Historical Review: Journal
Historical Review: Journal
Historical Review: Journal
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3
c , Historical Review
Special Issue
ROOSEVELT AND
WAR IN EUROPE
1938-40
Origins and Interventions
Mark Weber
President Roosevelt 's Campaign
To Incite War in Europe:
The Secret Polish Documents
Tyler Kent
The Roosevelt legacy
and The Kent Case
David L. Hoggan
President Roosevelt and
The Origins of The 1939 War
- - - - - - --
ROOSEVELT AND
WAR IN EUROPE
1938-40
Origins and Interventions
President Roosevelt's Campaign To Incite War In Europe:
The Secret Polish Documents by Mark Weber
The Roosevelt Legacy and The Kent Case by Tyler Kent
President Roosevelt and The Origins of
The 1939 War by David L. Hoggan
The Journal of Historical Review
is published quarterly by the
INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL REVIEW
Thomas J. Marcellus, Director
Keith Stimely, Editor
EDITORIAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE
DR. WALTER B. ALLENDE DR. MARTIN A. LARSON
University of Buenos Aires The Spotlight, Washington, D.C.
DR. AUSTIN J. APP DR. WILLIAM B. LINDSEY
La Salle College, Phila. (Ret.) DR. JAMES J. MARTIN
DR. GEORGE ASHLEY Institute for Historical Review
History Instructor DR. REVILO P. OLIVER
Los Angeles Unified School District University of Illinois, Urbana
JOHN BENNETT DR. WILHELM STAEGLICH
Victorian Council for Civil Liberties Retired Judge, West Germany
Melbourne, Australia
UDO WALENDY
DR. ARTHUR R. BUTZ Verlag fur Volkstum and
Northwestern University, Evanston, Ill. Zeitgeschichtsforschung
DR. ROBERT FAURISSON Vlotho/Weser, West Germany
University of Lyon-2, France DR. CHARLES E. WEBER
DITLIEB FELDERER Former Head, Department of
Revisionist History Magazine Modern Languages
Taby, Sweden University of Tulsa, Oklahoma
PERCY L. GREAVES, Jr. DR. ANDREAS R. WESSERLE
Free Market Economist Marquette University
SAMUEL E. KONKIN I11 Milwaukee, Wisconsin (Ret.)
The New Libertarian, Long Beach, Cal.
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ist efforts, which slipped easily and not accidentally into obscurity, this
subject has been ignored and allowed to disappear into the murky
backwaters of a forgotten branch of the stream of history.
We hope to begin remedying this situation with this, the first "theme"
issue of The JHR. The subjects of the three essays presented here have
long deserved careful consideration. It is hoped that they will help to
stimulate more interest and new research in this particular topic. It is
certain that their importance cannot be ignored by honest and curious
historiography.
Mark Weber in "President Roosevelt's Campaign To Incite W a r in
Europe" explores the meaning and historical importance of Polish diple
matic documents which were captured by the Germans in Warsaw,
selections from which were published in the German press, in a White
Book and in other official or semi-official editions. These documents,
which bear heavily on the roles of Roosevelt a n d his ambassador-at-
large William C. Bullitt in encouraging strident AngleFrench-Polish
defiance of Germany's program for a peaceful revision of the unfair
Versailles territoriavethnological provisions, a r e of the utmost impor-
tance in understanding what Roosevelt was thinking, doing and trying to
do in Europe in the prelude to war. What emerges is a Roosevelt who
was no innocent bystander merely sending private, occasionally public,
messages of concern to European leaders from time to time, all in the
quest for peace. Instead the documents make clear the picture of a
Roosevelt actively meddling in European affairs a t every turn, promis-
ing, cajoling, threatening-all toward the vigorous promotion of a n
anti-German front, ultimately toward war. Though well known and
readily available, the documents have been ignored, downplayed, or
rejected by all mainstream historians, largely on account of their p u b
lished origination a s a German propagandistic "colored book." De-
nounced by American officials immediately upon release a s inauthen-
tic-forgeries concocted by the Germans-most historians have not
seen fit to question the official denials and look for themselves, with the
aid of much relevant evidence made available since the war, into the
matter of their authenticity. It is the signal contribution of Mark Weber
that he has uncovered and here marshals for the first time all the
evidence which points toward the documents being, in fact, authentic; in
his words, the question is now "beyond doubt." He goes beyond merely
demonstrating this, presenting lengthy selections from the documents
newly translated by himself [including some parts never before trans-
lated into English), and fitting their significance in to the overall context
of Roosevelt's policy. The conclusions presented in this well-rounded
and pathbreaking essay a r e clearly ones that historians of Roosevelt
foreign policy will not be able to ignore.
In "President Roosevelt and the Origins of the 1939 War," excerpted
from Der erzwungene Krieg by David L. Hoggan, we present for the first
time in English the pertinent conclusions reached in what after 22 years
remains the most thorough-and most radically revisionist-volume
ever published on the general subject of the war's origins. Dr. Hoggan's
treatment of Roosevelt in the book is incidental to his main theme, which
is German-Polish and AngleGerman relations and how and why these
led to war in 1939; his explication of Roosevelt's role in the crucial years
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
MARK WEBER
Media Sensation
man who lied to his own people and broke his own country's laws,
while the German government told the truth. To accept that
would be quite a lot to expect of any nation, but especially of the
trusting American public.
Comment from Capitol Hill generally echoed the official govern-
ment view. Senator Key Pittman, the Democratic Chairman of the
Foreign Relations Committee, called the documents "unmitigated
falsehood designed to create dissension in the United States."
Senator Claude Peper, Democrat of Florida, declared: "It's Ger-
man propaganda and shouldn't affect our policies in the least."
