A World at Arms (188 page)

Carl Goerdeler was also in touch with the British at this time; see C 15792, 16893/15/18, FO 371/22985; C 2524/89/18, FO 371/24405; C 3245/89/18, FO 371/24406; C 1189, 1865/6/18, FO 371/24387’ Related documents and comments are in C 15720/53/18, FO 371/23010; C 2577/89/18, FO 371/24405; C 297/6/18, FO 371/24386; C 3439/6/18, FO 371/24389; a summary in C 4216/324/18, FO 371/26542.

It is worth noting that many of these contacts involved, or records about them were submitted to, Sir Robert Vansittart, who was incensed by the nationalistic tones of those

197
On the contacts established by the intermediary J. Lonsdale Bryans, see the documents from the papers of Lord Halifax in PRO, FO 800/326. One of the items on Bryans is closed until 2016 and presumably involves some checking into his background. On March 17, 1940, Lord Brocket, Bryans’s main sponsor in England, wrote to Cadogan about Bryans’s request for money to pay his debts and overdrafts; Cadogan commented “enlightening.” See also Thielenhaus,
Zwischen Anpassung und Widerstand,
pp. 181–82. Bryans tried to establish contact with the Foreign Office again repeatedly in 1943 but was always turned away, see C 7963/155/18, FO 371/34449; C 10397/155/18, FO 371/34449; C 10397/155/18, FO 371/34451; C 11893/188/18, FO 371/34451; C 13306/188/18, FO 371/34452.

198
Lothar Gruchmann (ed.),
Autobiographie eines Attentäters: Aussage zum Sprengstoffinschlag
im Bürgerbräukeller München am
8.
November
1939 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1970); Anton Hoch, “Das Attentat auf Hitler im Münchener Bürgerbräukeller 1939,”
VjZ
17 (1969), 383–413. A photocopy of the order “to liquidate” Elser is in Best,
Venlo,
between pp. 208 and 209.

199
Text of the speech in Domarus (ed.),
Hitler,
2:1047–67. Whenever Hitler subsequently referred in his public speeches to this open announcement of his intention of killing Europe’s Jews, he would shift the date of the January 30 speech to September 1 to bring the whole murder program into the context of the war.

200
The literature on this subject was for many years quite sparse; the subject was not popular in post-war Germany. There has been a substantial outpouring in recent years; Norbert Frei (ed.),
Medizin und Gesundheitspolitik in der NS-Zeit
(Munich: Oldenbourg, 1991), summarizes the current state of research and contains an excellent selective bibliography. The best recent monographs are Ernst Klee,
“Euthanasie” im NS-Staat
(Frankfürt/M: S. Fischer, 1983); and Hans-Walter Schmuhl,
Rassenhygiene, Nationalsozialismus, Euthanasie: Von der Verhütung zur Vernichtung “Lebensunwerten Lebens”
1890–1945
(Gottingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1987). By March 1941 the Germans knew of British, American and Vatican knowledge of the program
ADAP,
D, 12, No. 199). On January 31, 1941,

201
A brief survey of public reaction in Marlis Steinert,
Hitler’s War and the Germans
(Athens, Ohio: Ohio Univ. Press, 1977), pp. 79-83; also Frei, Medizin, pp. 235–51.

202
Some of the details in Broszat,
Polenpolitik,
pp. 28–31.

203
Fröhlich,
Goebbels Tagebücher,
14 Oct. 1939.

204
Hitler was especially annoyed about the complaints of General Johannes Blaskowitz, the military commander in occupied Poland, about excesses against the local population. Hans Frank eventually succeeded in having Blaskowitz removed in May 1940 (Broszat, P.76).

205
A good summary in Rich,
Hitler’s War Aims,
2: 32–42.

206
Note that from September I, 1939 to May 10, 1940 the number of Czech tanks in German armored divisions increased from 274 to 391
(DRuZW,
2: 268). Of the two types included, the models 35 and 38, the latter was still being built and used into 1945 (Friedrich M. von Senger und Etterlin,
German Tanks of World War II
[New York: Galahad Books, 19691, pp. 29-30).

207
Rich, 2: 58–61.

208
Seppo Myllyniemi,
Die baltische Krise
1938–1941 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1979), pp. 57–81.

209
It is clear from the evidence that the Soviets provided the Lithuanian government with the precise border agreed to by Stalin and von Ribbentrop; see von Weizsäcker’s comment in
ADAP,
D, 8, No. 200.

210
There is no satisfactory account of this whole question. A useful introduction in Boris J. Kaslas, “The Lithuanian Strip in Soviet-German Secret Diplomacy, 1939–1941,”
Journal of Baltic Studies
4, NO.3 (1973), 211–25. When the German Foreign Minister informed his subordinates that the Baltic States and Finland had been signed over to the Soviet sphere of influence, he did
not
refer to the piece of Lithuania reserved for Germany
V1DAP,
D, 8, No. 213).

