Wars do not start out so easily - there must be reasons for war. In addition to reasons, there must be pretexts: you must explain why you are forced to fight.
Any big war begins with the aggressor checking whether he can go unpunished? It is one thing to talk about "living space" and demand the unification of Germans in Greater Germany, another thing to try in practice. For "practice" you can get it on the head.
Hitler's national revolution from the very beginning came into conflict with the policy of the victors in the First World War.
After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Austria began the life of an independent nation-state. Involuntarily. The Austrian Germans did not want to be separate from Germany. On October 30, 1918, in Vienna, the Provisional National Assembly decided to annex Austria to the rest of Germany. But the victorious powers banned reunification - the Anschluss. They did not want to strengthen Germany.
On September 10, 1919, Austria signed the Saint-Germain Peace Treaty with the British Empire, France, USA, Japan and Italy. Article 88 of the treaty explicitly prohibited the Anschluss.
In Austria, there was the same sluggish civil war as in Germany. Even sharper, because there were more political forces: communists, social democrats, fascists, national socialists. The Social Democrats, Fascists and Nazis had armed organizations no worse than the Rot Front and fought each other. Losses are called different - from 2-3 thousand people to 50 thousand.
Chancellor of Austria Engelbert Dollfuss
In 1933, the new Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, a Catholic and a pro-fascist, banned the communist and Nazi parties and disbanded the armed formations of the Social Democrats "Schutzbund". He increased the number of the armed formations of the fascists, "Heimver", up to 100 thousand people, dissolved parliament and proclaimed an "authoritarian system of government" modeled on Mussolini's Italy. He crushed the communists and social democrats with an armed hand, and at the same time signed the Rome Protocols, declaring the creation of the Italy-Austria-Hungary axis.
On July 25, 1934, the Nazis assassinate the Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss. In a number of cities, armed groups of the Nazis appear, demanding the "Anschluss".
And then Mussolini hastily mobilizes four divisions, orders them to approach the border, to the Brenner Pass. The Italians are ready to go to help the Austrian government. Mussolini is counting on the support of Great Britain and France - but these powers have done absolutely nothing.
Mussolini speaks to the press: “The German Chancellor has repeatedly promised to respect the independence of Austria. But the events of recent days have clearly shown whether Hitler intends to uphold his rights before Europe. You cannot approach with ordinary moral standards a person who, with such cynicism, tramples on the elementary laws of decency."
Tellingly, the prospect of a war with Italy was quite enough for Hitler to retreat and not send troops to Austria. Without German support, the coup failed.
Mussolini Benito
That all changed when Italy launched a war against Ethiopia in October 1935. The West has been protesting: since November 1935, all members of the League of Nations (except the United States) have undertaken to boycott Italian goods, refuse loans to the Italian government, and prohibit the import of strategic materials into Italy. And Germany supports Italy.
On May 8, 1936, in connection with the victory in Ethiopia, Mussolini proclaimed the second birth of the Roman Empire. King Victor Emmanuel III assumed the title of Emperor of Ethiopia. The West does not recognize these seizures. You never know that India is ruled by the Viceroy as a possession of Britain! This is possible for Britain, but for some Italy it is impossible. Hitler supports the idea of a second Roman Empire and sends his congratulations.
Mussolini absolutely does not want the Communists to win the Spanish Civil War. He sends serious help to General Franco - people, planes, money, equipment. Hitler is also fighting in Spain. Since 1936, the rapprochement between Mussolini and Hitler begins.
True, after that Mussolini had to be persuaded for a long time. On January 4, 1937, Mussolini refuses to recognize the Anschluss in negotiations with Goering. He declares that he will not tolerate any changes in the Austrian question.
Applause to Hitler in the Reichstag after the announcement of the Anschluss between Germany and Austria. By annexing Austria, Hitler received a strategic foothold for the capture of Czechoslovakia and a further offensive in Southeast Europe and the Balkans, sources of raw materials, manpower and military production. As a result of the Anschluss, the territory of Germany increased by 17%, the population - by 10% (by 6, 7 million people). The Wehrmacht included 6 divisions formed in Austria. Berlin, March 1938.
Only on November 6, 1937, Benito Mussolini said he was "tired of defending the independence of Austria." But even after that, Mussolini is trying to prevent the creation of "Greater Germany". Again, no specific statements were made by the UK or France. Italy again confronts Germany alone … And the international situation has changed.