Only a few were not impressed with the official denials. Repre-
sentative Hamilton Fish of New york, the ranking Republican
member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, called for a
Congressional investigation and declared in a radio address: "If
these charges were true, it would constitute a treasonable act. If
President Roosevelt has entered into secret understandings or
commitments with foreign governments to involve us in war, he
should be impeached." 5
American newspapers stressed the high-level denials in re-
porting the release of the documents. The New York Times head-
line read: U.S. BRANDS AS FALSE NAZI DOCUMENTS CHARG-
ING WE FOSTERED WAR IN EUROPE AND PROMISED TO JOIN
ALLIES IF NEEDED. The Baltimore Sun headlined: NAZI DOCU-
MENTS LAYING WAR BLAME ON U.S. ARE ASSAILED IN
WASHINGTON.
Although the book of Polish documents was labeled "first
series," no further volumes ever appeared. From time to time the
German government would make public additional documents
from the Polish archives. These were published in book form in
1943 along with numerous other documents captured by the
Germans from the French Foreign Ministry and other European
archives, under the title Roosevelts Weg in den Krieg: Geheirn-
dokumente zur Kriegspolitik des Praesidenten der Vereinigten
Staaten ["Roosevelt's Way Into War: Secret Documents on the
War Policy of the President of the United States"].
A very important unanswered question is: Where are the orig-
inal Polish documents today? Unless they were destroyed in the
conflagration of the war, they presumably fell into either Amer-
ican or Soviet hands in 1945. In view of recent U.S. government
policy on secret archival material, it is very unlikely that they
would still be secret today if they had been acquired by the
United States. My guess is that if they were not destroyed, they
are now either in Moscow or at the East German Central State
Archives in Potsdam.
It is particularly important to keep in mind that these secret
reports were written by top level Polish ambassadors, that is, by
men who though not at all friendly to Germany nonetheless un-
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
The Documents
Here now are extensive excerpts from the Polish documents
themselves. They are given in chronological order. They are
remarkably lucid for diplomatic reports and speak eloquently for
themselves.
Europe or a t least limit the conflict that had broken out, Roosevelt
instructed his Ambassador with a "personal" and "strictly con-
fidential" telegram on 11 September 1939 that any American
peace effort was totally out of the question. The Roosevelt govern-
ment, it declared, "sees no opportunity nor occasion for any
peace move to be initiated by the President of the United States.
The people [sic] of the United States would not support any move
for peace initiated by this Government that would consolidate or
make possible a survival of a regime of force and aggression."34
It is now more than forty years since the events described here
took place. For many they are an irrelevant part of a best-forgot-
ten past. But the story of how Franklin Roosevelt engineered war
in Europe is very pertinent-particularly for Americans today.
The lessons of the past have never been more important than in
this nuclear age. For unless at least an aware minority under-
stands how and why wars are made, we will remain powerless to
restrain the warmongers of our own era.
series, Vol. VII (London, 19541, pp. 627-29, See also: Joseph P. Lash,
Roosevelt and Churchill 1939-1941 (New York: Norton, 1976), pp.
25-27; Dallek, pp. 164-65; Arnold A. Offner, America and the Ori:
gins of World War I1 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971), p. 61.
William Phillips, Ventures in Diplomacy (North Beverly, Mass.:
privately published, 1952), pp. 220-21.
Carl Burckhardt, Meine Danziger Mission 1937-1939 (Munich:
Callwey, 1960), p. 225.
Drew Pearson and Robert S. AUen, "Washington Daily Merry-Go-
Round," Washington Times-Herald, 14 April 1939, p, 16. A fac-
simile reprint of this column appears in Conrad Grieb (ed.), Amer-
ican Manifest Destiny and The Holocausts (New York: Examiner
Books, 1979), pp. 132-33. See also: Wirsing, pp. 238-41.
Jay P. Moffat, The Moffat Papers 1919-1943 (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1956), p. 232.
U.S., Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States
(Diplomatic Papers), 1939, General, Vol. I (Washington: 1956),
p. 122.
"Von Wiegand Says-," Chicago Herald-American, 8 October
1944, p. 2.
Edvard Benes, Memoirs of Dr. Eduard Benes (London: George Allen
& Unwin, 1954), pp. 79-80.
Lash, p. 64.
Hamilton Fish, FDR: The Other Side of the Coin (New York: Van-
tage, 1976; Torrance, Calif.: Institute for Historical Review, 1980),
p. 62.
James V. Forrestal (eds. Walter Millis and E.S. Duffield), The For-
restal Diaries (New York: Viking, 1951),pp. 121-22. I have been pri-
vately informed by a colleague who has examined the original
manuscript of the Forrestal diaries that many very critical refer-
ences to the Jews were deleted from the published version.
Jan Szembek, Journal 1933-1939 (Paris: Plon, 1952), pp. 475-76.
David E. Koskoff, Joseph P. Kennedy: A Life and Times (Englewood
Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974), p. 207; Moffat, p. 253; A.J.P. Tay-
lor, The Origins of the Second World War (London: Hamish Hamil-
ton, 1961; 2nd ed. Greenwich, Conn.: Fawcett Premier [paperback],
1965), p. 262; US., Department of State, Foreign Relations of the
United States, 1939, General, Vol. I (Washington: 1956), p. 355.
Dallek, p. 164.
Beschloss, pp. 190-91; Lash, p. 75; Koskoff, pp. 212-13.
Hull to Kennedy (No. 905), US., Department of State, Foreign Rela-
tions of the United States, 1939, General, Vol. I (Washington: 1956),
p. 424.
The Secret Polish Documents
Bibliography
Listed here a r e the published editions of the Polish documents, the
most important sources touching on the questions of their authenticity
and content, and essential recent sources on what President Roosevelt
was really-as opposed to publicly-doing and thinking during the
prelude to war. Full citations for all references in the article will be
found in the notes.
Beschloss, Michael R. Kennedy and Roosevelt. New York: Norton,
1980.
