Historical Accuracy & the IMT Aggressive War Judgment

[michael mills]

The Agreement was valid only in case of an aggression, "any military action by Poland" was out of a question:

Actually, "aggression" was defined as both "direct" and "indirect" aggression. "indirect" aggression was defined as any action that changed the status of Danzig that Poland did not like.

If the Danzig Senate had unilaterally declared reunification with Germany, and Poland had claimed that that action "threatened its independence" and sent its armed forces into the city to suppress it, that use by Poland of its armed forces would have triggered the agreement with Britain, obliging Britain to take military action against Germany.

Furthermore, the agreement signed at 17:10 on 25 August 1939 what not something new, it was merely a formalisation of the agreement reached on 6 April, during Beck's visit to London. Here is the relevant excerpt from that agreement of 6 April:

SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS

1. As a result of the conversations held in London on the 4th-6th April 1939, between the Polish Foreign Minister on the one side and the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs on the other, the Polish Government and His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom record the following conclusions:

2. The Polish Government and His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom have decided to place their collaboration on a permanent basis by the exchange of reciprocal assurances of assistance. They are accordingly prepared to enter into a formal agreement on the following basis:

(a) If Germany attacks Poland His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom will at once come to the help of Poland.
(b) If Germany attempts to undermine the independence of Poland by process of economic penetration or in any other way, His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom will support Poland in resistance to such attempts. If Germany then attacks Poland, the provisions of paragraph (a) above will apply. In the event of other action by Germany which clearly threatened Polish independence, and was of such a nature that the Polish Government considered it vital to resist it with their national forces, His Majesty’s Government would at once come to the help of Poland.
(c) Reciprocally, Poland gives corresponding assurances to the United Kingdom.
(d) It is understood that the Polish Government and His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom will keep each other fully and promptly informed of any developments threatening the independence of either country.

3. As an earnest of their intention to enter into a formal agreement to render assistance to Poland in the circumstances contemplated above, His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom have informed the Polish Government, and have stated publicly, that during the period required for the conclusion of the formal agreement outlined in paragraph 2 above, in the event of any action which clearly threatened Polish independence, and which the Polish Government accordingly considered it vital to resist with their national forces, His Majesty’s Government would feel themselves bound at once to lend the Polish Government all the support in their power.

Note that the words used by the British Government are "at once come to the help of Poland", and this action of coming to the "help" of Poland would occur under two circumstances:

1. if Germany attacked Poland.

2. If Germany undertook "other action...... which clearly threatened Polish independence, and was of such a nature that the Polish Government considered it vital to resist it with their national forces".

In the first case, an attack by Germany on Poland, it is clear that "coming to the help of Poland" means that Britain would use its armed forces to assist Poland in fighting against the German forces that had attacked Polish territory. It follows logically that "coming to the help of Poland" in the case of other action by Germany, not involving an attack on Poland but to which Poland had responded by using its armed forces, means that Britain would deploy its own armed forces to assist the Polish armed forces against Germany.

[michael mills]

Here is the relevant part of the treaty of 25 August:

ARTICLE I.
Should one of the Contracting Parties become engaged in hostilities with a European Power in consequence of aggression by the latter against that Contracting Party, the other Contracting Party will at once give the Contracting Party engaged in hostilities all the support and assistance in its power.

ARTICLE 2.
(1) The provisions of Article I will also apply in the event of any action by a European Power which clearly threatened, directly or indirectly, the independence of one of the Contracting Parties, and was of such a nature that the Party in question considered it vital to resist it with its armed forces.

(2) Should one of the Contracting Parties become engaged in hostilities with a European Power in consequence of action by that Power which threatened the independence or neutrality of another European State in such a way as to constitute a clear menace to the security of that Contracting Party, the provisions of Article I will apply, without prejudice, however, to the rights of the other European State concerned.

ARTICLE 3.
Should a European Power attempt to undermine the independence of one of the Contracting Parties by processes of economic penetration or in any other way, the Contracting Parties will support each other in resistance to such attempts. Should the European Power concerned thereupon embark on hostilities against one of the Contracting Parties, the provisions of Article I will apply.

In a secret codicil to the treaty, it was stated that the "indirect threat" to Polish independence referred to in Article 2(1) meant a German action in Danzig.

[michael mills]

Here is a link to a full copy of the Agreement of Mutual Assistance of 25 August 1939, including the secret codicil:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Agreement ... ndon_(1939)

Note paragraph 2 of the secret codicil, which states:

2. (a) The two Governments will from time to time determine by mutual agreement the hypothetical cases of action by Germany coming within the ambit of Article 2 of the Agreement. (b) Until such time as the two Governments have agreed to modify the following provisions of this paragraph, they will consider: that the case contemplated by paragraph (1) of the Article 2 of the Agreement is that of the Free City of Danzig;....

That meant that any action by Germany in relation to Danzig would trigger Article 1 of the Agremeent, namely that Britain would come to the aid of Poland by throwing its entire military force against Germany.

