Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

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wm
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#181

Post by wm » 02 Aug 2022, 22:40

Why was it a false assumption? Nothing indicated that Hitler would want more.
We should always give peace a chance before resorting to war that will kill tens of millions.

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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#182

Post by jabhatta » 02 Nov 2023, 05:29

ljadw wrote:
20 Sep 2021, 11:28
The attack on Poland was not delayed because of Italy .Italy had no role in a war with France and Britain .When the war with Britain and France started seriously on 10 May 1940, Italy remained neutral .
Besides: on 1 September Italy was still neutral .
the war started seriously on May 10th 1940 ?

what was going on between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?

No bombing of air defenses of london between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?


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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#183

Post by jabhatta » 02 Nov 2023, 05:36

ljadw wrote:
05 Nov 2021, 07:16
wm wrote:
04 Nov 2021, 22:44
If Britain declared war in absence of any obligation once and was ready to do it again in similar circumstances later it's obvious it would do that when an obligation existed.

I don't quite understand that "for domestic use" thing. The entire world knew and more appeasement would result in a massive loss of face and political credibility.
And it wasn't a mere guarantee - it was preceded by (quite long) negotiations with the Poles as to what it exactly meant. The British chose to call it a guarantee to not provoke Hitler, for political reasons.

It was 2 divisions but they planned for a long war - the British Fleet, the French Army, and massive American loans were reasonably good enough for that.
A long war would not help Poland: what Poland wanted was
A that Britain would prevent a German attack
B that,if there was still such an attack, a British army would be in Berlin,before the Germans would be in Warsaw .
And, about the domestic use : anti-appeasement elements in the Foreign Office and MI6 told the tabloids that Germany planned an attack against Poland in March 1939 (which was a lie ) and ,of course the tabloids published this lie .
The reply of Chamberlain was masterly (it was an election year ) : they told the word that if Hitler attacked Poland,they would declare war (at the stupefaction of Hitler ) and the public liked the reply (Hitler was brought into line without war ) and Attlee remained silent .This would save a lot of marginal constituencies .
About obligations : obligations are promises : countries do not fight because of promises ,but because of threats to their interests.
There was something as a guarantee to Czechia after Munich,but no one declared war on Germany when Hitler occupied Czechia in March 1939 .Appeasement continued : Attlee did not ask for a declaration of war in March 1939 .
The underlined bit confuses me.

Why was Attlee so determined to fight Hitler ? Attlee belonged to the Labour party.

If war breaks out between Britain and Germany, Britain would have the conscript workers.

The workers and the unions would not be happy. No worked would like to go to war.

Attlee, belonging to the labour party, was obviously pro-union.

Did the labour party want war with Germany ? If so, how would that help the labour party, politically ?

ljadw
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#184

Post by ljadw » 02 Nov 2023, 07:36

jabhatta wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 05:29
ljadw wrote:
20 Sep 2021, 11:28
The attack on Poland was not delayed because of Italy .Italy had no role in a war with France and Britain .When the war with Britain and France started seriously on 10 May 1940, Italy remained neutral .
Besides: on 1 September Italy was still neutral .
the war started seriously on May 10th 1940 ?

what was going on between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?

No bombing of air defenses of london between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?
You never heard of Sitzkrieg, Phoney War ,Drole de Guerre ?
The first soldier of the BEF who was KIA,was in December 1939 .

ljadw
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#185

Post by ljadw » 02 Nov 2023, 07:49

jabhatta wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 05:36
ljadw wrote:
05 Nov 2021, 07:16
wm wrote:
04 Nov 2021, 22:44
If Britain declared war in absence of any obligation once and was ready to do it again in similar circumstances later it's obvious it would do that when an obligation existed.

I don't quite understand that "for domestic use" thing. The entire world knew and more appeasement would result in a massive loss of face and political credibility.
And it wasn't a mere guarantee - it was preceded by (quite long) negotiations with the Poles as to what it exactly meant. The British chose to call it a guarantee to not provoke Hitler, for political reasons.