Bullitt, Orville H. (ed.). For the President: Personal and Secret. [Cor-
respondence between Franklin D. Roosevelt and William C. Bullitt.]
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1972.
Germany. Foreign Office Archive Commission. Roosevelts Weg in den
Krieg: Geheimdokumente z u r Kriegspolitik d e s Praesidenten d e r
Vereinigten Staaten. Berlin: Deutscher Verlag, 1943.
Germany. Foreign Office. The German White Paper. [White Book No.
3.1 New York: Howell, Soskin and Co., 1940.
Germany. Foreign Office. Polnische Dokumente zur Vorgeschichte des
Kriegs. [White Book No. 3.1 Berlin: F. Eher, 1940.
Koskoff, David E. Joseph P. Kennedy: A Life and Times. Englewood
Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974.
Lukasiewicz, Juliusz (Waclaw Jedrzejewicz, ed.). Diplomat in Paris
1936-1939. New York: Columbia University Press, 1970.
Wirsing, Giselher. Der masslose Kontinent: Roosevelts Kampf urn die
Weltherrschaft. Jena: E. Diederichs, 1942.
The Roosevelt Legacy
and The Kent Case
TYLER KENT
INTRODUCTION
In May 1940, a 29-year-old American code clerk a t the U.S.
embassy in London was arrested by British authorities in his
apartment. Tyler Kent was charged with having violated the
British Official Secrets Act. "For a purpose prejudicial to the
safety and interests of the state," the charge stated, Kent had
"obtained a document which might be directly or indirectly use-
ful to a n enemy." He was sentenced to seven years in prison, but
was released and returned to the United States after serving five.
Between June 1940 and December 1945, the Kent case was the
subject of numerous American newspaper articles. Most were
sensational or highly speculative, since reliable information was
hard to come by. (At the time, the British press was strictly
censored.) Many Americans wanted to know how a foreign gov-
ernment could secretly arrest and put on trial a U.S. citizen who
held diplomatic immunity. Congressmen and newspapers specu-
lated a s to what the code clerk really knew about rumored secret
arrangements between President Roosevelt and British leader
Winston Churchill. Many wondered if Kent had been jailed to
keep him from talking. But preoccupation with the war and
official government statements satisfied the curiosity of all but a
handful. When Kent returned to the United States in 1945 from
British imprisonment, almost all interest in the case had evapG
rated in the general euphoria of Allied military victory. For many
years the Kent story was virtually forgotten.
The passage of time and a more sober awareness of how
American presidents operate have encouraged new interest in
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
When Kent began work, war had already broken out in Europe.
U.S. law and overwhelming public sentiment seemed to insure
that America would avoid entanglement in the conflict. But from
his special vantage point in London, Kent quickly learned that
President Roosevelt was doing everything in his power to subvert
the law and deceive the people in order to get America into war.
Kent decided to make copies or summaries of diplomatic dis-
patches documenting Roosevelt's secret policies and somehow
bring them to the attention of sympathetic congressmen and
senators. And so he took the course that led to his untimely
arrest, briefly made him something of a celebrity, and cost him
five years in prison. As he puts it, he got "tangled up in history."
In fact he came very close to changing its course.
As code clerk, Kent intercepted hundreds of diplomatic dis-
patches between the embassies in Europe and the State Depart-
ment in Washington. He made verbatim copies of most of the
messages and paraphrased summaries of the rest. The most
important and incriminating of these was the top secret corre-
spondence between Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, which be-
gan with a letter from the President dated 11 September 1939.
Until 11 May 1940, Churchill was First Lord of the Admiralty
(or head of the British navy). Thus, the exchange of communica-
tions between him and Roosevelt until that date was highly ir-
regular because it took place behind the back of the head of the
British government, Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. Offi-
cially, heads of state communicate only with their counterpart
heads of state, and any communications otherwise are under-
stood to be for the ultimate attention of the counterpart head of
state. In the case of the Roosevelt-Churchill correspondence be-
fore 11 May 1940, not only was that exchange designed to be kept
secret from Prime Minister Chamberlain, it was indeed something
of a conspiracy against him. Churchill wanted to supplant Cham-
berlain, and Roosevelt himself desired this end. For this reason
the exchange was kept especially secret. Until he became Prime
Minister himself, Churchill signed his messages to Roosevelt sim-
ply, "Naval Person."
The public revelation of the mere existence of a secret Church-
ill-Roosevelt exchange behind Chamberlain's back would have
been highly embarrassing to both correspondents. But if Kent had
somehow succeeded in making the contents of the exchange
known to the American public, there would have been loud de-
mands for Roosevelt's impeachment.
Kent intercepted and made a complete copy of Churchill's
message to Roosevelt of 25 December 1939 (Telegram 2720) in
which Churchill informed the President that British warships
would continue to violate American sovereignty to seize German
ships within the U.S. three mile maritime territorial zone. How-
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
There are those who would have us believe that to dust off the
mildewed pages of history is an exercise in futility. Those espe-
cially believe this who consider the events of forty years ago
"ancient history." Many such persons are motivated by a wish to
conceal from the rest of us the relatively recent events which
have created the world as it is today. There can be no question
that the events which led to World War 11, and that war itself,
have shaped the lives of all of us alive now. In the United States,
the political figure who looms largest on the scene as creator,
through this war, of the world we live in today is of course
Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
During his unprecedented 12 years as President, he was the
arbiter of the fates of the hapless millions of his fellow citizens.
Roosevelt became President at the beginning of a severe depres-
sion which found millions of Americans without work or the
means of subsistence. Banks failed and factories shut their gates.
Roosevelt inaugurated what he touted as a "New Deal." It con-
sisted mainly of trying to solve the economic woes of the nation
with make-work projects financed out of the public treasury.
