May 10, 1941. Hess jumps, the Luftwaffe quits, Belgian workers walk.

Hess's wrecked Bf110.

On this day in 1941 Rudolph Hess, operating on his own initiative, took a German aircraft and flew himself to the UK with the expressed intent to broker a peace between Germany and the British Empire.

It's easy to sum up Hess as delusional, which he was.  He was peculiar in other ways, however, which is saying something as the Nazi leadership was overall peculiar.  He'd spent his youth in Egypt, where he was born of German parents, where he acquired an intense racism against non Europeans, rather than being broadened in his views as a person would suspect.  He also, from that experience, came to admire the British.  He'd served in World War One and emerged into an economy in which his family's business interests, of which it had been intended he'd be part of, had been badly damaged by the war, and in particular by the British seizing German interest in Egypt.  He was a very early member of the Nazi Party.  He became the Deputy Fuhrer of the party, an extremely high position in the German Nazi regime.  Following the start of the war his antisemitism grew.

On this day in 1941 he flew a Bf110 to Scotland in the belief that he could establish contacts with friendly British interest and negotiate a peace with the UK. Based on the statement he intended to deliver at the Nuremburg Trial and again attempted to issue in written form in 1986, he actually believed that he'd be able to negotiate a peace and bring the UK into the war against the Soviet Union, something that was then on the near horizon in German planning.

Hess used a Bf110 for his mission, which was a substantial aircraft.  He ran out of fuel near his target, a British estate that he mistakenly believed would house a sympathetic family, and bailed out, breaking his ankle and resulting in his capture by a Scottish farmer.  He was placed in the Tower of London where he spent the rest of the war.  The mission was hugely embarrassing to the Germans as Hess was a significant figure in the Nazi Party, and it was somewhat embarrassing to the British at it was both a reminder of there having been some significant members of British aristocracy who had sympathized with the Nazis before the war and because such a substantially sized aircraft had penetrated over Scotland without detection.

Following the war he was a defendant at the Nuremburg trials.  Being convicted, he spent the rest of his life a prisoner at Spandau Prison in Berlin where he remained an unrepentant Nazi, and he remained a prisoner far longer than any other figure sentenced to prison.  As he had very little in the way of a role after the war started, and served so many more years than any other German prisoner, there were fairly serious efforts to secure his release in later years, which tended to discount that his views had not changed at all.  Neither had the Soviets, however, who vetoed any release as they firmly believed that he was aware of plans to invade the Soviet Union and, therefore, could have warned the British who would have warned them.  At least according to one story, on a single occasion when the Soviets failed to veto his release, the British did.  The prison was torn down following his death in order to avoid having it turned into a Nazi shrine. His grave did become one, however, so in 2011 the Lutheran church on whose grounds it was located had the remains removed and the tombstone destroyed.

On the same day that Hess flew to Scotland, the Luftwaffe bombed London again.  You can read of both events here:

Today in World War II History—May 10, 1941

Huge raid on London

The London raid was the Luftwaffe's last largescale aircraft bombing raid on the city of the war.  The Blitz was winding down and in fact the nighttime raid, which also covered the following morning, ended the campaign.  German air raids over the UK would continue to the end of the war in a lesser capacity, but the largescale nighttime raids that had commenced after the German failure to win an aerial victory ended.  The Germans lost the Battle of Britain and they'd lost the Blitz.  They were not going to knock the UK out of the war through the air, and they gave up trying.  Of course, they also had limited air assets and began to rededicate them to the planned campaign against the Soviets Union.  Indeed, the termination of the campaign supported the British suspicion that the Soviet Union was next, something the British would attempt to warn the Soviets of.

While Hess went on his delusional mission, Belgian workers went out on strike.  The strike was remarkable not only for the fact it occurred in occupied country, but that even the Belgian Communist Party supported it. At the time, the Communists everywhere were generally somewhat pro Nazi or at least not anti Nazi due to the non aggression pact that had been entered into between the Soviet Union and Germany still being in effect.

The strike lasted eight days and ended when the Germans agreed to a wage raise.

May 6, 1941. Firsts

Joseph Stalin became the premier of the Soviet Union, replacing Molotov.  Molotov went into second position.

1937 portrait of Stalin.

