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U.S. Presidents Murdered by Banking Cartel...
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Sunday, July 21, 2019
Stalin's Plan To Conquer Europe!
In Icebreaker Suvorov takes a close look at the origins and development of World War II in Europe, and in particular the background to Hitler's "Operation Barbarossa" attack against the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. Since its original publication in Russian (entitled Ledokol) in France in 1988, it has been published in an astonishing 87 editions in 18 languages. In spite of its importance to the historical record, Icebreaker has received very little attention in the United States. The few reviews that have appeared here have been almost entirely brief and dismissive -- a shameful treatment that reflects the cowardice and intellectual irresponsibility of a "politically correct" scholarly establishment.
According to the conventional view, Hitler's perfidious attack abruptly forced a neutral and aloof Soviet Russia into war. This view further holds that a surprised Stalin had naively trusted the deceitful German Führer. Rejecting this view as political propaganda, Suvorov shows Stalin's personal responsibility for the war's outbreak and progression. Above all, this book details the vast Soviet preparations for an invasion of Europe in the summer of 1941 with the goal of Sovietizing central and western Europe. Suvorov is not alone in his view. It is also affirmed by a number of non-Russian historians, such as American scholar R. H. S. Stolfi in his 1991 study Hitler's Panzers East: World War II Reinterpreted.
In spite of rigid Soviet censorship, Suvorov has succeeded in digging up many nuggets of valuable information from publicly available Soviet writings that confirm his central thesis. Icebreaker is based on the author's meticulous scouring of such published sources as memoirs of wartime Soviet military leaders, and histories of individual Soviet divisions, corps, armies, fleets, and air units.
'Second Imperialist War'
A central tenet of Soviet ideology was that the Soviet Union, as the world's first Marxist state and bulwark of "workers' power," would eventually liberate all of humanity from the yoke of capitalism and fascism (the "last resort of monopoly capitalism"). While Soviet leaders might disagree about the circumstances and timing of this process of global liberation, none doubted the importance of this objective. As Suvorov notes:
"For Lenin, as for Marx, world revolution remained the guiding star, and he did not lose sight of this goal. But according to the minimum program, the First World War would only facilitate a revolution in one country. How, then, would the world revolution take place thereafter? Lenin gave a clear-cut answer to this question in 1916: as a result of the second imperialist war ..."Initially the "Union of Soviet Socialist Republics" was made up of only a handful of constituent republics. Lenin and the other Soviet leaders intended that more republics would be added to the USSR until it encompassed the entire globe. Thus, writes Suvorov, "the declaration accompanying the formation of the USSR was a clear and direct declaration of war on the rest of the world."
Hitler understood this much better than did the leaders of Britain, France or the United States. During a conversation in 1937 with Lord Halifax, one of Britain's most important officials, he said: "In the event of a general war [in Europe], only one country can win. That country is the Soviet Union." In Icebreaker, Suvorov explains how in 1939 Stalin exploited the long-simmering dispute between Germany and Poland over Danzig and the "Polish Corridor" to provoke a "second imperialist war" that would enormously expand the Soviet empire.
Stalin anticipated a drawn-out war of attrition in which Germany, France and Britain would exhaust themselves in a devastating conflict that would also spark Communist uprisings across Europe. And as the Soviet premier expected, "Icebreaker" Germany did indeed break up the established order in Europe. But along with nearly everyone else outside of Germany, he was astonished by the speed and thoroughness with which Hitler subdued not only Poland, but also France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Yugoslavia and Greece. Dashing Kremlin expectations that a "second imperialist war" would quickly usher in a Soviet Europe, by July 1940 Hitler was effectively master of the continent.
Soviet Preparations
An army whose mission is aggressive war acts very differently. Officers and troops are trained for offensive operations. They are supplied with weapons and equipment designed for attack, and the frontier area is prepared accordingly. Troops and their materiel are massed close to the frontier, obstacles are removed, and minefields are cleared. Maps of the areas to be invaded are issued to officers, and the troops are briefed on terrain problems, how to deal with the population to be conquered, and so forth.
Carefully examining the equipping, training and deployment of Soviet forces, as well as the numbers and strengths of Soviet weaponry, vehicles, supplies and aircraft, Suvorov establishes in great detail that the Red Army was organized and deployed in the summer of 1941 for attack, not defense.
Peculiar Tanks
Germany entered war in 1939 with 3,195 tanks. As Suvorov points out, this was fewer than a single Soviet factory in Kharkov, operating on a "peacetime" basis, was turning out every six months.
By 1941 everyone recognized the tank as the primary weapon of an army of attack in a European land war. During this period, Suvorov shows, the Soviets were producing large quantities of the well armed "Mark BT" tank, predecessor of the famed T34 model. "BT" were the initials for the Russian words "high speed tank." The first of this series had a top speed of 100 kilometers per hour, impressive even by today's standards. But as Suvorov goes on to note, this weapon had a peculiarity:
"Having said so many positive things about the numbers and quality of Soviet tanks, one must note one minor drawback. It was impossible to use these tanks on Soviet territory ...Mark BT tanks could only be used in an aggressive war, only in the rear of the enemy and only in a swift offensive operation, in which masses of tanks suddenly burst into enemy territory ...
"The Mark BT tanks were quite powerless on Soviet territory. When Hitler began Operation Barbarossa, practically all the Mark BT tanks were cast aside. It was almost impossible to use them off the roads, even with caterpillar tracks. They were never used on wheels. The potential of these tanks was never realized, but it certainly could never have been realized on Soviet territory. The Mark BT was created to operate on foreign territory only and, what is more, only on territory where there were good roads ...
"To the question, where could the enormous potential of these Mark BT tanks be successfully realized, there is only one answer: in central and southern Europe. The only territories where tanks could be used, after their caterpillar tracks were removed, were Germany, France and Belgium ... Caterpillar tracks are only a means for reaching foreign territory. For instance, Poland could be crossed on caterpillar tracks which, once the German autobahns had been reached, could then be discarded in favor of wheels, on which operations would then proceed …
"It is said that Stalin's tanks were not ready for war. That was not so. They were not ready for a defensive war on their own territory. They were, however, designed to wage war on others."
Airborne Assault Corps
And the USSR? Suvorov explains: "By the beginning of the war [1939], the Soviet Union had more than one million trained paratroopers -- 200 times more than all other countries in the world put together, including Germany.... It is quite impossible to use paratroopers in such massive numbers in a defensive war.... No country in history, or indeed all countries in the world put together, including the Soviet Union, has ever had so many paratroopers and air assault landing sub-units as Stalin had in 1941."As part of the planned invasion, in early 1940 orders were given for large-scale construction of airborne assault gliders, which were produced in mass quantity from the spring of 1941 onward. The Soviets also designed and built the remarkable KT "winged tank." After landing, its wings and tailpiece were discarded, making the KT instantly ready for combat. The author also describes a variety of other offense-oriented units and weapons, and their deployment in June 1941 in areas and jumping-off points right on the frontiers with Germany and Romania. All these weapons of offensive war became instantly useless following the Barbarossa attack, when the Soviets
suddenly required defensive weapons.
Suvorov tells of a secret meeting in December 1940 attended by Stalin and other Politburo members at which General Pavel Rychagov, deputy defense minister and commander of the Soviet air force, discussed the details of "special operations in the initial period of war." He spoke of the necessity of keeping the air force's preparations secret in order to "catch the whole of the enemy air force on the ground." Suvorov comments:
'It is quite obvious that it is not possible to 'catch the whole of the enemy air force on the ground' in time of war. It is only possible to do so in peacetime, when the enemy does not suspect the danger.Suvorov also reports on the dismantling in June 1941 of the Soviet frontier defense systems, and the deployment there of masses of troops and armor poised for westward attack.
"Stalin created so many airborne troops that they could only be used in one situation: after a surprise attack by the Soviet air force on the airfields of the enemy. It would be simply impossible to use hundreds of thousands of airborne troops and thousands of transport aircraft and gliders in any other situation."
Stalin Preempted
During the period just prior to the planned Soviet invasion, the USSR's western military districts were ordered to deploy all 114 divisions, then stationed in the interior, to positions on the frontier. Thus, remarks Suvorov, June 13, 1941, "marks the beginning of the greatest displacement of troops in the history of civilization."