211
See Hochman,
Soviet Union and Collective Security,
pp. 61–64, for one of the few accounts which notes the difference in Soviet handling of this issue from all other Russian territorial losses after World War I.

212
Hillgruber,
Hitler, König Carol,
pp. 59–63.

213
On Soviet-Bulgarian relations at this time, see Hans-Joachim Hoppe,
Bulgarien
-
Hitlers eigenwilliger Verbundete
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1979), pp. 70–71; Onder,
Turkische Aussenpolitik,
p. 75.

214
On this point, see Weinberg,
Germany and the Soviet Union,
pp. 46, 101;
ADAP,
D, 10, No. 10. On December 12, 1939, U.S. ambassador to Italy William Phillips recorded in his diary the report given him by Fred .Walcott on a long interview the latter had just had with von Ribbentrop. According to von Ribbentrop, Germany had agreed to what the Soviet Union had been refused by England: “A free hand in the Baltic and a free hand in the Balkan States.” Harvard, Houghton Library, Phillips Diary, p. 3590.

215
Accounts in Gerd R. Ueberschär,
Hitler und Finnland 1939–1941
(Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1978), pp. 42–45, 49–51; E. Schulin (ed.),
Studien zur europäischen Geschichte: Gedenkschrift Martin Gühring
(Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1968), pp. 338–52.

216
There is an extensive bibliography in Ueberschar. See also Weinberg,
Germany and the Soviet Union,
pp. 85–91.

217
The map in Ueberschar, p. 326, provides a good picture of the negotiating positions about southern Finland. The map in H. Peter Krosby,
Finland, Germany and the Soviet Union, 1940–1941: The Petsamo Dispute
(Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1968), facing p. 78, shows the post-Russo-Finnish War border with the whole Rybachi peninsula (called Fischer-Halbinsel by the Germans) included in the U.S.S.R. The Soviets, who already held the eastern portion, had asked for all of it in October; the Finns eventually offered them the northwestern portion but wanted to hold on to the southwestern part.

218
See Ueberschar, p. 123, n 404; Arvo Tuominen,
The Bells of the Kremlin
(Hanover, N.H.: Univ. Press of New England, 1983), pp. 315–17; J. J. Fol, “A propos des conversations finno–sovietiquesqui ont precede la ‘guerre d’hiver,’”
Revue d’histoire de la deuxieme guerre

219
English text in Vyacheslav M. Molotov,
Report to the Supreme Soviet,
31
October
1939 (New York: Workers Library, 1939).

220
The major literature on the war is largely in agreement on this point; some further insight into the likely role of Kuusinen (who was close to Stalin as a key official in both the Soviet government and the Comintern) in misleading Stalin can be obtained from the memoirs of Kuusinen’s wife, Aino Kuusinen,
The Rings of Destiny: Inside Soviet Russia from Lenin to Brezhnev
(New York: Morrow, 1974), pp. 230–32. After his puppet government was abandoned, Kuusinen became head of the Karelo-Finnish SSR, which included most of the territory seized from Finland in 1940, and continued to hold other high Communist Party and state offices until his death from natural causes in 1964.

221
On the war, see Seweryn Bialer (ed.),
Stalin and His Generals
(London: Souvenir Press, 1970), pp. 130–37; Ueberschar,
Hitler und Finnland,
pp. 130–34; John Erickson,
The Soviet High Command
(London: Macmillan, 1962), pp. 541–52; D. W. Spring, “The Soviet Decision for War against Finland, 30 November 1939,”
Soviet Studies
38 (Apr. 1986), 207–26. A survey of the operations in Tomas Ries,
Cold Will: The Defence of Finland
(London: Brassey’s 1988), chap. 4.

222
Weinberg,
Germany and the Soviet Union,
pp. 87–89. Some additional material on the Soviet request, German agreement, and eventual Soviet declination of German naval assistance for the Soviet blockade of Finland is now available. Perhaps the Soviets were merely testing German attitudes and dropped the request when Berlin passed the test. See
ADAP,
D, 8, Nos. 433, 437; Note by Federer and Foreign Ministry to Moscow No. 1036 of 10 Dec. 1939, AA, 51.5., “Russland,” Bd. 2, fr. 111858–59; KTB Skl A, 4, 12 Dec. 1939, BA/MA, RM 7/7, f. 87.