From previous administrations he had inherited a sound mone-
tary system and virtually no national debt. He could therefore
launch with impunity a policy of "spend and elect" as a perma-
nent feature of his administration.
Unfortunately, this deficit-financed, government-sponsored
program did not solve the problem of the Great Depression. As
The Roosevelt Legacy
rians no longer fear to tell the truth because of the menaces of the
Jewish Anti-Defamation League. In the meantime I am making use
of the incident to illustrate my contention that not all accurate
history is to be located in government files and archives. To aver
that it is so is to declare that governments do not lie-at least that
democratic governments do not. The fact is, while they may
possibly lie less often, and certainly less crudely, than the Bolshe-
viks, they nevertheless lie when it suits them to do so. One has
only to consider the case of the Potocki papers mentioned earlier.
The White House and the State Department declared them to be
forgeries. Today, all reputable historians recognize them to be
genuine.
What do Kimball and Bartlett know about the British plans to
invade Norway or about the manner in which the United States
government encouraged these plans on the grounds that some-
thing had to be done to raise the morale of allied troops in
garrisons whose unrelieved idleness might eventually lead to
insubordination and even mutiny? The "phony war" had been on
for over half a year. The British plan was to draw out the German
fleet for battle. Churchill and others believed that the best way to
do this would be to challenge the Germans in an open competition
to invade Norway. Churchill was typical of that breed of wartime
leaders who always fight the previous war. He had a fanatical
and absolute conviction that the British fleet could solve all of
Britain's problems if only the Germans could be induced to come
out and give battle. He was to be proven wrong in this as in so
much else.
The plan connived between Britain and the United States was
for the British to make overt and easily detectable plans for the
invasion of Norway. The United States diplomatic service would
assist in spreading the news all over Europe in such a way that
the Germans could not possibly fail to learn about it. The Ger-
mans did take the bait and organized their own expedition to take
Norway before the British could get there. There was a naval
engagement in the Skagerrak, the body of water which separates
Denmark from Norway, and a number of warships of Germany's
rather small navy were sunk. But not enough to prevent the
troopships from landing their contingents and taking over the
country while meeting very little resistance.
The United States' role in this British ploy was certainly not
consistent with neutrality either under domestic or international
legal definition. But Roosevelt had already told the American
public that they were not required to be "neutral in thought." So
perhaps the diplomatic service was authorized to be one jump
ahead of the public and to be un-neutral in deed as well. I do not
know of any actual written instructions on record. By this, I mean
direct instructions from the State Department. I personally saw,
The Roosevelt Legacy
which the Anti-Defamation League had about me, and was in-
strumental in having the Miami Herald print a defamatory article
which occasioned the libel suit. Incidentally, Perlmutter did such
a good job that he is now National Director of the Anti-Defama-
tion League a t its headquarters in New York. At the time I had
dealings with him, he was head of the Florida chapter of that
organization.
Professors Kimball and Bartlett in their article on the "Kent
Case" have argued that, as regards the question of Roosevelt's
role as a warmongering conspirator, there was "nothing in it." I
would reply that Roosevelt was probably the most shameless liar
ever to occupy the White House and that his lies have done what
is probably irreparable harm to this nation. Curiously enough,
those who were on the spot at that time in London-namely,
British Military Intelligence, Scotland Yard, and others-held an
opinion different from Kimball and Bartletts'. Otherwise, there
would never have been a "Kent Case" at all.
On 8 June 1940, a couple of weeks after my arrest, Ambassador
Kennedy informed the State Department by cable that:
The appropriate authorities inform me that investigation of the
case in which Kent is involved is being carried out with great care
and has involved a n enormous amount of labor. A final decision a s
to whether Kent is to be prosecuted may be expected within the
next ten days a t the latest.
On 11 June these same British authorities informed Kennedy that:
Those who have investigated the matter say that these papers
disclose the existence of a traitorous and dangerous conspiracy to
assist the enemy. The persons concerned a s defendants a r e Miss
Wolkoff, Capt. Archibald Ramsay, M.P., his wife Mrs. Ramsay,
Mrs. Christbel Nicholson (wife of a n admiral) a n d Mr. Tyler G.
Kent. All except the last named a r e British subjects. It is of the
greatest importance, if indeed not essential, to the presentation of
this case that a representative of the United States Embassy
should attend the trial to give certain formal evidence.
The following significant words are something to which the two
professors might usefully give attention before concluding that
the "Kent Case" is a non-story.
It is appreciated that neither the State Department nor the
Foreign Office would be prepared to contemplate a t the present
time the public discussion of the documents in question. It is
thought, however, that some documents could be selected from the
whole which, while sufficiently proving the case against the de-
fendants, could properly be produced in court.
The Roosevelt Legacy
But if Kimball and Bartlett are correct, why all the secrecy?
Why was the consent of Prime Minister Winston Churchill re-
quired before the proceedings could be initiated? As Kennedy
informed the State.Department on 6 July 1940: "The British prose-
cutors further inform [Kennedy] that the proposed defendents
take the view that they a r e safe from trial and punishment
because neither of the governments concerned dare have these
matters discussed in public."
What was it that they dared not discuss in public? That is
really the crux of the case. The real reason why I was tried and
sentenced to a prison term in England and not tried in the United
States is clear from the following statement of the British author-
ities, made to Joseph Kennedy: "The documents in question would
certainly be produced only behind locked doors in a cleared
court. Not only would the press be ordered not to publish their
contents. No press man would be present."
There you have it in a nutshell. The British, like the Bolsheviks,
still have secret trials-a relic from medieval times when an
absolute monarch was able to dispose of his enemies on the quiet
without any public outcry being possible, since the facts would
not be known until it was too late to do anything about it. In 1776,
the thirteen colonies revolted against Britain precisely to do
away with such Star Chamber proceedings a s well as much else
repulsive in the form of British government. Nonetheless, the
United States government in the year 1940 was very glad to make
use of Britain's Star Chamber practices against one of its own
citizens-for reasons of "cover-up" and secrecy.
