The Red Scare Continues

Nazi Germany as a ‘bulwark against Bolshevism’ – 1938 to May 1940

When a few weeks later,  in a new year address for 1938, the Reverend Handel Elvey, vicar of the East Sussex parish of Willingdon, thanked God for Hitler and Mussolini for “delivering the world from the horror of communism” not even the local Eastbourne Gazette thought it worthy of a front page headline, relegating the story instead to a single column on page 12.  Under the heading “Vicar Thanks God for Dictators”, the reporter explained how the vicar “takes his stand by the side of Hitler, Musolini and Franco, as an opponent of communism” and quoted the Vicar’s words in his parish newsletter that “whatever faults these dictators may have, we may well thank God for raising up Hitler and Mussolini as deliverers of the world from the horror of communism.”[1]

Even as late as May 1939, just four months before the outbreak of war,  long after Germany had overrun Austria and the whole of the Czech Republic and six months after the Krystallnacht anti-Jewish pogrom,  newspapers were still publishing letters in support of Hitler’s strong anti-communist stand such as this one from Major A. J. Leith in the Western Morning News. “If Hitler had not raised the swastika,” he asked, “would Europe have been better off if it had been dominated by the hammer and cycle ? I admit there does not appear to be much difference in the general methods employed – one adopting military methods and the other subterranean subversive propaganda. But I suggest under Hitler’s regime there is more religious toleration.”[2]

By this time Hitler had already shown his contempt for the Munich agreement by ordering the German army to march into Prague on 15 March. British public opinion then forced the government to open negotiations with the Soviet Union for a military alliance to deter further German acts of aggression. However Chamberlain’s government did not pursue the talks with any enthusiasm, partly for ideological reasons, partly because they were concerned that Eastern European states might consequently fall under Moscow’s influence and partly because they feared such an alliance might provoke Hitler into deciding to strike against France and Britain first.  The result of the British reluctance to strike any alliance with Moscow,  was increasing Soviet suspicions of British intentions, and on 23 August, Nazi Germany sprung a shock diplomatic surprise, when von foreign minister von Ribbentrop arrived in Moscow and only a few hours later signed a non-aggression pact.

This was a massive blow to many in the British establishment who had continued to hope that Germany’s predatory eyes were focused only on the East and that, through careful and discreet negotiations, Hitler might moderate his territorial ambitions so as not to upset the European balance of power and threaten Western interests. Worse, in allying itself with communist Russia, it now appeared that Nazi Germany was no longer the reliable bulwark against Bolshevism, one of the primary motives for British elite support for Hitler’s brutal regime.

The shock of the news of the Nazi-Soviet pact to the British establishment is clearly evident in the verdict of Lord Lloyd, a close political associate of  Winston Churchill who became a key member of the war time cabinet in May 1940.  In December 1939 he published “The British Case”, a nine penny propaganda pamphlet containing an intellectual justification, from the establishment perspective, of Britain’s decision to declare war on Germany.  He maintained that the Berlin-Moscow alliance “was Herr Hitler’s final apostasy. It was the betrayal of Europe. It meant the sacrifice on the alter of Communist ambition not only of Eastern Poland but of other independent states.” He then explained that until 23 August 1939, his “acts of brutality at home” could be overlooked due to “the need for order and discipline in Europe…. however abominable his methods, however intolerant he might show himself of the rights of other European peoples, he still claimed to stand ultimately for something which was a common European interest, and which therefore could conceivably provide some day a basis for understanding with other nations equally determined not to sacrifice their traditional institutions and habits on the bloodstained altars of the World Revolution.”[3]

Lloyd was not attempting to justify Hitler’s crimes against the Jews, the mentally handicapped or his political opponents, but rather to explain why the British government had decided to make its concerns about such issues subordinate to those of supporting a regime which would supposedly stamp out socialist and communist influence in Europe.  Such views were still widely shared within Britain’s establishment, even several months into the Second World War, with Lord Halifax, the  foreign secretary,  giving his benediction to the pamphlet by penning a supportive introduction and commenting that “those who wish to understand the real causes of the war would do well to read Lord Lloyd’s pamphlet on “The British Case.”[4] The Western Morning News noted that Lloyd had convincingly “removed any misgivings based on the notion that the British government regards the struggle as simply one against Hitlerism or the present German government.”[5]  It had to be made clear that this was not a war against Nazism or Fascism.  Rather it was a war to restore the balance of power and to safeguard “European freedom and civilisation,” which readers understood to be code for the preservation of British interests and the existing socio-economic system. It seems that even as late as December 1939, three months into the war, the British establishment was reluctant to accept that Nazism had replaced communism as the enemy.