Not that it would matter, as Stalin was the head of the party, which made him the defacto head of state.

Stalin would form his first government, which would last until 1946, the following day.

Liberty Aircraft plant, Long Island, New York.  May 6, 1941.  I'm unfamiliar with this company, but it apparently lasted until 1987.

Serbs staged a rebellion in Sanski Most against the fascist government of Serbia installed by the Nazis.

The Luftwaffe commenced two nights of bombing on Greenrock, Scotland.

Today was the first flight of the XP47, which would become the legendary P47 fighter.  The plane had been developed in a mere eight months.

The P47 provides a good example of the extraordinary rapid development of aircraft in this period. At the time, the P40 was the USAAC's most significant fighter.  The P47 was different from it in every fashion, including its massive size which accommodated a massive engine.

On the same day, Igor Sikorsky set a new record for helicopter flight endurance, which still wasn't long.

Bob Hope performed his first stand up performance for troops.  He would, of course, famously do this at least throughout the Vietnam War.

Hope is either an acquired taste or one of those acts that's best set in the context of their original times.  I can recall seeing televised performances from the Vietnam War, and they're just not funny.

Vichy France reached an agreement with Germany to provide material support to the Iraqi rebels, although the government never ratified it.  It did allow the Germans to use airbases in Syria to support the Iraqi insurgency, which they would make use of.

May 1, 1941. An Historical May Day

May 1, 1941, was remarkable for a whole host of things, not only in the war, but even in popular culture.  You can read about those here:

Today in World War II History—May 1, 1941

Defense bonds, CheeriOs, Citizen Kane. . . wow.  

CheeriOs, or Cheerios, were apparently originally called CheeriOats.

It was the start of the worst week of the Liverpool Blitz as well, pretty grim news.  Also grim, Gross-Rosen became an independent concentration camp.  40,000 would die there.

The Germans attempted to breach the British defenses at Tobruk, and failed.

April 27, 1941. Greece Falls

 

German propaganda poster issued on this day in 1941. The text, which is oddly in the German script more or less reads "The gigantic work of our Furher's in the struggle of the war is the highest and best duty of all Germans to support."^[1]

On this day in 1941, the Germans took Athens and the Greek government surrendered.

Today in World War II History—April 27, 1941

Almost 1,000 men died in British naval evacuations on this day when the ships carrying the evacuated troops were sunk in Luftwaffe raids. The event is known as the Salmat Disaster.

Churchill delivered a radio address:

Westward Look, the Land is Bright (Audio) - International Churchill Society: April 27, 1941. Broadcast, London. http://ia800205.us.archive.org/19/items/Winston_Churchill/1941-04-27_BBC_Winston_Churchill_Westward_Look_The_Land_Is_Bright.mp3 Related Story

All in all, obviously, it was a bad day for the Allies in what had been a bad month.

Hindsight is 20/20, of course, but relating these events now, what do they say about the actual state of the forces?  We know, of course, how the story ends, but even then there were certain things that seem evident, if considered.

One is, and the one the Germans were obviously focused on, that the Germans were pretty much the top contenders in ground combat at the time.  They'd now defeated all of the continental European powers they'd fought and had pushed the British off of the continent twice. And at the moment, they were besting the British in North Africa.

Having said that, and it wasn't quite evident yet, that strength waned considerably once they were removed from the continent, and the opposite was the case for the British. The British were retreating in North Africa in the face of the modern new opponent, the Afrika Corps, but they weren't defeated and hadn't been pushed out of Tobruk.

Moreover, the British, with naval power the Germans couldn't match, were capable of landing troops wherever they wished, and whenever they wished.  They'd commenced naval based raids and had conducted them on German held Norway, in North Africa, and on the Italian peninsula.  This meant that the Axis, which had a massive coastline, was really incapable of defending it against such raids but it had to try. The British, for their part, were not really subject to them due to their superior naval strength.

Additionally, the Italians had proven completely incompetent in the war.  This is something that is well known, and the reasons for it are debated by historians, but it was a fact. Without German direct support the Italian military was completely useless.  Indeed much of its more "modern" equipment was now obsolete, having peaked its point of being cutting edge in the mid 1930s prior to the onset of the war.  In the rapidly developing armor and aircraft industries of the time, that meant that their equipment was old and past its prime.

