Page 134 - Was Hitler a Riddle?

The French Diplomats 121

François-Poncet was scathing in his reaction to simon’s assessment of
Hitler. the ambassador conceded that Hitler could be gracious and could
give the impression of being moved by honorable sentiments. But Fran-
çois-Poncet warned that sir John had not taken the full measure of the
man. Hitler was also a person of “brutal arrogance, [who was] violent, de-
voured by the madness of [his own] greatness, . . . obstinate, stubborn and
mean to the point of madness.” simon had placed his trust in a “primitive
brute.” François-Poncet seems to have forgotten that too often he himself
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had dwelled on the apparently attractive features of Hitler.
When François-Poncet returned to Berlin on June 23, 1935, after a one-
month stay in Paris, he was amazed at the change in the political climate.
When he left, the mood had been downcast, mainly because the league of
Nations had condemned Germany for rearming in violation of the treaty of
Versailles. Moreover, it had seemed that several european powers—France,
the soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, and romania—were planning to isolate
and encircle Germany. But by the end of June, the atmosphere was entirely
different. the British government, which sympathized with Germany’s re-
sentment of the punitive measures of the treaty of Versailles, had signed
a naval agreement with Hitler that allowed Germany to build a navy 35
percent as large as the royal Navy. the British government looked upon
the treaty as a way of limiting German rearmament, but the Germans were
pleased to be permitted to exceed the limits set by the treaty of Versailles,
and they also saw the agreement as a first step toward creating an alliance
with Great Britain against France and the soviet Union. But the French
and italians were disturbed because they had been kept in the dark during
the negotiations. “the naval accord of london,” François-Poncet noted,
“had banished the clouds [in Germany] and had brought back the sun.” the
Nazis considered the agreement a complete transformation of the interna-
tional situation because Germany was now no longer isolated. it enhanced
Hitler’s prestige, and his followers were now confident that within a few
years their country would reemerge as “the foremost military power in the
world.” Writing after World War ii, François-Poncet argued that all along
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British political leaders had underestimated the military threat posed by the
Nazis and that they therefore bore much responsibility for the West’s failure
to stop the rearmament of Germany. 58
days after his return to Berlin, the ambassador received an unsettling
report from General renondeau on Germany’s expansionist plans. the
general had been sent a remarkably candid account of those plans by Major
Friedrich-Carl rabe von Pappenheim, a soldier who within another eight