Such a massive buildup of forces directly on the frontier simply could not be kept secret. As Suvorov notes, Wilhelm Keitel, Field Marshal and Chief of Germany's armed forces High Command, spoke about the German fears during a postwar interrogation:
"All the preparatory measures we took before spring 1941 were defensive measures against the contingency of a possible attack by the Red Army. Thus the entire war in the East, to a known degree, may be termed a preventive war ... We decided ... to forestall an attack by Soviet Russia and to destroy its armed forces with a surprise attack. By spring 1941, I had formed the definite opinion that the heavy buildup of Russian troops, and their attack on Germany which would follow, would place us, in both economic and strategic terms, in an exceptionally critical situation ... Our attack was the immediate consequence of this threat ..."In 1941, Admiral N. G. Kuznetsov was the Soviet Navy minister, as well as a member of the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party. In his postwar memoirs, published in 1966, he recalled:
"For me there is one thing beyond all argument -- J. V. Stalin not only did not exclude the possibility of war with Hitler's Germany, on the contrary, he considered such a war ... inevitable ... J. V. Stalin made preparations for war ... wide and varied preparations -- beginning on dates ... which he himself had selected. Hitler upset his calculations."Suvorov comments:
"The admiral is telling us quite clearly and openly that Stalin considered war inevitable and prepared himself seriously to enter it at a time of his own choosing. In other words, Stalin was preparing to strike the first blow, that is to commit aggression against Germany; but Hitler dealt a preventive blow first and thereby frustrated all Stalin's plans
"Let us compare Keitel's words with those of Kuznetsov. Field Marshal Keitel said that Germany was not preparing an aggression against the Soviet Union; it was the Soviet Union which was preparing the aggression. Germany was simply using a preventive attack to defend itself from an unavoidable aggression. Kuznetsov says the same thing -- yes, the Soviet Union was preparing for war and would inevitably have entered into it, but Hitler disrupted these plans with his attack. What I cannot understand is why Keitel was hanged [at Nuremberg], and Kuznetsov was not."
Suvorov believes that Hitler's preemptive strike came just two or three weeks before Stalin's own planned assault. Thus, as Wehrmacht forces smashed Soviet formations in the initial weeks of the "Barbarossa" attack, the Germans marveled at the great numbers of Soviet tanks and other materiel destroyed or captured -- an enormous buildup sufficient not just for an assault on Germany, but for the conquest of all of Europe. Suvorov writes
"Hitler decided that it was not worth his while waiting any longer. He was the first to go, without waiting for the blow of the 'liberating' dagger to stab him in the back. He had begun the war in the most favorable conditions which could possibly have existed for an aggressor; but given the nature of Stalin's grand plan, he could never have won it. Even in the most unfavorable conditions, the Red Army was able to 'liberate' half of Europe ..."
As Suvorov repeatedly points out, the widely accepted image of World War II, and particularly of the roles of Stalin and Hitler in the conflict, simply does not accord with reality:
"In the end ... Poland, for whose liberty the West had gone to war, ended up with none at all. On the contrary, she was handed over to Stalin, along with the whole of Eastern Europe, including a part of Germany. Even so, there are some people in the West who continue to believe that the West won the Second World War.
"... Stalin became the absolute ruler of a vast empire hostile to the West, which had been created with the help of the West. For all that, Stalin was able to preserve his reputation as naive and trusting, while Hitler went down in history as the ultimate aggressor. A multitude of books have been published in the West based on the idea that Stalin was not ready for war while Hitler was."A Soviet Europe?
An intriguing historical "what if" is to speculate on the fate of Europe if Stalin, and not Hitler, had struck first. For example, a less rapidly successful German campaign in the Balkans in the spring of 1941 could have forced the postponement of Barbarossa by several weeks, which would have enabled Stalin to strike the first blow.
Could German forces have withstood an all-out Soviet assault, with tens of thousands of Soviet tanks and a million paratroopers? With the advantage of striking first, how quickly could Stalin have reached Berlin, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, Rome and Madrid? Suvorov writes:
"It would be a mistake to underestimate the enormous strength and vast resources of Stalin's war machine. Despite its grievous losses, it had enough strength to withdraw and gather new strength to reach Berlin. How far would it have gone had it not sustained that massive blow on 22 June, if hundreds of aircraft and thousands of tanks had not been lost, had it been the Red Army and not the Wehrmacht which struck the first blow? Did the German Army have the territorial expanse behind it for withdrawal? Did it have the inexhaustible human resources, and the time, to restore its army after the first Soviet surprise attack?"Partially answering his own question, Suvorov states: "If Hitler had decided to launch Operation Barbarossa a few weeks later, the Red Army would have reached Berlin much earlier than 1945."
Suvorov even presents a hypothetical scenario of a Soviet invasion and occupation of Europe, replete with Stalinist terror and oppression:
"The [Soviet] troops meet endless columns of prisoners. Dust rises on the horizon. There they are, the oppressors of the people -- shopkeepers, bourgeois doctors and architects, farmers and bank employees. The Chekists' [NKVD] work will be hard. Prisoners are cursorily interrogated at every stopping place. Then the NKVD investigates each one in detail, and establishes the degree of his guilt before the working people. But by now it has become necessary to expose the most dangerous of the millions of prisoners: the former Social Democrats, pacifists, socialists and National Socialists, former officers, policemen and ministers of religion.
"Millions of prisoners have to be sent far away to the east and the north, in order to give them the opportunity, through honest labor, to expiate their guilt before the people ..."In Suvorov's scenario, a camp called Auschwitz is captured early on by the advancing Soviets. In response to the question, "Well, what was it like in Auschwitz, pal?," a Red Army man replies: "'Nothing much, really' The worldly-wise soldier in his black jacket shrugs his shoulders. 'Just like at home. Only their climate is better'."
Actually, "what if" historical speculation is normally uncertain because key factors are often simply imponderable. In this case, one such factor is Soviet morale. While it is certainly true that Soviet troops fought bravely and tenaciously in 1941-1943 defending their home territory, they may not have fought with the same fervor and morale in an invasion of Europe. The tenacity and endurance shown by Red Army troops in Hungary and Germany in 1944 and 1945 is not necessarily indicative, because these soldiers were bitterly mindful of more than two years of savage fighting against the invaders, and of stern occupation, on their home territory.
Another imponderable is the response of Britain and the United States to an all-out Soviet invasion of Europe. If Soviet forces had struck westward in July 1941, would Britain and the United States have sided with Stalin and the USSR, or would they have sided with Hitler and Germany, Italy, France, Romania, Finland, Hungary, Denmark, and the rest of Europe? Or would Roosevelt and Churchill have decided to remain aloof from the great conflict?
Anyway, when Hitler did launch his preemptive strike against Soviet Russia, Roosevelt and Churchill immediately sided with Stalin, and when the Red Army took half of Europe in 1944-45, neither the British nor the American leader objected.
What can now be stated with certainty -- thanks to the work of Suvorov and other revisionist historians -- is that in smashing the great Soviet military buildup in 1941, Hitler dashed Stalin's plan to quickly conquer Europe, and that, in spite of his defeat in 1945, Hitler saved at least the western half of Europe, and tens of millions of people, from the horrors of Soviet subjugation.
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Why Germany Attacked The Soviet Union...
The stunning news of this attack was announced to the world by German radio at 5:30 that Sunday morning, when Reich Minister Joseph Goebbels broadcast the text of a proclamation by Adolf Hitler to the German people that laid out his reasons for the historic offensive.
Following that was the broadcast of Germany’s declaration of war against the Soviet Union. This was in the form of a diplomatic note to the Soviet government, read by Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop to a packed and hastily organized news conference of journalists representing the German press, as well as newspapers across Europe and overseas.
This Foreign Office statement explains in some detail the German government’s reasons for the momentous decision to attack the USSR. About two hours earlier, Ribbentrop had given the text to the Soviet ambassador in Berlin, while at the same time the German ambassador in Moscow was delivering a shorter version of it to the Soviet Foreign Minister.
The text of Ribbentrop’s statement, quickly distributed by Germany’s DNB news agency, appeared the next day in newspapers in Germany and abroad. An English-language text, which contained a number of errors due perhaps to the haste with which it had been prepared, appeared in The New York Times.
Although the two German statements of June 22 portrayed a grave and looming Soviet threat, they actually understated the scale of the danger. While Hitler and his generals knew that the Red Army was large and formidable, they had seriously underestimated its size and power. This miscalculation proved to be an important and probably decisive factor in the failure to crush the Soviet military by the onset of winter 1941-42, as planned – which then made possible the ultimate triumph of the Red Army in the titanic four-year clash.
By June 1941, the Soviet air force was not only the world’s largest, it was greater than the combined air forces of all other countries together. Similarly, the Soviet airborne assault force – which could be used only in offensive operations – was not only larger than Germany’s, it was larger than the combined paratroop forces of the rest of the world. The Soviet Red Army’s tank force was not only the world’s largest, it was larger than the tank forces of the rest of the world combined.
German leaders did not know that the Soviets were already producing the T-34, KV-1 and KV-2 tanks, the heaviest and most deadly in the world, and more formidable than any German model. Nor they did they know that the Soviet military had more than 4,000 amphibious tanks – which were meant only for offensive operations – while the Germans had none.
The Germans were also unaware of how the Soviets had been preparing their military commanders for war. For example, at a secret speech to military academy graduates in May 1941, just weeks earlier, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin said: “In conducting the defense of our country, we are compelled to act in an aggressive manner. From defense we have to shift to a military policy of offense. It is indispensable that we reform our training, our propaganda, our press to a mindset of offense. The Red Army is a modern army, and the modern army is an army of offense.”
