The Chancellor of the Exchequer [Sir John Simon] said that this was the first time that Mr Hitler had been forced to withdraw in one way or another – I think that was the word. After all this long debate about the difference between positions in Berchtesgaden, Godesberg and Munich, we really can`t waste any time. They can simply be embodied if the Assembly allows me to vary the metaphor. Number one was asked on the gun. When we gave it away, we asked for $2 on the gun. Eventually, the dictator agreed to take 1 17s. 6d. and the rest in promises of goodwill for the future. London, FridayThe Munich agreement gives Hitler everything he wants (first), except to the extent that he may not be quite able to get it as quickly as he would have done under Godesberg`s full ultimatum. He will begin tomorrow the invasion of Czechoslovakia, as he threatened in his speech of 12 September. It is free to occupy all the regions where the Sudeten Germans are the majority, and this by leaps and bounds.
Australian Prime Minister Joseph Lyons said: “We warmly thank all those responsible for the result and appreciate the efforts of President Roosevelt and Signor Mussolini to set up the Munich Conference of Powers, which has shown a united desire for peace.” [55] The chief of staff of the Czechoslovakian army, General Ludvek Kreja, said that “in about two days, our army will be in great shape to withstand an attack by all the German armed forces together, provided that Poland does not move against us.” [71] In the past, it was said that the first victim of war was the truth. But there are countries where the truth is killed long before the war begins. During the war between Russia and Japan, we were told, as a dramatic reference to the dense ignorance of the Russian peasant, that there were villages where no one knew that a war was under way; which was cited as an illustration of the primitive state of Russian civilization. The most alarming fact today is the ignorance of the best-educated peoples, an ignorance that is the result of a deliberate policy of their leaders. Nobel laureate Thomas Mann came to the pen and the pulpit to defend his surrogate house to proclaim his pride in being a Czechoslovakian citizen and praised the achievements of the Republic. He attacked a “Europe ready for slavery” and wrote: “The Czechoslovakian people are ready to fight for freedom and go beyond their own destiny” and “It is too late for the British government to save peace.” You`ve missed too many opportunities. On 22 May, Poland`s ambassador to France, Juliusz Eukasiewicz, told French Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet that if France preferred Germany to defend Czechoslovakia, “we will not budge.” The city also told Bonnet that Poland would oppose any attempt by Soviet forces to defend Czechoslovakia against Germany. Daladier told Jakob Surits [ru; de], to the Soviet ambassador to France: “Not only can we not count on Poland`s support, but we also do not believe that Poland will not hit us in the back.” [19] However, the Polish government has indicated on several occasions (in March 1936 and May, June and August 1938) that he was ready to fight Germany if the French decided to help Czechoslovakia: “Beck`s proposal to Bonnet to show his statements to Ambassador Drexel Biddle and to Vansittart`s statement that the Polish Foreign Minister is indeed ready to pursue a radical policy if the Western powers commit a war with Germany. But these proposals and statements did not elicit a reaction from the British and French governments, which seemed to avoid war by calming Germany.
[20] There can never be absolute certainty that there will be a fight if a party is determined to give in completely. When you read the words of Munich, when you see what is happening hour by hour in Czechoslovakia, when you are safe, I am not saying parliamentary approval, but parliamentary tolerance, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer gives a speech that tries in any case, the fact that he was in avoidab