The Second Munich Conference

Updated Sunday 15 May, 2011 12:18 PM

The Second Munich

Conference

August 20^th – 25^th, 1939

By the middle of August 1939, Europe stood on the brink of war. The UK had guaranteed Poland’s borders. France had an alliance with Poland. France and the UK had a de facto alliance. Germany and Italy had an explicit one (the Pact of Steel or Axis, signed 5/22/39). Hitler had started the usual mechanisms – incidents, agitation by local Germans, the propaganda machine, and military mobilization – to obtain a ‘rectification’ of the Versailles settlement as regards Poland. Poland had been given the provinces of West Prussia and Posen. The famous city of Danzig had been stripped from Germany, and made a League of Nations protected city-state with special rights for Poland. Parts of Upper Silesia had also been given to Poland.

This Polish settlement was widely unpopular in Germany, including many circles that per se had no use for the Nazi Party or Hitler. However, the thought of war was even more widely unpopular, even among the generals and industrialists. They knew that Hitler’s rearmament had a large element of bluff. They knew that Germany was in no position to sustain a long war against the West. Both Germany’s finances and her limited raw materials stock made this virtually impossible.

There were several wild cards in the equation. The West and Italy were still hoping that a diplomatic settlement could be arranged. Also both sides were wooing the Soviets. The Soviets had an alliance with France, but had made clear after Munich that they would see to their own interests. Both the West and Germany were courting Stalin.

In OTL Stalin played the two sides off against each other before arriving at a deal with Hitler to partition Poland and much of the rest of Eastern Europe. The deal was put into place in the 2^nd half of August. Stalin left no memos on his thought processes (or at least none yet released in the post-Soviet flood of documents). However, given the penetration of Soviet spy nets in the West, it is reasonable to believe that he was aware of the West’s lack of eagerness to actually fight Hitler. The UK might be able to blackmail the French into declaring war. Britain had no army. France had no plan to actively use their army to help Poland. Therefore, siding with the West meant fighting Germany while the West watched. A deal with Hitler in 1939 would be followed by a war in the West. Germany would fight Britain and France directly. Stalin’s army would be at liberty to attack other side or gobble up neutrals as suited his convenience.

Let us presume that in the tense maneuvering Hitler dies of a drug overdose. His physicians used a mix of quack remedies on him, including mixes of amphetamines. So let us have one of the idiots hotshot him. He dies foaming and jerking on the floor of the Chancellery of massive coronary failure. Herman Goring is now Reichs Chancellor.

Now Fat Herman was in many ways the least ideologically Nazi of the Nazi hierarchy. In a party of quacks and weirdoes, he was a legitimate war hero. He had been an air ace, had led the Red Baron’s wing after his death, and had shown physical courage in Munich in 1923 when many of the senior leaders ran like rabbits. He was closer to the industrialists, generals and old elite than the rest of the Nazi crew. He also viewed a world war realistically – given a choice he wanted no part of it. So let us have him listen to Italy and the British ambassador. He approves a new Munich Conference to settle the ‘Polish Crisis’.

Now the Poles would have gone ballistic. They had no wish to be carved up like Czechoslovakia. However, they would have been under tremendous pressure from the West. It is not certain that they would knuckle under. We will presume that after fuming, they do so. So on August 20^th, 1939, the four Munich powers (Germany, Italy, the UK, and France) plus Poland meet at Munich. This is different from the first Munich in two ways. The Poles are allowed to sit at the table. The Czechs were kept waiting in the lobby at the first conference in 1938. Second, the Soviets are invited. They were not invited to the first conference. Stalin sends Beria as he trusts no one else and will not leave Moscow himself.

The Polish part of the conference actually takes the least amount of time. In OTL Goring had offered the Poles a last minute deal that was basically fair. Neither Hitler nor the Poles had any intention of accepting it. This time the Germans are sincere and the Poles have no choice. So we will go with a slightly more pro-German version thereof. Germany gets West Prussia and Upper Silesia. Poland keeps Posen. They also keep Gydnia (their Baltic port) with an extraterritorial road and rail link to Poland proper. Germans in Poland are returned to Germany. Poles in the new Germany are returned to Poland. This solved the question of future ethnic difficulties.

