Europe. France could not risk war with Germany
without British support; Britain could not afford
to contemplate war with Japan without the guar-
antee of American support unless driven into war
in defence of the territory of the empire and
Commonwealth. In Europe also, Britain could
only act defensively. Its air force, intended as a
deterrent, lagged behind the strength of the
German air force and so its deterrent value never
materialised. It did not even figure in Hitler’s cal-
culations: Germany made great efforts towards
self-sufficiency (autarky) under Göring’s Four-
Year Plan after 1936, though Hitler recognised
that, without conquests, self-sufficiency could not
be completely attained. Nevertheless, dependence
on foreign supplies was reduced and to that
extent the damage that a British blockade by sea
could inflict lessened. How then did Britain con-
ceive a war with Germany might be conducted so
that it would end in Germany’s defeat?
The one consistent military assumption that
the politicians in the British Cabinet made until
February 1939 was the extraordinary one that
Britain needed no large army to fight Germany
on the continent. Chamberlain, as chancellor of
the exchequer, argued that there was not enough
money to expand all three services and everyone,
except the chiefs of staff, agreed that the British
public would never accept that Britain should, as
in 1914–18, send an army of millions to France
and Belgium. The French realised that they could
not opt out of providing the land army to repel
Germany. All the heavy casualties would thus fall
on them. No wonder that in the circumstances
they sought to protect their depleted manhood
by reliance on the Maginot Line and felt bitter-
ness towards their British ally.
While the British and French service chiefs
were agreed that the most dangerous enemy
would be a rearmed Germany, their policy
towards Italy was never coordinated. When
France wanted to conciliate Mussolini in 1935,
Britain gave no backing and in January 1939 the
reverse occurred. British attention, moreover, and
French too, was not exclusively fixed on
Germany. From 1931 to 1933 Japanese aggres-
sion in Manchuria and the question of support for
the League of Nations occupied the attention of
the public and of governments. Alarm at
Germany’s growing armament was next diverted
by the Italian–Abyssinian war in 1935. Hitler was
singularly lucky at having these ‘diversions’
during his years of military preparations. In just
the same way the remilitarisation of the
Rhineland, Germany’s own ‘backyard’, soon came
to be overshadowed by the outbreak of the
Spanish Civil War. While Hitler incessantly
worked in his foreign relations to extend and
strengthen Germany, he was simultaneously
transforming the country from inside with
increasing emphasis on Nazi ideology and the
militarisation of the whole of society. German
women were admonished to ‘give’ the Führer
many babies, the soldiers of the future. The
Führer cultivated the image of the lone leader on
whom rested all the burdens of his people. He
was occasionally shown more humanly in the
company of children and dogs. But the existence
of his blonde mistress, Eva Braun, was one of the
best-kept secrets of the Third Reich.
The middle 1930s were years of feverish prepara-
tion for the great moment when Nazi Germany
would consummate Hitler’s revolution and estab-
lish the new racial order in Europe. The prepara-
tions were still taking place within the frontiers
of Germany, though party propaganda was reach-
ing out and spawning local parties not only in
Austria but as far afield as Latin America. Within
Germany, incessant propaganda was directed
against one arch-opponent in Nazi demonology,
the Jews. Despite widespread anti-Semitism
Hitler felt he had to move with caution so as not
to arouse sympathy for the Jews: many good
‘Aryans’ knew at least ‘one good’ Jew. The Jews
were bewildered. Many saw themselves as patri-
otic Germans, tied to German culture, and
thought the Hitler phenomenon was a passing
madness. The tide of emigration was slow. They
could transfer only a fraction of their possessions
out of the country. Opportunities of earning a
living abroad were restricted, and the language
and customs were strange. Most German Jews
hung on. Despite all the discrimination against
them they continued to enjoy the protection of
the law from common violence. By and large they
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