h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Has "history" treated Neville Chamberlain fairly? In other words does he "deserve" the opprobrium historically assigned to him as an "appeaser" to Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist party that were in control of Germany?

http://h2g2.com/dna/h2g2/plain/A51607118

I think Chamberlain is unduly pilloried: he was trying to avoid a war he didn't realise was inevitable. He'd lived through WW1 20 years previously and seen how it wiped out a generation. That's an honourable thing.

He also knew that the British army and air force weren't in any condition to fight a major European war in 1938 but knew there were major developments like radar coming shortly and it's worth noting it wasn't just Germany Chamberlain feared war with: no-one knew which way Russia would jump as the Soviets were an unknown quantity at that point. Chamberlain had the reasonable fear he might also be starting a war with Russia.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but put yourself in his shoes and it's, I believe, hard to judge Chamberlain too harshly.

>>He also knew that the British army and air force weren't in any condition to fight a major European war in 1938

Yes, this is the main reason we night give him credit, his buying us time.
Seems a shame to cast him as a failure and Churchill as a hero, when our 'winning' of the war cost us so very dearly, and handed so much power to a Soviet regime which was at least as evil as the Nazis.

Yes for me appeaser par excellence.

And when he gave that ridiculous 'I have in my hand a piece of paper..' well only a complete thick idiot could have done that after meeting Hitler and given the well known history of what had been happening in Nazi Germany for years.

WW2 from my perspective is to do with a fight of Plurality against Purity.

Yeah Chamberlain makes me puke.

"... given the well known history of what had been happening in Nazi Germany for years."

Which would be what exactly? By 1938, all they'd done internationally was take back a chunk of Germany, and taken over part of Czechoslovakia (to replace territory ceded in 1919) with international consent.

In 1938, nobody knew what capabilities the German army had. Had we known just how weak the Wehrmacht was, the French would've rolled into the Rhineland and the Nazi government was fallen.

Hell, had we known how shaky the German army was as late as 1940, the Allies could've rolled into the Rhineland and forced the Nazis to the negotiating table.

The fact is, nobody was ready for a war in 1939. The German high command didn't expect to be ready until 1941, we didn't expect to be ready until around then, and the French government knew France wouldn't be able to fight a modern war after the beating their national psyche took at Verdun.

It's easy to slate Chamberlain in hindsight. At the time, he had two choices. Take a country with a shaky economy and outdated military to war against an unknown quantity that looked to all the world like a powerhouse, or give Hitler what he wanted by way of an apology for Versailles, and hope that he'd calm down and be happy with his lot.

One way guarantees war, one would give peace against anyone who wasn't a maniac. Unfortunately, he didn't know Hitler was a maniac.

I've said this a few times but, hey ho.

"Abominable"? That's set against what we knew about Hitler & Nazism in 1945. In the 30's, fascism was just another new, vigorous political ideology. It was much admired in various Western countries as in Italy and Germany it had pulled moribund economies out of the Depression. Eleanor Roosevelt was quite enamoured by Mussolini. The only people vociferously opposing fascism were the communists - possibly because they were competing for the same votes with similar totalitarian approaches to society. What differed between Italian fascism & German fascism was the addition of Hitler's racism and in the 1930's, nobody was bothered about anti-Semitism in the West.

I think Chamberlain was a man of his time. We tend to gloss over the fact that the post WWI period was meant to be the Age of Reason, where reasonable men could talk out differences in a reasonable manner in places like the League of Nations. Negotiation, negotiation, negotiation was the mantra of the time and Chamberlain in 38 had just negotiated a solution to a diplomatic impasse which avoided war. Nobody in Britain wanted war after the horrors of WWI. We forget that Churchill was a figure of ridicule in the 30s, seen as a warmonger and a throwback to a distant Imperial age. Chamberlain accurately reflected the will of the British people when he chose reasoned negotiation over sabre rattling and this can be seen in the amazing reception he got from the gathered crowds as he stepped off the plane with the Munich Agreement.

