Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
When emissaries of the German underground opposition against Hitler's dictatorship sought contacts and co-operation with the British government in 1938, prime minister Neville Chamberlain said they reminded him of the Jacobites in King William's reign; but until May 1940, the British government was not averse to co-operating with Germans conspiring to overthrow their own government.
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39 Trott's report in DGFP D VI, 681 says Wednesday, 8 June, but 7 June was a Wednesday.
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41 Trott, pp. 163–4; Astor, , ‘Mission’, p.7Google Scholar: ‘Every sentence of Trott's official report, now published, had this object of trying to delay theoutbreak of war. This is specially true of his deliberate flattery of Hitler. He discussed these tactics with me in detail as he was staying with me in London during part of his visit.’
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55 War Cabinet 78 (39), Conclusions, 10 Nov. 1939, P.R.O., Cab. 65/2.
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66 Ludlow, , ‘Papst Pius XII.’, pp. 336–7Google Scholar; Schulz, Gerhard, ‘“Dismemberment of Germany”: Kriegsziele und Koalitionsstrategie 1939–1945’, Historische Zeitschrift, CCXLIV (1987)Google Scholar, 39 misquotes Halifax as saying that a decentralized and federal Germany was of interest with a view to France's security requirements.
67 Ludlow, , ‘Papst Pius XII.’, pp. 337–8Google Scholar.
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69 Ludlow, , ‘Papst Pius XII.’, p. 337Google Scholar.
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72 Cf. Hoffmann, Peter, German resistance to Hitler (Cambridge, Mass., London, 1988), pp. 95–104Google Scholar.
73 The memoirs of Lord Gladwyn (London, 1972), pp. 88–9Google Scholar. See also von Hassell, Ulrich, The von Hassell diaries 1938–1944 (London, 1948), pp. 186, 189–90 for August 1941Google Scholar; the summary of Dr George Bell, the bishop of Chichester, for 1942, in [Bell], George Cicestr, ‘The background of the Hitler plot’, The Contemporary Review, 10 1945, pp. 206–7Google Scholar; for 1943 see von Kluge's, Fieldmarshal question to Goerdeler in September what foreign-policy conditions could be created for a coup d'état, Spiegelbild einer Verschwörung: Die Kaltenbrunner-Berichte an Bormann und Hitler über das Attentat vom 20. Juli 1944 (Stuttgart, 1961), pp. 410–12Google Scholar; exposé inspired by Moltke's mission to Istanbul in December 1943 in van Roon, Ger, Neuordnung im Widerstand: Der Kreisauer Kreis innerhalb der deutschen Widerstandsbewegung (Munich, 1967), pp. 582–6Google Scholar. Cf. Moltke's letter to Lionel Curtis of 25 March 1943 in Balfour, Michael and Frisby, Julian, Helmuth von Moltke: a leader against Hitler (London, 1972), pp. 215–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Astor, , ‘Why’, pp. 3–4Google Scholar.
74 The public papers and addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1937 volume: the constitution prevails [ed.] Rosenman, Samuel I. (New York, 1941), pp. 406–11Google Scholar.
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76 War Cabinet 84 (41), Conclusions of a Meeting of the war cabinet held at 10, Downing Street, S.W. I, on Tuesday, August 19, 1941, at 11.30 a.m., P.R.O., Cab. 65/19. Blasius, pp. xliv, 450, refers to a meeting of 26 Aug. 1941 as a war cabinet meeting through a misunderstanding of a diary entry by Dalton, Hugh, The Second World War diary of Hugh Dalton 1940–45, ed. Pimlott, Ben (London, 1986), pp. 273–5Google Scholar where Dalton speaks of a ‘meeting of ministers’, not a cabinet meeting, at which Churchill spoke ina similar vein; cf. Burridge, T. D., British Labour and Hitler's war (London, 1976), p. 29Google Scholar; this led to an incorrect citation by Hillgruber, Andreas, Da Zusammenbruch im Osten 1944/45 als Problem der deutschen Nationalgeschichte und der europäischen Geschichte (Opladen, 1985), p. 23Google Scholar. See also ‘The Atlantic Charter’, radio broadcast speech in Churchill, Winston S., His complete speeches 1897–1963, VI, 1935–42 (New York and London, 1974), 6473–6Google Scholar; Debates, fifth series, vol. 374 (1941) 9 Sept. 1941, cols. 67–8Google Scholar; Debates, fifth series, vol. 376 (1942), 18 Nov. 1941, cols. 187–8Google Scholar; Debates, fifth series, vol. 398 (1944), 22 March 1944, cols. 853–4Google Scholar.
