out. On September , Hitler revealed to him and the other
commanders in chief his intention of invading France as soon as
possible. Göring brought Dahlerus to see Hitler the same day,
then sent the Swede straight to London with details of the Ger-
man offer. For three days, from the twenty-eighth to the thirti-
eth, the Swede was closely questioned by Cadogan, Halifax, and
then Chamberlain in person. (Birger Dahlerus, curiously, con-
cealed from the British that Hitler himself was behind the offer:
Perhaps Hitler did not want to lose face.) The British position
remained unchanged. They would not, they said, trust the word
of Germany’s “present leaders”; and they wanted guarantees
about the future.
Göring quaked as each day passed, lest Hitler order Yellow
the assault on France to begin. The Luftwaffe’s easy baptism
by fire in Poland had not concealed from him the inherent un-
readiness of his air force for serious war. Above all, the all-
important Ju standard bomber was still not in mass produc-
tion.
Accordingly, when William R. Davis, the American oilman,
arrived from Washington with his curious message from Roose-
velt, Göring paid close attention to him. He sent Wohlthat to
hear Davis out first, on October . Davis suggested that Roose-
velt hoped to appear in his coming presidential-election cam-
paign as the “angel of peace”; he had undertaken, in conversa-
tion with him, to restore Germany to her frontiers and
colonies, and to grant economic aid as well. Göring discussed
this alleged proposal with Hitler, then handed to the American
emissary a signed list of Germany’s peace terms, to disclose only
to Roosevelt. Orally, he added that the Reich was willing to re-
store independent governments to Poland and Czechoslovakia.
Davis departed, carrying this portentous document to Wash-
ington. It has since vanished, but he told the Des Moines Regis-