This in turn meant that for the most part the Italian army was of no real aid to the German war effort other than that it simply existed.  Indeed, Italy had caused the Germans to commit men to North Africa and to an effort in Greece which caused it to have to invade Yugoslavia.  The German Army, in 1939-1941, was the best on the ground in Europe, but it was spread pretty thin.

All of this sets the background, of course, for what was coming. But what was, was this.  Germany could go where it wanted and when it wanted on the European landmass. . . against conventionally sized European states.  It couldn't, however, knock the United Kingdom out of the war, and the UK could strike the Axis coast anywhere it wanted at any time.  Germany was committed to an air campaign against the UK but it wasn't denting British resolve and it wasn't really impacting British production much.  The British, in turn, could and did hit Germany fairly frequently in bombing raids conducted at night, which also weren't denting German resolve and which weren't really impacting German production much, but which should have been a red flat to the Germans that in spite of their ability to occupy the European landmass they weren't even remotely close to defeating the British and whatever they might wish to do next, the British remained a power capable of really harassing them, at a bare minimum, and one that needed to be constantly guarded against.

And, in the background, the United States was openly edging closer to war every day with the Roosevelt Administration openly backing the British and coming as close to bringing the country into the war without openly asking for a declaration of war.  The German Navy's "Happy Time" had ended and now the production scale was tipping towards the British.

Not obvious yet, with the occupation of Yugoslavia and Greece the Germans now would, additionally, have to maintain a fighting garrison as those countries would soon be the seen of guerilla warfare.

With all of this in mind, the Germans looked east towards the Soviet Union, which had started a rolling slow mobilization earlier that week.  Hitler and his lieutenants calculated, perhaps rationally, that German land forces had been invulnerable to date and they would be again.  But they discounted, and rather seriously, that their rear was completely exposed from the air and sea, they hadn't been able to really absorb what they'd taken to date, and with every miles they gained anywhere, they were spread that much thinner with no real source of additional manpower to supply them with replacements other than from Germany itself.

Footnote:

1.  This is one of those odd texts that doesn't translate directly from one language to another, so it can be translated more than one way.

April 19, 1941. National Service.

 The British passed their second National Conscription Act on this day in 1941.

An act passed the day after the German invasion of Poland created military conscription for all men who had obtained 18 years of age and who were not yet 42, meaning that Britain was including some men who had be liable to conscription in World War One, during which the conscription age eventually went up to age 50.  Exemptions were made for war work and health.  Keep in mind, however, that being liable for service did not necessarily mean that a person would be called up.

The second conscription act required men up to 60s years of age to perform some war service, which included military service for men up to 51 years of age.  It lifted the exemption for men under 20 years of age for foreign service.  And it made unmarried women without children between the ages of 20 and 30 liable for war service at home, other than military service.

On the same day London suffered a heavy bombing raid.

A research from Rocky Mountain Laboratories in Montana was photographed on this day flagging for ticks.

April 4, 1941. Reversals

O'Connor in captivity.

Symbolizing the sudden reversal of fortune in the Desert, a German patrol captured Gen. Richard O'Connor, the commander of the British forces in Egypt.  On the same day the Germans took Derna, Libya.

The British had already striped British forces in North Africa to supply them to the mission to Egypt, and that was followed by German gains in Libya.  O'Connor's capture somewhat symbolized the reversals the British were now seeing.

O'Connor would remain a prisoner of the Italians until their surrender, at which point he was reincorporated into the British command structure and held significant commands until the war's end.  He retired in 1948, but lived a very long life after the war, dying in 1981 at age 91.

O'Connor was Anglo Irish, of a military family, and had been born in India.

On the same night, British Ireland was struck by the Luftwaffe on the first of its prolonged raids on Belfast.

Clearing rubble in Belfast.

The British government introduced a budget which dramatically increased taxes and forced savings in an application of Keynesian economics.  It was an effort to address inflation. The British public took it well.

The British also broke diplomatic relations with Hungary.

March 18, 1941. Long reaches.

 Defused German aerial mine, Glasgow, March 18, 1941.

The Luftwaffe continued to hit targets in Scotland on this day in 1941.