Hitler is now confident that Italy will not go to war over Austria. On March 12, 1938, the 200,000-strong army of the Third Reich crosses the Austrian border. The West was silent again. The USSR proposes to "discuss the Austrian question" in the League of Nations. The answer is silence. Do not want.
The problem of the Sudetenland
According to the Treaty of Saint Germain, Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia were recognized as parts of a new country - Czechoslovakia. But Czechoslovakia is not one, but three countries: the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Carpathossia. In addition, many Poles live in the Tenishev region in northern Czechoslovakia. There are many Germans in the Sudetenland. Many Hungarians live in Carpatho-Russia. In the era of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, this did not matter, but now it does.
The Hungarians wanted to join Hungary. Poles - to Poland. Slovaks wanted to have their own state. It was most calm in Carpatho-Russia, but there were many supporters of leaving under Hungary: Hungary has long-standing ties with Transcarpathian Rus, since the time of Galician Rus.
In fact, Czechoslovakia is the empire of the Czechs. There were fewer street fights than in Germany and Austria, but there was also a sluggish civil war in that country.
Since 1622, the Czech lands were part of the Austrian Empire. In the Sudetenland, Germans predominate. They want to enter Germany, and Hitler supports them.
The Czechoslovak authorities banned the National Socialist Party (NSDAP). But then the Sudeten-German party appeared. At its congress in Karloni Vari in April 1938, this party demanded the broadest autonomy, up to the right to secede from Czechoslovakia and join Germany.
The Nazis cannot refuse to annex the Sudetenland: they will not be understood either in Germany or in the Sudetenland. Millions of Germans are closely watching their policies. They want a national revolution.
But as soon as the Nazis enter Czechoslovakia, Britain and France will start a war with it. After all, these countries are the guarantors of the independence of Czechoslovakia.
… And then something amazing happens: the countries of the West themselves are persuading Czechoslovakia to capitulate. In April 1918, at a Franco-British meeting, Chamberlain said that if Germany wanted to occupy Czechoslovakia, he saw no means to prevent her from doing so.
In August 1938, the British Commissioner Lord Runciman and the US Ambassador to Germany G. Wilson arrived in Prague. They persuade the government of Czechoslovakia to agree with the transfer of the Sudetenland to the Third Reich.
At a meeting with Hitler in September in Bertechsgaden, Chamberlain agreed to Hitler's demands. Together with French Prime Minister Daladier, they persuade Prime Minister Benes to agree to the dismemberment of the country.
In September 1938, the French government declares that it is unable to fulfill allied obligations to Czechoslovakia. Hitler, on September 26, declares that the Third Reich will destroy Czechoslovakia if it does not accept his terms.
All this is against the background of the German revolt in the Sudetenland and the uprisings of the Slovaks that had already begun on September 13, 1938.
A Sudeten woman, unable to hide her emotions, humbly greets the triumphant Hitler, who is a serious tragedy for millions of people who were forcibly forced into "Hitlerism" and at the same time keep "submissive silence."
The Munich Agreement of September 29-30, 1938 only crowns these efforts of the Western countries.
During these two days in Munich Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler and Mussolini agreed on everything. Without the participation of the Czechoslovak government, they signed an agreement on the transfer of the Sudetenland region to Germany, the Cieszyn region to Poland and Transcarpathian Rus to Hungary. They obliged the Czechoslovak state to satisfy the claims against it within three months. France and Britain acted as guarantors of the "new borders of the Czechoslovak state."
The consequences are obvious. Already on October 1, the Third Reich introduces troops to Czechoslovakia. Slovakia is instantly seperated. On October 2, Poland introduces troops into the Teshin region, and the Hungarians begin the occupation of Transcarpathia. Since then, the National District of the Carpathians has been part of Hungary.
Soon the Nazis took over the rest of the Czech Republic, proclaiming the creation of a "protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia." They are trying to return to the times of the Austrian-German occupation of the country and begin its systematic Germanization. Hitler declares that some of the Czechs are Aryans, they need to be Germanized, and the rest must be destroyed. On what grounds to Germanize and destroy, he does not specify. Goebbels suggests that blondes should be Germanized, and brunettes should be destroyed … Fortunately for the Czechs, this strong idea remains a theory, in practice it is not applied.
On March 13, an independent Slovak state emerges in Slovakia under the leadership of Tiso. It declares itself to be an ally of the Third Reich.
The Benes government is fleeing abroad. Until the end of the war, it is in London.
Why?!
