THE GERMAN .MIND
Britain Faces Germany. By A. L. Kennedy. (Cape. 554
Tut small:bulk and modest price of this volume afford no criteria of its importance. So illuminating a contribution tn. the understanding of our principal international problem might well have been presented in a more imposing form. On the other hand, the discerning reader will be grateful that words have not been wasted, and that he has received sur-, prisingly good value for his money.
Mr. Kennedy's little work has two outstanding merits— intimate knowledge of the subject, and an outlook of the , strictest impartiality. He has had exceptional opportunities of studying and understanding the mind of Germany ; he speaks from personal acquaintance of many of the leading political figures whose actions are in question, and his character studies of such men as Stresernann are among the most successful passages in his book. But the author's judicial attitude to the main problem is the quality which gives his work special value at the present time. Those who discuss the phenomenon of Nazism are too often divided between those who throw all the blame on the errors of Versailles— as represented in German propaganda—and those who see only a fresh manifestation of unchanging and ineradicable traits in the German character. Since the appropriate- treatment depends on the diagnosis, the real truth is all-important, and it is a relief, in turning to Mr. Kennedy, to feel that it is this which it is his single-hearted object to supply, and that this aim has, so far as is humanly possible, been attained. Some- thing is conceded to both sides : many wholesome correctives are applied. The defence, says the author, is right in attaching responsibility to the Treaty for the present temper of Germany. It created some genuine grievances, the most important of which lay in the fact that the settlement was imposed and not negotiated. It also afforded unnecessary opportunities to German propagandists for inflaming the legitimate sense of grievance by distortion and misrepresentation - of its text. But there is now little left of the Treaty beyond territorial provisions, and Mr. Kennedy reminds us that "the territorial surrenders of Germany were neither extensive nor vindictively imposed," and constituted a fairer adjustment in Europe than any which had previously existed. More disastrous, in his opinion, than the Treaty itself was the unconciliatory policy of the earlier post:War. years, with its tragic list of missed opportunities ; in particular, he is "convinced that tight up to the moment or the Hitler offer of April, 1934, it would have been possible to win Germany for an equalised limitation of armaments," and he is severely critical of M. Barthou's notorious "No," which' he believes could have been prevented by more skilful diplomacy on our part.
On the other hand, Mr. Kennedy fully recognises the difficulty of dealing with a government in whose good faith there is so little ground for confidence, and the conspicuous fairness of his approach only renders more , convincing the indictment which he frames against Herr Hitler and "the German mind," for he agrees with the anti-German group that there are permanent national and even atavistic Hurnuish characteristics in the policy and aims of the Fulmer. -The book drives home with irrefutable examples "the gross contradiction between what is inculcated at home (in Germany) and what is professed in foreign countries," and it is right that this should be emphasised. Pacific protestations made to the world can hardly be trusted so long as the internal education of the people is conducted, as it is here shown to be, on the lines of Man Kampf, with that Eimgkeit des Denkens of which Dr. Goebbels has boasted.
- On the whole, Mr. Kennedy's verdict inclines to the pessi- mistic side. He evidently doubts the possibility of the "just and honourable. settlement" in default of which, he tells us, "we must be ready to face war." His own final chapter, which promises "a suggested basis for a comprehensive and practical agreement," is, it must be confessed, rather disap- pointing. The nature of the proposed agreement is left altogether vague, and the method advocated for arriving it it, through independent bilateral negotiations between England and Germany, seems hardly calculated to secure the desired result. it is more likely to suit the Fiihrer's policy of Divide et Impera. Mr. Kennedy's one concrete proposal is confined to the colonial issue, though concession on this point is justified only as part of a major settlement. He suggests the transfer of Gambia and Sierra Leone under mandate to Germany, together with the small strips of. Togoland and Cameroon which are now under British mandator*. administration. This proposal scarcely seems likely to _find favour in any quarter; - From the British standpoint it inyolves the violation of repeated pledges to our colonies, and it would obviously place France in an invidious position, without in any way meeting German aspirations. For, as is made dear on an earlier page, the word "mandate "has dropped out of Hitler's vocabulary, and the current cry is foi!,,the cession of former colonies in full sovereignty. "There is an element of inter- nationalism in the mandatory system Which is wholly contrary to the. possessive," dominating and ultra-national doctrine of the Nazis."
It is nevertheless °Emote importance to the general public that they should understand the true situation than that they should initiate policy, and the difficulties with which even so informed an observer as Mr. Kennedy is faced when he tries to be constructive are part of the truth which his book
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