The U.S. and Canada entered into a defensive treaty as the US crept closer and closer to war. The treaty made sense, in a symbolic fashion, but wat may be most notable about it is that Canada was really beyond the reach of Germany, which Canada was at war with, except in terms of Germany's raiding fleet.  It wasn't beyond the reach of Japan, which was at war in China but not yet at war with any other power. Be that as it may, the United States was, of course, much more exposed to a Japanese strike than Canada.

Other events in World War Two on this day:

Today in World War II History—March 18, 1941

Day 565 March 18, 1941

March 14, 1941. The Blitz over Scotland, Italian submarines in the North Atlantic, Japanese offensive in China.

British troops took meals and were photographed on this day in St. Andrew's House, which is now the seat of the Scottish Parliament.

Serving during what is now regarded as Britain's dark days of the war, these men would have nonetheless have had a hard time imagining a United Kingdom with more than one parliament and being in the current state of being at least somewhat disunited, let alone that kingdom not having an Empire.

In Leeds, the city would sustain the worst night of the Leeds Blitz. Clydeside was destroyed on the second night of raids against it.  You can read more about that here:

Clydeside bombed again

In  China, the Japanese would launch as assault at Shanggao which would result in a decisive Chinese victory.

The SS Western Chief, formerly a U.S. naval cargo vessel but now a civilian cargo ship, was sunk by an Italian submarine in the North Atlantic.

We tend to not even think of the Italians having submarines in the Battle of the Atlantic, but in fact their submarine fleet was the largest in the world at the start of World War Two and their commitment to the Atlantic early in the war equaled that of the Germans.

A  Marcello class submarine in German service in the Inland Sea, Japan, in August, 1944. This submarine had been Comandante Cappelini in Italian service prior to their surrender to the Allies and would go on to Japanese service as the  IJN I-503 after Germany's surrender to the Allies.

The submarine in question was the Emo, a Marcello class submarine that was sunk in the Mediterranean in 1942.  

The story of Italian submarines during the war is not only largely forgotten, but complicated as well.  About half their fleet was destroyed in action as the war went on, and a surprising number of their boats were converted to transport craft to run to the Far East.

On the topic of submarines, German film maker Wolfgang Petersen, who filmed the submarine masterpiece Das Boot, was born on this day in 1941.

And speaking of the Japanese, President Roosevelt met with the Japanese Ambassador late in the day, on this day in 1941.

March 9, 1941. The Italians launch an offensive.

Italy launched its Spring Offensive against Greece in Albania. The offensive was was commanded personally by Mussolini and would run for a week, ending in complete failure although it severely depleted Greek resources.

The Luftwaffe bombed Buckingham Palace.

Other events in World War Two on this day:

Today in World War II History—March 9, 1941

February 21, 1941. Frederick Banting killed in accident.

On this day in 1941 Nobel laurate and medical scientist, the Canadian Frederick Banting, died in an airplane crash.  He was the co discoverer of insulin.

He was, in a way, a victim of the Second World War in that he was serving in the Canadian Army at the time, and was a passenger on a Lockheed Hudson that developed mechanical trouble. The bomber was being ferried to the UK but went down in Newfoundland.

It was the last day of the Swansea Blitz, that event in which the Germans bombarded that city for three nights.

It was strategically ineffective. Swansea had significant military targets, including oil facilities, but they were not damages in the three day raid.

More on both of these events can be read about here:

Today in World War II History—February 21, 1941

The British disembarked 1300 men on Malta.

21 February 1941: Reinforcements for Malta – 1300 Troops Disembark

January 3, 1941. The Battle of Bardia commences.

The Battle of Bardia commenced in North Africa, the longest battle in Operation Compass, the Dominion campaign against the Italians.

Australian soldiers in Bardia on January 4, 1941

.

The Germans conducted an air raid of Bristol that lasted twelve hours.  In Ireland, Eamon de Valera protested the German raids on Dublin following an emergency cabinet meeting.

Nazi official and member of the SS Martin Bormann issued a decree banning the use of the German "Gothic" type script as it was difficult for people in occupied countries, which did not use it, to read.  The banning was not without irony as the Gothic typeface was unique to German speakers.  It was overall in decline in any event, except in Germany.