In September 1944, in response to a certain interest in my case
which had been aroused in Congress and led to questions being
addressed to the Secretary of State concerning my imprisonment,
the State Department issued a lengthy press release which pur-
ported to be the final word on the subject. I shall quote that part
which deals with the reasons for turning me over to the British
for a secret trial, since that action is prohibited by the 6th
Amendment to the Constitution. The 6th Amendment requires
that a criminal trial be "speedy and public." My trial was nei-
ther. This is what the State Department had to say: "The interest
of Great Britain was pre-eminent . . . and all the evidence, wit-
nesses, et cetera, were available to the British Courts." The true
reasons were set forth in messages to and from the embassy and
the State Department during the weeks following my arrest. I
have already indicated what they were. So dense, in fact, were
the clouds of secrecy around my case (in the "pre-eminent inter-
est of Great Britain") that when the New York Times applied to
see the transcript of the stenographic notes of the trial they were
informed by the London embassy in these terms:
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
Before the interception of the note, Gowan had taken off his
overcoat and lent it to the policeman so that it would cover his
uniform and thus not alarm the person being talked to. Here we
have the extraordinary spectacle of an American Foreign Service
officer working with the British police and even providing one of
them with a disguise in order to entrap British subjects. Gowan
had long since done all that could be required of him in the matter
of my arrest. Now he was extending his sleuthing to the possible
arrest of Britons whom he did not know and with whom he had no
connection whatsoever. Although the foregoing is mainly of anec-
dotal interest, it does serve to illustrate how closely Americans
and British officials worked together before America entered the
war, and to what extent they were willing to ignore legality in
such cooperation. I am quite sure the Foreign Service regulations
do not include a requirement that an officer of that service do the
dirty work of the police of a foreign country with regard to the
citizens of that country.
It must have been Sir Galahad-Gowan's "finest hour." This
.paunchy, balding nonentity of a Second Secretary savored it to
the last drop and no doubt regales his grandchildren with the
account of how he, single-handedly, broke up a dangerous spy-
ring in London during the war. This alleged spy-ring to which I
was supposed to have belonged was headed by Captain Archi-
bald Ramsay, a Member of Parliament. Ramsay was subse-
quently described by the very prosecutor himself, Solicitor-
General Sir William Jowitt, as an honorable man who would not
knowingly do anything to harm his country. That did not prevent
Ramsay being interned for a long period during the war although
never convicted of any offense. These facts are public knowledge,
yet they did not stop the New York Times from printing and
circulating in the United States and in England libelous state-
ments to the effect that I gave Ramsay certain vital defense
information which Ramsay then took to the German embassy in
Dublin for transmission to Germany. Ramsay sued the New York
Times for libel as he was easily able to prove that he had never
left Britain during the period alleged, much less visited any
German embassy in Dublin or anywhere else. He won the suit.
Both the New York Times and the author of the article, a certain
Raymond Daniels, were shown up as liars.
By the time the Ramsay suit came to trial, I had already been
languishing in a cell in the almost medieval Wandsworth prison
in London, I had gone on a hunger strike and was a t that time in
the prison infirmary. One morning, I was informed that some
lawyers wished to see me. Supposing them to be my own, I agreed
to see them. It turned out that they represented the London
offices of the New York Times and they wanted my help in
defending the newspaper against Ramsay's suit. They showed me
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
proved that the ship with its American passengers was deliber-
ately sent to its doom by the British authorities. They knew
positively that a German submarine was lying in wait for the liner
off the south coast of Ireland, and purposely failed to inform the
Lusitania's captain. The hulk of the Lusitania lies in compara-
tively shallow water and divers have examined it. Its holds have
been shown to have been filled with contraband of war and its
decks equipped with defensive weapons. This made it a warship
and a legitimate target for the German submarine. Knowing the
psychological effect that the sinking of the Lusitania had on
public opinion in the United States and how the loss of American
lives helped so greatly in gaining support for intervention, the
British lost no time in contriving a similar incident very early in
World War 11. This was the sinking of the liner Athenia on 4
September 1939 when the war was only twenty-four hours old.
Some thirty American lives were lost. Howver, the anti-war sen-
timent was so strong this time that the ploy failed in its object.
The public more or less shrugged off the incident, saying in effect:
"Stay out of the war zones if you don't want to get hurt."
Now some very mysterious correspondence came to my notice
at that time. It was from the office of the Naval Attache, a
Captain Kirk. By close questioning, Captain Kirk had been able to
ferret out of the British a n admission that the Athenia might have
been sunk on their own orders. Not that it was sunk by a torpedo
from a British submarine. Rather, it was done by one of the two
Polish submarines which escaped from the Germans and had
come to England where they were under the command of the
British Admiralty. It is true that a German U-Boat commander
was forced by torture and intimidation to confess a t the Nurem-
berg trials that he sank the Athenia. But such a confession is as
credible as all the other confessions extorted by similar means.
By now it should be obvious to the reader that the screen of
secrecy which surrounded my case was for a long time virtually
impenetrable. Were the "Kent documents" of a vital military
nature? Did they involve information about troops or armaments?
