Godesberg and After

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22516, 26 September 1938, Page 10

Godesberg and After

During the week-end the European crisis has developed with bewildering rapidity, and it is noticeable that even the best informed London newspapers find it difficult either to present a coherent picture of what is happening or to

' interpret some of the more important events which have occurred. Out of the haze of conjecture surrounding the Godesberg discussions there emerge only two established facts. One is that the cession to Germany of the Sudeten German areas of Czechoslovakia has been agreed upon and that what is now being discussed is the method by which the transfer of territory shall take place. The other is that Herr Hitler has presented Mr Chamberlain with a memorandum salting out the views (perhaps "demands" is the more appropriate word) of the German Government on this question. The memorandum has been communicated without comment to the Czech Government. Why there was a hitch in the discussions and whether the episode of the German memorandum means virtually a breakdown are questions which for the moment cannot be answered. In the meantime, it has become depressingly clear that the Chamberlain-Hitler conversations are no longer the focal point in the European situation which they were a few days ago. The terrifying acceleration in the pace of military preparations in every European country recorded in the cable news this morning tells a story of which the import is only too plain. If there was ever any prospect of a permanent European settlement based on an adjustment of the claims of Germany against Czechoslovakia, it has now vanished. Germany is not remotely likely to guarantee the frontiers of a State against which both Poland and Hungary have revisionist claims. All that Mr Chamberlain can now hope to do is to persuade Germany to be content for the time being with the Sudeten areas and to leave Poland and Hungary to settle their own claims as best they can.