More on the Second World War on this day:

Today in World War II History—January 3, 1941

Day 491 January 3, 1941

The 77th Congress of the United States went into session.

December 29, 1940. The Great Fire of London and the Arsenal of Democracy

Tank engine for M3 tank, which were used by the British and the Soviets in combat during the war, but not the US, being manufactured in a Chrysler plant.

On this date in 1940 President Roosevelt delivered his radio address that included the phrase "arsenal of democracy"

MY FRIENDS:

This is not a fireside chat on war. It is a talk on national security, because the nub of the whole purpose of your President is to keep you now, and your children later, and your grandchildren much later, out of a last-ditch war for the preservation of American independence and all of the things that American independence means to you and to me and to ours.

Tonight, in the presence of a world crisis, my mind goes back eight years to a night in the midst of a domestic crisis. It was a time when the wheels of American industry were grinding to a full stop, when the whole banking system of our country had ceased to function.

I well remember that while I sat in my study in the White House, preparing to talk with the people of the United States, I had before my eyes the picture of all those Americans with whom I was talking. I saw the workmen in the mills, the mines, the factories; the girl behind the counter; the small shopkeeper; the farmer doing his spring plowing; the widows and the old men wondering about their life's savings.

I tried to convey to the great mass of American people what the banking crisis meant to them in their daily lives.

Tonight, I want to do the same thing, with the same people, in this new crisis which faces America.

We met the issue of 1933 with courage and realism.

We face this new crisis -- this new threat to the security of our nation -- with the same courage and realism.

Never before since Jamestown and Plymouth Rock has our American civilization been in such danger as now.

For, on September 27th, 1940, this year, by an agreement signed in Berlin, three powerful nations, two in Europe and one in Asia, joined themselves together in the threat that if the United States of America interfered with or blocked the expansion program of these three nations -- a program aimed at world control -- they would unite in ultimate action against the United States.

The Nazi masters of Germany have made it clear that they intend not only to dominate all life and thought in their own country, but also to enslave the whole of Europe, and then to use the resources of Europe to dominate the rest of the world.

It was only three weeks ago their leader stated this: " There are two worlds that stand opposed to each other." And then in defiant reply to his opponents, he said this: "Others are correct when they say: With this world we cannot ever reconcile ourselves .... I can beat any other power in the world." So said the leader of the Nazis.

In other words, the Axis not merely admits but the Axis proclaims that there can be no ultimate peace between their philosophy of government and our philosophy of government.

In view of the nature of this undeniable threat, it can be asserted, properly and categorically, that the United States has no right or reason to encourage talk of peace, until the day shall come when there is a clear intention on the part of the aggressor nations to abandon all thought of dominating or conquering the world.

At this moment, the forces of the states that are leagued against all peoples who live in freedom are being held away from our shores. The Germans and the Italians are being blocked on the other side of the Atlantic by the British, and by the Greeks, and by thousands of soldiers and sailors who were able to escape from subjugated countries. In Asia the Japanese are being engaged by the Chinese nation in another great defense.

In the Pacific Ocean is our fleet.

Some of our people like to believe that wars in Europe and in Asia are of no concern to us. But it is a matter of most vital concern to us that European and Asiatic war-makers should not gain control of the oceans which lead to this hemisphere.

One hundred and seventeen years ago the Monroe Doctrine was conceived by our Government as a measure of defense in the face of a threat against this hemisphere by an alliance in Continental Europe. Thereafter, we stood (on) guard in the Atlantic, with the British as neighbors. There was no treaty. There was no "unwritten agreement."

And yet, there was the feeling, proven correct by history, that we as neighbors could settle any disputes in peaceful fashion. And the fact is that during the whole of this time the Western Hemisphere has remained free from aggression from Europe or from Asia.

Does anyone seriously believe that we need to fear attack anywhere in the Americas while a free Britain remains our most powerful naval neighbor in the Atlantic? And does anyone seriously believe, on the other hand, that we could rest easy if the Axis powers were our neighbors there?

If Great Britain goes down, the Axis powers will control the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and the high seas -- and they will be in a position to bring enormous military and naval resources against this hemisphere. It is no exaggeration to say that all of us, in all the Americas, would be living at the point of a gun -- a gun loaded with explosive bullets, economic as well as military.