The answer is provided by the words of the judge, Mr. Justice
Tucker. Judge Tucker, in passing sentence, said: "I am taking into
consideration that the documents in question did not involve any
military matters." But if not military matters, then what? Obvi-
ously, there remained only political matters. And these were then
so sensitive that the British told Kennedy that there could be no
public discussion of the documents in question. What then was
their nature, which could justify my trial and imprisonment? The
United States was not a t war at that time. The people of this
country were overwhelmingly in favor of neutrality. This, in fact,
was the great frustration which Roosevelt had to suffer. He had
been a rabid Anglophile all his life. As early a s 1915, when he
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
The hoax of the twentieth century, as the title of Dr. Butz's book
on the "Holocaust" goes, is the smoke-screen to conceal the utter
failure to achieve the professed war aims of Roosevelt, Churchill
and the CFR. Now the Zionist Establishment will continue to have
a free hand to commit genocide in the Near East and smear any
person in this country who dares to dispute the orthodoxy or
point out the real results of World War 11. And the Establishment
is so besmirched with the responsibility of failure that it needs
the Jewish publicists and news media to destroy anyone who has
the temerity to ask awkward questions. The horrid prospect
looms of having to say: "Maybe we were wrong." A further
prospect then looms: "Maybe Hitler was right." But such confes-
sions buttered no parsnips in the harsh judgments of the post-war
world. They were not accepted as excuses at Nuremberg under
the new ex-post-facto "law" worked out by the United States and
their Soviet allies. The new basic law of nations requires only one
clause, very simply: "It pays to be on the winning side."
Bibliography
of Works on the Tyler Kent Affair
and the Roosevelt-Churchill Exchanges
Harris, Robert. "The American tearoom spy." The Times (London) (4
December 1982), p. 6.
[Irving, David]. "Tyler Gatewood Kent: The Many Motives of a Mis-
guided Cypher Clerk." Focal Point (23 November 1981). pp. 3-10.
Kimball, Warren F. "Churchill and Roosevelt: The Personal Equa-
tion." Prologue Vol. 6 (Fall 19743, pp. 169-82.
Kimball, Warren F., and Bartlett, Bruce. "Roosevelt and Prewar
Commitments to Churchill: The Tyler Kent Affair." Diplomatic History
Vol. 5, No. 4 (Fall 1981), pp. 291-312.
Lash, Joseph P. Roosevelt and Churchill 1939-1941. New York: Norton,
1976.
Leutze, James. "The Secret of the Churchill-Roosevelt Correspond-
ence: September 1939-May 1940." Journal of Contemporary History Vol.
10 (19751, pp. 465-91.
Loewenheim, Francis L., Langley, Harold D., and Manfred Jonas
(eds.]. Roosevelt and Churchill: Their Secret Wartime Correspondence.
London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1975.
Snow, John Howland. The Case of Tyler Kent. New York: Domestic
and Foreign Affairs, 1946: New Canaan, Conn.: The Long House, 1962?
Whalen, Richard. "The Strange Case of Tyler Kent." Diplomat (No-
vember 1965), pp. 16-19, 62-64.
*Available from the IHR, $3.00 ppd.
ÿ he origins 0
of the Second
~ r l War
d
A J ~Tayior
DISGRACE. . . 99
-Hugh Trevor-Roper
CONSIDERiNG T H E R E V I E W E R , w e c a n i t t h i n k
of a remark that better recommends A.J.P.
Taylor's classic, brilliantined, and quite unflag-
gingly controversiai study of the diplomatic trag-
edy of errors that caused Europe to "slither over the
brink" a second time. This book forthrightly chal-
lenges the myth of Hitler's war guilt, of his "plan"
for aggression. It rakes over the coals in scathing
fashion the entire structure of Hitlerian "demon-
ology" that was laboriously set u p at the Nurem-
berg Trial as an explanation for what happened, and
- as a hoped-for guide to historical writing about the
origins of the war for all time.
First published 22 years ago, Taylor's The Origins of the Second W o r l d W a r is
the only thoroughly revisionist work on this subject to have attained a piace even
on the Establishment's list of "must reading." Few undergraduate history stu-
dents get their degrees without having had to buy, read and be tested on this
book. Seminars are devoted to it. Debates are organized around it. Classroom top-
ical schedules become a shambles when students go "overtime" for days discussing it.
Some professors seem to have devoted their whole careers to knocking it down.
Anthologies have been published about it. Where other books on this subject appear
and shortly disappear, this one has staying power. There are two basic reasons why:
Taylor is a brilliant writer who entertains as well as informs; his case is so persuasive
and his reputation already so pronounced (he is the most widely-read serious English
historian of modern times) that the book just couldn't and can't be ignored-even by
Establishment paladins like Trevor-Roper, and others of like ilk who have variously
called it "perverse," "dangerous," and a "whitewash of Hitler." Taylor cannot get
away with this one! The fuss among the historians has served to make Taylor very
happy, and to keep his book in print.
If you haven't encountered A.J.P. Taylor's masterpiece yet,
you are missing out on one of the great experiences in reading y;
history. If you are a revisionist, you will delight in seeing w i t h
what supreme power-yet also ease and unders
Taylor blithely walks along toppling one Establ
m y t h about Hitler after another. (Revisionist or not, you
will also probably f i n d things of your own to dis- i
agree with. Taylor can, and usually does, hold a
controversial opinion on anything.). One thing is
for sure: if you t r u l y want to understand how and
w h y war broke out in 1939, you cannot ignore Tay-
l o r ' s classic c o n t r i b u t i o n . T h e a n t i - r e v i s i o n i s t
Establishment certainly hasn't.
T H E ORIGINS OF T H E SECOND W O R L D W A R
Paperback, 357pp., $5.75 postpaid from A.J.P. TAYLOR
INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL R E V I E W
P . 0 . Box 1306 Torrance, Calif. 90505
President Roosevelt and
The Origins of the 1939 War
DAVID L. HOGGAN
normal alliance. Beck did not believe that the British Prime Min-
ister possessed either delicacy or discretion. Beck observed, with
a knowing smile to his listeners, that Chamberlain had said he
was glad Poland had come instantly to an agreement with Eng-
land. This amused Beck, because Poland had been waiting over a
considerable period for the English offer of an agreement.