This same strange sense of priorities can be seen in the discussions at high level within the British and French governments to aid Finland, after Russian forces invaded on 30 November.   The British and French forces had launched no major military assault to aid Poland in September, despite the savage German assault which killed up to 200,000 civilians.  Yet, even while Allied forces were still not deployed in sufficient numbers in France to fend off any major German offensive, the French government authorized sending 50,000 troops to Finland  who were to be disguised as “volunteers,” while the British government had by early March had already delivered 22 Bristol Blenheim bombers, 30 Gloucester Gladiator fighters, 10,000 anti-tank mines and large quantities of other military supplies and was now also planning to send at least the same number of troops as the French.[6]

On 7 March Chamberlain informed his war cabinet that he was “in favour of taking considerable risks and sending a substantial number of bombers, provided always, of course, that the Finns were not intending to give way to the Russians.” Despite this “considerable risk” of dispatching such large numbers of aircraft to this remote Arctic front,  it was then decided, in addition to the 73 additional fighters already promised, that the RAF would dispatch a further 50 bombers.[7] Chamberlain also briefed the press that he had promised that the British and French governments if invited by Finland, would offer immediate military assistance “using all available resources at their disposal.”[8] Winston Churchill was critical, but only because he felt that troops should be sent to face the Soviet army in Finland regardless of whether they were invited or not.[9]

The risks of diverting vital defence forces to Finland were enormous as the Birmingham Post pointed out in an editorial on 14 March 1940. “England and France, as Mr. Chamberlain and M. Daladier (the French premier) have made clear, were ready three weeks ago, whatever the effects on the Maginot-Siegfried front, to add substantially to Finland’s manpower.”[10] The use of the phrase “whatever the effects” is astonishing, suggesting that aiding the Finnish war effort against Communist Russia was a strategic priority above any offensive assault against Nazi Germany, and that, for this purpose, France and Britain were even willing to deplete their defensive capability against any German assault in the West.  Hugh Dalton, the Labour Party chairman, later conceded that he had been “shocked by the proposal, not only to supply Finland with arms, including aircraft, which were badly needed by France and ourselves, but to send an Anglo-French expeditionary force to fight in Finland against Russia. This seemed to be sheer political lunacy.”[11]

Ironically, at the same time as Britain and France were planning a military intervention to support Finland, Germany allowed Mussolini to dispatch 52 aircraft to aid the Finnish war effort. A significant boost to the Finnish war effort which was only made possible by refuelling at German airfields. However, Nazi support for Finland was not confined to allowing the transit of Italian aircraft.  On at least two occasions, Berlin made it clear to Swedish diplomats that it was happy for Sweden to adopt a “benevolent neutrality” towards Finland, so long as support was restricted to “volunteers” and war material.[12] So, it seemed that, to some extent, Nazi and British war aims coincided in their desire to limit the expansion of Soviet influence in Scandinavia. British and French military support for Finland was only put on hold when, in early March, Sweden, which was considered vital as a base for any anti-Soviet operation, refused to cooperate by allowing the passage of Allied troops.

A few days later, on 13 March 1940,  the Fins, unable to withstand the much larger Soviet forces, agreed to an armistice with the Russians. The shock and shame felt in Paris, was greater than it had been on the news of the fall of Warsaw to the Nazis on 28 September, and Daladier was forced to resign after fierce attacks on him in the French parliament, during which Senator Henry Lémery expressed the anger of French conservatives. “You had in Finland,” he declared, “an almost miraculous opportunity to vanquish the Soviet Union. You let it slip by. France weeps for it ! Her heart bleeds !”[13]

In London, many MPs felt angry that the government hadn’t done even more to support Finland against the Soviet invasion. The Birmingham Evening Despatch noted that “some members, such as Mr. Harold Macmillan feel that their criticism on the whole subject would be so outspoken that it would be safer to hold the debate in secret.”[14]  Leslie Hore-Belisha, who had until January served as Secretary of State for War, also declared his dissatisfaction in the House of Commons. He argued that a larger air reinforcement “could have broken the Russian assault,” and asked “would it not have been worth one month’s output of aeroplanes from our factories to have saved the situation ?” Clement Attlee, the leader of the Labour Party, appeared to share the former War Secretary’s concerns and asked for evidence “that what we did send was sent on time and that there were no unnecessary delays.”[15]  Fortunately for Chamberlain, the Cabinet and most MPs remained reluctant to express their dissatisfaction with the government too openly in war time.

