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I think historians in recent years have been pretty kind to Neville Chamberlain and the idea of "Appeasement" as most of use were taught it at school has been totally debunked.
This guy however argues pretty convincingly that Chamberlain utterly outwitted Hitler with the Munich Agreement and Hitler knew it:
Highlights:
- Chamberlain took the words of a speech Hitler had made and cut and pasted them into the agreement, forcing him to formally sign up to a load of stuff that had been utter lies.
- By making Hitler sign up to an agreement and then making a big song and dance about it holding it in the air at the airfield he a) Put pressure on Hitler to keep to the agreement and b) when it was broken really rammed home to potential allies that Hitler never kept to agreements and couldn't be negotiated with.
- The agreement did delay the war, Britain needed a delay, Germany needed a prompt war. (Ok, this isn't a new idea!)
- I quite like the way Chamberlains description of Hitler was minuted. 🙂
Thanks, have downloaded this and will listen to it later. I'm not expecting anything new, I remember debating most of what you mention 20 years ago at uni. I doubt the simplistic view will disapear, it's too easily used to justify adventures in far off lands even if the tin-pot dictator's not a patch on Adolf.
*bump*
(Seems like people are more interested in this now, I knew this thread's time would come. 😀 )
Britain needed a delay, Germany needed a prompt war.
Hitler never intended to go to war in 1939. He wasn't ready. The Panzer 3's and 4's which he wanted for his Blitzkrieg, made up only 10% of his tank numbers.
On paper the France had far more and better tanks than Germany.
He never thought that the UK and France would go to war over Poland.
On t’other thread, numbers of fighters were much discussed, but it’s only part of the picture - remember this was the age when ‘the bomber would always get through’.
The extra months saw other big improvements in the readiness of other defences, eg. The number of AA guns available increased by about fourfold (but still only about half of what we thought was needed) and Chain Home went from being only partially operational to nearly complete (18/20 stations IIRC) which was possibly the most important step in ensuring we could deploy fighters as needed when the air war did actually begin.
Thanks OP
I do enjoy the History Extra Podcasts, despite the annoying music!
I will have to download a bunch to keep the little grey cells active whilst I am on holiday next week
Germany needed a prompt war.
total cobblers
He never thought that the UK and France would go to war over Poland
He had no reason to think we would, given that we handed him Czechoslovakia.
The counter argument is some threats and possibly some minor military force would have made Hitler back down. Which is possibly true but obviously cant be shown one way or another. Even with the benefit of hindsight I dont think anyone could really make an accurate call on which side was bluffing less.
I think the only thing that can be stated for certain is Chamberlain despite his famous speech wasnt overly optimistic it would end up being true. If he hadnt put the money into the military research, as per ninfan, then Churchill wouldnt have had anything to back up his words.
I guess the victor is the one who writes the history holds true in this case.
I do enjoy the History Extra Podcasts, despite the annoying music!
Yup, and I deffo agree about the music.
The counter argument is some threats and possibly some minor military force would have made Hitler back down
With hindsight we know for a fact Hitler wasn't going to back down. Hitler's whole plan was to use France/Britain's refusal to put pressure on Czechoslovakia to hand over bits of territory as an excuse to invade.* Chamberlain didn't refuse which completely removed Hitler's pretext. However, you could argue that Chamberlain didn't know that at the time, so maybe on the facts he knew he should have started the war then. But was the UK population ready to kick off a war over a few chunks of Czechoslovakia? Much more public support a year later after Hitler had demonstrated beyond doubt that he could not be trusted to stick to agreements had to be defeated militarily.
* As someone on the other thread pointed out, Hitler was subsequently careful never to offer terms for peace that could actually be met.
I don't like the way Chamberlain has been vilified for 'appeasement'. I thought he just wanted to try and stop millions of people being killed - again. Can't blame him for that. This is an interesting spin on it though thanks for posting.