It did not take long for German leaders to realize that they had greatly misjudged the scope of the Soviet military buildup. On August 11, 1941 – just eight weeks after the start of “Operation Barbarossa” – General Franz Halder, chief of the German army high command, noted in his diary: “In the situation as a whole, it is becoming ever clearer that we have underestimated the Russian colossus, which has consciously prepared for the war with the absolute lack of restraint that is peculiar to totalitarian states ... At the outset of the war we reckoned with about 200 enemy divisions.
Now we are already counting 360.”
A week later – on August 19 – the well informed Reich Propaganda Minister, Joseph Goebbels, similarly noted in his diary: “We obviously quite underestimated the Soviet shock power and, above all, the equipment of the Soviet army. We had nowhere near any idea of what the Bolsheviks had available. This led to erroneous decision-making ...”
Hitler himself acknowledged, both in public and in private, that he had misjudged the extent and scale of the Soviet threat. “Certainly, though, we were mistaken about one thing,” the German leader told a large audience in Berlin on Oct. 3, 1941. “We had no idea how gigantic the preparations of this enemy were against Germany and Europe, and how immeasurably great was the danger; how we just barely escaped annihilation, not only of Germany but also of Europe.”
The US government responded to the news of the German-led offensive with an official statement, issued by Deputy Secretary of State Sumner Welles. Completely ignoring the points made by the leaders in Berlin, it claimed that Germany’s “treacherous” attack was part of a plan by Hitler “for the cruel and brutal enslavement of all peoples and for the ultimate destruction of the remaining free democracies.” Actually, it was the Soviet Union – the world’s most oppressive regime at the time – that was dedicated to the eradication of “free democracies” and to the ultimate triumph of “proletarian dictatorship” in all countries. Stalin had made clear his elemental hostility to “free democracy” when the Red Army tried impose a Bolshevik regime on Finland in the “Winter War” of 1939-1940. In fact, soldiers of Finland – a parliamentary democracy – were now fighting as allies of Hitler’s Germany against the Soviets.
The American public, largely ignorant of European affairs and conditioned by years of media propaganda and alarmist rhetoric by President Franklin Roosevelt, generally accepted their government’s view of the conflict. “Of course,” Roosevelt told reporters on June 24, “we are going to give all the aid that we possibly can to Russia.” In violation of its proclaimed status as a neutral country, and with disregard for international law, the US was soon providing military aid to Soviet Russia.
Influential American historians have for years accepted the official US view of the German-Soviet clash. They portrayed the German-led offensive as a treacherous and unprovoked surprise attack against a peaceable country, motivated above all by grandiose visions of empire. Typical is the view of James MacGregor Burns, a prominent US historian and specialist of twentieth century American history. In his widely acclaimed book Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom he dismissed the German Foreign Office declaration of June 22, 1941, as a “pack of Nazi lies.”
In recent years, however, a growing number of historians have assembled considerable evidence that validates key points made by Hitler and the German government, and which shows that the Soviets were preparing a massive assault. The most influential of these historians has probably been a former Soviet GRU military intelligence officer, Vladimir Rezun. In a series of books written under the pen name of Viktor Suvorov, he has presented impressive evidence to show that the Soviet regime was preparing a massive offensive against Germany and Europe, and that the German-led attack forestalled an imminent Soviet strike. It is Stalin, not Hitler – he says – who should be considered the “chief culprit” of World War II.
Numerous documents and other historical evidence have come to light in recent decades that confirm key points made in the German statements of June 22, 1941. This evidence also thoroughly discredits the simplistic portrayal of the German-Soviet clash, and indeed of the Second World War itself, that US officials and prominent historians presented to the American public during the war, and for years afterwards.
Even if the leaders in Germany, Finland, and other European countries were mistaken in believing that a Soviet assault was imminent, they certainly had ample reason to regard the Stalin regime as a dangerous threat, and to conclude that the Soviets were deploying vast military forces in preparation for attack at some point in the future. The reasons given by Hitler and his government to justify the German-led attack were not lies or pretexts.
Indeed, the German, Finnish, and Romanian leaders had more valid and substantive cause to strike against the USSR in June 1941 than American leaders have had for launching a number of wars – including against Mexico in 1845, against Spain in 1898, and against Iraq in 2003. In none of those cases did the country attacked by US military forces present a clear and present danger to the US, or a threat to vital American national interests.
Because Hitler’s proclamation of June 22, 1941, and the German Foreign Office declaration of the same day, explain at some length the reasons and motives for the fateful decision to strike against the USSR, these are documents of historic importance.
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The Myth of "The Good War."
This global clash -- with the United States and the other "Allies" on one side, and Nazi Germany, imperial Japan and the other "Axis" countries on the other -- is routinely portrayed in the US as the "good war," a morally clear-cut conflict between Good and Evil.
In the view of British author and historian Paul Addison, "the war served a generation of Britons and Americans as a myth which enshrined their essential purity, a parable of good and evil."
Dwight Eisenhower, Supreme wartime Commander of American forces in Europe, and later US president for eight years, called the fight against Nazi Germany "the Great Crusade."
And President Bill Clinton said that in World War II the United States "saved the world from tyranny."
Americans are also told that this was an unavoidable and necessary war, one that the US had to wage to keep from being enslaved by cruel and ruthless dictators.
Whatever doubts or misgivings Americans may have had about their country's role in Iraq, Vietnam, or other overseas conflicts, most accept that the sacrifices made by the US in World War II, especially in defeating Hitler's Germany, were entirely justified and worthwhile.
For more than 60 years, this view has been reinforced in countless motion pictures, on television, by teachers, in textbooks, and by political leaders. The reverential way that the US role in the war has been portrayed moved Bruce Russett, professor of political science at Yale University, to write:
"Participation in the war against Hitler remains almost wholly sacrosanct, nearly in the realm of theology ... Whatever criticisms of twentieth-century American policy are put forth, United States participation in World War II remains almost entirely immune. According to our national mythology, that was a 'good war,' one of the few for which the benefits clearly outweighed the costs. Except for a few books published shortly after the war and quickly forgotten, this orthodoxy has been essentially unchallenged."
How accurate is this hallowed portrayal of America's role in World War II? As we shall see, it does not hold up under close examination.
First, a look at the outbreak of war in Europe.
When the leaders of Britain and France declared war against Germany on September 3, 1939, they announced that they were doing so because German military forces had attacked Poland, thereby threatening Polish independence. In going to war against Germany, the British and French leaders transformed what was then a geographically limited, two-day-old clash between Germany and Poland into a continental, European-wide conflict.
It soon became obvious that the British-French justification for going to war was not sincere. When Soviet Russian forces attacked Poland from the East two weeks later, ultimately taking even more Polish territory than did Germany, the leaders of Britain and France did not declare war against the Soviet Union. And although Britain and France went to war supposedly to protect Polish independence, at the end of the fighting in 1945 – after five and a half years of horrific struggle, death and suffering – Poland was still not free, but instead was entirely under the brutal rule of Soviet Russia.
Sir Basil Liddell Hart, an outstanding twentieth-century British military historian, put it this way:
"The Western Allies entered the war with a two-fold object. The immediate purpose was to fulfill their promise to preserve the independence of Poland. The ultimate purpose was to remove a potential menace to themselves, and thus ensure their own security. In the outcome, they failed in both purposes. Not only did they fail to prevent Poland from being overcome in the first place, and partitioned between Germany and Russia, but after six years of war which ended in apparent victory they were forced to acquiesce in Russia's domination of Poland – abandoning their pledges to the Poles who had fought on their side."
In 1940, shortly after he was named prime minister, Winston Churchill spelled out, in two often quoted speeches, his reasons for continuing Britain's war against Germany. In his famous "Blood, Sweat and Tears" speech, the great British wartime leader said that unless Germany was defeated, there would be "no survival for the British empire, no survival for all that the British empire has stood for..." A few weeks later, in his "Finest Hour" address, Churchill said: "Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire."
How strange those words sound today. Even though Britain supposedly "won," or at least was on the winning side in the war, the once-mighty British empire has vanished into history. No British leader today would dare defend the often brutal record of British imperialism, including killing and bombing in order to maintain exploitative colonial rule over millions in Asia and Africa. Nor would any British leader today dare to justify killing people in order to uphold "Christian civilization," not least for fear of offending Britain's large and rapidly growing non-Christian population.
Americans like to believe that "good guys" win, and "bad guys" lose, and, in international affairs, that "good" countries win wars, and "bad" countries lose them. In keeping with this view, Americans are encouraged to believe that the US role in defeating Germany and Japan demonstrated the righteousness of the "American Way," and the superiority of our country's form of government and society.
But if there is any validity to this view, it would be more accurate to say that the war's outcome showed the righteousness of the "Soviet Way," and the superiority of the Soviet Communist form of society and government. Indeed, for decades that was a proud claim of Moscow's leaders. As one official Soviet history book, published in the 1970s, put it:
"The war demonstrated the superiority of the Soviet socialist social and state system ... The war further demonstrated the social and political unity of the Soviet people ... Once again it underscored the significance of the guiding and organizing role of the Communist Party in socialist society. The Communist Party consolidated millions of people in their fight against the fascist aggressors ... The selfless dedication demonstrated by the Communist Party during the war years further solidified the trust, respect and love it enjoys among the Soviet people."