77 Foreign relations of the United States 1942 (FRUS 1942), I (Washington, 1960), 1–38Google Scholar; FRUS: the conference at Washington, 1941–1942, and Casablanca, 1943 (Washington, 1968), pp. 362–76Google Scholar.
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80 Balfour, Michael, Withstanding Hitler in Germany 1933–45 (London and New York, 1988), P 155Google Scholar.
81 Terry, pp. 218, 247–8, 252. Terry considers the evidence for Stalin's mention of the Oder uncorroborated; but see Siebel-Achenbach, Sebastian, ‘The social and political transformation of Lower Silesia, 1943–1948’ (Oxford University: Phil, diss., 1987), pp. 63–8Google Scholar, for the period Nov. 1940 to Dec. 1942. Dalton, p. 441, recorded a lunch conversation with Sikorski under 21 May 1942: ‘[…] I impressed on him that he should get the whole East Prussian coast and Danzig. “Yes, and Königsberg,” he said, with an eager look in his eye. I said that, as he knew, Stalin had offered him the line of the Oder. He said that that was “only a provocation”. He could not take over an area containing so many Germans. I said that he can drive them out, but he still seemed to think that this was too large an operation. In East Prussia there were all the Kashubians. He was also quite prepared to take the whole Silesian coalfields, but not, certainly not, the Oder.’ ‘Sikorski's reaction to Stalin's ‘offer’ of the Oder line may account for Terry judging it uncorroborated. Cf. Siebel-Achenbach, pp. 82–3 for Stalin's position on the Oder line in December 1943.
82 Siebel-Achenbach, pp. 63–8.
83 Eden to British ambassador in Moscow, Sir Stafford Cripps, 1 Dec. 1941, Blasius, pp. 577–9.
84 Blasius, p. 579. Schulz, p. 53, cites Rothwell, Victor, Britain and the cold war 1941–1947 (London, 1982), pp. 87–8Google Scholar to the effect that deputy under-secretary Sir Orme Sargent and Cadogan had made this statement; Rothwell ascribes it to Cadogan; Blasius, pp. 577–9, prints the entire document that Rothwell apparently refers to (P.R.O., FO 371/29472/N6893; Rothwell's reference is ‘FO 29472/6893’), where Eden is shown as having made the comment, in writing. Cf. Burridge, pp. 29–30, who quotes Dalton from his 1939 [sic] diary as foreseeing the Red Army getting control of ‘all of Poland, part of Germany and the Czech and Slovak lands, so that there emerged a Polish, a German, a Slovak and a Czech Soviet Socialist Republic’ which Dalton would greatly prefer' to the continuance of Hider Germany with its Protectorates'; in the autumn of 1939, Dalton lobbied the under-secretary of state in the foreign office, R. A. Butler, and Polish embassy officials to persuade them that Poland should accept the Curzon line in the east and receive East Prussia as compensation, and he agreed with the Poles ‘that the transfer of populations, “now that Hitler has taken it up officially”, should be carried much further in any post-war settlement’. Cf. W. M. 43), 135th Conclusions, Minute 4, Confidential Annex (5th October, 1943 - 5.30 p.m.), P.R.O., Cab. 65/40, and below at note 91.
85 Terry, p. 253.
86 Eden's summary of his talks in Moscow dated 5 Jan. 1942, in Ross, Graham, The foreign office and the Kremlin: British documents on Anglo-Soviet relations, 1941–45 (Cambridge, 1984), pp. 82–3Google Scholar; cf. Dalton, p. 441.