We should enter upon a new and terrible era in which the whole world, our hemisphere included, would be run by threats of brute force. And to survive in such a world, we would have to convert ourselves permanently into a militaristic power on the basis of war economy.

Some of us like to believe that even if (Great) Britain falls, we are still safe, because of the broad expanse of the Atlantic and of the Pacific.

But the width of those (these) oceans is not what it was in the days of clipper ships. At one point between Africa and Brazil the distance is less from Washington than it is from Washington to Denver, Colorado -- five hours for the latest type of bomber. And at the North end of the Pacific Ocean America and Asia almost touch each other.

Why, even today we have planes that (which) could fly from the British Isles to New England and back again without refueling. And remember that the range of a (the) modern bomber is ever being increased.

During the past week many people in all parts of the nation have told me what they wanted me to say tonight. Almost all of them expressed a courageous desire to hear the plain truth about the gravity of the situation. One telegram, however, expressed the attitude of the small minority who want to see no evil and hear no evil, even though they know in their hearts that evil exists. That telegram begged me not to tell again of the ease with which our American cities could be bombed by any hostile power which had gained bases in this Western Hemisphere. The gist of that telegram was: "Please, Mr. President, don't frighten us by telling us the facts."

Frankly and definitely there is danger ahead -- danger against which we must prepare. But we well know that we cannot escape danger (it), or the fear of danger, by crawling into bed and pulling the covers over our heads.

Some nations of Europe were bound by solemn non-intervention pacts with Germany. Other nations were assured by Germany that they need never fear invasion. Non-intervention pact or not, the fact remains that they were attacked, overrun, (and) thrown into (the) modern (form of) slavery at an hour's notice, or even without any notice at all. As an exiled leader of one of these nations said to me the other day, "The notice was a minus quantity. It was given to my Government two hours after German troops had poured into my country in a hundred places."

The fate of these nations tells us what it means to live at the point of a Nazi gun.

The Nazis have justified such actions by various pious frauds. One of these frauds is the claim that they are occupying a nation for the purpose of "restoring order." Another is that they are occupying or controlling a nation on the excuse that they are "protecting it" against the aggression of somebody else.

For example, Germany has said that she was occupying Belgium to save the Belgians from the British. Would she then hesitate to say to any South American country, "We are occupying you to protect you from aggression by the United States?"

Belgium today is being used as an invasion base against Britain, now fighting for its life. And any South American country, in Nazi hands, would always constitute a jumping-off place for German attack on any one of the other republics of this hemisphere.

Analyze for yourselves the future of two other places even nearer to Germany if the Nazis won. Could Ireland hold out? Would Irish freedom be permitted as an amazing pet exception in an unfree world? Or the Islands of the Azores which still fly the flag of Portugal after five centuries? You and I think of Hawaii as an outpost of defense in the Pacific. And yet, the Azores are closer to our shores in the Atlantic than Hawaii is on the other side.

There are those who say that the Axis powers would never have any desire to attack the Western Hemisphere. That (this) is the same dangerous form of wishful thinking which has destroyed the powers of resistance of so many conquered peoples. The plain facts are that the Nazis have proclaimed, time and again, that all other races are their inferiors and therefore subject to their orders. And most important of all, the vast resources and wealth of this American Hemisphere constitute the most tempting loot in all of the round world.

Let us no longer blind ourselves to the undeniable fact that the evil forces which have crushed and undermined and corrupted so many others are already within our own gates. Your Government knows much about them and every day is ferreting them out.

Their secret emissaries are active in our own and in neighboring countries. They seek to stir up suspicion and dissension to cause internal strife. They try to turn capital against labor, and vice versa. They try to reawaken long slumbering racist and religious enmities which should have no place in this country. They are active in every group that promotes intolerance. They exploit for their own ends our own natural abhorrence of war. These trouble-breeders have but one purpose. It is to divide our people, to divide them into hostile groups and to destroy our unity and shatter our will to defend ourselves.

There are also American citizens, many of then in high places, who, unwittingly in most cases, are aiding and abetting the work of these agents. I do not charge these American citizens with being foreign agents. But I do charge them with doing exactly the kind of work that the dictators want done in the United States.