In fact, Hitler's Germany was defeated, first and foremost, by the Soviet Union. Some 70-80 percent of German combat forces were destroyed by the Soviet military on the Eastern front. The D-Day landing in France by American and British forces, which is often portrayed in the United States as a critically important military blow against Nazi Germany, was launched in June 1944 -- that is, less than a year before the end of the war in Europe, and months after the great Soviet military victories at Stalingrad and Kursk, which were decisive in Germany's defeat.
What were the American goals in World War II, and how successful was the US in achieving them?
In 1941 President Franklin Roosevelt, together with British prime minister Winston Churchill, issued a formal declaration of Allied war aims, the much-publicized "Atlantic Charter." In it, the United States and Britain declared that they sought "no territorial changes that do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned," that they would "respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of governments under which they will live," and that they would strive "to see sovereign rights and self-government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them."
It soon became apparent, though, that this solemn pledge of freedom and self-government for "all peoples" was little more than empty propaganda.
This is hardly surprising, given that America's two most important military allies in the war were Great Britain and the Soviet Union – that is, the world's foremost imperialist power, and the world's cruelest tyranny.
At the outbreak of war in 1939, Britain ruled over the largest colonial empire in history, holding more millions of people against their will than any regime before or since. This vast empire included what is now India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and South Africa.
America's other great wartime ally, the Soviet Union, was, by any objective measure, the most tyrannical or oppressive regime of its time, and a vastly more cruel despotism than Hitler's Germany. As historians acknowledge, the victims of Soviet dictator Stalin greatly outnumber those who perished as a result of Hitler's policies. Robert Conquest, a prominent scholar of twentieth century Russian history, estimates the number of those who lost their lives as a consequence of Stalin's policies as "no fewer than 20 million."
During the war the United States helped substantially to maintain Stalin's tyranny, and to aid the Soviet Union in oppressing additional millions of Europeans, while also helping Britain to maintain or re-establish its imperial rule over many millions in Asia and Africa.
Paul Fussell, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania who served in World War II as a US Army lieutenant, wrote in his acclaimed book Wartime that "the Allied war has been sanitized and romanticized almost beyond recognition by the sentimental, the loony patriotic, the ignorant and the bloodthirsty."
An important feature of this "sanitized" view is the belief that whereas the Nazi German regime was responsible for many terrible war crimes and atrocities, the Allies, and especially the United States, waged war humanely. In fact, the record of Allied misdeeds is a long one, and includes the British-American bombing of German cities, a terroristic campaign that took the lives of more than half a million civilians, the genocidal "ethnic cleansing" of millions of civilians in eastern and central Europe, and the large-scale postwar mistreatment of German prisoners.
After "forty months of war duty and five major battles" in which Edgar L. Jones served as "an ambulance driver, a merchant seaman, an Army historian, and a war correspondent," he wrote an article dispelling some myths about the Americans' role in the war. "What kind of war do civilians suppose we fought, anyway?," he told readers of The Atlantic monthly. "We shot prisoners in cold blood, wiped out hospitals, strafed lifeboats, killed or mistreated enemy civilians, finished off the enemy wounded, tossed the dying into a hole with the dead, and in the Pacific boiled the flesh off enemy skulls to make table ornaments for sweethearts, or carved their bones into letter-openers."
Shortly after the end of the war, the victorious powers put Germany's wartime leaders on trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity. In doing so, the US and its allies held German leaders to a standard that they did not respect themselves.
US Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson was not the only high-ranking American official to acknowledge, at least in private, that the claim of unique Allied righteousness was mere pretense. In a letter to the President, written while he was serving as the chief US prosecutor at the great Nuremberg trial of 1945-1946, Jackson acknowledged that the Allies "have done or are doing some of the very things we are prosecuting the Germans for. The French are so violating the Geneva Convention in the treatment of [German] prisoners of war that our command is taking back prisoners sent to them [for forced labor in France]. We are prosecuting plunder and our Allies are practicing it. We say aggressive war is a crime and one of our allies asserts sovereignty over the Baltic States based on no title except conquest."
At the conclusion of the Nuremberg trial of 1945-1946, the respected British weekly The Economist cited Soviet crimes, and then added, "Nor should the Western world console itself that the Russians alone stand condemned at the bar of the Allies' own justice." The Economist editorial went on:
"... Among crimes against humanity stands the offence of the indiscriminate bombing of civilian populations. Can the Americans who dropped the atom bomb and the British who destroyed the cities of western Germany plead 'not guilty' on this count? Crimes against humanity also include the mass expulsion of populations. Can the Anglo-Saxon leaders who at Potsdam condoned the expulsion of millions of Germans from their homes hold themselves completely innocent?... The nations sitting in judgment [at Nuremberg] have so clearly proclaimed themselves exempt from the law which they have administered."
Another popular American assumption is that this country's enemies in World War II were all non-democratic dictatorships. In fact, on each side there were regimes that were repressive or dictatorial, as well as governments that had broad public support. Many of the countries allied with the US were headed by governments that were oppressive, dictatorial, or otherwise non-democratic. Finland, a democratic republic, was an important wartime partner of Hitler's Germany.
In crass violation of their own solemnly proclaimed principles, the US, British and Soviet statesmen disposed of tens of millions of people with no regard for their wishes. The deceit and cynicism of the Allied leaders was perhaps most blatant in the infamous British-Soviet "percentages agreement" to divide up South Eastern Europe. At a meeting with Stalin in 1944, Churchill proposed that in Romania the Soviets should have 90 percent influence or authority, and 75 percent in Bulgaria, and that Britain should have 90 percent influence or control in Greece. In Hungary and Yugoslavia, the British leader suggested, each should have 50 percent. Churchill wrote all this out on a piece of paper, which he pushed across to Stalin, who made a check mark on it and passed it back. Churchill then said, "Might it not be thought rather cynical if it seemed we had disposed of these issues, so fateful to millions of people, in such an off-hand manner? Let us burn the paper." "No, you keep it," replied Stalin.
To solidify the Allied wartime coalition – which was formally known as the "United Nations" -- President Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Churchill, and Soviet premier Stalin met together on two occasions: in November 1943 at Tehran, in occupied Iran, and in February 1945 in Yalta, in Soviet Crimea. The three Allied leaders accomplished what they accused the Axis leaders of Germany, Italy and Japan of conspiring to achieve: world domination.
During a 1942 meeting in Washington, President Roosevelt candidly told the Soviet foreign minister that "the United States, England and Russia, and perhaps China, should police the world and enforce disarmament [of all others] by inspection."
To secure the global rule of the victorious powers after the war, the "Big Three" Allied leaders established the United Nations organization to serve as a permanent world police force. Once Germany and Japan were defeated, though, the US and the Soviet Union squared off against each other, which made it impossible for the UN to function as President Roosevelt had intended. While the US and Soviet Union each sought for decades to secure hegemony in its own sphere of influence, the two "super powers" were also rivals in a decades-long struggle for global supremacy.
In his book, A People's History of the United States, historian Howard Zinn wrote:
"The victors were the Soviet Union and the United States (also England, France and Nationalist China, but they were weak). Both these countries now went to work – without swastikas, goose-stepping, or officially declared racism, but under the cover of 'socialism' on the one side, and 'democracy' on the other, to carve out their own empires of influence. They proceeded to share and contest with one another the domination of the world, to build military machines far greater than the Fascist countries had built, to control the destinies of more countries than Hitler, Mussolini, and Japan had been able to. They also acted to control their own populations, each country with its own techniques – crude in the Soviet Union, sophisticated in the United States – to make their rule secure."
The United States officially entered World War II after the Japanese attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii on December 7, 1941. Until then, the US was officially a neutral country, and most Americans wanted to keep out of the war that was then raging in Europe and Asia. In spite of the country's neutral status, President Roosevelt and his administration, together with much of the US media, prodded the American people into supporting war against Germany. A large-scale propaganda campaign was mounted to persuade Americans that Hitler and his Nazi "henchmen" or "hordes" were doing everything in their power to take over and "enslave" the entire world, and that war with Hitler's Germany was inevitable.
As part of this effort, the President and other high-ranking American officials broadcast fantastic lies about supposed plans by Hitler and his government to attack the United States and impose a global dictatorship.
President Roosevelt's record of lies is acknowledged even by his admirers. Among those who have sought to justify his policy is the eminent American historian Thomas A. Bailey, who wrote:
"Franklin Roosevelt repeatedly deceived the American people during the period before Pearl Harbor ... He was like the physician who must tell the patient lies for the patient's own good ... The country was overwhelmingly noninterventionist to the very day of Pearl Harbor, and an overt attempt to lead the people into war would have resulted in certain failure and an almost certain ousting of Roosevelt in 1940, with a complete defeat of his ultimate aims."
Professor Bailey went on to offer a cynical view of American democracy:
"A president who cannot entrust the people with the truth betrays a certain lack of faith in the basic tenets of democracy. But because the masses are notoriously shortsighted and generally cannot see danger until it is at their throats, our statesmen are forced to deceive them into an awareness of their own long-run interests. This is clearly what Roosevelt had to do, and who shall say that posterity will not thank him for it?"
