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REICH TAKES OVER SLOVAKIA; PUTS MILITARY IN CONTROL (8/19/39)
Microfiche-New York Times archives, McHenry Library, U.C. Santa Cruz | 8/19/39 | Jerzy Szapiro, Guido Enderis, John Gunther

Posted on 08/19/2009 5:24:48 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson

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TOPICS: History
KEYWORDS: milhist; realtime
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If you would like to be added to or deleted from the Real Time +/- 70 Years ping list, send me a freepmail. You can also search for these articles by the keyword realtime, going back to the first one on January 27, 2008. These articles are posted on the 70th anniversary of their original publication date. See my profile for additional information.
1 posted on 08/19/2009 5:24:49 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
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To: Homer_J_Simpson
On August 19 - another fateful day – orders to sail were issued to the German Navy. Twenty-one submarines were directed to put out for positions north and northwest of the British Isles, the pocket battleship Graf Spee to depart for waters off the Brazilian coast and her sister ship, the Deutschland, to take a position athwart the British sea lanes in the North Atlantic.

William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

2 posted on 08/19/2009 5:27:38 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

During this entire time, FDR pretty much had his finger up his a==.


3 posted on 08/19/2009 5:30:30 AM PDT by steven33442
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To: Homer_J_Simpson
THE NAZI-SOVIET TALKS: AUGUST 15-21, 1939 (Part 5)

August 19 was the decisive day. Orders for the German submarines and pocket battleships to sail for British waters were being held up until word came from Moscow. The warships would have to get off at once if they were to reach their appointed stations by Hitler’s target date for the beginning of the war, September 1 – only thirteen days away. The two great army groups designated for the onslaught on Poland would have to be deployed immediately.

The tension in Berlin and especially on the Obersalzberg, where Hitler and Ribbentrop waited nervously for Moscow’s decision, was becoming almost unbearable. The Foreign Office dispatches and memoranda that day disclosed the jittery feelings in the Wilhelmstrasse. Dr. Schnurre reported that the discussions with the Russians on the trade agreement had ended the previous evening “with complete agreement” but that the Soviets were stalling on signing it. The signature, he said, was to have taken place at noon this day, August 19, but at noon the Russians had telephoned saying they had to await instructions from Moscow. “It is obvious,” Schnurre reported, “that they have received instructions from Moscow to delay the conclusion of the treaty for political reasons.” From Obersalzberg, Ribbentrop wired Schulenburg “most urgent” to be sure to report anything Molotov said or any sign of “Russian intentions” by telegram, but the only wire received from the ambassador during the day was the text of a denial by Tass, the Soviet news agency, in Moscow that the negotiations between the Russian and Anglo-French military delegations had become snarled over the Far East. However, the Tass dementi added that there were differences between the delegations on “entirely different matters.” This was a signal to Hitler that there was still time – and hope.

And then at 7:10 P.M. on August 19 came the anxiously awaited telegram:

SECRET

MOST URGENT

The Soviet Government agree to the Reich Foreign Minister coming to Moscow one week after the announcement of the signature of the economic agreement. Molotov stated that if the conclusion of the economic agreement is made public tomorrow, the Reich Foreign Minister could arrive in Moscow on August 26 or 27.

Molotov handed me a draft of a nonaggression pact.

A detailed account of the two conversations I had with Molotov today, as well as the text of the Soviet draft, follows by telegram at once.

SCHULENBURG

The first talk in the Kremlin, which began at 2 P.M. on the nineteenth and lasted an hour, did not, the ambassador reported, go very well. The Russians, it seemed, could not be stampeded into receiving Hitler’s Foreign Minister. “Molotov persisted in his opinion,” Schulenburg wired, “that for the present it was not possible even approximately to fix the time of the journey since thorough preparations would be required . . . To the reasons I repeatedly and very emphatically advanced for the need of haste, Molotov rejoined that, so far, not even the first step – the concluding of the economic agreement – had been taken. First of all, the economic agreement had to be signed and published, and achieve its effect abroad. Then would come the turn of the nonaggression pact and protocol.

“Molotov remained apparently unaffected by my protests, so that the first conversation closed with a declaration by Molotov that he had imparted to me the views of the Soviet Government and had nothing to add to them.”

But he had something, shortly.