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89 Eden's report on his trip to Moscow in W.M. (42) 1st Conclusions, Minute 4, Confidential Annex (1 January, 1942, 12 Noon), P.R.O., Cab. 65/21.
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In 1941 and 1942 the British government gave the Polish government in exile several assurances that Britain didnot propose to conclude with the Soviet Union an agreement confirming the Soviet-German demarcation line of 1940, and that the British government did not recognize any territorial changes effected in Poland since 1939. A[nthony] E[den], War Cabinet, Western Frontiers of the U.S.S.R., W.P. (43) 438, 5 October 1943, P.R.O., Cab. 66/41. But the British position did not extend beyond ‘non-recognition’ of theterritorial changes affecting Poland since 1939. The American position was identical in effect. The United States never intended to recognize Polish territorial integrity in the boundaries of 1939 and shared Britain's disposition to consider the Curzon Line as properly or legitimately Poland's easternmost frontier. Eden said that Poland's territorial losses to Russia would not affect her economically, and Roosevelt told Eden in March 1943 the great powers would decide what Poland was to have. Terry, pp. 283–4.
91 War Cabinet 137(43), Conclusions of a Meeting of the War Cabinet held at 10 Downing Street, S.W. I, on Friday, 8 October 1943, at 11.30 a.m., P.R.O., Cab. 65/36 and W.M. (43), 137th Conclusions, Confidential Annex, P.R.O., Cab. 65/40.
92 W.M. (43), 135th Conclusions, Minute 4, Confidential Annex (5 October 1943 – 5.30 p.m.), P.R.O., Cab. 65/40; there is nothing in the minutes to support Kitchen, Martin, ‘Winston Churchill and the Soviet Union during the Second World War’, Historical Journal, XXX (1987), 427Google Scholar, who says that Churchill announced in cabinet on 5 Oct. 1943 that Germany would have to be strengthened after the war as a bulwark against the Soviet Union, although, of course, changes of mood were not uncommon.
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94 A[nthony] E[den], War Cabinet, Anglo-Czechoslovak Relations, W.P.(42) 280, 2 July 1942, P.R.O., Cab. 66/26; Brandes, Detlef ‘Grossbritannien und die Exilregierungen Polens, der Tschechoslowakei und Jugoslawiens vom Kriegsbeginn bis zur Konferenz von Teheran’, (Habilitationsschrift, Freie Universitat Berlin, 1984), pp. 352–5Google Scholar; cf. de Zayas, Alfred M., Nemesis at Potsdam: the Anglo-Americans and the expulsion of the Germans. Background, execution, consequences (London, Henley and Boston, 1977), p. 7Google Scholar; see also FRUS 1943, I (1963), 542 (for 5 Oct. 1943); FRUS: the conferences at Malta and Yalta 1945 (1955), pp. 159–63 (for Oct. 1944), pp. 612–6 (for Yalta, Feb. 1945). Cf. Churchill in the house of commons, 22 Feb. 1944, in Churchill, , Speeches, VII (1974), 6893Google Scholar: ‘I cannot feel that the Russian demand for a reassurance about her Western frontiers goes beyond the limits of what is reasonable or just. Marshal Stalin and I also spoke and agreed upon the need for Poland to obtain compensation at the expense of Germany both in the North and in the West.’;
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97 Russia herself appears not to have adhered strictly to this principle, but thus far only contacts, not negotiations, during the years 1941–4 between German government agents and Soviet agents, mainly in Stockholm, have come to light; see Mastny, Vojtech, ‘Stalin and the prospects of a separate peace in World War II’, American Historical Review, LXXVII (1972), 1365–88Google Scholar; Martin, Bernd, Friedensinitiativen und Machtpolitik im Zweiten Welktrieg 1939–1942 (Düsseldorf, 1976 edn)Google Scholar; Martin, Bernd, ‘Verhandlungen Über separate Friedensschlüsse 1942–1945’, Militärgeschichtliche Mitteilungen (1976), no. 2, pp. 95–113Google Scholar; Fleischhauer, Ingeborg, Die Chance des Sonderfriedens: Deutsch–sowjetische Geheimgespräche 1941–1945 (Berlin, 1986), passimGoogle Scholar. At least some of the contacts between Russian agents and German official or semi-official agents must have served to exert pressure on the western allies to agree to concessions to Russia, an d to establish a second front in Europe.