>>And when he gave that ridiculous 'I have in my hand a piece of paper..' well only a complete thick idiot could have done that after meeting Hitler and given the well known history of what had been happening in Nazi Germany for years.>>

You're forgetting that when he went for that piece of paper, he was also responsible for the re-armament and upgrading of the British armed forces and tried to get the US involved lest a war did kick off. He sought peace but prepared for war.

Churchill during WW2 was a hero, but Prime Ministers like him are exceptional: our PMs are normally primus inter pares. Chamberlain fitted with British expectations and he reflected what the British wanted. As Psy says, he created a peace that would have sated anyone except a madman and the public of the time loved him for it.

I am no expert on Chamberlain per se but I tend to agree with the general concencus. Chamberlain has three major factors in his favour for me:

1) He tried to keep us out war

2) When this failed, he laid an ultimatum, and when this was ignored, the declared war

3) When war was declared he recognised that he was not the man to lead britain into war and resigned.

All of these things speak to me of a man with integrity and courage. If you want to question his judgement, you could just as easily question Churchhill's re: Stalin.

>One way guarantees war, one would give peace against anyone who wasn't a maniac. Unfortunately, he didn't know Hitler was a maniac.<

Actually from watching Lord Avon's (Anthony Eden) interviews from the BBC's most awesome The World at War series, back from the 70s I am aware that Chamberlain had absolutely no doubt that Hitler was a very seriously nasty piece of work. But as Eden said, 'sometimes you have to deal with people like that in international politics.'

I think it's more true to say that he possibly didn't know - at that point - just how *much* of a maniac Hitler was.
Or maybe he did - which is why serious war preparations began in '38/'39 as others have said.

It is absurd to think that Chamberlain was a complete idiot, it wasn't the case. Maybe he could have handled things better but as most are saying, with hindisght we could all do everything better.

>Hell, had we known how shaky the German army was as late as 1940, the Allies could've rolled into the Rhineland and forced the Nazis to the negotiating table.<

I'm struggling to get my head around this one. Is this the same 1940 where the Wehrmach in fact rolled all over France the british expeditionary force?

Yeah, in mid-1940, having already tied up everything in the East, and on the offensive.

The German army's main strengths in the invasion of France were that they could use thier Blitzkrieg tactics, and that they had a better grasp of how to use armour effectively.

If the British army had listened to people like Liddell-Hart, and we'd have gone on the offensive with our own (marginally superior at that point) tanks in March, the Allies might have taken a sizable chunk of Germany while they were still pacifying Poland, invading Norway and signing treaties with the Soviets.

Admittedly, we're straying deep into counterfactual territory here, and the ifs above are massive...

Fair enough, wasn't really sure what you meant, but I see what you mean

Phew. Wasn't sure I'd explained it well.

I'm sure there's a great book waiting to be written about the fact that every single power attempted to lose WW2 at some point.

That's an interesting way of looking at it

How did the Japanese attempt this might I ask? I can see it for the US, France (their attempt being almost uniquely successful) and the USSR but I'm not sure how Japan attempted this.

I'm assuming that you're not counting the _actual_ losing for Germany and Japan on account of being roundly beaten in the conventional manner of losing battles and stuff.

Yahy counterfactual history. My favorite hobby.

Attacking Pearl Harbour instead of just hoovering up Dutch and English colonies in the Far East was probably a stupid idea.

Would American have entered the war without Pearl Harbour?

(PS do we have an h2g2 history society?)

Well that was supposed to be a massive strike to help them win was it not? I'm not sure trying to win counts as trying to lose personally.

Of course, attacking the single most powerful military power in the world was (with hindsight not a wise move.


That's an interesting question Z and I guess we'll never know - but Hitler did declare war on them first and they were rather openly helping us for several years before they did formally join. So I suspect yes. But then without the tripartite AXIS pact being a strong factor, who knows...

I like this comparison of WWII with Dr Who - http://wsogmm.h2g2.com/dna/h2g2/brunel/F17194315?thread=7631496