In the USSR, the Munich Agreement was explained very simply: the Anglo-American and French bourgeoisie conspired with Hitler to incite him against the USSR.
In France, the Munich shame was explained by a lack of strength.
In Britain, the reluctance to shed British blood because of the Czechs.
There is some truth in the latter: after the implausible, monstrous losses of the First World War, Western countries are trying to avoid any military clashes. The idea of "appeasing the aggressor" even at the cost of "surrendering" the allies in Eastern Europe seems to them more attractive than war.
- The British! I brought you the world! shouts Chamberlain as he descends the plane on his return to Britain.
Churchill said on this occasion that Chamberlain wanted to avoid war at the cost of shame, but received both shame and war. Fair enough, because the Munich Treaty of 1938 became a kind of mandate to redistribute the world. It could not have taken place if it were not for the psychological consequences of the First World War and its implausible losses.
But there are two more simple, completely rational reasons.
In the story of the partition of Czechoslovakia, everything is completely different from what we were taught. The Third Reich does not act as an aggressor at all, but as a fighter for justice. Hitler wants to unite all Germans … He performs the same task that Garibaldi and Bismarck performed. Hitler rescues the Germans who do not want to live in a foreign state, in Czechoslovakia.
But Czechoslovakia is an empire! The Czechs in it impose their language and their rules on the Slovaks, Germans, Poles, Carpathians. This strange state has no long tradition. It has a very distant relationship to the Bohemian Kingdom of the Middle Ages. It arose only in 1918, on the wreckage of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, on the money of another empire - the Russian one.
In December 1919, the Bolsheviks set a condition for the command of the Czechoslovak Corps: they would release the Czechs with all the gold of the Russian Empire, with all the loot …
Such a state did not command much respect and was devoid of legitimacy in the eyes of the West.
The second reason is that the Nazis are revolutionaries and socialists. This was highly appreciated in France, a country with a long tradition of the socialist movement. In the same year 1919, the French corps had to be withdrawn from the south of Russia, because the Bolsheviks were very active in agitating it.
Let me remind you that the Munich Agreement was signed by the same Edouard Daladier, who personally presented the gold medal to Leni Riefenstahl. For the documentary "Triumph of the Will".
In general, the position of the Third Reich and Hitler seemed in the West both more attractive and even nobler than the position of Czechoslovakia and Beneš.
The position of the USSR
The USSR is on the side of poor Czechoslovakia. On September 21, he raises the "Czechoslovak question" in the League of Nations. The League of Nations is silent.
Then, on the instructions of the Soviet government, the head of the Czech communists K. Gottwald conveyed to President Be-nesh: if Czechoslovakia begins to defend itself and asks for help, the USSR will come to its aid.
Noble? Beautiful? Probably … But how could the USSR imagine such "help"? The USSR did not have a common border with Czechoslovakia at that time. In this case, Gottwald clarifies: the USSR will come to the rescue even if Poland and Romania refuse to let the Soviet troops pass.
If Benes agreed, it could be like this …
The Third Reich strikes, introduces troops. The Czechoslovak army is trying to stop the aggressor. Naturally, Poland and Romania do not allow Soviet troops to pass through. Soviet troops enter Poland and Romania … If they do not even reach Czechoslovakia, but get bogged down in a war with these countries, a hotbed of war will arise. Moreover, as the future has shown, the Western world is ready to stand up for Poland's freedom.
Done: World War II has begun, with the West joining the Third Reich against the USSR.
The second option: Soviet troops instantly crushed the Polish units, reached the borders of Czechoslovakia … Yes, just in time for the Slovak state, which is not at all eager to become one of the Soviet republics. And the Nazi tankers are already pulling the levers, aiming the gun barrels …
Moreover, in this case, the West is on Hitler's side
In general, the most disastrous option for starting a war. There are two possible assumptions:
1) Stalin understood from the very beginning that he would be refused. The noble gesture will remain in the memory of the peoples as a noble gesture.
2) Stalin hoped that at first all the participants in the events would get bogged down in the war and bleed each other. After all, it is not at all necessary to fulfill the allied duty right now … While diplomatic squabbles still go on, until the noble position of the USSR is brought to the whole world …
Czechoslovakia will begin to resist, and it is "in danger" of war with the Third Reich, and with Poland, and with Hungary … And the communists in all these countries immediately begin to fight both with an external enemy and with their governments.
A bloody mess, where you can't make out anything … And in a month or two nightmares on all the participants in the events will fall on the fresh Red Army …