98 P.R.O., FO 371/26542/[C 610], FO 371/26543/C10855, PREMIER 4/100/8, also for the following; the first two items were printed partly in Blasius, p. 269; see also Kettenacker, p. 59.
99 W.M. (41) 120th Conclusions, Minute 5, Confidential Annex (27 November 1941 – 5.0 p.m.), P.R.O., Cab. 65/24; Kitchen, p. 422, misread this source: neither Hess nor ‘a separate peace with the Germans’ were raised in the cabinet meeting he cites.
100 Fleischhauer, pp. 173–220. The evidence that has come to light about these contacts is tenuous as regards their substance and seriousness on both sides; cf. Mastny, pp. 1369–72; see also William J. Donovan to President Roosevelt, 20 March 1944, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Library, President's Secretary's File Box 6, Safe File OSS; Martin, , ‘Verhandlungen’, pp. 101–3Google Scholar appears to accept the alleged peace offers at face value.
101 The Times (late London edn), 23 July 1943, p. 3; Scheurig, Bodo, Free Germany: the National Committee and the League of German Officers (Middletown, Connecticut, 1969), pp. 32–77Google Scholar; FRUS 1943, I, 687; FRUS 1344, IV (1966), 805, 872 note 62Google Scholar. Fleischhauer, pp. 195–6 offers inconclusive speculations without reference to the material in FRUS; for a further Russian denunciation of peace feelers in September 1943 see Fleischhauer, p. 199.
102 FRUS 1943, I, 680, 687, 737, 752–4.
103 See FRUS 1944, I, 510–13; Fleischhauer, pp. 221–3.
104 Eisenhower, to Smith, 20 05 1944, The papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, III, ed. Chandler, Alfred D. Jr, [ et al. ] (Baltimore and London, 1970), 1872–6Google Scholar; FRUS 1944, I, 507–9.
105 FRUS 1944, I, 493–4, 501–2, 510–14; FRUS: The conference at Washington, 1941–1942, and Casablanca, 1943 (1968), pp. 362–76; also Allen Dulles' cables from Berne where he was European resident of the American Office of Strategic Services, OSS files, National Archives, Washington, D.C., e.g. no. 1890–3, 27 Jan. 1944; no. 1913–4, 29 Jan. 1944; no. 1965, 3 Feb. 1944.
106 FRUS 1944, I, 517–18.
107 FRUS 1944, I, 519.
108 Balfour and Frisby, pp. 184–5.
109 Cicestr, pp. 206–8; Bishop Bell's memorandum reporting Bonhoeffer's views in Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, Gesammelte Schriften, I (Munich, 1958), 373Google Scholar; ibid. p. 320; Bethge, Eberhard, Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Theologe, Christ, Zeitgenosse (Munich, 1970 edn), pp. 824–35, 732–7Google Scholar; Hooft, Willem Visser't, Die Welt war meine Gemeinde (Munich, 1972), pp. 185–6Google Scholar; Arvid Brodersen (Norwegian resistance leader), interview with the author, 13 Jan. 1985.
110 Balfour and Frisby, p. 185.
111 Balfour and Frisby, pp. 184–6, 271–7; von Moltke, Freya, Balfour, Michael and Frisby, Julian, Helmuth James von Moltke 1907–1945: Anwalt der Zukunft (Stuttgart, 1975), p. 285Google Scholar; Steltzer, Theodor and Gerstenmaier, Eugen, both members of the ‘Kreisau Circle’, to Anderson, Ivar, ed. of Svenska Dagbladet on 6 10 1943Google Scholar, Anderson diary 17 Sept., 6 Oct. and 30 Oct. 1943, Royal Library, Stockholm, Ivar Anderson papper L 91:3.