223
Enrica Costa Bora,
Helsinki-Ginevra, Dicembre 1939-Marzo 1940: La guerra d’inverno e la societa delle nazioni
(Milan: Giuffre, 1987). it should be noted that the British government,
though in the end voting for expulsion, had tried to restrain League action to keep the focus on Germany and avoid war with the Soviet Union (Bayer, “British Policy”, pp. 3637).

224
For a report from the British embassy in Paris of 22 Nov. 1939 about the French Communist Party’s propaganda against the war and samples of its documents and leaflets, see C 19065/90/17, PRO, FO 371/22914’ Other examples may be found in Angelo Rossi (pseud. of Angelo Tasca),
Les Communistes franfais pendant la drole de guerre
(Paris: l Ies

225
Bayer, “British Policy”, pp. 34–35. On French concern over British reluctance to take steps leading to open war with the Soviet Union, see C 4723/9/17, PRO, FO 371/ 24298.

226
Some of the literature,
e.g.
Juho K. Paasikivi,
Meine Moskauer Mission 1939–1941
(Hamburg: Holsten, 1966), p. 163, stresses that the change in the Soviet negotiating position with the dropping of the Kuusinen government and a willingness to deal with the real government of Finland came at the end of January
before
the great Soviet offensive of February 1940, but this seems to me to ignore the obvious fact that the massive troop movements and accumulation of ammunition and other supplies had had to be ordered at the very least two weeks before the date of the first big attack on February I. The military success of the Soviet offensive, once launched, may have contributed to some further increase in Soviet territorial demands, or to a harder line in the Moscow peace talks; but that is another, and less significant matter. The negotiations with the Finns via Sweden, by–passing Kuusinen, actually began on January 10 (Ueberschar,
Hitler und Finnland,
pp. 142–50), so the main decisions were made in Moscow around the turn of the year and presumably at the same time. The Soviets had intimated to the Germans that they might drop Kuusinen as early as January 8
ADAP,
D, 8, Nos. 513, 521).

227
Note Molotov’s comments on March 5, 1940, in
ADAP,
D, 8, No. 664.

228
Soviet willingness to settle for an agreement rather than occupy the whole country now that they had clearly won very greatly puzzled Hitler at the time. Note the comments of his air force adjutant, Nicolaus von Below, “Aufzeichnungen aus dem Winter 1948/1949: Zwischen Aufstieg und Absturz, Hitler und die Luftwaffe,” p. 142, Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Irving excerpts, p. 49.

229
See Travis Beale Jacobs,
America and the Winter War, 1939–1940
(New York: Garland, 1982). Note, especially FDR to Welles, 22 Dec. 1939,
FDR
Letters, 2: 974, asking Welles to hint to the Soviet Ambassador at the possibility of a break in relations, a point of great importance in view of Roosevelt’s having opened them in the first place.

230
Ueberschar’s explanation
(Hitler und Finnland,
p. 157), that this was done out of consideration for England, seems entirely unconvincing to me.

231
Rumors that Polish prisoners in the officers’ camps were being moved were being pursued by the International Red Cross as early as March 14
ADAP,
D, 8, No. 676).

232
The best account currently available, but likely to be superseded when recent Soviet revelations are taken into account, is Janusz K. Zawodny,
Death in the Forest: The Story of the Katyn Forest A1assacre
(Notre Dame, Ind.: Univ. of Notre Dame Press, the
New York Times
for Oct. 15, 1992. Zawodny notes (chap. 8) that 448 officers
to the Russians in the 1920S and 1930S; Elke Fröhlich, “Katyn im neuen Licht?”
Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht
37 (1986), 234–35.

233
ADAP,
D, 8, No. 657 n 2.

234
Weinberg,
Foreign Policy,
1937–39, pp. 371, 382.

235
Ibid., pp. 579–81.

236
See “B Wi 9332/g Kdos III, Besprechung bei Generalfeldmarschall Göring am 19.5.39,” 19 May 1939,
BA/MA,
RM 7/257, f. 3–5. On the dive–bomberconcept and its problems, especially the JU-88’s loss of distance and speed capability sacrificed for a rarely utilized diving capacity, see Boog,
Luftwaffenführung,
pp. 183–90.

237
Homze,
Arming the Luftwaffe,
p. 23 I; Chef des Stabes AHA, “Tagebuch V,” 6 and 7 Sept. 1939, Imperial War Museum, MI 14/981; Reichert to Poensgen, 6 Sept. 1939, BA, R 13/692.

238
Rolf-Dieter Mülller, “Die deutschen Gaskriegsvorbereitungen 1919–1945,”
MGM 27,
No. I (1980), 40–41.

239
Below, “Aufzeichnungen,” p. 128 (Irving’s excerpts, p. 44).

240
Kriegstagebuch des OKW,
4 vols. (Frankfurt/M: Bernard & Graefe, 1961–65), 1: 951;