Throughout the 104 day Russo-Finnish conflict, the politicians as well as many intellectuals and the press, in both France and Britain, had used the language of defending civilisation and taking up a crusade against communism. At first they came as opinions from lesser known members of the establishment appearing as letters to the editor of The Times.  So on 9 December, the newspaper published a letter which asserted that one had “to go back to the dark ages to find a parallel to this unprovoked attack – if indeed one could find it there.” The writer claimed that the German invasion of Poland (which killed 200,000 civilians) was a “gentlemanly act in comparison with this latest demonstration of cold blooded gangsterism” and he called for “an international crusade” against Russia.  A  similar letter followed on 18 December, urging that “perhaps, through Finland, the beginning of the downfall of Bolshevism may still be achieved if she (Finland) gets the help she needs on time,” and another, just two days later, reminding readers that “Finland is fighting not only for herself – she does not wish to be Bolshevised – she is fighting for Western civilisation too. Should Russia succeed in crushing Finland, then the whole of Northern Europe may succumb to the hideous Soviet system… that brave little country cannot be alone, she needs material and men. Need I say more ?” Then on the next two days, two more passionate appeals, the first asking “is no help to be forthcoming for this gallant land and its brave people ?” and the second eulogizing “Finland’s defence against barbarism” and again reiterating the mantra that “the maintenance of the defence is vital not only to Finland herself, but to the rest of the civilised world.”[16]

These calls for action were then echoed across other newspapers. On 3 January an editorial in the Daily Mirror declared that “we hope that assistance, if given, will be given quickly,”  while, in France, on 11 January, the military correspondent of the Petit Parisien commented that “it is intolerable that diplomatic relations still exist with a country that has nothing in common with the civilised world,” and added that “the moment is perhaps not far distant when a general crusade against Bolshevism will be undertaken.” Two days later, on 13 January, the illustrated London newspaper, The Sphere,  described the Finish resistance to the Soviet invasion as “this modern Thermopylae in the Arctic snows,” and, on 30 January, even the left leaning Daily Herald lauded the anti-Soviet cause, with yet another reference to the famous last stand in 480 BC of Leonidas and the Spartans against the Persian hordes. “With no less brilliant daring than the Spartans at the pass of Thermopylae,” the paper observed, “the Finns have thrown back again and again the terrific onslaught of overwhelming numbers.”  Less surprisingly, the Daily Express also lent its weight to the pro-interventionist campaign, warning, on 18 January, that “if Finland is  not held as a bastion against Stalin, it will become a stepping stone to Scandinavia.”[17]

Members of Parliament couldn’t resist applauding the renewed anti-Soviet spirit. On 23 December, Patrick Donner, the Conservative MP for Basingstoke, declared his gratitude that “The Times does not share the view in certain quarters that we cannot send help to Finland because we, too, are fighting for our very existence.”  On 22 January, Winston Churchill, writing in the Daily Telegraph,  praised “the close association of Britain and France in the crusade for the freedom of all and their help to the heroism of Finland.”  On 26 January Philip Noel-Baker, the Labour MP for Derby,  told the Press Association that “the Fins were performing the same service to civilisation as Athens had done 2000 years ago when they drove out the Persians.”  On 14 February Hore-Belisha, addressing his constituents at Davenport, again resurrected the legend of the Spartans at Thermopylae, asserting that “this gallant country is fighting not for herself alone. She is holding the pass of civilisation,” and that same month, Sir Alfred Knox, MP for Wycombe, spoke in the House of Commons reminding it of the urgent need to support “Finland’s fight for civilisation.” It was clear that for many MPs, Finland had become the supposed new bulwark against Bolshevism, protecting Europe from the Soviet hordes.[18]

While in September 1936, it was Hitler who had been lauded by Lloyd George as “the George Washington of Germany, the man who won for his country independence from all her oppressors,” now British intellectuals and the press used precisely the same description for Field Marshal Mannerheim, the Finnish commander-in-chief leading the “crusade” against the “Red aggressor.”  As tensions mounted between the two countries in late October 1940 the Illustrated London News informed its readers that “Mannerheim’s work in liberating Finland” from Bolshevism in 1917 had “earned him the sobriquet of the Finnish “George Washington.”

