: .. former ambassador to Rome Ulrich von Hassell
pleaded with Olga Göring to get her brother to listen to him;
she phoned Hermann, and he could hear that she was crying.
Von Hassell begged the field marshal to intervene for peace.
“Weizsäcker has just spoken to me. He says that Ribbentrop will
be the gravedigger of the Third Reich.” To rub it in, he added,
“Carinhall will go up in flames!” Hassell reported that he had
learned from Henderson how Ribbentrop had described the
Sixteen Points as überholt.
“They are only überholt,” thundered Göring “if and when
no Polish negotiator comes.”
“I’ll tell Henderson !”
“ but one must come at once.”
Göring persuaded Lipski to see Dahlerus. The Pole seemed
past caring. “A revolution will take place within a week in Ger-
many,” Lipski confidently predicted. “And we are strong
enough to take on Germany.”
The FA heard Dahlerus phoning No. Downing Street
about this at midday. Although the Sixteen Points were “ex-
tremely liberal,” waffled the Swede, Ambassador Lipski was re-
jecting them out of hand. “My government will not budge,”
Lipski had said.
Just before : .. the OKW teleprinters issued the ex-
ecutive order for White to the commanders in chief. Göring re-
ceived it out at Kurfürst. He summoned an immediate Ministe-
rial Defense Council (a body set up by Hitler by special decree
on the thirtieth). He was convinced that he had eliminated the
risk of British intervention. “[Martin] Bormann optimistic,” re-
corded Staatssekretär Herbert Backe after this secret session.
Göring says things look good. The Poles wanted to
play for time, we are inflexible. Decision in twenty-