The German Government was well aware of the provisions of the preliminary agreement of 6 April, so it knew that Britain would go to war against it even if it limited its actions to an occupation of Danzig only, without any action against Polish sovereign territory.

That is the essential reason why Hitler decided to launch a full-scale invasion of Poland rather than just an occupation of Danzig, which latter action he had ordered the Wehrmacht to prepare for in November 1938. Whichever action he took, Britain might go to war against Germany.

Since an action limited to Danzig would not prevent war but might engender it, it was better to go the whole hog and knock Poland out with a full-scale invasion, in the hope that with Poland knocked out completely the encirclement of Germany would be broken and Britain and France might be deterred from going to war.

That is why I say that Germany's action was not wanton, but was determined to a large extent by Britain's actions. If Britain had limited its guarantee to Polish sovereign territory, and not extended it to cover Danzig, then Germany would probably have limited its own action to an occupation of Danzig in accordance with the clearly expressed wish of its population, thereby not providing a casus belli.

It is also why I say that the judgement of the IMT in relation to crimes against peace does not represent objective historical truth.

[Terry Duncan]

Germany would probably have limited its own action to an occupation of Danzig in accordance with the clearly expressed wish of its population, thereby not providing a casus belli.

They could have done, I doubt anyone believes Hitler would not then have found yet another 'demand' for territory he wanted. However, even an occupation of Danzig is in violation of the Treaty of Versailles 1919, Part III, Section XI and therefore casus belli for any nations signatory to that treaty who wish to see its provisions enforced. Breaking such a treaty can also be considered a criminal act, so Germany would be not only giving casus belli but also laying herself open to charges of a criminal violation of a treaty should she lose the ensuing war.

[David Thompson]

Michael -- You wrote:

That is why I say that Germany's action was not wanton, but was determined to a large extent by Britain's actions. If Britain had limited its guarantee to Polish sovereign territory, and not extended it to cover Danzig, then Germany would probably have limited its own action to an occupation of Danzig in accordance with the clearly expressed wish of its population, thereby not providing a casus belli.

It is also why I say that the judgement of the IMT in relation to crimes against peace does not represent objective historical truth.

The IMT judgment was accurate, as we've already seen. Hitler started breaking treaties years earlier than the Polish crisis. Since Hitler's supposed "last territorial demand in Europe" had been fulfilled in Sept 1938, and overfulfilled by Hitler's subsequent actions, of course the German invasion of Poland in Sept 1939 was wanton. After the Munich crisis in Sept 1938 ended with the cession of the Sudetenland, Germany had nothing more coming. After the NS-regime's annexation of Memel and the partition of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, it was clear Hitler had been lying all along. It was just as clear there was a war coming, and the question was no longer "whether" but "when." The western allies were fed up with being played for dupes, and who could blame them?

[wm]

The fledgling Polish state after a hundred-year-long slavery in hands of Germans was given certain economic and political rights in Danzig by the international community after the WWI. One of the main aim of this arrangement was to provide a long term stability to the Free State of Danzig.

If Hitler wanted the rights, and the city, he could have them - for a right price. Instead he opted for "give them to me or else" and he got the "else" part, so in fact he got what he wished for.
He managed to steal the Prague from the Czech, Memel from the Lithuanians. Did he really think that luck with be on his side for ever?

And it is really a strange concept that soil is worth defending but rights not. As if, using a modern example, a country offshore drilling rights on the other side of the planet would be free for taking for anyone who wants them without any compensation.

Next, it is a criminal wantonness on part of a leader to fight a war because a few people (who really had everything already, including self-government) in a city outside his country borders have a wish. And he was not that stupid as the example of South Tyrol shows.

But of course his huge army had to be used somewhere. Year after year a large part of the country GDP were being sent to the drains, funding unprofitable armaments, bringing Germany to its knees economically. The money were unrecoverable forever without a few conquests.
Danzig was a small fry, it could do nothing to improve the German economic situation - the conquest, plunder and extermination of populations of entire countries were required for this.

[ljadw]

Hm,better would be to say "the winners of WWI",or "the enemies of Germany" ,instead of using the anachronism "international community".
Whatever,after WWI,Poland wanted Danzig,because it needed a harbour,but,because this would be openly violating the principles of Versailles ,it got "only" economic and political rights.
I also do not believe that the aim of this was to give Dantzig a period of stability .The result was ,of course,not a period of stability .
One also could argue that Memel was stolen from Germany after WWI.

[Boby]

Memel from the Lithuanians

Indeed. The lithuanians lived in a different world that those stupid and incompetent colonels.

[wm]

Whatever,after WWI,Poland wanted Danzig,because it needed a harbour,but,because this would be openly violating the principles of Versailles ,it got "only" economic and political rights.
I also do not believe that the aim of this was to give Dantzig a period of stability .

Well, you can not create a blocking the sea access enclave and expect that this would be a stable solution. Without the Danzig the Polish access to the sea was worthless so the a few rights were granted by the winners of the WWI.
Danzig and Poland both needed each other. Poland - the access to the sea, Danzig - economic access to the entire Central Europe through Poland.
For this reason and for quite long, before Danzig was drenched in Nazi propaganda, there had been a political fraction in Danzig which favored this arrangement.

