On 18 September, the Czechoslovak government officially asked Moscow for the first time whether it could count on a unilateral fulfilment of the pact by the USSR. An entirely positive reply followed from Moscow on the 19th. The Czechs took heart. On the very same day they were given the ‘Anglo-French plan’. The Czechs were indignant. Only today, towards evening, did they send their reply to the ‘Western democracies’: without rejecting the plan directly, the Czechoslovak government suggested using the 1926 German–Czech treaty, confirmed at one time by Hitler himself, to settle the present controversy by arbitration.