As part of the US government's campaign to incite war, President Roosevelt in 1941 ordered the US Navy to help British forces in attacking German vessels in the Atlantic. This was reinforced by a presidential "shoot on sight" order to the US Navy against German and Italian ships. Roosevelt's goal was to provoke an "incident" that would provide a pretext for open war. Hitler, for his part, was anxious to avoid conflict with the United States. The German leader responded to the US government's blatantly illegal provocations by ordering his navy commanders to avoid clashes with US ships.
Also in crass violation of international law, the officially neutral US government provided massive "Lend Lease" aid to Germany's enemies, especially Britain and its empire, as well as to Soviet Russia.
Two prominent American historians, Allan Nevins and Henry Steele Commager, noted that:
"This [1941 "Lend Lease"] measure was clearly unneutral, but the United States, committed now to the defeat of Germany, was not to be stayed by the niceties of international law. Other equally unneutral acts followed – the seizure of Axis shipping, the freezing of Axis funds, the transfer of tankers to Britain, the occupation of Greenland and, later, of Iceland, the extension of lend-lease to the new ally, Russia, and ... the presidential order to 'shoot on sight' any enemy submarines."
In the view of British historian J.F.C. Fuller, President Roosevelt "left no stone unturned to provoke Hitler to declare war on the very people to whom he so ardently promised peace. He provided Great Britain with American destroyers, he landed American troops in Iceland, and he set out to patrol the Atlantic seaways in order to safeguard British convoys; all of which were acts of war ... In spite of his manifold enunciations to keep the United States out of the war, he was bent on provoking some incident which would bring them into it."
So belligerent and unlawful were the Roosevelt administration's policies that Admiral Harold R. Stark, chief of US naval operations, acknowledged in a confidential September 1941 memorandum for the President: "He [Hitler] has every excuse in the world to declare war on us now, if he were of a mind to."
Across Europe and Asia, the Second World War brought mass destruction, death to tens of millions of men, women and children, and great suffering to many more. Americans, though, were spared the horrors of large-scale bombing, combat fighting on their home soil, or occupation by foreign armies.
At the end of the war the United States was the only major nation not shattered in the global conflict. It emerged as the world's preeminent economic, military, and financial power. For the US, the half-century from 1945 to the mid-1990s was an era of spectacular economic growth and unmatched global stature.
Lewis H. Lapham, author and for years editor of Harper's magazine, put it this way:
"In 1945, the United States inherited the earth ... At the end of World War II, what was left of Western civilization passed into the American account. The war had also prompted the country to invent a miraculous economic machine that seemed to grant as many wishes as were asked of it. The continental United States had escaped the plague of war, and so it was easy enough for the heirs to believe that they had been anointed by God."
But were Americans really better off than if they had stayed out of World War II? Among those who has not thought so is Prof. Bruce Russett, who wrote:
"American participation in World War II had very little effect on the essential structure of international politics thereafter, and probably did little either to advance the material welfare of most Americans or to make the nation secure from foreign military threats ... In fact, most Americans probably would have been no worse off, and possibly a little better, if the United States had never become a belligerent...
"I personally find it hard to develop a very emphatic preference for Stalinist Russia over Hitlerite Germany ... In cold-blooded realist terms, Nazism as an ideology was almost certainly less dangerous to the United States than is Communism."
Although Third Reich Germany and imperial Japan were destroyed, the United States and Britain failed to achieve the political goals proclaimed by their leaders. In August 1945, the prestigious British weekly, The Economist, noted: "At the end of a mighty war fought to defeat Hitlerism, the Allies are making a Hitlerian peace. This is the real measure of their failure."
Among those who were not happy about the war's outcome was British historian Basil Liddell Hart, who wrote:
"... All the effort that was put into the destruction of Hitlerite Germany resulted in a Europe so devastated and weakened in the process that its power of resistance was much reduced in the face of a fresh and greater menace – and Britain, in common with her European neighbors, had become a poor dependent of the United States. These are the hard facts underlying the victory that was so hopefully pursued and so painfully achieved – after the colossal weight of both Russia and America had been drawn into the scales against Germany. The outcome dispelled the persistent popular illusion that 'victory' spelt peace. It confirmed the warning of past experience that victory is a 'mirage in the desert' – the desert that a long war creates, when waged with modern weapons and unlimited methods."
Even Winston Churchill had misgivings about the war's outcome. Three years after the end of the fighting, he wrote:
"The human tragedy [of the war] reaches its climax in the fact that after all the exertions and sacrifices of hundreds of millions of people and of the victories of the Righteous Cause, we have still not found Peace or Security, and that we lie in the grip of even worse perils than those we have surmounted."
At the end of the war, Europe for the first time in its history was no longer master of its own destiny, but was instead under the domination of two great outer European powers, the United States and the Soviet Union, which for political and ideological reasons had no special interest in, or concern for, European culture or Western civilization.
In the view of Charles A. Lindbergh, the world-famous author and aviator, the war was a great setback for the West. Twenty-five years after the end of the conflict, he wrote:
"We won the war in a military sense; but in a broader sense it seems to me we lost it, for our Western civilization is less respected and secure than it was before. In order to defeat Germany and Japan we supported the still greater menaces of Russia and China – which now confront us in a nuclear-weapon era. Poland was not saved ... Much of our Western culture was destroyed. We lost the genetic heredity formed through aeons in many million lives ... It is alarmingly possible that World War II marks the beginning of our Western civilization's breakdown, as it already marks the breakdown of the greatest empire ever built by man."
The outcome of the US and British role in the war moved British historian J.F.C. Fuller to write:
"What persuaded them [Roosevelt and Churchill] to adopt so fatal a policy? We hazard to reply – blind hatred! Their hearts ran away with their heads and their emotions befogged their reason. For them the war was not a political conflict in the normal meaning of the words, it was a Manichean contest between Good and Evil, and to carry their people along with them they unleashed a vitriolic propaganda against the devil they had invoked."
Even after the passage of so many years, this hatred has endured. American schools, the US mass media, government agencies and political leaders have for decades carried on a campaign of emotion-laden, one-sided propaganda to uphold the national mythology of World War II.
How a nation views the past is not a trivial or merely academic exercise. Our perspective on history profoundly shapes our actions in the present, often with grave consequences for the future. Drawing conclusions from our understanding of the past, we make or support policies that greatly impact many lives.
The familiar American portrayal of World War II, and the "good war" mythology of the US role in it, is not merely bad history. It has helped greatly to support and justify a series of arrogant US foreign policy adventures, with harmful consequences for both America and the world.
"World War II has warped our view of how we look at things today," said US Navy rear admiral Gene R. LaRoque, who served in 13 major battles during the war. "We see things in terms of that war, which in a sense was a good war. But the twisted memory of it encourages the men of my generation to be willing, almost eager, to use military force anywhere in the world."
Since 1945, American presidents have repeatedly sought to justify US military actions in foreign countries by recalling the "good war" and, in particular, the US role in defeating Germany. During the 1960s, President Lyndon Johnson sought to win support for his Vietnam war policy with historically false portrayals of World War II and Hitler's Germany.
This moved historian Murray Rothbard to write in 1968:
" ...World War II is the last war myth left, the myth that the Old Left clings to in pure desperation: the myth that here, at least, was a good war, here was a war in which America was in the right. World War II is the war thrown into our faces by the war-making establishment, as it tries, in each war that we face, to wrap itself in the mantle of good and righteous World War II."
In recent years, American political leaders have tried to gain support for war against Iraq and Iran by drawing historical parallels between Hitler and the leaders of those two Middle East countries.
Many Americans are understandably outraged by the deceit and falsehoods of President George W. Bush and his administration in seeking public support for the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. But as we have seen, presidential deception to justify war did not start with him. Americans who express admiration for the US role in World War II, and for Franklin Roosevelt's presidential leadership, have little moral right to complain when presidents follow his example and lead the country into war by breaking the law, subverting the Constitution, and lying to the people.
If the history of war and conflict teaches us anything, it is the danger of arrogance and hubris – that is, the danger of going to war because a nation's leaders are convinced of their own righteousness, or have persuaded themselves and the public that a foreign country should be attacked because its government or society is not merely alien, hostile or threatening, but "evil."
This is perhaps the most harmful legacy of America 's national mythology about World War II -- the notion that worthwhile or justifiable wars are fought against countries headed by supposedly "evil" regimes. And it is this very outlook that moved President George W. Bush to refer to his "war on terrorism" as a "crusade," and, in a major speech, to proclaim a US foreign policy dedicated to "ending tyranny in the world."
A nation should go to war only after prudent consideration, after carefully weighing the possible consequences, and only for the most compelling of reasons, after all other alternatives have been exhausted, and as a last resort. This is especially true given the awesome destructive power of modern weaponry, and because – as World War II , the "Good War," so tragically attests -- wars rarely turn out the way anyone expects.
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Hitler's Peace Offers 1933-1939 - What The World Rejected...