[ljadw]

Was the Gdnya access to the sea worthless?

[Gorque]

Was the Gdnya access to the sea worthless?

I should hope not. I've read that it cost the Poles plenty and was to be a worthy competitor to Danzig.

[wm]

After the WWI Gdynia hadn't been built yet, and assuming a successful and long lasting cooperation between Poland and the Free State - it was a colossal waste of money.

[henryk]

Danzig prevented military supplies being provided during the Polish-Soviet war. This by itself proves the necessity of a port at Gdynia. Also the port served as a base for the Polish Navy, and for passenger traffic to North America.

[David Thompson]

Let's get back to the subtopic -- whether or not the IMT judgment on crimes against peace is historically accurate.

[michael mills]

A number of participants to this thread appear to be basing their arguments on the sanctity of treaties.

Treaties can only be regarded as sacrosanct if they fulfil the Wilsonian principles of being freely negotiated without duress.

The three treaties which constituted the Versailles system imposed after the First World War, that of Versailles with Germany, and those of St Germain with Austria and Trianon with Hungary as successors to the Habsburg Empire, did not fulfil that principle, since they were not negotiated but simply dictated to the defeated nations, on the age-old principle of Vae Victis.

Accordingly, within the new international system of the League of Nations, that was supposedly based on the Wilsonian principles, the defeated nations were justified in seeking revisions to the treaties to bring them into conformity with those principles.

In some cases the former victors did permit negotiated revisions of the treaties. For example, the Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935 represented a sensible revision of the disarmament clauses of the Treaty of Versailles.

However, in other cases the former victors stubbornly refused to allow revisions that represented the popular will. For example, in 1931 Germany and Austria tried to create a customs union that was a clear precursor to an eventual political union; that would have been a fulfilment of the wishes of the people of Austria expressed in the proclamation of the Republic of German-Austria in 1918.

However, France opposed the customs union, and threatened force to prevent it. In the end the Court of the Leaugue of Nations ruled against it on the basis that such union was prohibited by the Treaty of St Germain.

There were other ways in which the victors of the First World War obviated the principles on which the new international order was supposed to be based. For example, the disarmament of Germany, Austria and Hungary under the treaties was proclaimed to represent the first stage in a general international disarmament intended to establish permanent peace. Nevertheless, the victor powers never fully disarmed to the envisaged extent, despite the proposals of some statesmen on the Allied side to create a balance of armaments between the former victors and the former defeated at the low level to which the latter had been reduced.

Thus, the rearmament of Germany after 1933 simply represented the re-establishment of a balance of armaments between Germany and its former enemies. At no time between 1933 and 1939 did German rearmament create a superiority to the existing armament of Britain and France combined.

Finally, there were occasions where the victor powers colluded in violations of the treaties that they saw as beneficial to themselves.

For example, under the Treaty of Versailles, the city of Memel and the strip of German territory north of the Niemen River had been separated from Germany and placed under the sovereignty of the League of Nations, pending its final disposition. The population of this territory was equally divided between ethnic Germans and ethnic Lithuanians.

Thge Memel territory was placed under French administration, and occupied by French troops. In 1923, the French administration connived at the illegal seizure of the territory by Lithuania. Although that seizure was a violation of the Treaty of Versailles, since it had not been consented to by the League of Nations, the Allied powers assented to it, and recognised Lithuanian sovereignty de facto.

Another violation of a treaty was the Polish seizure of East Galicia at the beginning of 1919. The Treaty of Saint Germain had separated the province of Galicia from Austria, but had not decided the final disposition of the eastern part of it, which had an ethnic Ukrainian majority, and where a Republic of West Ukraine had been proclaimed.

The Polish seizure was a violation, since the Treaty of St Germain had not awarded East Galicia to Poland. Nevertheless, in 1923 the Allied powers recognised Polish sovereignty de facto, thereby making themselves complicit in the violation.

Given the violations of the treaties that had been winked at by the Allies, it seems rather hypocritical of them to get up in arms over similar later violations by Germany.

The IMT may also be accused of hypocrisy in declaring the sanctity of treaties claimed to have been violated by Germany, while ignoring violations by others, and in the face of the manifest injustice of some of those treaties in certain respects.

For example, it is blindingly obvious that the German annexations of Austria and the Sudetenland in 1938 were a belated rectification of the injustice of the Treaty of St Germain in preventing the ethnic German population of those two areas from uniting with Germany at the end of 1918 in accordance with their freely expressed will.

As another example, the German seizure of Memel in March 1939 was a rectification of the illegal Lithuanian seizure of that territory in 1923. The sovereignty of the League of Nations had been extinguished by its acquiescence in the Lithuanian seizure.

Furthermore, the judgement of the IMT represented a serious perversion of historical truth in that proclaimed Germany as the sole aggressor and all other European states as solely victims of aggression.