Ribbentrop, aided by Göring, played — for strategic reasons — the moderate on this occasion. For him, the main enemy was not Poland, but Britain. He countered that, through a premature attack in 1939 on Poland and Russia, Germany would become isolated, would forfeit its armaments advantage, and would most likely be forced by western strength to give up any territorial gains made. Instead, Germany needed to act together with Italy and Japan, retaining Polish neutrality until France had been dealt with and Britain at least isolated and denied all power on the Continent, if not militarily defeated.15 War by Germany and Italy to defeat France and leave Britain isolated had been the basis of the military directives laid down by Keitel, in line with Hitler’s instructions, in November 1938.16 The priority which Hitler accorded in January 1939 to the navy’s Z-Plan, for building a big battle-fleet directed squarely at British naval power, indicates that he was looking at this stage to an eventual showdown with the western powers as the prime military objective. The construction at the same time of an ‘East Wall’ — limited defensive fortifications for the event of possible conflict with Poland over Danzig — is a further pointer in that direction.17 Russia, and the eradication of Bolshevism, could wait. But neither Hitler nor anyone in his entourage expected war with Britain and France to come about in the way that it would do that autumn. Hitler had told Goebbels in October 1938 that he foresaw ‘for the more distant future a very serious conflict’, to decide European hegemony. This would be ‘probably with England’.18 Göring — who had lost face with Hitler since helping to engineer the Munich Agreement that had thwarted his intention of taking Czechoslovakia by force, and by this time no longer initiated into his plans — had no expectation of any general war before about 1942.19 Keitel had seen his right-hand man in the High Command of the Wehrmacht, General Jodl, transferred to Vienna at the end of October 1938, a move he later stated he would have prevented had he had any notion that war might have been imminent.20
In the late autumn and winter of 1938–9, differing views about foreign-policy aims and methods existed within the German leadership. The army was more ready to turn to military action against Poland than it had been against Czechoslovakia. But the specific measures adopted, particularly the building of the eastern fortifications, were still defensive in nature. The ‘Ostwall’ comprised little more than basic fortifications — castigated by Hitler as grossly lacking in fire-power and death-traps for those manning them — along a bend in the river Oder some sixty miles east of Berlin.21 Long-term military preparations were directed towards eventual confrontation with the West, but it was well recognized that the armed forces were years away from being ready for any conflict with Britain and France.22 As in 1938, military leaders’ prime fear was confrontation being forced on Germany too soon through impetuous actions and an over-risky foreign policy. Göring and Ribbentrop were advocating diametrically opposed policies towards Britain. Göring’s hopes still rested on an expansive policy in south-eastern Europe, backed for the foreseeable future by an understanding with Britain.23 Ribbentrop, by now violently anti-British, was, as we have noted, pinning his hopes on smoothing the problems on Germany’s eastern front and tightening the alliance with Italy and Japan to prepare the ground for a move against Britain as soon as was feasible. But at this stage, Göring’s star was temporarily on the wane and Ribbentrop’s usually clumsy diplomacy was meeting in most instances with little success.24 Hitler’s thoughts, whether or not influenced by Ribbentrop’s reasoning, were broadly consonant with those of his Foreign Minister. The coming show-down with Bolshevism, prominent in the foreground in 1936, though certainly not displaced in Hitler’s own mind as the decisive struggle to be faced at some point in the future had by now moved again into the shadows. Hitler favoured at this point rapprochement with the Poles, to bring them into the German orbit, and preparations for confrontation with the West (which he continued to indicate would not be before 1943 or 1944).25 But he was, as usual, content to keep his options open and await developments.
The one certainty was that developments