“Hardly half an hour after the conversation had ended,” Schulenburg reported, “Molotov sent me word asking me to call on him again at the Kremlin at 4:30 P.M. He apologized for putting me to the trouble and explained that he had reported to the Soviet Government.”

Whereupon the Foreign Commissar handed the surprised but happy ambassador a draft of the nonaggression pact and told him that Ribbentrop could arrive in Moscow on August 26 or 27 if the trade treaty were signed and made public tomorrow.

“Molotov did not give reasons,” Schulenburg added in his telegram, “for his sudden change of mind. I assume that Stalin intervened.”

The assumption was undoubtedly correct. According to Churchill, the Soviet intention to sign a pact with Germany was announced to the Politburo by Stalin on the evening of August 19. [Hmm. Excerpts now citing one another. – Homer] A little earlier that day – between 3 P.M. and 4:30 P.M. – it is clear from Schulenburg’s dispatch, he had communicated his fateful decision to Molotov.

Exactly three years later, in August 1942, “in the early hours of the morning,” as Churchill later reported, the Soviet dictator gave to the British Prime Minister, then on a mission to Moscow, some of the reasons for his brazen move.

We formed the impression [said Stalin] that the British and French Governments were not resolved to go to war if Poland were attacked, but that they hoped the diplomatic line-up of Britain, France and Russia would deter Hitler. We were sure it would not. “How many divisions,” Stalin had asked, “will France send against Germany on mobilization?” The answer was: “About a hundred,” He then asked: “How many will England sent?” The answer was: “Two, and two more later.” “Ah, two, and two more later,” Stalin had repeated, “Do you know,” he asked, “how many divisions we shall have to put on the Russian front if we go to war with Germany?”” There was a pause. “More than three hundred.”

In his dispatch reporting the outcome of his conversations with Molotov on August 19, Schulenburg had added that his attempt to induce the Foreign Commissar to accept an earlier date for Ribbentrop’s journey to Moscow “was, unfortunately, unsuccessful.”

But for the Germans it had to be made successful. The whole timetable for the invasion of Poland, indeed the question of whether the attack could take place at all in the brief interval before the autumn rains, depended upon it. If Ribbentrop were not received in Moscow before August 26 or 27 and then if the Russians stalled a bit, as the Germans feared, the target date of September 1 could not be kept.

William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

4 posted on 08/19/2009 5:30:56 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: r9etb; PzLdr; dfwgator; Paisan; From many - one.; rockinqsranch; GRRRRR; 2banana; henkster; ...
Developments in Europe – 1
Arms Pact Signed – 1-3
Budapest Premier Incurs Nazi Wrath – 4
Reich Authorities Charged by Poles – 5
Danzig Nazi Says ‘We Want to Fight’ – 5
Reich Holds Time for Words is Past – 6
Reich Move Likely, London is Informed – 6
Danzig Crisis Held Preliminary To Reich Showdown With Britain – 7
French Now Plan 8,000 War Planes – 8
Fish’s Plan Diluted by Oslo Congress – 8

On the evening of August 19 Stalin announced to the Politburo his intention to sign a pact with Germany.

Winston S. Churchill, The Gathering Storm

German fleet update at reply #2.
Nazi-Soviet pact update at reply #4.

5 posted on 08/19/2009 5:33:09 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

????????????????????????????

6 posted on 08/19/2009 5:37:24 AM PDT by SampleMan (Socialism enslaves you & kills your soul.)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

This move certainly removed any doubt that Hitler not only wanted Danzig and The Corridor and the former German territories, but to occupy all of Poland, and to wipe her off the map. The Poles knew that concessions were meaningless.


7 posted on 08/19/2009 6:09:27 AM PDT by dfwgator
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To: SampleMan

He’s too short to invade! Geez.


8 posted on 08/19/2009 6:22:51 AM PDT by PIF
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

With the commitment in secret for the Hitler-Stalin Pact on this day, tens of millions of innocent people were as good as dead. You might say they were ‘shovel-ready’.


9 posted on 08/19/2009 6:36:43 AM PDT by Lucius Cornelius Sulla ("men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters." -- Edmund Burke)
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To: Lucius Cornelius Sulla
You might say they were ‘shovel-ready’.

Thank goodness our government today doesn't have a "secret protocol."

