An agreement was reached on September 29, and around 1:30 a.m. on September 30.m .m. 1938,[43] Adolf Hitler, Neville Chamberlain, Benito Mussolini and Édouard Daladier signed the Munich Accords. The agreement was officially introduced by Mussolini, although the Italian plan was almost identical to Godesberg`s proposal: the German army was to complete the occupation of the Sudetenland by October 10 and an international commission was to decide on the future of the other disputed territories. On August 19, 1939, Beck declared in a telegram to Daladier: “We have no military agreement with the USSR. We do not want to have any. [48] Later in the meeting, a pre-arranged deception was undertaken to influence and pressure Chamberlain: one of Hitler`s assistants entered the room to inform Hitler of the other Germans killed in Czechoslovakia, to which Hitler shouted in response: “I will avenge each of them. The Czechs must be annihilated. [32] The meeting ended with Hitler`s refusal to make concessions to the Allies` demands. [32] Later that evening, Hitler worried that he had gone too far to put pressure on Chamberlain and called the suite of Chamberlain`s hotel and said he would agree to annex only the Sudetenland, with no plans for other areas, provided that Czechoslovakia began evacuating ethnic Czechs from the territories of the German majority by September 26 at 8:00 a.m. .m. After pressure from Chamberlain, Hitler agreed to set the ultimatum for October 1 (the same date on which Operation Green was to begin). [37] Hitler then told Chamberlain that this was a concession he was willing to give to the prime minister as a “gift,” out of respect for the fact that Chamberlain had been willing to give up his previous position somewhat.
[37] Hitler went on to say that if the Sudetenland were annexed, Germany would no longer have territorial claims over Czechoslovakia and would conclude a collective agreement to guarantee the borders of Germany and Czechoslovakia. [37] In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria with annexation. It was generally expected that the Czechoslovak Sudetenland, with its large German population, led by Nazi politician Konrad Henlein, would be Hitler`s next claim. Indeed, as Hitler delivered increasingly inflammatory speeches calling for the reunification of the German minority in Czechoslovakia with his homeland, war seemed increasingly likely. Many thought that war was inevitable and that a peace agreement that would satisfy everyone would be impossible to achieve. On September 28 at 10:00 a.m..m.four hours before the deadline and without Czechoslovakia`s approval of Hitler`s request, the British ambassador to Italy, Lord Perth, summoned Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano to request an urgent meeting. [37] Perth told Ciano that Chamberlain had asked him to ask Mussolini to enter into negotiations and urge Hitler to postpone the ultimatum. [37] At 11:00.m., Ciano met Mussolini and informed him of Chamberlain`s proposal; Mussolini agreed and responded by calling the Italian ambassador to Germany and telling him: “Go immediately to the Führer and tell him that whatever happens, I will be at his side, but that I ask for a delay of twenty-four hours before the start of hostilities. In the meantime, I`ll explore what can be done to fix the problem. [40] Hitler received Mussolini`s message during a conversation with the French ambassador. Hitler told the ambassador: “My good friend, Benito Mussolini, asked me to postpone the marching orders of the German army by twenty-four hours, and I agreed.
Of course, this was not a concession, as the date of the invasion was set at 1. October 1938. [41] Addressing Chamberlain, Lord Perth Chamberlain thanked Mussolini and Chamberlain for asking Mussolini to attend a conference of the four powers of Britain, France, Germany and Italy in Munich on September 29 to resolve the Sudetenland problem before the deadline of 2:00.m p.m. Mussolini agreed. [41] Hitler`s only demand was to ensure that Mussolini was included in the conference negotiations. [41] When U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt learned that the conference was scheduled, he telegraphed Chamberlain: “Good Man.” [42] On the 22nd. Chamberlain, who was about to board his plane to go to Germany for further talks in Bad Godesberg, told the press that met him there: “My goal is peace in Europe, I am confident that this journey is the path to that peace.” Chamberlain arrived in Cologne, where he was generously received with a German band playing “God Save the King” and Germans giving flowers and gifts to Chamberlain.[32] [32] Chamberlain had calculated that full acceptance of the German annexation of all sudetenland without reductions would force Hitler to accept the agreement. [32] When Hitler learned of this, he replied, “Does this mean that the Allies accepted Prague`s consent to the surrender of the Sudetenland to Germany?” Chamberlain replied, “Exactly,” to which Hitler responded by shaking his head, saying that the Allied offer was insufficient.
