler said, had ceased to exist.
[On] March 15, after it had taken place, the Prime Minister used the proclamation of Slovakia's "independence" as an excuse not to honor his country's word. "The effect of this declaration," he explained, "put an end by internal disruption to the State whose frontier we had proposed to guarantee. His Majesty's Government cannot accordingly hold themselves any longer bound by this obligation."
Hitler's strategy had thus worked to perfection. He had given Chamberlain his out and the Prime Minister had taken it.
It is interesting that the Prime Minister did not even wish to accuse Hitler of breaking his word. "I have so often heard charges of breach of faith bandied about which did not seem to me to be founded upon sufficient premises," he said, "that I do not wish to associate myself today with any charges of that character." He had not one word of reproach for the Fuehrer, not even for his treatment of Hacha and the shabby swindle which obviouslyeven if the details were still unknownhad been perpetrated at the Reich Chancellery on the early morning of this day, March 15.
No wonder that the British protest that day, if it could be called that, was so tepid, and that the Germans treated itand subsequent Anglo-French complaintswith so much arrogance and contempt.
His Majesty's Government have no desire to interfere unnecessarily in a matter with which other Governments may be more directly concerned. . . . They are, however, as the German Government will surely appreciate, deeply concerned for the success of all efforts to restore confidence and a relaxation of tension in Europe. They would deplore any action in Central Europe which would cause a setback to the growth of this general confidence . . .
There was not a word in this note, which was delivered on March 15 by Ambassador Henderson to Ribbentrop as an official message from Lord Halifax, about the specific events of the day.
The French were at least specific. Robert Coulondre, the new ambassador of France in Berlin, shared neither his British colleague's illusions about Nazism nor Henderson's disdain of the Czechs. On the morning of the fifteenth he demanded an interview with Ribbentrop, but the vain and vindictive German Foreign Minister was already on his way to Prague, intending to share in Hitler's humiliation of a beaten people. State Secretary von Weizsaecker received Coulondre, instead, at noon. The ambassador lost no time in saying what Chamberlain and Henderson were not yet ready to say: that by its military intervention in Bohemia and Moravia, Germany had violated both the Munich Agreement and the Franco-German declaration of December 6. Baron von Weizsaecker, who later was to insist that he had been stoutly anti-Nazi all along, was in an arrogant mood that would have done credit to Ribbentrop. According to his own memorandum of the meeting.
I spoke rather sharply to the Ambassador and told him not to mention the Munich Agreement, which he alleged had been violated, and not to give us any lectures ... I told him that in view of the agreement reached last night with the Czech government I could see no reason for any demarche by the French ambassador . . . and that I was sure he would find fresh instructions when he returned to his Embassy, and these would set his mind at rest.
William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
So begins Herman Wouks epic novel The Winds of War. I checked the weather reports for March 1939 and found that it was a remarkably dry month. Or maybe March is always dry in Washington. At any rate, I arbitrarily decided that this opening scene takes place on the fifteenth. I mention this because I plan to excerpt from Winds and its companion, War and Remembrance from time to time. Wouk researched the books thoroughly and his factual accounts of certain events Midway and Leyte Gulf come to mind are concise essays that will serve us well. Besides, I have read them both several times over thirty years and will enjoy giving Wouk a new kind of exposure.
If you want to carry the Real Time concept to a ridiculous extreme you can read the first two chapters this month. DVDs of the television miniseries for each book are available from Netflix. Disc 1 of Winds of War opens on March 31.
Where in any of these many articles is the President of the United States mentioned, either directly or indirectly? No quotes, no reports on what the US government has said or done.
Must we not conclude that neither the Times nor its readers saw the President as relevant to these issues? Could we even imagine such attitudes today? Curious.
From the editorial:
It is understandable that many of us in the United States, remembering that the plan for a Czcho-Slovak state was put together on American soil, and that the independence of such a state was made one of our own objectives during the World War, should feel that American aloofness from the work of post-war reconstruction was one of the early influences in the long series of events which has now ended in this final act of degradation.
This sounds like implied criticism of Congress for not joining the League of Nations. But you are right. This is the only reference I can find in this post to U.S. foreign policy. Today Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama would be all over the news holding press conferences and explaining how this incident clearly demonstrates the need for the federal government to take over health care in America.
Remember Lidice!
In fairness I should point out that I only posted the lead article. It is possible that at least one of the sidebar articles was written by a Washington correspondent and included U.S. government reaction to developments in Europe. Perhaps it was just understood that at this point it didn't matter what FDR or the State Department thought because there wasn't a hell of a lot the U.S. government can do to influence events over there.
Good observation. I can only surmise that back in 1939, the United States was not seen as the "world superpower" that it is today. To most of Europe at that time, the United States might as well have been Australia - some remote outpost on the other side of the world. In other words, what the United States government thought of European affairs was irrelevant.
Even though war was about to break out all over Europe back in 1939, the United States was still two full years away from being directly involved in the war.
That said, this series of posts by Homer has been fascinating. I look forward to reading these narratives over the next six years as the United States is slowly dragged into the war and is thus transformed from a backwater nation (emerging from the Great Depression) into the world's premier superpower.
Also, March 15, 1939 is probably the pivotal event that would lead to Nazi Germany's eventual downfall. With the shameless rape of Czechoslovakia, Hitler overreached, and while it wasn't evident at the time, events were irrevocably set in motion that would lead to his utter defeat six years later.
May 1942 is still three years in the future. The question is whether anyone in March, 1939 could have foreseen the monstrosities soon to be unleashed on Europe. I don't know if they could have, but it seems they didn't.
Anyone who read Mein Kampf could see what was coming.
I fully understand your point, but remember, this is the NEW YORK Times, most of whose readers were presumably Americans. Wouldn't you suppose that most Americans were curious to know what their government said and did about these events?
Answer: apparently not. And perhaps that's as good a measure as any of the depth of American isolationism at the time.
For what it's worth, my opinion: Hitler calculated that Germany could eventually defeat the combined forces of France, Britain and even Stalin's Russia. And he would have been right, but he completely discounted the isolationist Americans, and that proved his fatal mistake. Meanwhile, estimates say somewhere between 35 million and 50 million died as a result of his war in Europe.
No statesman of the time was more clear-eyed and far-sighted than Winston Churchill. I have here Churchill's memoirs, written after the war, in which he discusses Mein Kampf as some length.
Mein Kampf clearly laid out Hitler's plans for conquest in Eastern Europe, but Churchill's review mentions nothing about genocide, mass murders or other atrocities.
So, we have to ask, if this portion of Hitler's agenda escaped even Churchill's scrutiny, how much of it could lesser men have predicted, back in 1939?
For what it's worth, my opinion: The whole idea of "appeasement" was to let the Germans have what they said they wanted, but peacefully. In time though, it finally became clear the peace was not an option for Hitler -- then appeasement got replaced by opposition, and soon, by war.
Many thanks again for doing this... Fascinating
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