Milner Group, wrote his book on Munich: Prologue to Tragedy, published in 1948, he
relegated the last quotation to a footnote and suppressed the references to the Belgian
Congo and Angola. This, however, was an essential part of the appeasement program of
the Chamberlain group. On 3 March 1938, the British Ambassador in Berlin, Nevile
Henderson, one of the Chamberlain group, tried to persuade Hitler to begin negotiations
to carry out this plan but did not succeed. He repeated Lord Halifax's statement that
changes in Europe were acceptable to Britain if accomplished without "the free play of
forces," and stated that he personally "had often expressed himself in favour of the
Anschluss." In the colonial field, he tried to interest Hitler in an area in Africa between
the 5th parallel and the Zambezi River, but the Fuhrer insisted that his interest was
restricted to restoration of Germany's 1914 colonies in Africa.
At the famous interview between Hitler and Schuschnigg in February 1938, Hitler told
the Austrian that Lord Halifax agreed"with everything he [Hitler] did with respect to
Austria and the Sudeten Germans." This was reported in a "rush and strictly confidential"
message of 16 February 1938 from the American Consul General in Vienna to Secretary
of State Hull, a document released to the American press on 18 December 1948.
Chamberlain and others made it perfectly clear, both in public and in private, that Britain
would not act to prevent German occupation of Austria or Czechoslovakia. On 21
February 1938, during the Austrian crisis, John Simon said in the House of Commons,
"Great Britain has never given special guarantees regarding Austrian independence." Six
days later, Chamberlain said: "We must not try to delude small nations into thinking that
they will be protected by the League against aggression and acting accordingly when we
know that nothing of the kind can be expected." Five days after the seizure of Austria on
12 March 1938, the Soviet Union sent Britain a proposal for an international conference
to stop aggression. The suggestion was rejected at once, and, on 20 March 1938,
Chamberlain wrote to his sister: "I have therefore abandoned any idea of giving
guarantees to Czechoslovakia or to the French in connection with her obligation to that
country."
When Daladier, the French Premier, came to London at the end of April 1938 to seek
support for Czechoslovakia, Chamberlain refused and apparently, if we can believe
Feiling, put pressure on the French to compel the Czechoslovaks to make an agreement
with Hitler. On 1 May, Chamberlain wrote to his sister in this connection: "Fortunately
the papers have had no hint of how near we came to a break over Czechoslovakia. "
In a long report of 10 July 1938, Ambassador Dirksen wrote to Ribbentrop as follows:
“In England the Chamberlain-Halifax Cabinet is at the helm and the first and most
essential plank of its platform was and is agreement with the totalitarian States.... This
government displays with regard to Germany the maximum understanding that could be
displayed by any of the likely combinations of British politicians. It possesses the inner-
political strength to carry out this task. It has come nearer to understanding the most
essential points of the major demands advanced by Germany, with respect to excluding
the Soviet Union from the decision of the destinies of Europe, the League of Nations
likewise, and the advisability of bilateral negotiations and treaties. It is displaying
increasing understanding of Germany's demands in the Sudeten German question. lt
would be prepared to make great sacrifices to meet Germany s other just demands—on
the one condition that it is endeavoured to achieve these ends by peaceful means. If
Germany should resort to military means to achieve these ends, England would without
the slightest doubt go to war on the side of France.”
This point of view was quite acceptable to the Milner Group. In the leading article for
December 1937, The Round Table examined the German question at some length. In
regard to the colonial problem, it contrasted two points of view, giving greater emphasis
to "those who now feel that it was a mistake to have deprived Germany of all her colonies
in 1918, and that Great Britain should contribute her share towards finding a colonial
area—say, in central west Africa—which could be transferred to Germany under
mandate. But they, too, make it a condition that colonial revision should be part of a final
all-round settlement with Germany, and that the colonies should not be used as leverage
for fresh demands or as strategic bases." Later it said: "A majority would regard the
abandonment of France's eastern alliances as a price well worth paying for lasting peace
and the return of Germany to the League." It welcomed German rearmament, since this
would force revision of the evil Treaty of Versailles. In this connection, the same article
said: "The pressure of rearmament and the events of the last few years have at least had
this effect, that the refusal of those who have benefitted most by the peace settlement to
consider any kind of change is rapidly disappearing; for forcible changes which they have
been unable to prevent have already taken place, and further changes will certainly
follow, especially in eastern Europe, unless they are prepared to fight a very formidable
war to prevent them." The article rejected such a war on the grounds that its"outcome is
uncertain" and it "would entail objectionable domestic disasters." In adding up the
balance of military forces in such a war, the article significantly omitted all mention of
Czechoslovakia, whose forces at that time were considerably stronger than Germany's. It
placed the French Army at two-thirds the size of Germany's (which was untrue) and
Britain at no more than two or three divisions. The point of view of The Round Table was
not identical with that of the Chamberlain group (which intersected, through common
members, with the second circle of the Milner Group). The Round Table, speaking for the
inner circle of the Milner Group, was not nearly so anti-Russian as the Chamberlain
group. Accordingly, it never regarded a collision between Nazi Germany and the Soviet
Union as a practical solution of Europe's problems. It did accept the idea of a four-power
pact to exclude Russia from Europe, but it was not willing to allow Germany to expand
eastward as she wished. The Milner Group's misunderstanding of the Nazi system and of
Germany itself was so great that they envisioned a stable situation in which Europe was
dominated by a four-power pact, with Soviet Russia on one side and an Oceanic bloc of
the British Commonwealth and the United States on the other. The Group insisted on
rapid British rearmament and the building up of the Oceanic System because they had a
lower opinion of Britain's own powers than did the Chamberlain group (this idea was
derived from Milner) and they were not prepared to allow Germany to go eastward
indefinitely in the hope she would be satisfied by a war with Russia. As we shall see, the
policies of the Milner Group and the Chamberlain group went jointly forward, with slight
shifts of emphasis, until March 1939, when the Group began to disintegrate.
In the same article of December 1937 The Round Table said that the democracies
must
“make clear the point at which they are prepared to risk war rather than retreat....
During the last year or two The Round Table has criticized the popular dogma of
"collective security" on two main grounds: that it meant fighting to maintain an out-of-