He told Chamberlain that he wanted Czechoslovakia completely dissolved and its territories redistributed to Germany, Poland, and Hungary, and told Chamberlain to take it or leave it. [32] Chamberlain was shocked by this statement. [32] Hitler went on to tell Chamberlain that since their last meeting on the 15th, Czechoslovakia`s actions, which Hitler said involved killing Germans, had made the situation unbearable for Germany. [32] London, FridayThe Munich Accords give Hitler (initially) everything he wants, except that they may not allow him to get it as quickly as he would have done under Godesberg`s uncircumcised ultimatum. He will begin tomorrow the invasion of Czechoslovakia, as he threatened in his speech of 12 September. It is free to occupy all regions where Sudeten Germans are in the majority, and to do so in rapid stages. Hitler had already begun to rearm Germany in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles, reoccupied the Rhineland in 1936 and annexed Austria in 1938. He was now determined to conquer the Sudetenland, which was in Czechoslovakia but had a considerable German population and significant industrial resources. It was clear that he would do it by force if necessary, and that the Czechs alone had no hope of resisting him. He had told his generals in May that he intended to “break Czechoslovakia with military action in the near future,” although some of his confidants felt he did not want a general war at the time. Six months later, in March 1939, German troops captured the rest of Czechoslovakia.
Poland seemed to be the next most likely victim of Nazi aggression, and Chamberlain struck a deal with the Poles to defend them in Germany. Hitler did not believe that Britain would go to war for Poland after failing to do so through Czechoslovakia. In September 1939, he sent his soldiers to Poland. On the same day, Britain declared war on Germany. [silent] An agreement signed at the Munich Conference in September 1938 ceded the German-speaking Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia to Germany. The agreement was concluded between Germany, Italy, Great Britain and France. Czechoslovakia was not allowed to participate in the conference. In March 1939, six months after the munich accords were signed, Hitler violated the agreement and destroyed the Czech state. UCLA Film and Television Archive During World War II, British Prime Minister Churchill, who rejected the agreement when it was signed, decided that the terms of the agreement would not be respected after the war and that Sudetenland should be returned to post-war Czechoslovakia. On August 5, 1942, Foreign Minister Anthony Eden sent the following note to Jan Masaryk: the leaders were accompanied by advisers after lunch, and hours were spent discussing each clause of the draft “Italian” agreement. Late in the evening, the British and French left for their hotels and said they needed advice from their respective capitals.
Meanwhile, germans and Italians enjoyed the party Hitler had planned for all participants. During this break, Chamberlain Counsellor Sir Horace Wilson met with the Czechoslovaks; He informed them of the draft agreement and asked them which districts were particularly important to them. [127] The conference resumed around 10 p.m. .m. and was largely in the hands of a small editorial board. By 1:30 a.m.m, the Munich Accords were ready to be signed, although the signing ceremony was delayed when Hitler discovered that the ornate inkwell on his desk was empty. [128] Under the Munich Accords, the entire predominantly German territory in Czechoslovakia had to be handed over by October 10. Poland and Hungary occupied other parts of the country and after a few months, Czechoslovakia ceased to exist and what remained of Slovakia became a German puppet state. The Czechoslovaks were appalled by the colony of Munich.
They were not invited to the conference and felt betrayed by the British and French governments. Many Czechs and Slovaks refer to the Munich Agreement as the Munich diktat (Czech: Mnichovský diktát; Slovak: Mníchovský diktát). The term “betrayal of Munich” (Czech: Mnichovská zrada; Slovak: Mníchovská zrada) is also used because Czechoslovakia`s military alliance with the France proved useless. This was also reflected in the fact that the French Government, in particular, had considered that Czechoslovakia would be held responsible for a European war that would result if the Czechoslovak Republic defended itself by force against German incursions. [59] In 1938, the Soviet Union was allied with France and Czechoslovakia. By September 1939, the Soviets were practically participating in the war against Nazi Germany, with Stalin fearing that a second Munich Agreement with the Soviet Union would replace Czechoslovakia. .