On 3 December, a few days after Soviet forces began their assault, the historian R.A. Colwill, speaking at the Torquay Rotary Club, also granted Mannerheim the same nom de guerre, and eight weeks later, on 29 January, the Derry Journal asserted that the “George Washington of Finland was a wealthy landowner named Baron Mannerheim” who was leading “heroic little Finland” against the “Red hordes” who were “trying to impose the yoke of communist tyranny upon Finland.”[19]  Two years later the “George Washington of Finland” was to lead his troops again, this time in alliance with Hitler’s forces, in the savage siege of Leningrad which resulted in the deaths of between 1.5 and 2 million civilians.  When in December 1941 the Russians proposed to Finland terms for a separate peace, in return for allowing food supplies through to the starving population, Mannerheim rejected the idea.[20]

The Soviet Union and Finland were thankfully both more open to compromise to end the earlier Winter War.  When, on 13 March 1940, the British establishment learned that the gallant Fins had agreed to a peace settlement with Moscow, their crusading passion turned into to a deep concern that a chance to inflict a military defeat on the Soviet Union had been lost. Hugh Cudlipp, Editor of the Sunday Pictorial, launched a front page assault under the headline “Finland was Betrayed” in which he quoted Hore-Belisha’s disappointment, expressed in the House, that Britain had not sent more aircraft.  Cudlipp then asked “Did we do our share ? And did we help with all the speed we would expect of others if the enemy were at our gates ?” and argued that the government had been too slow in sending enough military support and that the people of Britain were “tired of lethargy, ineptitude and lack of foresight which continually hazard our progress.”[21]

The Daily Mirror, while it was slightly more restrained in its criticism of the government, made it clear that it thought strong military measures should be taken against the Soviet Union. On the 15th March, in an editorial, entitled “Little and Late,” the newspaper observed that “in parliament and the press and all over the country” there was “a burst of sympathy for Finland”,  but it then asked acerbically “Can we win this war on sympathy ?”  That rhetorical question had already been clearly answered by the Mirror two days earlier when it advocated an audacious assault on the Caucasus, publishing a reader’s letter suggesting that “it should be easy to seize and destroy Russia’s oil wells and lines at Batum and Baku.” This proposal was not left as merely the opinion of a reader. It was commented on favourably by the newspaper itself, which agreed that it would be “dam easy” to “walk into Russia and smash up the oil supply,” adding that Britain had, after all, “promised Finland all possible help against Russia.” The fact that such an assault would be too late to be of any help to Finland was of little importance.[22]

The Times, was also clearly disappointed that an opportunity to strike at the Soviet Union had been missed. Although the newspaper had proved loyal in backing Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler, it was now deeply concerned about anything which might be construed as appeasing Moscow. On 14 March, it published a surprisingly censorious editorial observing that there was “something to be said for submitting it (the failure of British government attempts to aid Finland) to a searching examination in a secret session (in parliament),” and it reminded readers that it was “only last month that arrangements were made to assemble an expeditionary force,” adding that “what was done tardily would have had twice the value if it could have been done promptly.” However the editor, possibly concerned that too much pessimism might be bad for public morale, stressed that Stalin, who had “expected his troops to walk into Finland and establish a Soviet Republic there,” had entirely failed in his objective. The paper acknowledged that Finland had now conceded territory but it also stressed that she retained “her moral independence,” even if she would “need also the whole of her moral strength to resist the advance of Bolshevism.”[23] However, given Britain was now at war, The Times‘ editorial should have made worrying reading for the generals. The flagship newspaper of the establishment had issued a sharp reminder that in its view the fight against Moscow backed communism must remain a strategic priority, even if that could only be made by diverting badly needed forces from the defence of France against any German assault.

The government’s anti-Moscow focus had some critics but they found that their warnings received little or no coverage or sympathy from the press.  Colonel Josiah Wedgwood, Labour MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme, declared in the House of Commons that he considered it “an amazing idea that in the middle of a war with Hitler we should gratuitously take on another war with Russia,” and added that “if it had not been for the greatest piece of luck this country has ever had, we should have sent 200,000 men to Finland, and all would have been captured… How His Majesty’s government could have undertaken a declaration of war against Russia, which it would have involved, and an almost impossible military expedition, I cannot imagine.” He found it impossible to escape the conclusion that “it would have been the maddest military adventure upon which this country had ever embarked.”[24]