It was 2 divisions but they planned for a long war - the British Fleet, the French Army, and massive American loans were reasonably good enough for that.
A long war would not help Poland: what Poland wanted was
A that Britain would prevent a German attack
B that,if there was still such an attack, a British army would be in Berlin,before the Germans would be in Warsaw .
And, about the domestic use : anti-appeasement elements in the Foreign Office and MI6 told the tabloids that Germany planned an attack against Poland in March 1939 (which was a lie ) and ,of course the tabloids published this lie .
The reply of Chamberlain was masterly (it was an election year ) : they told the word that if Hitler attacked Poland,they would declare war (at the stupefaction of Hitler ) and the public liked the reply (Hitler was brought into line without war ) and Attlee remained silent .This would save a lot of marginal constituencies .
About obligations : obligations are promises : countries do not fight because of promises ,but because of threats to their interests.
There was something as a guarantee to Czechia after Munich,but no one declared war on Germany when Hitler occupied Czechia in March 1939 .Appeasement continued : Attlee did not ask for a declaration of war in March 1939 .
The underlined bit confuses me.

Why was Attlee so determined to fight Hitler ? Attlee belonged to the Labour party.

If war breaks out between Britain and Germany, Britain would have the conscript workers.

The workers and the unions would not be happy. No worked would like to go to war.

Attlee, belonging to the labour party, was obviously pro-union.

Did the labour party want war with Germany ? If so, how would that help the labour party, politically ?
Attlee was determined to fight against Chamberlain.
The guarantee of Chamberlain was a very good move .
If Chamberlain said nothing after the Coup of Prague,Attlee would attack him ,saying he was a coward of a sympathizer of Hitler .
If he declared war, Attlee would say that he was a war monger .
Thus Chamberlain gave a meaningless guarantee to Poland and warned Hitler .The British Lion was roaring,but not fighting and this was what the pacifists wanted .
And Attlee could not attack Chamberlain : he could not say that it was not enough, he also could not say that it was too much .
And the question if the Labour Party wanted war with Germany or not,is irrelevant : Labour wanted to win the elections which were scheduled for November 1939 .
Chamberlain wanted also to win them .

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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#186

Post by ljadw » 02 Nov 2023, 16:59

wm wrote:
02 Aug 2022, 22:40
Why was it a false assumption? Nothing indicated that Hitler would want more.
We should always give peace a chance before resorting to war that will kill tens of millions.
Goering said the following : Germany would be willing to reach an understanding with Britain on one basis only :German recognition of British overseas interests and the maintenance of her empire in exchange for British recognition of Germany's ''preponderating influence in Central Europe . ''
Source : memorandum from Henderson from 12 September,2 October and 10 October 1937 .
Germany wanted the return of the situation of before 1914 .
Britain said yes,with one condition : that this would happen without war .
THIS (without war ) was the essential difference between Britain's policy before 1914 and its policy after Versailles .There were 4 wars ( FOUR ) in Central Europe shortly before the outbreak of WW1 and Britain did not move . Why ? Because the wokes, the followers of W.Wilson,the pacifists, had not the influence before 1914 which they had after Versailles .

jabhatta
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#187

Post by jabhatta » 02 Nov 2023, 17:28

ljadw wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 07:36
jabhatta wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 05:29
ljadw wrote:
20 Sep 2021, 11:28
The attack on Poland was not delayed because of Italy .Italy had no role in a war with France and Britain .When the war with Britain and France started seriously on 10 May 1940, Italy remained neutral .
Besides: on 1 September Italy was still neutral .
the war started seriously on May 10th 1940 ?

what was going on between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?

No bombing of air defenses of london between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 ?
You never heard of Sitzkrieg, Phoney War ,Drole de Guerre ?
The first soldier of the BEF who was KIA,was in December 1939 .
Hi ljadw - dont you think the term "phoney war" is unfair ? I think there was a lot of action between September 3rd 1939 and May 10th 1940 .

To name just some of the action..

----------------------------

a) September 4th - 15 Blenheim bombers launch a bombing raid on the German fleet in the Heligoland Bight
b) September 5th - UK National Registration Act 1939 to register on the whole population
c) September 5th - British freighter SS Bosnia is targeted off the coast of Portugal by the German U-boat U-47
d) September 6th - British Naval blockade has begun.
e) September 7th - French offensive of 10 divisions into Saarland
f) September 17th - British aircraft carrier HMS Courageous is torpedoed and sunk by U-29 on patrol off the coast of Ireland, causing the death of 514 aboard; it represented the first major warship to be sunk in the wa
g) September 20th - German submarine U-27 is sunk by British destroyers HMS Fortune and HMS Forester.

