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Table of Contents
The Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1
  • 27 October 1937
  • 12 July
  • 18 July
  • 9 August
  • 30 October
  • 31 October
  • 1 November
  • 4 November
  • 5 November
  • 6 November
  • 7 November
  • 9 November
  • 10 November
  • 12 November
  • 15 November
  • 16 November
  • 17 November
  • 18 November
  • 23 November
  • 24 November
  • 25 November
  • 27 November
  • 28 November
  • 29 November
  • 1 December
  • 5 December
  • 6 December
  • 11 December
  • 13 December
  • 16 December
  • 17 December
  • 18 December
  • 19 December
  • 20 December
  • 24 December
  • 27 December
  • 31 December
  • 8 January
  • 9 January
  • 15 January
  • 18 January
  • 25 January
  • 26 January
  • 28 January
  • 1 February
  • 4 February
  • 6 February
  • 10 February
  • 12 February
  • 14 February
  • 15 February
  • 20 February
  • 21 February
  • 22 February
  • 28 February
  • 1 March (1)
  • 1 March (2)
  • 2 March
  • 4 March
  • 5 March
  • 6 March
  • 7 March
  • 8 March
  • 9 March
  • 11 March
  • 12 March
  • 13 March
  • 14 March
  • 15 March
  • 16 March
  • 17 March
  • 18 March
  • 19 March
  • 20 March
  • 21 March
  • 22 March
  • 23 March
  • 3 June
  • 5 June
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  • 12 June
  • 15 June
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  • 17 June
  • 19 June
  • 27 June
  • 2 July
  • 8 July
  • 9 July
  • 7 September
  • 4 November
  • 6 November
  • 8 November
  • 13 November
  • 14 November
  • 15 November
  • 14 December
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  • 20 January
  • 21 January
  • 26 January
  • 28 January
  • 29 January
  • 30 January
  • 31 January
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  • 28 June
  • 1 July
  • 27 July
  • 29 July
  • 29 July
  • 1 August
  • 10 August
  • 23 August
  • 25 August
  • 12 September
  • 14 September
  • 19 September
  • 27 October
  • 6 November
  • 16 November
  • 17 November
  • 18 November
  • 24 November
  • 1 December
  • 4 December
  • 12 December
  • 14 December
  • 4 January
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  • 25 January
  • 27 January
  • 28 January
  • 7 February
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  • 25 February
  • 1 March
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  • 30 August
  • 31 August
  • 1 September
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  • 5 September
  • 7 September
  • 8 September
  • 11 September
  • PS 1 October
  • 12 September
  • 13 September
  • 14 September
  • 15 September
  • 16 September
  • 18 September
  • 19 September
  • 20 September
  • 21 September
  • 22 September
  • 23 September
  • 24 September
  • 25 September
  • 26 September
  • 27 September
  • 28 September
  • 29 September
  • 30 September
  • 1 October
  • 6 October
  • 11 October
  • 13 October
  • 15 October
  • 17 October
  • 19 October
  • 20 October
  • 22 October
  • 25 October
  • 26 October
  • 27 October
  • 28 October
  • 30 October
  • 31 October
  • 1 November
  • 3 November
  • 9 November
  • 15 November
  • 16 November
  • 17 November
  • 25 November
  • 27 November
  • 7 December
  • 11 December
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  • 19 December
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© 2025
26 September
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By Liakhovetsky, Ivan Mikhailovich (Maisky)

The Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1

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26 September
Moscow instructed us today that Surits, Merekalov,
Aleksei Fedorovich Merekalov, deputy people’s commissar for foreign trade, 1937–38. Stalin’s personal appointee as ambassador to Berlin in April 1938, he initiated rapprochement with Germany a year later, but was recalled to Moscow in May 1939 and sidelined to direct the country’s meat industry.
and I should be back in our places. Surits has already been in Paris for five days. After consulting M.M., Merekalov and I decided to leave tomorrow. I shall go by train in order to arrive by 28 September, when a session has been planned in parliament, at which Chamberlain will make a statement about his talks with Hitler and at which, who knows, a decision might be taken about war. Agniya will return by car one or two days later.
Before the French ministers’ departure from Paris, the French government held a special meeting which resolved that the Godesberg ultimatum was unacceptable. That’s good. The hands of Daladier and Bonnet are now tied and they won’t get too far in London. The British and French ministers spent the whole of yesterday afternoon in meetings. Gamelin
Maurice Gustave Gamelin, chief of the French general staff, 1931–40.
also arrived in London this morning.
A propos, I heard the following story. Bonnet, whose role throughout the crisis has been of the most sinister kind, insisted in his talks in London on the need to avert a war whatever the cost. In the main, Daladier supported him. It goes without saying that the French ministers met with Chamberlain’s full ‘understanding’ and ‘sympathy’. As an argument in favour of capitulation, Bonnet cited the unpreparedness of the French army, particularly its air force for a large-scale war. Gamelin found out about this and immediately decided to go to London personally in order to renounce Bonnet’s slander and restore the honour of the French army. When Daladier learned about the forthcoming


Page 349

arrival of the chief of the general staff, he deemed it best to legalize his appearance in London and sent Gamelin an official invitation to the conferences. In London, Gamelin admitted to certain flaws in the French armed forces (especially in aviation), but he declared categorically that, although he was against preventive war, France would emerge victorious if war were to break out now. According to Gamelin, the Siegfried line does not yet pose an insurmountable obstacle. The Germans have not had sufficient time to reinforce it properly. Gamelin is said to have used the following expression: ‘The Siegfried line is just a wall of marmalade.’
Gamelin did not think much of the Maginot Line either, warning Hore-Belisha that it might still take quite a while to complete the fortification of its northern and southern sections; R.J. Minney (ed.), The Private Papers of Hore-Belisha (New York, 1961), p. 168.
***
When Chamberlain returned from Godesberg, Attlee and Greenwood went to see him. Halifax was also present at the meeting.
Chamberlain began with lengthy deliberations on the theme that Hitler is ‘an honest man’, and that, having received the Sudetenland, he would be appeased. The speech bored Greenwood, who interrupted the prime minister and asked him: ‘Have you read Hitler’s Mein Kampf?’
Chamberlain got angry and answered irritably: ‘Yes, I have, but I have conversed with Hitler and you have not!’
The Labour leaders wanted to know whether the Godesberg memorandum was forwarded to Czechoslovakia with or without a recommendation that it be


Page 350

accepted. The prime minister replied that no recommendations had been made from his side.
‘What will happen,’ the Labourites went on, ‘if Czechoslovakia rejects Hitler’s demands?’
‘That will depend on the behaviour of France,’ responded the prime minister.
‘And what if France supports Czechoslovakia? What stand will the British government take in that case?’
Chamberlain avoided answering this question directly, but said that ‘a new situation would be created’ which the Cabinet had not yet discussed. Neither could the prime minister give a clear and definite answer to the question about the guarantees of Czechoslovakia’s new borders. Concluding the conversation, the Labour leaders returned once more to their initial point: What foundations were there for assuming the Sudetenland to be the Führer’s last demand? Chamberlain exclaimed once again with renewed annoyance: ‘I saw Hitler and I believe him!’
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Document Details
Document Title26 September
AuthorLiakhovetsky, Ivan Mikhailovich (Maisky)
RecipientN/A
RepositoryN/A
ID #N/A
DescriptionN/A
Date1938 Sep 26
AOC VolumeThe Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1
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