Beck admitted that Halifax had sought to entangle him with
obligations to Holland, Belgium, Denmark, and Switzerland, but
he did not attach serious importance to this fact. He was more
interested in speculating about the German response to his visit
to England and to his acceptance of the British guarantee. He
declared that the alliance with England (sojusz z Anglia) had
dealt a real blow to Hitler's plans for a German-Polish agreement.
He believed that British approval of Polish aspirations at Danzig
had buttressed the Polish cause there as never before. A main
topic of speculation was whether Hitler would respond to the
British guarantee by denouncing the 1934 Pact with Poland.
Bullitt took his leave from Beck at Lille and returned to Paris.
He sent an exuberant report to Washington, D.C., a t 11:00p.m. on
April 7, 1939. He informed Roosevelt and Hull that Beck was
immensely pleased by recent developments in England, and that
the degree of understanding which had been achieved was quite
adequate to fill Polish needs. Beck had said that he knew that
Hitler would be furious. Bullitt also added with obvious satisfac-
tion that Beck had described Ribbentrop as a "dangerous im-
becile."
Poland's Use of the British Guarantee
It was likely that the Poles would seek to provoke Germany into
attacking them. Unlike Germany, they could not expect to achieve
any of their objectives in a major war through their own efforts.
Their hope of ultimate victory rested with distant foreign powers.
The Polish leaders were far more enthusiastic about a German-
Polish war than Hitler ever was, but considerations of high policy
suggested the wisdom of a role which was at least passive in
appearance.
Poland was counting on the support of Halifax for the realiza-
tion of her program at the expense of both Germany and Russia. It
was conceivable that Halifax could lead Great Britain into a war
which began with a surprise Polish invasion of Germany, but the
Polish leaders knew that France and the United States were also
of decisive importance to British policy. The Poles knew that
Halifax would never support Poland unless he could drag France
into war. This policy was dictated by the simple fact that Halifax
did not believe Great Britain could win a war against Germany
without the participation of France. The Poles also knew that it
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
Jerzy Potocki, who was on leave from the United States, discussed
the situation with Beck at the Polish Foreign Office on July 6,
1939. He told Beck that he had returned to Poland with. the
express purpose of proposing a change in Polish policy. He com-
plained that the United States and England were suffering from a
severe war psychosis. There had been wild rumors on the ship
which brought him to Europe that the Germans had occupied
Danzig. He insisted that the Jews, the leading capitalists, and the
armament manufacturers of the West were united in a solid front
for war. They were delighted to find their pretext in the Danzig
issue and in Poland's defiant attitude. Potocki added that the
most repulsive factor was their complete and cold indifference to
the destruction of Poland.
Potocki insisted that the Poles were merely negro slaves in the
opinion of the Western profiteers. They were expected to work
without receiving anything in return. He sought to appeal to
Beck's vanity by claiming that the Polish Foreign Minister was the
only man they feared in Poland. He argued that the United States,
despite Roosevelt's fever for intervention in Europe, were actu-
ally concentrating their own imperialist drive on Latin America.
He assured Beck that it would be sheer illusion to expect the
United States to intervene in Europe on behalf of Poland. Potocki
was forced to conclude that his eloquent arguments produced no
effect on the Polish Foreign Minister.
Polish Ambassador Sokolnicki at Ankara supported Potocki in
this effort. He was a close friend of Jan Szembek, and it was
evident to Potocki and Sokolnicki that Szembek would accept
their position if he were Polish Foreign Minister. It seemed likely,
too, that Pilsudski would have rejected the Beck policy had he
been alive. Sokolnicki confided to German Ambassador Papen at
Ankara on July 14, 1939, that he would like to see a negotiated
settlement between Germany and Poland before the Jews and the
Free Masons had convinced the world that a catastrophic con-
flict was inevitable. The Polish diplomat added that he would be
pleased to see the Angl~Sovietalliance negotiations end in fail-
ure as soon as possible.
The American diplomats in Europe continued to oppose peace
and urge war. Bullitt was disgusted with the failure of Bonnet to
encourage Poland with a blank check a t Danzig. He continued to
warn Roosevelt that the French Foreign Minister was working for
peace. Bullitt was delighted at times to find that Bonnet was
pessimistic about the chances for peace. He reported with satis-
faction on June 28, 1939, that Bonnet could see no way out for
Hitler other than war. Biddle a t Warsaw gave uncritical support
to Polish policy at Danzig. He claimed in a report on July 1 2 , 1939,
that Viktor Boettcher, the unofficial Danzig foreign minister and a
Roosevelt and 1939
States. The letter with the message was sent by way of Bullitt a t
Paris, and Steinhardt did not receive it until August 15, 1939. He
concluded that Molotov had instructed Umansky to reveal the
contents of the letter'before it reached Russia, and that Molotov
had proceeded to permit the news of the letter to reach the
foreign Powers before he had actually received it himself.
Steinhardt presented the Roosevelt letter to Molotov on August
16,1939 and the two diplomats proceeded to discuss its contents.
Roosevelt, in writing the letter, had hoped to influence Russian
policy in favor of the Western Powers, but it is not surprising that
he failed completely in this effort, and that Molotov used the
message for his own purposes. Molotov told Steinhardt that the
British and French military missions had come to Russia to dis-
cuss military collaboration in terms which the Soviet Foreign
Commissar characterized as "vague generalities." Molotov
added that these missions were unable to contend with the spe-
cific points which Russia had raised.
