Chamberlain, Versailles and Appeasement (Again)

In a discussion about things that happened in the past, hindsight is not allowed .

 

typical exemple of hindsight

 

The French would fight if Hitler attacked France, but,there was no enthusiasm in France to get killed for the Czechs/Poles.Besides,France had not the means to help CZ/Poland .And without a strong France that was willing and capable to march through Germany,there was nothing Britain could do .

 

??? When you make a statement that clearly was falsifide by events you don't want it brought to the attention of the board? I understand but do not agree.

As you can see the quote system works. It's not hard at all to use really. Why do you keep messing it up?

You say there were diplomatic warnings but you also indicate that they were given a greenlight. Obviously the signals were at best murky. A clear positoin confirming their right to exist as a country would have been of some support.

As for handwaving 90+% of your postings are handwaving. In case it isn't clear I know I'm not going to change your mind and so see no need to run through any hoops you try to generate when you fail to respond reasonably to my querries.

Actually no. It's simply a case of showing how history clearly indicated that you were wrong. Nothing exceptional of that though so I guess the typical bit is correct.

 

Those who are claiming that Britain (haha) had a wealth of ways to support CZ,should ponder the words of Ludlow-Hewitt in 1938: Our Bomber Force is,judged from a war standard,practically useless .

FYI: Ludlow-Hewitt was the chief of BC.

Of course,people have the right to disagree with him,but then, a paper of some 20 pages would be advisable .

The same for Vuillemin (chief of the French air force) who said in 1938:In case of war, the French air force will be destroyedin 15 days .

Thus,from the wealth (haha) of ways that Britain and France had to help CZ,,2 are already eliminated.

Remaining from the wealth: the RN and the French navy,but,unless some one could explain how these would help CZ,they are also good for under the bus . (BTW:saying that a British/French Overlord in Hamburg would be possible,will be received with scorn).
Remaining are
the 2 divisions of the BEF who would arrive at the French-German border after the fall of CZ,thus: under the bus with this support .

and the 11 French divisions which in 1939 were available for the Saar offensive and did not help Poland : thus under the bus .

Unless one can prove the existence of secret French/British air bases in Antarctica,the conclusion is that the wealth is meagre,very meagre .

 

In 1935,the French war minister (general Maurin) told the government that the French army was conceived for a purely defensive role and was unable to undertake a military intervention of the most limited scape .(source : Battle of France P 46)


This is not surprising :France was a democracy,and democracies do not give their army the order to be ready to attack other countries .

 

Your formula never seams to change. As far as I can tell it is as follows:
1) Make an outragous/unbelivable proclamation/statement implying it's fact.
2) When challenged repeat.
3) When challenged again produce some irrelevant or marginally relevant factoid and take a huge leap of faith to "prove" you are correct.
3) When evidence to the contrary is presented ignore or missinterpret the same.
4) Assing some off the wall strawman to your opposition and say they have to prove it.

Oh well it should be clear to those following this thread by now that you have no idea what you are talking about unless of course you really are just a troll trying to agrevate people. The latter is seaming more likely with each post.

 

I see that you are unable to refute what Ludlow-Hewitt and Vuillemin were saying ,not that I expected that you would .Of course,you will say that what Maurin,Ludlow-Hewitt and Vuillemin were saying was irrelevant,or marginally relevant .

It should be clear to those following this thread that your knowledge about Europe between Versailles and the German attack on Poland is lacking . ( I am using an euphemism )

 

You were correct in that it was narginally relevant. Oh wait that's not what you meant is it. OH well.
If I see anyone even you present some sort of fact based reasoned debate that your position has any validity I'll respond again otherwise I think I'll take a break from this thread and let you continue to make a fool of yourself alone or with the help of others.

 

Then again these observations were as accurate on August/September 1939, yet they chose a different course which to take for Poland, no acceptance to meet in a conference excluding the Poles to to redraw their borders.

 

Well, they had tried that already, and six months later, on March 15, 1939, it blew up in their faces.

 

Again the French and British were doing the absolute best case scenario for Germany and the absolute worse case scenario for them selves. There was absolutely no way of knowing how effective bombers would be, yet it was decided that German bombers would always succeed and French and British would fail. If the premise that the bomber always got through, why did that not apply for both sides. What would have happened if a admiral came to Chamberlain and said we cant fight the German navy since we guarantee we cant sink their ships and their ships will always sink ours???

 

This is a flawed argument .

Simplified ,it is : there was no need for shelters,for air defense,for FC :all we need to deter the Germans from attacking our cities is BC and the threat that,if they attack our cities,we will attack their cities .

It would be a feeble consolation for the inhabitants of Coventry that after the destruction of their city,BC would destroy Lübeck.

The policy and responsability of the British government was to prevent (if possible) /limit air attacks on the British cities :it was not to destroy German cities .Before the war,the chief of BC said that his force was useless(thus the threat of reprisals was empty),and,also before the war the general assumption was that there was no defense possible against air attacks,but, OTOH,the public demanded protection against air attacks,something the government tried to do ..

Whatever, the claim that the belief that there was no defense possible against air attacks, was one of the reasons for appeasement,is,IMHO, unproved and very dubious .In september 1938,while there was a big scare for air attacks, Chamberlain gave a stern warning to Hitler and mobilised:air defense measures were started and people carried gas masks .
Besides: the famous statement of Baldwin (that the bomber always would pass) dated fro 1934,4 years before Munich .

 

It was not decided that the German bomber would succeed and that the B+F bombers would fail: as the B+F air chiefs said that their bombers were useless,and as the German air chiefs said that their bombers would succeed, the conclusion was obvious .

 

They didn't do a very good job preparing did then. So how come when Germany could still pulverize London and the British bombers were still useless junk the British declared war in 1939???

 

Did any of the Allies? America had just as much time plus the two years we sat on the sidelines, and we were still woefully prepared for war in December, 1941.

Because Germany didn't stop with the Sudetenland in '38, and occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia in March, 1939. This shook the "appeasers" to their very core, because they finally had to come to terms with German expansionism and that appeasement was not the "solution."

Feel free to peruse the many discussions in British Parliament at the time.
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/sittings/1930s

 

I know, Im saying that what the irrational fears of 1938 that prevented a stand all of a sudden were not valid reasons.

 

Britain was ready to accept German dominance over the Conntinent. There were secret talks about the British-Nazi non-aggression pact which would void guarantees of Czech and Polish borders. As the Nazi violence over the Continent gradually revealed, Britons became aware how dangerous the Nazis were for the Empire. The Krystalnacht was the ultimate pre-war showdown of the Nazi brutality. After November 9th 1938, continuation of appeasement would be nothing less than collaboration with criminal murderous Nazi state.

 

Those secret talks continued into 1939, however, the guarantee of Polish borders was one of the conditions, and was not voided.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/5893089/Minister-explains-peace-loan-talks-Jul-24-1939.html
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/search/wohltat?year=1939
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=114&t=201649