Yellow and Blue
The French Yellow Book on the origins of the war was published too close to Christmas to get in this and other countries the attention it deserves. It supplements, without in any way duplicating, the British Blue Book. The latter depicted the Nazi oligarchy as seen mainly through the eyes of Sir Nevile Henderson, the former as seen mainly through those of M. Coulondre, and M. Coulondre, partly perhaps because he came later on the scene, when illusions were more difficult to cherish, saw with accurate and penetrating vision the goal on which Herr Hitler and his entourage had fixed their ambitious gaze. " Now," wrote the French Ambassador in December, 1938, " Herr Hitler's racial aims having been achieved, the hour of Lebensraum has struck." Dust was being assiduously thrown in France's eyes—the hypo- critical Bonnet-Ribbentrop accord was signed on December 6th, 1938 ; on February 7th, 1939, Herr von Ribbentrop declared " Our struggle against Bolshevism is merciless; in relation to the Soviet we shall remain adamant; never shall we have an agreement with Bolshevik Russia "—but little of it lodged in her Ambassador's. As early as May 7th of this year he transmits a report, from a source in which he places confidence, that Herr Hitler is about to reach an under- standing with Russia, and " perhaps we shall see a fourth partition of Poland." At this time the Anglo-French negotiations at Moscow were in full swing. The volume is prefaced impressively by a textual reproduction of Herr Hitler's successive pledges to Austria, to Poland and to Czecho-Slovakia. The Yellow Book inculpates Herr Hitler as damningly as the Blue Book—which is saying much.
Previous page