Steinhardt reported to President Roosevelt on August 16th that
he was personally convinced that the Soviet Union would seek to
avoid participation in the early phase of a European conflict. This
annoyed President Roosevelt, who seemingly would have led the
United States into a European conflict on the first day of war had
American public opinion and the American Congress permitted
such a policy. The American President was perturbed to learn, a
few days later, that Alexis Leger a t the French Foreign Office
was not the unconditional advocate of war-at-any-price which
Bullitt had claimed. Leger revealed his opinion that it would be
exceedingly unwise for Great Britain and France to attack Ger-
many without military support from the Soviet Union. This
seemed to indicate that there would be virtually no support for a
war policy in France if the negotiations a t Moscow failed. Roose-
velt also learned that Premier Daladier was continuing to de-
nounce the "criminal folly" of the Poles. President Roosevelt
knew that Halifax would abandon his project for war against
Germany if he was unable to gain the military support of either
the Soviet Union or France. The possibility that the peace might
be saved was perturbing to the American President who hoped to
utilize a European war to achieve his dream for the perpetuation
of his tenure and the increase of his personal prestige and glory.
By August Ilth, even as negotiations with the British and
French are still in progress, Stalin decides to exercise the option
with Germany. A definite indication is sent to Berlin the next day.
Russian Foreign Minister Molotov and German Ambassador
Schulenberg engage in preliminary talks. With the final failure of
the British and French missions, the way is open for a German-
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
Bonnet had entertained for many days, and he was inclined for
this reason to accept the Russian explanation at face value.
Bonnet continued to be furious with the Poles. They had allowed
Lipski to engage in an inconclusive conversation with Marshal
Goering the previous day, but they had haughtily rejected his
suggestion for Franco-Polish consultation on Danzig. The French
Foreign Minister was resolved to retaliate by seizing the first
opportunity of releasing France from her military obligations to
Poland.
Halifax was no longer concerned about Russia, and he did not
share the desire of Bonnet to repress Polish excesses a t Danzig.
He was primarily interested in creating the impression every-
where in the world that the Russo-German pact had not caused
him to reconsider his policy toward Germany. Halifax dispatched
uniform instructions to British diplomatic missions in all coun-
tries on August 24th. He urged them to accept the superhuman
task of correcting the impression that the pact had been a blow to
the "peace front" headed by England and France. He also
claimed that the pact "had produced no effect" on the British
Cabinet. He exhorted his diplomats that the British course was
straight ahead under the slogan of "preventing the domination of
Europe by Germany." Halifax did not explain how a revived
German nation of eighty million German citizens could fail to be
the leading continental power. After all, it had been said after
1871 that the Germany of Bismarck, with her forty million inhabi-
tants, dominated Europe. The policy of Halifax was calculated to
destroy Germany rather than to permit that normal growth and
development which for centuries had been considered the nat-
ural right of every nation. It was a policy which led to the
destruction of a friendly Germany and to the domination of Eu-
rope by a hostile Union pledged to overthrow the capitalist sys-
tem in Great Britain.
Percy Loraine in Rome exposed himself to ridicule in an effort
to meet the diplomatic requirements of Halifax. He informed
Ciano on August 24 that the Russo-German pact had given him
"the first hearty laugh he had had for some weeks." The same
man had previously informed the Italian leaders that a pact of
mutual assistance with Russia was a necessary feature of the
British program. The Italians could be pardoned for suspecting
that his "hearty laugh" closely resembled an hysterical scream,
because they had never heard him laugh. Loraine soon learned
that Halifax was under heavy pressure a t home on August 24th to
modify the uncompromising British stand a t Danzig. The British
Foreign Secretary confided to Loraine, despite his earlier cir-
cular instructions, that Great Britain might ultimately consider
the return of Danzig to Germany as part of an international
THE JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL REVIEW
inquire indignantly why the soldiers had been sent out if it was
intended to settle differences with Poland by diplomatic means.
The German Foreign Office had no ready answer with which to
meet this embarrassing question.
In Berlin, British Ambassador Henderson, a sincere advocate
of a British-German understanding who privately sympathizes
with Germany in the Polish question, works tirelessly for peace in
the difficult position of having to officially represent Halifax's
war policy. He tries to persuade Halifax of the reality of the
German minority's sufferings in Poland. He stresses that unless
Poland finally negotiates with Germany there will undoubtedly be
war. He remarks that from the beginning "the Poles were utterly
foolish and unwise. "
Roosevelt Hopes for War and Strives to Coordinate Policy
Phipps reported from Paris that Bullitt had received new in-
structions from President Roosevelt designed to facilitate a closer
coordination of British and American policy against Germany.
The American President suggested that everything possible
should be done by propaganda to bring down the German regime
in revolutionary chaos. Roosevelt believed that wireless propa-
ganda should be broadcast to Germany around the clock. He
expected that it would produce a great effect to argue in advance
that Hitler would be solely responsible for any war. He hoped
that the pacific desires of the German people might be exploited
to undermine the loyalty of Germans toward their government
after the outbreak of war.
Henderson continued to do what he could at Berlin to preserve
peace. He contacted Polish Ambassador Lipski again on August
25th and urged him to discuss the problem of the German minor-
ity in Poland with the German Government. Henderson reported
to Halifax that Italian Ambassador Attolico was horrified at the
prospect of war. Attolico had declared with indignation that
warmongers such as Anthony Eden should be hanged. Henderson
avoided criticizing Attolico's statement about Eden in any way.
Eden, to be sure, had worked with Churchill to sabotage appease-
ment, but the chief role in the scuttling of the appeasement policy
had been played by Halifax, the man to whom Henderson ad-
dressed his report.
Sir Ronald Lindsay, the British Ambassador to the United
States, addressed a series of final reports to Halifax prior to his
return to England and his replacement by Lord Lothian. Lindsay
indicated that Roosevelt was delighted a t the prospect of a new
World War. The American President had damaged his prospects
in May 1939 with his unsuccessful attempt to pull the teeth from
Roosevelt and 1939
TH7 BARPIES
I
I
A r e v i r of L a n p r and Glsuon's The ChaQmge?Q
tsoI-8tion and Herbert Feis's The Roadfa PRarl Harbor.
A scathing critique of the "official" history of
Roosevelr's road to war.