Russia calls for Lithuania to hand over 1500 conscripts who refused to join Soviet army in 1990-91.

[The Magistrate]

33. To Be Fair To Chamberlain, Sir

It must be recalled his policy of appeasement was meant to preserve the possibility of forming an alliance with Hitler, in which Hitler would do the heavy lifting in a war against the Soviet Union. He had offered tremendous economic incentives to Hitler for such an alliance, referred to in the English press when it was discovered as 'the biggest bribe in history'. His anti-Communism was the unthinking reflex of a class of businessmen which saw Hitler as a champion of Europe against Bolshevism, and held nothing could be too bad if it was also against Communism ( which they largely held to be a plot by Jews in any case ). Chamberlain was not a simple dupe and delusional pacifist sort; he was playing for something, however clumsily and inexpertly.