The veteran war correspondent Sir Herbert Russell, who had covered Britian’s ill fated Gallipoli campaign in the First World War, was also critical of the government’s plans and in  particular how capable such a force would have been in the Arctic conditions of Finland. He pointed out that while the Fins had resorted to ski warfare as the basis of their defence, “not more than a few dozen” British soldiers had had any appropriate training and concluded that “Western trained troops with mechanised equipment would probably have proved a positive encumbrance to the ghostly war of movement which the Russians found so terribly costly.”[25]  However, unlike the critical comments of Hore-Belisha, who had asserted that Britain should have diverted “one month’s output of aeroplanes” to stop the Red hordes ( just four months prior to the Battle of Britain ), the more sober assessments of Sir Herbert and Josiah Wedgwood were never championed on the front page of any mainstream newspaper.

Historians Alvin Finkel and Clement Leibovitz make an incisive observation regarding the bizarre plans for a vast Finnish expedition during the spring of 1940.  They observe that “as it became less and less likely that a compromise with Nazi Germany could be worked out, the Allies found their foreign policy objectives and methods of the 1930s in ruins. The Finnish crisis was an effort to pick up the pieces. Once again, Britain and France could turn attention away from Nazi Germany and make the Soviet Union out to be the principal threat to European countries. Communism, not Nazism, could be treated as the principal threat to Western civilization.”[26]

Even a few contemporaries understood that it was Hitler who would gain most if the Soviet attack on Finland produced the expected call for anti-Bolshevist crusade from Western politicians and intellectuals.  The French politician and former Air Minister Pierre Cott  observed in January 1940 that Hitler “will continue to do his utmost to bring about a state of war between the Soviets and the democracies – just as before overrunning Poland he made every effort to wreck the negotiations between the democracies and the Soviet Union… He reckons with an upheaval of world conscience against Stalin and expects the latter to replace him as public enemy number one.”[27] Cott’s fear was that the West appeared to be returning to its appeasement mentality of the previous decade when the supposed threat of a Moscow backed revolution in Europe had blinded the establishment to both the crimes and dangers of Nazism.

An apt verdict on how the extreme fear of communism had influenced British appeasement of Nazi Germany through the 1930s was given by Rabbi Cohen during at talk at Birmingham’s Singers Hill Synagogue in September 1939. Spoken, just two weeks after Britain had declared war on Germany, his words are remarkable for their frank criticism of a decade of widespread British support for Hitler. “Even in this country,” he observed, “there were many, including persons of influence, who were ready to shut their eyes to these atrocities (against the Jews) and took every opportunity of praising the new Germany created by Hitlerism….. Thousands of persons here and elsewhere were prepared to overlook and excuse Nazi villainies because….. they regarded Nazism as a bulwark against communism. What fools they must be feeling today !“[28]

Footnotes

1. “Vicar Thanks God for Dictators”, the Eastbourne Gazette, 5 January 1938 p2.

2. “Letters to the Editor”, the Western Morning News and Daily Gazette, 5 May 1939, p11.

3. Alvin Finkel and Clement Leibovitz (2011) “The Chamberlain-Hitler Collusion,” James Lorimer and Company Ltd., London p259

4. “The British Case by Lord Lloyd,” Advertisement in the Yorkshire Post, 15 December 1939, p4

5. “Threats to Neutrals,” the Western Morning News, 13 December 1939 p6

6. The figures for British fighters and bombers dispatched to Finland are given in the War Cabinet Conclusions 7 March 1940 W.M.40, Assistance to Finland, CB65/12/7 accessed online via http://www.histdoc.net/history/BRCAB1940-03-07.html. The figure for anti-tank mines from “Allies Planned 100,000 Finland Force,” the Daily Mirror, 20 March 1940 p4. The figure of 50,000 French troops given in Thomas William Kistle (1968), “Finland in Nazi Germany’s War Strategy, 1939-45,” Thesis, University of Montana, p69  The figure of 200,000 civilian deaths during the September 1939 invasion of Poland is given in Joshua D. Zimmerman (2015), “The Polish Underground and the Jews,” Cambridge University Press, Cambridge p41.

7. The figures for British fighters and bombers dispatched to Finland are given in the War Cabinet Conclusions 7 March 1940 W.M.40, Assistance to Finland, CB 65/12/7 accessed online via http://www.histdoc.net/history/BRCAB1940-03-07.html. Chamberlain’s statement also taken from the same source.