ljadw
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#188

Post by ljadw » 02 Nov 2023, 22:39

And what was the result of the bombing raid of 15 British bombers ? SEVEN bombers were lost and the damage to the Hochseeflotte was insignificant .
The first British civilian casualty was on 16 March 1940 .
What was the result of the British blockade ?
What was the result of the Saar offensive ? The occupation of 700 ha of German territory .
On 17 September the RN lost 514 of its men ,but how many Poles had been killed between 1 and 17 September ?
The two BEF divisions arrived at the German/Belgian border at the end of September .
Britain had boasted that it would send 2 divisions to France ( it never had promised to send 2 battalions to Poland ) ,Gamelin had promised to start an offensive with an undetermined number of divisions ,meaning that he would do nothing ,and he did nothing .The French also had never the intention to send forces to Poland to prevent a German attack .
For reasons that have been already mentioned/discussed,the intention of France and Britain (France was the most important of both ) was
1 not to aid Poland, because they knew the aid they could give to Poland was meaningless and because the fate of Poland was secondary .
2 to minimize their losses as much as possible
3 to wage a war of blockade hoping (wrongly ,as they could have known ) that this blockade would force Germany to capitulate
That means that both France and Britain declared war to Germany because Germany attacked Poland,but that they knew that they could not help Poland .I doubt very much that they had even the intention to help Poland . The aim of France and Britain was never to help Poland : it was to punish Germany for ideological reasons .
And Poland knew it .
And Germany knew it.
And the Soviets knew it .
And, if the blockade had forced Germany to capitulate,the fate of Poland would still have been the fate of Poland in 1945 : the Soviets would not give back the part of Poland they had occupied .And there would be no independent Polish state .
2

jabhatta
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#189

Post by jabhatta » 03 Nov 2023, 04:19

ljadw wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 07:49
jabhatta wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 05:36
ljadw wrote:
05 Nov 2021, 07:16
wm wrote:
04 Nov 2021, 22:44
If Britain declared war in absence of any obligation once and was ready to do it again in similar circumstances later it's obvious it would do that when an obligation existed.

I don't quite understand that "for domestic use" thing. The entire world knew and more appeasement would result in a massive loss of face and political credibility.
And it wasn't a mere guarantee - it was preceded by (quite long) negotiations with the Poles as to what it exactly meant. The British chose to call it a guarantee to not provoke Hitler, for political reasons.

It was 2 divisions but they planned for a long war - the British Fleet, the French Army, and massive American loans were reasonably good enough for that.
A long war would not help Poland: what Poland wanted was
A that Britain would prevent a German attack
B that,if there was still such an attack, a British army would be in Berlin,before the Germans would be in Warsaw .
And, about the domestic use : anti-appeasement elements in the Foreign Office and MI6 told the tabloids that Germany planned an attack against Poland in March 1939 (which was a lie ) and ,of course the tabloids published this lie .
The reply of Chamberlain was masterly (it was an election year ) : they told the word that if Hitler attacked Poland,they would declare war (at the stupefaction of Hitler ) and the public liked the reply (Hitler was brought into line without war ) and Attlee remained silent .This would save a lot of marginal constituencies .
About obligations : obligations are promises : countries do not fight because of promises ,but because of threats to their interests.
There was something as a guarantee to Czechia after Munich,but no one declared war on Germany when Hitler occupied Czechia in March 1939 .Appeasement continued : Attlee did not ask for a declaration of war in March 1939 .
The underlined bit confuses me.

Why was Attlee so determined to fight Hitler ? Attlee belonged to the Labour party.

If war breaks out between Britain and Germany, Britain would have the conscript workers.

The workers and the unions would not be happy. No worked would like to go to war.

Attlee, belonging to the labour party, was obviously pro-union.