The attempts repeatedly made by Adolf Hitler to induce the governments of other states to join with him in a collaborative restoration of Europe are part of an ever-recurring pattern in his conduct since the commencement of his labors for the German Reich. But these attempts were wrecked every time due to the fact that nowhere was there any willingness to give them due consideration, because the evil spirit of the [first] World War still prevailed everywhere, because in London and Paris and in the capitals of the western powers' vassal states there was only one fixed intention: to perpetuate the power of [the imposed] Versailles [settlement of 1919].
A quick look at the most important events provides incontrovertible proof of this.
When Adolf Hitler came to the fore, Germany was as gagged and as helpless as the victors of 1918 intended her to be. Completely disarmed, with an army of only 100,000 men meant solely for police duties within the country, she found herself within a tightly closed ring of neighbors all armed to the teeth and allied together. To the old enemies in the West -- Britain, Belgium and France -- new ones were artificially created and added in the East and the South: above all Poland and Czechoslovakia. A quarter of the population of Germany was forcibly torn away from their mother country and handed over to foreign powers. The German Reich, mutilated on all sides and robbed of every means of defense, at any moment could become the helpless victim of a rapacious neighbor.
It was then that Adolf Hitler for the first time made his appeal to the common sense of the other powers. On May 17, 1933, a few months after his appointment to the post of Reich Chancellor, he delivered a speech in the German Reichstag that included the following passages:
“Germany will be perfectly ready to disband her entire military establishment and destroy the small amount of arms remaining to her, if the neighboring countries will do the same thing with equal thoroughness.
“... Germany is also entirely ready to renounce aggressive weapons of every sort if the armed nations, on their part, will destroy their aggressive weapons within a specified period, and if their use is forbidden by an international convention.
“... Germany is ready at any time to renounce aggressive weapons if the rest of the world does the same. Germany is prepared to agree to any solemn pact of non-aggression because she does not think of attacking anybody, but only of acquiring security.”
No answer was received.
The other powers heedlessly continued to fill their arsenals with weapons, to pile up their stores of explosives, to increase the numbers of their troops. At the same time the League of Nations, the instrument of the victorious powers, declared that Germany must first undergo a period of "probation" before it would be possible to discuss with her the question of the disarmament of the other countries. On October 14, 1933, Hitler withdrew from the League of Nations, with which it was impossible to reach an understanding. Shortly afterwards, however, on December 18, 1933, he came forward with a new proposal for the improvement of international relations. This proposal included the following six points:
“1. Germany receives full equality of rights.
2. The fully armed states undertake among themselves not to increase their armaments beyond their present level.
3. Germany adheres to this agreement, freely undertaking to make only so much actual moderate use of the equality of rights granted to her as will not represent a threat to the security of any other European power.
4. All states recognize certain obligations in regard to conducting war on humane principles, or not to use certain weapons against the civilian population.
5. All states accept a uniform general supervision that will monitor and ensure the observance of these obligations.
6. The European nations guarantee one another the unconditional maintenance of peace by the conclusion of non- aggression pacts, to be renewed after ten years.”
Following up on this, a proposal was made to increase the strength of the German army to 300,000 men, corresponding to the strength “required by Germany taking into account the length of her frontiers and the size of the armies of her neighbors," in order to protect her threatened territory against attacks. The defender of the principle of peaceable agreement was thus trying to accommodate himself to the unwillingness of the others to disarm by expressing a desire for a limited increase of armaments for his own country. An exchange of notes, which began with this and continued for years, finally came to a sudden end with an unequivocal “no” from France. This “no” was moreover accompanied by tremendous increases in the armed forces of France, Britain, and Russia.
In this way Germany's position became even worse than before. The danger to the Reich was so great that Adolf Hitler felt himself compelled to act. On March 16, 1935, he reintroduced conscription. But in direct connection with this measure he once more announced an offer of wide-ranging agreements, the purpose of which as to ensure that any future war would be conducted on humane principles, in fact to make any such war practically impossible by eliminating destructive armaments. In his speech of May 21, 1935, he declared:
“The German government is ready to take an active part in all efforts which may lead to a practical limitation of armaments. It regards a return to the principles of the Geneva Red Cross Convention as the only possible way to achieve this. It believes that at first there will be only the possibility of a step-by-step abolition and outlawing of weapons and methods of warfare that are essentially contrary to the still-valid Geneva Red Cross Convention.
“Just as the use of dum-dum [expanding] bullets was once forbidden and, on the whole, thereby prevented in practice, so the use of other specific weapons can be forbidden and their use, in practice, can be eliminated. Here the German government has in mind all those armaments that bring death and destruction not so much to the fighting soldiers as to non-combatant women and children.
“The German government considers as erroneous and ineffective the idea of doing away with airplanes while leaving open the question of bombing. But it believes it possible to ban the use of certain weapons as contrary to international law, and to ostracize those nations which still use them from the community of humankind, and from its rights and laws.
“It also believes that gradual progress is the best way to success. For example, there might be prohibition of the use of gas, incendiary and explosive bombs outside the actual battle zone. This limitation could then be extended to complete international outlawing of all bombing. But so long as bombing as such is permitted, any limitation of the number of aerial bombers is dubious in view of the possibility of rapid replacement.
“Should bombing as such be branded as barbaric and contrary to international law, the construction of aerial bombing planes will soon be abandoned as superfluous and pointless. If, through the Geneva Red Cross Convention, it proved possible to prevent the killing of defenseless wounded men or of prisoners, it ought to be equally possible, through an analogous convention, to forbid and ultimately to bring to an end the bombing of similarly defenseless civilian populations.
“In such a fundamental way of dealing with the problem, Germany sees a greater reassurance and security for the nations than in all the pacts of assistance and military agreements.
“The German government is ready to agree to any limitation that leads to abolition of the heaviest arms, especially suited for aggression. Such weapons are, first, the heaviest artillery, and secondly, the heaviest tanks. In view of the enormous fortifications on the French frontier, such an international abolition of the heaviest weapons of attack would automatically give France nearly one hundred percent security.
“Germany declares herself ready to agree to any limitation whatsoever of the caliber-size of artillery, as well as battleships, cruisers, and torpedo boats. In like manner the German government is ready to accept any international limitation of the size of warships. And finally it is ready to agree to limitation of tonnage for submarines, or to their complete abolition through an international agreement.
“And it gives further assurance that it will agree to any international limitations or abolition of arms whatsoever for a uniform period of time.”
Once again Hitler's declarations did not receive the slightest response.
On the contrary, France made an alliance with Russia in order to further increase her predominance on the continent, and to enormously increase the pressure on Germany from the East.
In view of the evident destructive intentions of his adversaries, Adolf Hitler was therefore obliged to take new measures for the security of the German Reich. On March 3, 1936, he occupied the Rhineland, which had been without military protection since [the] Versailles [settlement of 1919], and thus shut the wide gate through which the Western neighbor could carry out an invasion. Once again he followed the defensive step which he had been obliged to take with a generous appeal for general reconciliation and for the settlement of all differences. On March 31, 1936, he formulated the following peace plan:
1 . In order to give to future agreements securing the peace of Europe the character of inviolable treaties, those nations participating in the negotiations do so only on an entirely equal footing and as equally esteemed members. The sole compelling reason for signing these treaties can only lie in the generally recognized and obvious usefulness of these agreements for the peace of Europe, and thus for the social happiness and economic prosperity of the nations.
2. In order to shorten, in the economic interest of the European nations, the period of uncertainty, the German government proposes a limit of four months for the first period up to the signing of the pacts of non-aggression guaranteeing the peace of Europe.
3. The German government gives the assurance not to add any reinforcements whatsoever to the troops in the Rhineland during this period, always provided that the Belgian and French governments act in the same way.
4. The German government gives the assurance not to move during this period closer to the Belgian and French frontiers the troops at present stationed in the Rhineland.
5. The German government proposes the setting up of a commission composed of the two guarantor Powers, Britain and Italy, and a disinterested third neutral power, to guarantee this assurance to be given by both parties.
6. Germany, Belgium, and France are each entitled to send a representative to this Commission. If Germany, France, or Belgium think that for any particular reason they can point to a change in the military situation having taken place within this period of four months, they have the right to inform the Guarantee Commission of their observations.
7. Germany, Belgium, and France declare their willingness in such a case to permit this Commission to make the necessary investigations through the British and Italian military attaches, and to report thereon to the participating powers.
8. Germany, Belgium and France give the assurance that they will give the fullest consideration to the objections arising therefrom.
9. Moreover the German government is willing on a basis of complete reciprocity with Germany's two western neighbors to agree to any military limitations on the German western frontier.
10. Germany, Belgium, and France and the two guarantor powers agree to enter into negotiations under the leadership of the British government at once or, at the latest, after the French elections, for the conclusion of a 25-year non-aggression or security pact between France and Belgium on the one hand, and Germany on the other.
11 . Germany agrees that Britain and Italy shall sign this security pact as guarantor powers once more.
12. Should special engagements to render military assistance arise as a result of these security agreements, Germany on her part declares her willingness to enter into such engagements.