8.”Finland’s Choice,” Editorial in The Times, 13 March 1940 p9

9. Markku Ruotsilla (2005), “Churchill and Finland: A Study in Anticommunism and Geopolitics,” Routledge, Abingdon, p96

10. “Finland’s Surrender,” the Birmingham Post and Journal, 14 March 1940 p4

11. Hugh Dalton (1957), “The Fateful Years: Memoirs 1931-1945,” Frederick Muller, London, pp292-3.

12. Thomas William Kistle (1968), “Finland in Nazi Germany’s War Strategy, 1939-45,” Thesis, University of Montana p50 and pp56-57 accessed online at http://scholarworks.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6230&context=etd

13. Senator Henry Lémery quoted in Patrick R. Osborn (2000), “Operation Pike: Britain Versus the Soviet Union, 1939-41,” Greenwood Press, London p41. For Daladier’s resignation see Talbot Imlay, (1998)”France and the Phoney War,” in Robert W.D. Boyce (Editor), “French Foreign and Defence Policy, 1918-40: The Decline and Fall of a Great Power,” Routledge, London p273.

14. “Premier will Review the Diplomatic War,” the Birmingham Evening Despatch, 16 March 1940 p5

15. Leslie Hore-Belisha and Clement Attlee in the House of Commons,  Hansard, HC Deb 19 March 1940 vol 358 cc1833-952 accessed online at http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1940/mar/19/progress-of-the-war

16. E.M Nielsen, “Finland,” The Times, 9 December 1939 p4, De Saumarez, “The Heroism of Finland – A Fight for Freedom,” The Times 18 December 1939 p9, C.H. Jones, “Help for Finland,” The Times, 20 December 1939 p9, Alfred E. Blackwell, “Help for Finland,” The Times, 21 December 1939 p9 and E.S. Olsewka and G. Turville-Petre, “Help for Finland,” The Times 22 December 1939 p9 – all letters to the editor accessed in The Times Digital Archive on 5 October 2017

17. “New ‘Moves,'” editorial in the Daily Mirror, 3 January 1940 p7, Charles Morice in “Petit Parisien” quoted in the Dundee Evening Telegraph, 11 January 1940 p1, “The Epic of Finland,” The Sphere, 13 January 1940 p35, “Heroes of the North,” the Daily Herald, 30 January 1940 p6 and “Opinion,” editorial in the Daily Express, 18 January 1940 p6

18. Patrick Donner, “Help for Finland,” letter to The Times, 23 December 1939 p7, Winston Churchill in the Daily Telegraph quoted in “Britain’s Voice – Why She is Fighting,” the Belfast Newsletter, 22 January 1940 p8, Philip Noel-Baker quoted in “More Fierce Fighting in Finland,” the Yorkshire Post, 26 January 1940 p5, Leslie Hore-Belisha quoted in “Holding the Pass,” The Western Mail and South Wales News, 24 February 1940 p6 and Sir Alfred Cox quoted in “Wants More Help for Finland,” the Nottingham Evening Post, 6 February 1940 p3

19. “The ‘George Washington’ of Finland,” caption for a photo in the Illustrated London News, 28 October 1939, p641, R.A. Colwill quoted in “Finland and the Fins,” the Torbay Herald and Express, 4 December 1939 p5 and “Finland’s Great Fight for Freedom,” the Derry Journal, 29 January 1940 p5

20. Richard Bidlack and Nikita Lomagin (2012), “The Leningrad Blockade 1941-44: A New Documentary History from the Soviet Archives,” Yale University Press, p35 and p163.

21. “Finland was Betrayed,” the Sunday Pictorial, 17 March 1940 p1 and p11.

22. “Little and Late,” the Daily Mirror, 15 March 1940 p9 and letter to the editor in the Daily Mirror, 13 March 1940 p13

23. “Finland,” Editorial in The Times, 14 March 1940, p9 accessed online in The Times Digital Archive on 30 September 2017.

24. Colonel Josiah Wedgwood in the House of Commons,  Hansard, HC Deb 19 March 1940 vol 358 cc1833-952 accessed online at http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1940/mar/19/progress-of-the-war

25. Sir Herbert Russell, “And Now Forget the Lies,” the Daily Mirror, 15 March 1940 p8

26. Clement Leibovitz and Alvin Finkel, (2011) “The Chamberlain-Hitler Collusion,” James Lorimer and Company Ltd., Toronto p284

27. Pierre Cot, “The Race for Supremacy in the North,” the Daily Record, 2 January 1940 p7

28. “Birmingham Rabbi’s New Year Address” in the Birmingham Post, 15 September 1939, p3.