Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

FRANCE IS TO BLAME 711Eden, in his official capacity of British Minister at the League ofNations, in fact even then a second Foreign Minister slowly built up atthe side of Sir John Simon, undertook such a tour of investigation inFebruary, 1934, a strikingly young envoy of the conservative Britishruling class. In a marked gesture of courtesy toward National SocialistGermany, the British Minister first visited Hitler in Berlin (February21), and the courtesy was well received. Once again Hitler was on thewhole satisfied with the British proposals; he was satisfied with thethree hundred thousand soldiers which were to be allowed him. Heinsisted on planes, which the British had not foreseen, but he did notwant bombers, only fighters for the purpose of repelling attacks; andeven this German air force, intended purely for defense, would be onlyhalf as strong as the French air force. To be sure, if Germany agreed tosuch marked military inferiority, it was not for all time to come, butonly for five years, and full equality must be achieved within ten years.It seemed that Hitler's meeting with Eden was just such a success asthe Fuhrer desired. Perhaps for the first time he managed to convince aforeign statesman that the much-discussed and feared S.A. were not anarmy and that he did not want them to be an army. He seems to havepromised Eden that he would do away with certain aspects of NationalSocialist Germany which were considered particularly offensive abroad,such as the terrorist rule of the S.A. At any rate, Eden left withfavorable impressions, and these were perhaps strengthened when a fewdays later Mussolini joyfully told him that if Hitler made suchacceptable proposals, the best thing to do was to take him quickly at hisword. Three hundred thousand soldiers for Germany seemed toMussolini a reasonable figure; and if Hitler renounced bombing planesfor ten years, the Italian dictator — as he told Eden — hoped that by theend of that period bombing planes would have disappeared from theworld completely.Thus, negotiations and exchanges of notes went on between thepowers. That there was still a high council of nations in Geneva washalf-forgotten; no one any longer took the Disarmament Conferenceseriously; collective security was almost a fantasy, a chimera,something like perpetual peace or the elimination of poverty.