13. The German government hereby repeats its proposal for the conclusion of an air- pact to supplement and strengthen these security agreements.
14. The German government repeats that should the Netherlands so desire, it is willing to also include that country in this West European security agreement.
15. In order to give this peace-pact, voluntarily entered into between Germany and France, the character of a conciliatory agreement ending a centuries-old quarrel, Germany and France pledge themselves to take steps to see that in the education of the young, as well as in the press and publications of both nations, everything shall be avoided that might be calculated to poison relations between the two peoples, whether it be a derogatory or contemptuous attitude, or improper interference in the internal affairs of the other country. They agree to set up at the headquarters of the
League of Nations at Geneva, a joint commission whose function it shall be to lay before the two governments all complaints received, for information and investigation.
16. In keeping with their intention to give this agreement the character of a sacred pledge, Germany and France undertake to ratify it through a plebiscite of the two nations.
17. Germany expresses her willingness, on her part, to contact the states on her south-eastern and north-eastern frontiers, to invite them directly to the final formal signing of the proposed non-aggression pacts.
18. Germany expresses her willingness to re-enter the League of Nations, either at once, or after the conclusion of these agreements. At the same time, the German government once again expresses as its expectation that, after a reasonable time and through friendly negotiations, the issue of colonial equality of rights, as well as the issue of the separation of the Covenant of the League of Nations from its foundation in the Versailles Treaty, will be cleared up.
19. Germany proposes the setting up of an International Court of Arbitration, which shall be responsible for the observance of the various agreements and whose decisions shall be binding on all parties.
After the conclusion of this great work of securing European peace, the German government considers it urgently necessary to endeavor by practical measures to put a stop to the unlimited competition in armaments. In her opinion this would mean not merely an improvement in the financial and economic conditions of the nations, but above all a lessening of psychological tension.
The German government, however, has no faith in the attempt to bring about universal settlements, as this would be doomed to failure from the outset, and can therefore be proposed only by those who have no interest in achieving practical results. On the other hand it is of the opinion that the negotiations held and the results achieved in limiting naval armaments should have an instructive and stimulating effect.
The German government therefore recommends future conferences, each of which shall have a single, clearly defined objective.
For the present, it believes the most important task is to bring aerial warfare into the moral and humane atmosphere of the protection afforded to non-combatants or the wounded by the Geneva Convention. Just as the killing of defenseless wounded, or of prisoners, or the use of dum-dum bullets, or the waging of submarine warfare without warning, have been either forbidden or regulated by international conventions, so it must be possible for civilized humanity to prevent the senseless abuse of any new type of weapon, without running counter to the object of warfare.
The German government therefore proposes that the practical tasks of these conferences shall be:
1. Prohibition of the use of gas, poison, or incendiary bombs.
2. Prohibition of the use of bombs of any kind whatsoever on towns or places outside the range of the medium-heavy artillery of the fighting fronts.
3. Prohibition of the bombardment with long-range guns of towns or places more than 20 kilometers distant from the battle zone.
4. Abolition and prohibition of the construction of tanks of the heaviest type.
5. Abolition and prohibition of artillery of the heaviest caliber.
As soon as possibilities for further limitation of armaments emerge from such discussions and agreements, they should be utilized. The German government hereby declares itself prepared to join in every such settlement, in so far as it is valid internationally.
The German government believes that if even a first step is made on the road to disarmament, this will be of enormous importance in relations between the nations, and thereby in reestablishing confidence, which is a precondition for the development of trade and prosperity.
In accordance with the general desire for the restoration of favorable economic conditions, the German government is prepared immediately after the conclusion of the political treaties to enter into an exchange of opinions on economic issues with the other nations concerned, in the spirit of the proposals made, and to do all that lies in its power to improve the economic situation in Europe, and of the world economic situation which is closely bound up with it.
The German government believes that with the peace plan proposed above it has made its contribution to the building of a new Europe on the basis of reciprocal respect and confidence between sovereign states. Various opportunities for such a pacification of Europe, for which
Germany has so often in the last few years made proposals, have been neglected. May this attempt to achieve European understanding succeed at last. The German government confidently believes that it has opened the way in this direction by submitting the above peace plan."
Anyone who today reads this comprehensive peace plan will realize in what direction the development of Europe, according to the wishes of Adolf Hitler, should really have proceeded. Here was the possibility of truly constructive work. This could have been a real turning-point for the benefit of all nations. But once more he who alone called for peace was not heard. Only Britain replied with a rather scornful questionnaire that avoided any serious consideration of the essential points involved.
Incidentally, however, Britain revealed her actual intentions by setting herself up as the protector of France and by instituting and commencing regular general staff military consultations with the French Republic just as in the period before the [first] World War.
There could no longer be any doubt now that the western powers were following the old path toward an armed conflict, and were steadily preparing a new blow against Germany, even though Adolf Hitler's thoughts and endeavors were entirely directed towards proving to them that he wanted to remain on the best possible terms with them. Over the years he had undertaken numerous steps in this direction, of which a few more will be mentioned here. With Britain he negotiated the Naval Agreement of June 18, 1935, which provided that the German Navy could have a strength of 35 percent of that of the British Navy. By this he wanted to demonstrate that the German Reich, to use his own words, had “neither the intention, the means, nor the necessity” to enter into any rivalry as regards naval power, which, as is well known, had had such a fateful impact on its relations with Britain in the years before the [first] World War.
On every appropriate occasion he assured France of his desire to live at peace with her. He repeatedly renounced in plain terms any claim to [the region of] Alsace-Lorraine. On the occasion of the return to the German Reich of the Saar territory as a result of plebiscite by its people, he declared on March 1, 1935:
“It is our hope that through this act of just compensation, in which we see a return to natural reason, relations between Germany and France have permanently improved. Therefore, just as we desire peace, we must hope that our great neighbor is ready and willing to seek peace with us. It must be possible for two great peoples to join together and collaborate in opposing the difficulties that threaten to overwhelm Europe.”
He even endeavored to arrive at a better understanding with Poland, the eastern ally of the western powers, although that country in 1919 had unlawfully incorporated millions of Germans, and had ever since subjected them to the worst oppression. On January 26, 1934, he concluded a non-aggression pact with her in which the two governments agreed “to settle directly all questions of whatever sort that concern their mutual relations.”
Thus on all sides he countered the enemy plans with his determination to preserve peace, and in this way strove to protect Germany. When however he saw that London and Paris were arming for an attack, he was once more obliged to undertake fresh measures of defense. The enemy camp, as we have seen above, had been enormously extended through the alliance between France and Russia. In addition to this the two powers had secured an alliance line to the south of the German Reich through Czechoslovakia, which, already allied with France, then concluded a treaty with Russia, thereby making her a bridge between east and west.
Moreover, Czechoslovakia controlled the high-lying region of Bohemia and Moravia, which Bismarck had called the citadel of Europe, and this citadel projected far into German territory. The threat to Germany thus assumed truly overwhelming form.
Adolf Hitler found an ingenious way of countering this danger. The conditions in German Austria, which under the terror of the Schuschnigg government were tending towards civil war, offered him the opportunity of stepping in to save the situation, and to lead back into the Reich the sister nation to the south-east that had been sentenced by the victorious powers to lead the life of a hopelessly decaying "Free State." After he had thus established himself near the line of connection between France and Russia mentioned above, a process of dissolution began in the ethnically mixed state of Czechoslovakia, which had been artificially put together from the most diverse national elements. Then, after the liberation of the [ethnically German] Sudetenland [region] and the secession of Slovakia, the Czechs themselves asked for the protection of the German Reich. With this the enemy's “bridge” came into Hitler's hand, while at the same time direct land connection was made established with Italy, whose friendship had been secured some time previously.
While he was gaining this strategic success for the security of his country, Adolf Hitler was again endeavoring with great eagerness to reach a peaceable understanding with the western powers. In Munich immediately after liberation of the Sudeten Germans, which was approved by Britain, France, and Italy, he made an agreement with the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, the text of which was as follows:
“We have had a further meeting today and are agreed in recognizing that the question of Anglo-German relations is of the first importance for the two countries and for Europe.
We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement [of 1935] as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again.
We are resolved that the method of consultation shall be the method adopted to deal with any other questions that may concern our two countries, and we are determined to continue our efforts to remove possible sources of difference and thus to contribute to assure the peace of Europe.
September 30, 1938.
Adolf Hitler, Neville Chamberlain.”
Two months later, on Hitler's instructions, the German Foreign Minister, von Ribbentrop, made the following agreement with France:
“Herr Joachim von Ribbentrop, Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs, and M. Georges Bonnet, French Minister of Foreign Affairs, acting in the name and by order of their governments, have at their meeting in Paris, on December 6, 1938, agreed as follows:
1. The German government and the French government fully share the conviction that peaceful and good-neighborly relations between Germany and France constitute one of the most essential elements for the consolidation of the situation in Europe and the maintenance of general peace. The two governments will in consequence use all their efforts to ensure the development in this direction of the relations between their countries.
2. The two governments recognize that between the two countries there is no territorial question outstanding, and they solemnly recognize as final the frontiers between their countries as they now exist.
