NAZIS’ PICTURE OF EVENTS

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 2, 27 September 1939, Page 10

NAZIS’ PICTURE OF EVENTS

Pre-War Negotiations

DOCUMENTS IGNORE VITAL FACTS

Misleading The Germans

(British Official Wireless.)

RUGBY, September 25.

The German Foreign Office has published a short collection of diplomatic documents on the “Last Phase of the German-Polish Crisis.” The documents exclude any account of the interviews between Sir Nevile Henderson and Herr Hitler on August 23, 25, 28 and 29, or between Sir Nevile. Henderson and Herr von Ribbentrop on the night of August 30-31. It might have been interesting to have had the German accounts of these interviews. It is obvious that readers will have no means of appreciating the documents’ significance or of getting a true picture of events.

A comparison of the German publication and two British publications shows that 15 out of the 26 documents, which is all the former contains, were among the total of 130 made public by the British Government, while the German Foreign Office has omitted a number of documents recording facts of great importance.

Sir Nevile Henderson’s records o£ the interviews on August 23, 25, 28, 20, 30 and 31 were one of the most interesting sections of the second British White Paper, revealing, as they did, the violent and menacing language used by Herr Hitler and Herr von Ribbentrop. Points Concealed. Readers of the German documents who had no access to the fuller British publication would be unaware, for example, that the British Government protested at once against the German demand for the arrival of a Polish plenipotentiary in Berlin to receive and accept the German demands by midnight, August 30. They would not know that the German Government, while insisting on August 29 that this demand was not an ultimatum, stated at midnight on August 30 that it regarded its proposals as already rejected because the demand for the arrival of a Polish plenipotentiary had not been accepted.

It would have been concealed from t hem that the German Government refused absolutely repeated suggestions made by Britain and accepted by Poland that the Polish-German negotiations should take an ordinary form, that is, that any German proposals should be given to the Polish Ambassador for transmission to his Government, and that at midnight on August 30 Herr von Ribbentrop refused to give Ihe British Ambassador a -written communication stating the German proposals or to suggest to the Polish Government any method of negotiation other than that of facing a Polish plenipotentiary and being unwilling to listen to Polish counter-proposals.

Clumsy Method. Again, later in the introduction there is a clumsy attempt by the omission of dates and times to give the impression that on August 30 Sir Nevile Henderson was given the German proposals, which were explained, to him in detail. In fact', on the night of August 30-31, Herr von Ribbentrop's method of explanation was, in Sir •Nevile Henderson’s own words, ‘’to lead out a lengthy document in German at top speed.” Herr von Ribbentrop refused to give Sir Nevile Henderson a copy of these proposals, adding that in any case lie considered the proposals—which the Polish Government had not seen—were rejected because the Polish plenipotentiary had not arrived to accept them en bloc before midnight. The proposals were not given to Sir Nevile Henderson until 9.15 p.m. on August 31, when the German Government again repeated that the proposals were rejected because the Polish Government had not agreed to what, in effect, was a German intention to obtain a dictated settlement in Berlin with a series of demands which the Polish plenipotentiary would have been expected to accept without consultation with his Government. British Guarantee. As a method of stating a case the procedure adopted by Herr von Ribbentrop has an obvious advantage so long as it is intended only for those who can be prevented from obtaining fuller information, but it is not likely to impress any who have access to the statements of both sides. The introduction to the German Foreign Office’s selection of documents is no less tendentious than the selection itself. It is implied that the British guarantee to Poland was given before the Polish rejection of the German oiler in March, 1939. In fact, the British guarantee was not offered to Poland until after these terms had been refused by the Polish Government as incompatible with Polish independence. A correspondent of the Italian newspaper “Stampa” says that .Sovietism is being applied with lightning speed in

CONTRABAND CONTROL

Rules Of International Law (British ODicial Wireless.) RUGBY, September 25. The sinking by German submarines of Swedish and Finnish merchantmen recalls similar sinkings of neutral shipping in the last war, when the Central Powers sank about 1700 neutral ships. It was then sought to justify these actions on the ground that the cargoes carried in these vessels were contraband and that to have taken them to a German port in order to bring them before a prize court would have endangered the submarines.

In general, the rules of international law about the seizure of a neutral ship carrying contraband are quite plain. Belligerent vessels may search her and if there is good reason to think i hat the cargo includes certain contraband they may take her to port, for judgment. According to the British rule, if the captain cannot take her to port he must abandon her.