Short History of World War II - James L. Stokesbury [26]
The Czechs took a jaundiced view of all this nonsense, but the Anschluss changed the strategic situation immeasurably to their disadvantage. On the day Hitler paraded through Vienna, France and Russia both categorically restated their intention to stand behind Czechoslovakia. Whether they would do so or not remained to be seen; what was already certain was that geographically Czechoslovakia was caught between the upper and nether millstones.
In April, Henlein produced a series of demands known as the Carlsbad program; these would practically have turned the state over to the Nazis. France, and Britain as well, urged that they be accepted. The Czech government in Prague turned them down. Hitler fulminated, and there were riots in the Sudetenland. The Czechs replied by mobilizing 400,000 men. France and Britain therefore announced they would support her, and Hitler was constrained to back down. He was furious, but the “May crisis” was over.
This was in the spring. The summer was tortuous, with tension increasing daily, and negotiations seeming to get nowhere. Gradually through these negotiations the British moved to center stage.
British involvement happened in a curious way. Britain was not allied with the central European powers and she had hitherto played a somewhat detached role, generally seconding but not fully associating herself with France. However, the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, was anxious to assume a major role in foreign policy. He was a man about whom opinions still differ radically; some authorities see him as a great figure who deliberately sacrificed himself to gain precious time for Britain’s rearmament; others see him as a meddling amateur who lied to his own Foreign Office, and who sacrificed not himself to his country but Czechoslovakia to his vanity. In either case, he was heaven-sent for France.
The dominant wish in France was that this cup might pass from them. They were re-equipping their army, slowly, and they were obsessed by their fears of Germany, whose propaganda claims they tended to accept uncritically. Though they were at this time far stronger than Germany, they believed—and that is what counts—that they were far weaker. What the French government of Premier Daladier really wanted was someone to get it off the hook. Chamberlain volunteered.
By the end of August tempers were short, and the crisis was reaching a flash point. For summer maneuvers the Germans called up 750,000 men. Hitler toured the new fortifications in the west of Germany. The Royal Navy for its summer tour did a practice mobilization, and then kept the fleet at war readiness. Henlein rejected proposed concessions by the Czech government; early in September, France called a million reservists to the colors. In a speech at Nuremberg, Hitler declared he would not tolerate the Czech oppression of the Sudetenland much longer. Europe teetered on the edge.
The result was not war, but a personal meeting between Chamberlain and Hitler. With the relieved concurrence of the French government the British Prime Minister suggested that he fly to Germany and talk to Hitler face to face. This was unprecedented “summit” diplomacy for those days. The Prime Minister had never even flown before. He believed the effort would demonstrate his willingness to go to any lengths to be reasonable, and the whole exercise was given that air in the western press. Hitler took it all as a sign of cowardliness and weakness.
The two met at Berchtesgaden on September 15. Hitler demanded annexation of the Sudetenland and said he was ready to fight.