3. The two governments are resolved, while leaving unaffected their particular relations with other powers, to remain in contact with regard to all questions concerning their two countries, and mutually to consult should the later evolution of those questions lead to international difficulties.
In token whereof the representatives of the two governments have signed the present Declaration, which comes into immediate effect.
Done in duplicate in the French and German languages at Paris, December 6, 1938.
Joachim von Ribbentrop,
Foreign Minister
Georges Bonnet,
Foreign Minister”
It should have been entirely reasonable to expect that the way was clear for collaborative reconstruction in which all leading powers would participate, and that the Fuehrer's endeavors to secure peace would at last meet with success. But the contrary was true. Scarcely had Chamberlain reached home when he called for rearmament on a considerable scale and laid plans for a new and tremendous encirclement of Germany. Britain now took over from France the leadership of this further encirclement of the Reich, to more than make up for the loss of Czechoslovakia. She opened negotiations with Russia, and concluded guarantee treaties with Poland, Romania, Greece and Turkey. These were alarm signals of the greatest urgency.
Just at this time Adolf Hitler was occupied with the task of finally eliminating sources of friction with Poland. For this purpose he made an uncommonly generous proposal by which the purely German Free City of Danzig would return to the Reich, and a narrow passage through the Polish Corridor, which since 1919 had torn asunder the north-eastern part of Germany to an unbearable extent, would be connected with the separated area. This proposal, which moreover afforded Poland the prospect of a 25-year non- aggression pact and other advantages, was nevertheless rejected in Warsaw, because there it was believed, conscious as the authorities were of forming one of the principal members of the common front set up by London against Germany, that any concession, however minor, could be refused. And that wasn’t all. With this same attitude, Poland took an aggressive stance, threatened Danzig, and prepared to take up arms against Germany.
Thus the moment was close at hand for an attack against Germany by the countries that had aligned together for that purpose. Adolf Hitler, making a final extreme effort in the interests of peace, saved what he could. On August 23rd, Ribbentrop succeeded in reaching an agreement in Moscow for a non-aggression pact with Russia. Two days later the German Fuehrer himself made a final and truly remarkable offer to Britain, declaring himself ready "to enter into agreements with Britain that ... would not only, on the German side, safeguard the existence of the British Empire come what may, but if necessary would pledge German assistance for the British realm, regardless of where such assistance might be required.” At the same time he was prepared to accept a reasonable limitation of armaments, “in accordance with the new political situation and which are economically sustainable.” And finally he assured once again that he had no interest in the issues in the west, and that “a revision of the borders in the west are out of any consideration.”
The reply to this was a pact of mutual assistance signed that same day between Britain and Poland, which made the outbreak of war inevitable. Then a decision was made in Warsaw to mobilize at once against Germany, and the Poles began with violent attacks not only against Germans in Poland, who for some time had been the victims of frightful massacres, but against Reich German territory.
But even after Britain and France declared war, as they had intended, and Germany had overcome the Polish danger in the east by a glorious campaign without a parallel, even then Adolf Hitler raised his voice once more in the name of peace. He did this even though his hands were now free to act against the enemy in the west. He also did this even though in London and Paris the fight had been proclaimed against him personally, in boundless hate, as a crusade. At this moment he possessed the supreme self-control to present, in his speech of October 6, 1939, to public opinion throughout the world, a new plan for the pacification of Europe. This plan was as follows:
“By far the most important task, in my opinion, is the creation of not only a belief in, but also a feeling for European security.
1. For this it is necessary that the aims of the foreign policy of each European state should be made perfectly clear. As far as Germany is concerned, the Reich government is ready to give a thorough and exhaustive exposition of the aims of its foreign policy. In so doing, it begins by stating, first of all, that it regards the Treaty of Versailles as no longer valid – in other words, that the German Reich government, and with it the entire German nation, no longer see cause or reason for any further revision of the Treaty, apart from the demand for adequate colonial possessions justly due to the Reich, involving in the first place a return of the German colonies.
This demand for colonies is based not only on Germany's historical claim to her colonies, but above all on her elementary right to a share of the world's raw material resources. This demand does not take the form of an ultimatum, nor is it a demand that is backed by force, but rather a demand based on political justice and common sense economic principles.
2. The demand for a real revival of international economic life coupled with an extension of trade and commerce presupposes a reorganization of the international economic system, in other words, of production in the individual states. In order to facilitate the exchange of the goods thus produced, however, a new system of markets must be found, and a conclusive settlement of relations of the world currencies must be reached, so that the obstacles in the way of unrestricted trade can be gradually removed.
3. The most important condition, however, for a real revival of economic life in and outside of Europe is the establishment of an unconditionally guaranteed peace, and of a sense of security on the part of the various nations. This security will not only be rendered possible by the final sanctioning of the European status, but above all by the reduction of armaments to a reasonable and economically tolerable level. An essential part of this necessary sense of security, however, is a clear definition of the legitimate use and application of certain modern armaments which could, at any given moment, strike straight at the heart of every nation, which therefore create a permanent sense of insecurity. In my previous speeches in the Reichstag I made proposals with this end in view. At that time they were rejected -- presumably for the simple reason that they were made by me.
I believe that a sense of national security will not return to Europe until clear and binding international agreements have provided a comprehensive definition of the extent to which the use of certain weapons is permitted or forbidden.
The Geneva Convention once succeeded in prohibiting, in civilized countries at least, the killing of wounded, the mistreatment of prisoners, war against non- combatants, and so forth. Just as it was possible gradually to achieve the universal observance of this prohibition, a way ought surely to be found to regulate aerial warfare, the use of poison gas, of submarines, and so forth, and likewise clearly to define contraband, so that war will lose its terrible character of a conflict waged against women and children and against non-combatants in general. The growing horror of certain methods of modern warfare will of its own accord lead to their abolition, and thus they will become obsolete.
In the war with Poland, I endeavored to restrict aerial warfare to objectives of military importance, or only to employ it to deal with resistance at a given point. But it must surely be possible to emulate the Red Cross in drawing up some universally valid international regulation. It is only when this is achieved that peace can reign, particularly on our densely populated continent a peace which, free of suspicion and fear, will provide the conditions for real growth and economic prosperity. I do not believe that there is any responsible statesman in Europe who does not in his heart desire prosperity for his people. But such a desire can only be realized if all the nations inhabiting this continent work together. To help bring about this collaboration must be the goal of everyone who is sincerely striving for the future of his own people.
To achieve this great goal, the leading nations on this continent will one day have to come together in order to draw up, accept and guarantee a statute on a comprehensive basis that will ensure for them a feeling of security and calm -- in short, of peace.
Such a conference could not possibly be held without the most thorough preparation, that is, without clearly specifying every point at issue. It is equally impossible that such a conference, which would determine the fate of this continent for many years to come, could carry on its deliberations while cannons are thundering, or when mobilized armies are bringing pressure to bear upon it. Since, however, these problems must be solved sooner or later, it would surely be more sensible to tackle the solution before millions of men are first pointlessly sent to their death, and billions of dollars’ worth of property are destroyed.
The continuation of the present state of affairs in the west is unthinkable. Each day will soon demand increasing sacrifices. Perhaps the day will come when France will begin to bombard and demolish [the city of] Saarbrucken. The German artillery will in turn lay [the French city of] Mulhouse in ruins. France will retaliate by bombarding Karlsruhe, and Germany in her turn shell Strasbourg. Then the French artillery will fire at Freiburg, and the Germans at Colmar or Sélestat. Long-range artillery will then be set up, and from both sides destruction will strike deeper and deeper, and whatever cannot be reached by the long-range artillery will be destroyed from the air. And while all that will be very interesting for certain international journalists, and very profitable for airplane, weapons and munitions manufacturers, and so forth, it will be appalling for the victims. And this battle of destruction will not be confined to the land. No, it will reach far out over the sea. Today there are no longer any islands.
And the national wealth of Europe will be shattered by shells, and the vigor of every nation will be sapped on the battlefields. And one day there will again be a frontier between Germany and France, but instead of flourishing towns there will be ruins and endless graveyards.”
The fate of this appeal was the same as that of all the previous ones made by Adolf Hitler in the name of reason, in the interests of a true renaissance of Europe. His enemies paid him no heed. On this occasion as well no response was forthcoming from them. They rigidly adhered to the attitude they had taken up in the beginning.
In the face of this series of historical facts is there any need for further details as to the question of why they did so? They had created the Versailles system, and when it threatened to collapse they wanted war, in order to follow it with an even worse Versailles.
The reproaches they make today against Adolf Hitler and Germany, recoil one and all on those who make them, and characterize their actions.
They are the disturbers of peace. They are the ones who contemplate the forcible oppression of other peoples, and who seek to plunge Europe into devastation and disaster. If that were not so, they would long ago have taken the hand that was stretched out to them, or at least they would have made a gesture of honestly wishing to cooperate in making a new order, and thus spare the nations an excess of "blood, tears and sweat.”
World history is the world court; and in this case as always when it reaches its decision it will pronounce a just verdict.
***
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