10 posted on 08/19/2009 6:53:28 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: steven33442
During this entire time, FDR pretty much had his finger up his a==.

I don't know what more he could have done to influence the course of events. The U.S. was a potential super power at the time. The actualization was a few years off.

11 posted on 08/19/2009 6:56:31 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: Homer_J_Simpson
Thank goodness our government today doesn't have a "secret protocol."

Want to bet on that?

12 posted on 08/19/2009 6:58:53 AM PDT by Lucius Cornelius Sulla ("men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters." -- Edmund Burke)
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/holocaust/filmmore/reference/primary/index.html


13 posted on 08/19/2009 7:03:07 AM PDT by steven33442
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To: Homer_J_Simpson
Contrary to what we think today, the whole world knew in 1939 that war was coming soon.
14 posted on 08/19/2009 8:13:23 AM PDT by 2banana (My common ground with terrorists - they want to die for islam and we want to kill them)
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To: 2banana; dfwgator

I think everyone knew war was coming, but there were still people in denial. Look at John Gunther’s article datelined from Riga. In the article he mentions that Poland is ready to fight, but those comments are always juxtaposed with the comments that “Hitler has miscalculated Polish resolve” or words to that effect.

It appears that Gunther, based on the “informed sources from the region,” was taking the line that all the saber-rattling over Danzig was a bluff on Hitler’s part. It’s an assumption that Hitler didn’t really want to go war. Today, we all know that Hitler did indeed want to go to war; he insisted on it. What Homer hasn’t posted yet from “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” were Hitler’s FEARS at this time of another “Munich.” Yes, he actually was afraid he’d be coerced to the bargaining table. Even if a Polish Munich handed him all the territorial concessions he demanded of Poland, he still would not have gotten what he wanted. He wanted a war. He got one.

By the way, these articles show why Hitler was so successful; with one notable exception, nobody had a clear read on the man. Everything he said was so bombastic that it was dismissed as bombast. But it was all really true. He even fooled Stalin right up to June 22, 1941. Stalin, in his paranoia, as far as I know, only trusted one person. He trusted the last person on earth he should have trusted; Adolf Hitler. The exception was Winston Churchill; he saw right through Hitler from the beginning.

What’s scary is that today, we have bombastic loons like Chavez, Kim Jong Il and Achmedinijah who act the same way. Bombast, or statements of true intent? You make the call.


15 posted on 08/19/2009 9:30:53 AM PDT by henkster (The frog has noticed the increase in water temperature)
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To: henkster
What Homer hasn’t posted yet from “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” were Hitler’s FEARS at this time of another “Munich.”

My difficulty is deciding what excerpts to post and what to pass on. I could post many pages for each day during the last half of August. I don't because I don't have time to transcribe it all and, even if I did, it would not serve the readers to make all those really long posts. So I try to include enough to give an idea of what is going on behind the news articles without going overboard. I just read a section from August 26, for example where Mussolini and Hitler exchange communicaitons. Il Duce is hoping for another "Munich" while Der Fuerhrer tries to get it though his erstwhile ally's head that a peaceful settlement is not part of the program. I do not plan to post that section.

I recommend that anyone interested in the origins of the war get a copy of "Rise and Fall" if you haven't read it. It is a real pot-boiler.

16 posted on 08/19/2009 10:36:55 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: Homer_J_Simpson

so you know, I look forward to this ping everyday.


17 posted on 08/19/2009 12:25:11 PM PDT by VaRepublican (I would propagate taglines but I don't know how.)
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To: VaRepublican
so you know, I look forward to this ping everyday.

I appreciate it. Now I have to figure out a way to squeeze in a trip to the library soon so the world doesn't end on October 20 when my material runs out.

18 posted on 08/19/2009 1:01:02 PM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: VaRepublican

Just wait until the 24th when the Non-Agression Pact announcement is announced. I’m really looking forward to reading the comments on that day.


19 posted on 08/19/2009 2:32:19 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: dfwgator

I got decent grades in history and passed 101 and 102 but this is great stuff, a day by day account I just hope the times is reporting from a non biased viewpoint. Is rise and fall reallty that good?


20 posted on 08/19/2009 2:41:19 PM PDT by VaRepublican (I would propagate taglines but I don't know how.)
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