112 R[othfels], H[ans] (ed.), ‘Zwei aussenpolitische Memoranden der deutschen Opposition (Friihjahr 1942)’, Vierteljahrshefte fiir Zeitgeschichte, V (1957), 388–95Google Scholar; Visser 't Hooft, pp. 182–200; Gerstenmaier, Eugen, ‘Der Kreisauer Kreis: Zu dem Buch Gerrit van Roons “Neuordnung im Widerstand”’, Vierteljahrshefte fur Zeitgesckichte, XV (1967), 236–7Google Scholar; Bell, George K. A., ‘Die Okumene und die innerdeutsche Opposition’, Vierteljahrshefte Jiir Zeitgeschichte, V (1957), 362–78Google Scholar; Bonhoeffer, pp. 372–89. See also Malone, passim.
113 Political memorandum, Germany No. 41, 23 March 1944, for Political Intelligence Department, P.R.O., FO 371/39059 139936; Hoffmann, , History, pp. 230–1Google Scholar.
114 By the summer of 1944, the leaders of the conspiracy generally, with the exception of Goerdeler, accepted surrender on all fronts; Trial of the major war criminals before the international military tribunal: Nuremberg 14 November 1345–1 October 1946, XXXIII (Nuremberg, 1949), 423Google Scholar; Dulles, Allen Welsh, Germany's underground (New York, 1947), p. 140Google Scholar.
115 Copy of Goerdeler's draft in Bundesarchiv, Koblenz, Nl. Goerdeler 23; printed in Dulles, , Underground, pp. 144–5Google Scholar.
116 People's Court judgement of 17 Jan. 1945 against Captain (Res.) Hermann Kaiser, Bundesarchiv, EAP 105/30; Spiegelbild, pp. 126–7, 410–12; Goerdeler, , ‘Unsere Idee’, typescript, n.p. [11 1944], pp. 33–40Google Scholar, Bundesarchiv, Nl. Goerdeler 26; cf. Hoffmann, Peter, Widerstand, Staalsstreich, Attentat: Der Kampf der Opposition gegen Hitler (Munich, 1969), pp. 749–51, note 104Google Scholar.
117 H[ans] B[ernd] G[isevius], memorandum for A[llen] W[elsh] D[ulles], July 1944, typescript in the author's possession; Gisevius, Hans Bernd, To the bitter end (Boston and Cambridge, Mass., 1947), p. 493Google Scholar.
118 Lamb, Richard, The ghosts of peace 1935–1945 (Wilton, 1987), pp. 250–4Google Scholar, 262, 265, 270, 301–2; cf. Fieldhouse, passim.
119 Colonel Truman Smith to Allen Dulles 25 Apr. 1947, Allen W. Dulles papers, Princeton University Library; Smith names Colonel Vorys H. Connor, the Chief of the Mediterranean Division of Operations in the Pentagon at the time, and General J. E. Hull, Connor's superior in the Operations Division who for a time at least supported Connor's view; Wedemeyer, Albert C., Wedemeyer reports!. (New York, 1958), p. 238Google Scholar; on the second front, see Churchill, , Second world war IV, 267–71Google Scholar and passim.
120 Dulles, passim; Dulles' cables from Berne in National Archives, Washington, Record Group 226 and in FDR Library, PSF box 170 and 171; cf. Bryant, Arthur, Triumph in the west, 1943–1946: based on the diaries and autobiographical notes of Field Marshal The Viscount Alanbrooke, K.G., O.M. (London, 1959), p. 242Google Scholar: in the interest of the balance of power General Sir Alan Brooke suggested converting Germany to an ally against a future Russian threat rather than dismembering her.
121 Lamb, pp. 256–86, 296–303.
122 Quoted in Lamb, p. 257. Elizabeth Wiskemann served in the British Legation in Berne; her name is misspelled in Harrison's minute as ‘Wiskeyman’.
123 P.R.O., FO 371/39087 010.
124 Quoted in Lamb, p. 283.
125 Quoted in Lamb, pp. 296–7.
126 Debates, fifth series, vol. 402 (1944), 2 Aug. 1944, col. 1487.