At Chamberlain’s insistence the conference then turned to European boundaries in general. He was not willing to be forced into piecemeal concessions anymore. He wanted a final and definitive solution guaranteed by the six nations at the conference.

Stalin’s bargaining position was much weaker than in OTL. Then he could play the West off against the Nazis for the privilege of his support. Now his fear was that he would be left to face Germany while the West financed Goring’s Reich. So he got less than in OTL but more than he started with. Against Poland he got frontier rectifications but less than the Curzon Line. In the Baltic he got Estonia and half of Latvia, rather than all three Baltic states. He got his original proposed borders with Finland rather than the larger gains he took after the Winter War. Instead of Bessarabia and Bukovina from Rumania he got Bessarabia and Dobrujia. However, he was given Bulgaria and two Turkish border provinces as a partial consolation. Rumanians, Poles and Finns were to be allowed to exit to the remains of their states. A considerable number of Germans were sent back to Germany. Some Muslims were sent to Turkey. Balts from the Russian gains were sent to Germany. In return Stalin was forced to take Europe’s unwanted Jews, Romany, and Communists, plus a considerable number of Belorussians from Poland. Millions were loaded onto boxcars and shuttled, ending the ethnic causes of future wars.

The Balkans was also reworked. Italy received Albania, Corfu, Dalmatia and a bit of Albanian ethnic Yugoslavia on the borders. Germany took Slovenia, the Banat and the Vodjivina. The rump was split into a Serbia and a Croatia. The populations were swapped to make monoethnic states with Muslims and Bosnians being offered a quick choice of Italy or Turkey. Croatia was to be an Italian protectorate and Serbia a German one. Hungary was given northern Transylvania, with the rump of Rumania as well as Hungary being made German protectorates. Greece and Turkey became British protectorates.

In the West, France was allowed to garrison Belgium and Luxembourg. Holland was to remain neutral but economically attached to Germany. Scandinavia was to be an Anglo-German economic zone.

In colonial matters, everyone showed such sense and much less bombast than usual. Germany had to get colonies. She did not take them from Britain and France. Instead she was awarded the Belgian Congo and Portuguese Angola. Italy got the promised Azzou Strip from France. France was awarded the Spanish Empire in Morocco, the Sahara and Guinea. France also got Portuguese Guinea. Britain was awarded the Dutch East Indies, Siam, Macao, Goa, Portuguese Timor, Mozambique, the Cape Verde Islands, the Azores, and Portuguese Principe and San Thome. Britain and Russia divided Persia and Afghanistan. In far west China, the Russians were awarded Sinkiang and the British took Tibet for India.

World War Two ended before it began. Enlightened opinion in the West and elsewhere was of course outraged. The mass of populace of Europe was of course ecstatic. Several hundred thousand people died in the forced population transfers and the armed occupations that followed the conference. However, Europe did not commit suicide a second time. The Sino-Japanese War did not spread into a general Asia and Pacific War. It burned itself out into the early 1950’s, with the Soviets picking up the Maoist and Nationalist remnants in western China. Tens of millions of dead didn’t die. Tens of millions of others were uprooted but eventually made new lives.

The Philippines were given their independence in 1946. They were followed by Greater India (India, Pakistan, Goa, Nepal, Bhutan, Shikim, Ceylon, Burma, Tibet, south Afghanistan and Iranian Bachulistan) in 1947. Indian independence was marred by armed ethnic strife that killed tens of millions. Over twenty million Muslims fled to the Middle East and Soviet Union. Millions of Burmans fled to British protected Siam. This debacle marked the end of decolonization. The first German space satellite came in 1946. Germany led the powers into space, but all followed.

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