Did the labour party want war with Germany ? If so, how would that help the labour party, politically ?
Attlee was determined to fight against Chamberlain.
The guarantee of Chamberlain was a very good move .
If Chamberlain said nothing after the Coup of Prague,Attlee would attack him ,saying he was a coward of a sympathizer of Hitler .
If he declared war, Attlee would say that he was a war monger .
Thus Chamberlain gave a meaningless guarantee to Poland and warned Hitler .The British Lion was roaring,but not fighting and this was what the pacifists wanted .
And Attlee could not attack Chamberlain : he could not say that it was not enough, he also could not say that it was too much .
And the question if the Labour Party wanted war with Germany or not,is irrelevant : Labour wanted to win the elections which were scheduled for November 1939 .
Chamberlain wanted also to win them .
Attlee was determined to have Britain fight Germany on the battlefield in my opinion

Proof - Attlee was willing to form a coalition government with Churchill

If Attlee refused to form a coalition government in may 10 1940, there would be no continuation of the war on behalf of Britain

Chamberlain has resigned || not sure why Chamberlain was so desperate to have a coalition government though as it was quite possible to have an all Tory government given Tories had all a significant majority in the government as per the 1935 election

ljadw
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Posts: 15589
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#190

Post by ljadw » 03 Nov 2023, 07:17

jabhatta wrote:
03 Nov 2023, 04:19
ljadw wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 07:49
jabhatta wrote:
02 Nov 2023, 05:36
ljadw wrote:
05 Nov 2021, 07:16
wm wrote:
04 Nov 2021, 22:44
If Britain declared war in absence of any obligation once and was ready to do it again in similar circumstances later it's obvious it would do that when an obligation existed.

I don't quite understand that "for domestic use" thing. The entire world knew and more appeasement would result in a massive loss of face and political credibility.
And it wasn't a mere guarantee - it was preceded by (quite long) negotiations with the Poles as to what it exactly meant. The British chose to call it a guarantee to not provoke Hitler, for political reasons.

It was 2 divisions but they planned for a long war - the British Fleet, the French Army, and massive American loans were reasonably good enough for that.
A long war would not help Poland: what Poland wanted was
A that Britain would prevent a German attack
B that,if there was still such an attack, a British army would be in Berlin,before the Germans would be in Warsaw .
And, about the domestic use : anti-appeasement elements in the Foreign Office and MI6 told the tabloids that Germany planned an attack against Poland in March 1939 (which was a lie ) and ,of course the tabloids published this lie .
The reply of Chamberlain was masterly (it was an election year ) : they told the word that if Hitler attacked Poland,they would declare war (at the stupefaction of Hitler ) and the public liked the reply (Hitler was brought into line without war ) and Attlee remained silent .This would save a lot of marginal constituencies .
About obligations : obligations are promises : countries do not fight because of promises ,but because of threats to their interests.
There was something as a guarantee to Czechia after Munich,but no one declared war on Germany when Hitler occupied Czechia in March 1939 .Appeasement continued : Attlee did not ask for a declaration of war in March 1939 .
The underlined bit confuses me.

Why was Attlee so determined to fight Hitler ? Attlee belonged to the Labour party.

If war breaks out between Britain and Germany, Britain would have the conscript workers.

The workers and the unions would not be happy. No worked would like to go to war.

Attlee, belonging to the labour party, was obviously pro-union.

Did the labour party want war with Germany ? If so, how would that help the labour party, politically ?
Attlee was determined to fight against Chamberlain.
The guarantee of Chamberlain was a very good move .
If Chamberlain said nothing after the Coup of Prague,Attlee would attack him ,saying he was a coward of a sympathizer of Hitler .
If he declared war, Attlee would say that he was a war monger .
Thus Chamberlain gave a meaningless guarantee to Poland and warned Hitler .The British Lion was roaring,but not fighting and this was what the pacifists wanted .
And Attlee could not attack Chamberlain : he could not say that it was not enough, he also could not say that it was too much .
And the question if the Labour Party wanted war with Germany or not,is irrelevant : Labour wanted to win the elections which were scheduled for November 1939 .
Chamberlain wanted also to win them .
Attlee was determined to have Britain fight Germany on the battlefield in my opinion

Proof - Attlee was willing to form a coalition government with Churchill

If Attlee refused to form a coalition government in may 10 1940, there would be no continuation of the war on behalf of Britain

Chamberlain has resigned || not sure why Chamberlain was so desperate to have a coalition government though as it was quite possible to have an all Tory government given Tories had all a significant majority in the government as per the 1935 election
1 Attlee refused to form a'' coalition'' government with Chamberlain, because Chamberlain was since 1931 one of the biggest enemies of Labour ,while Churchill was insignificant,despised by all parties .
2 A ''coalition '' government was not needed to fight against Germany : the Liberal Government of Asquith declared war on Germany in August 1914 and became a coalition government only in 1915 .
3 Chamberlain remained leader of the Tories and the new government had de facto two Prime Ministers :Chamberlain could fire Churchill at any moment .

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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#191

Post by jabhatta » 03 Nov 2023, 15:58

ljadw wrote:
03 Nov 2023, 07:17

1 Attlee refused to form a'' coalition'' government with Chamberlain, because Chamberlain was since 1931 one of the biggest enemies of Labour ,while Churchill was insignificant,despised by all parties .
2 A ''coalition '' government was not needed to fight against Germany : the Liberal Government of Asquith declared war on Germany in August 1914 and became a coalition government only in 1915 .
3 Chamberlain remained leader of the Tories and the new government had de facto two Prime Ministers :Chamberlain could fire Churchill at any moment .

Why was Chamberlain so keen to form an coalition government in 1940 and not form an coalition government in 1939 itself ?

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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#192

Post by ljadw » 03 Nov 2023, 17:17

For the same reason as Asquith was not keen to form a coalition government in August 1914 , although he,opposite to Chamberlain, had no majority in the Commons : the war started in September 1939 without setback, but there was a setback in May 1940 : Norway .Chamberlain was looking if Liberals and Labour would accept a coalition government,and they said : yes,but with another PM .And Chamberlain accepted their Diktat and Churchill became PM .
In August 1914 the Conservative opposition accepted the DOW wholeheartedly ,which was not so in September 1939 :there was still a strong pacifist group in Labour and the Liberals .
In August 1914 the pacifists could be found in the government ( Morley, Bryce,...) in 1939 they were present in the opposition .
And, there was no guarantee to Belgium /France in August 1914,which means that Britain did not need a guarantee to declare war .

jabhatta
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Location: england

Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#193

Post by jabhatta » 03 Nov 2023, 19:16

ljadw wrote:
03 Nov 2023, 17:17
For the same reason as Asquith was not keen to form a coalition government in August 1914 , although he,opposite to Chamberlain, had no majority in the Commons : the war started in September 1939 without setback, but there was a setback in May 1940 : Norway .Chamberlain was looking if Liberals and Labour would accept a coalition government,and they said : yes,but with another PM .And Chamberlain accepted their Diktat and Churchill became PM .
In August 1914 the Conservative opposition accepted the DOW wholeheartedly ,which was not so in September 1939 :there was still a strong pacifist group in Labour and the Liberals .
In August 1914 the pacifists could be found in the government ( Morley, Bryce,...) in 1939 they were present in the opposition .
And, there was no guarantee to Belgium /France in August 1914,which means that Britain did not need a guarantee to declare war .
but even after the fall of Norway in May 1940 - why do you need to form an all party coalition?

Tories had the numbers

Chamberlain could have resigned and another Tory PM replacement should have taken his place in 1940.

There were other Tory replacement, whom the rest of the Tory party could surely rally behind (Lord Halifax for example)

ljadw
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Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#194

Post by ljadw » 03 Nov 2023, 21:53

If there was no need for a coalition government ,there was no need for Chamberlain to resign .
And a coalition government was needed,as in WW1,because the ruling party could not expect that the opposition would continue to support how the government would wage war, if the opposition was not offered a number of seats in the cabinet .
To wage war,to win war, unanimity was needed in Britain and that meant that the opposition would join the government .
This happened also in Belgium and France .
There was a Burgfriedenspolitik in Germany in 1914, an Union Sacrée in France in 1914,the same was needed in Britain : Attlee had severely attacked the government since 1935 ,the only way to neutralize the attacks from the opposition,was to include them in the government: Bevin was appointed minister of employment to have a bigger support from the TUC.
And Halifax , not a member of the Commons but an appeaser,as PM ,would face big criticism .Not only from Labour .

jabhatta
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Location: england

Re: Was Hitler really surprised when England and France followed thru and declared war?

#195

Post by jabhatta » 08 Nov 2023, 07:23

Ijadw - I don't understand Attlee

On one hand, atlee is from the labour party.. The labour party I presume is anti war .. Why ? Because if war breaks out , it's the middle class and the lower class that will be in the trenches, certainly not the rich nor the elites will go too the trenches


The middle class and the lower class all vote for labor obviously

So why did atlee join any government in 1940 .. atlee should have refused to join government if atlee cared about what his voter base wanted.

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