These people not only believe that we can save our own skins by shutting our eyes to the fate of other nations. Some of them go much further than that. They say that we can and should become the friends and even the partners of the Axis powers. Some of them even suggest that we should imitate the methods of the dictatorships. But Americans never can and never will do that.

The experience of the past two years has proven beyond doubt that no nation can appease the Nazis. No man can tame a tiger into a kitten by stroking it. There can be no appeasement with ruthlessness. There can be no reasoning with an incendiary bomb. We know now that a nation can have peace with the Nazis only at the price of total surrender.

Even the people of Italy have been forced to become accomplices of the Nazis, but at this moment they do not know how soon they will be embraced to death by their allies.

The American appeasers ignore the warning to be found in the fate of Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and France. They tell you that the Axis powers are going to win anyway; that all of this bloodshed in the world could be saved, that the United States might just as well throw its influence into the scale of a dictated peace, and get the best out of it that we can.

They call it a "negotiated peace." Nonsense! Is it a negotiated peace if a gang of outlaws surrounds your community and on threat of extermination makes you pay tribute to save your own skins?

Such a dictated peace would be no peace at all. It would be only another armistice, leading to the most gigantic armament race and the most devastating trade wars in all history. And in these contests the Americas would offer the only real resistance to the Axis powers.

With all their vaunted efficiency, with all their (and) parade of pious purpose in this war, there are still in their background the concentration camp and the servants of God in chains.

The history of recent years proves that the shootings and the chains and the concentration camps are not simply the transient tools but the very altars of modern dictatorships. They may talk of a "new order" in the world, but what they have in mind is only (but) a revival of the oldest and the worst tyranny. In that there is no liberty, no religion, no hope.

The proposed "new order" is the very opposite of a United States of Europe or a United States of Asia. It is not a government based upon the consent of the governed. It is not a union of ordinary, self-respecting men and women to protect themselves and their freedom and their dignity from oppression. It is an unholy alliance of power and pelf to dominate and to enslave the human race.

The British people and their allies today are conducting an active war against this unholy alliance. Our own future security is greatly dependent on the outcome of that fight. Our ability to "keep out of war" is going to be affected by that outcome.

Thinking in terms of today and tomorrow, I make the direct statement to the American people that there is far less chance of the United States getting into war if we do all we can now to support the nations defending themselves against attack by the Axis than if we acquiesce in their defeat, submit tamely to an Axis victory, and wait our turn to be the object of attack in another war later on.

If we are to be completely honest with ourselves, we must admit that there is risk in any course we may take. But I deeply believe that the great majority of our people agree that the course that I advocate involves the least risk now and the greatest hope for world peace in the future.

The people of Europe who are defending themselves do not ask us to do their fighting. They ask us for the implements of war, the planes, the tanks, the guns, the freighters which will enable them to fight for their liberty and for our security. Emphatically we must get these weapons to them, get them to them in sufficient volume and quickly enough, so that we and our children will be saved the agony and suffering of war which others have had to endure.

Let not the defeatists tell us that it is too late. It will never be earlier. Tomorrow will be later than today.

Certain facts are self-evident.

In a military sense Great Britain and the British Empire are today the spearhead of resistance to world conquest. And they are putting up a fight which will live forever in the story of human gallantry.

There is no demand for sending an American Expeditionary Force outside our own borders. There is no intention by any member of your Government to send such a force. You can, therefore, nail -- nail any talk about sending armies to Europe as deliberate untruth.

Our national policy is not directed toward war. Its sole purpose is to keep war away from our country and away from our people.

Democracy's fight against world conquest is being greatly aided, and must be more greatly aided, by the rearmament of the United States and by sending every ounce and every ton of munitions and supplies that we can possibly spare to help the defenders who are in the front lines. And it is no more unneutral for us to do that than it is for Sweden, Russia and other nations near Germany to send steel and ore and oil and other war materials into Germany every day in the week.

We are planning our own defense with the utmost urgency, and in its vast scale we must integrate the war needs of Britain and the other free nations which are resisting aggression.

This is not a matter of sentiment or of controversial personal opinion. It is a matter of realistic, practical military policy, based on the advice of our military experts who are in close touch with existing warfare. These military and naval experts and the members of the Congress and the Administration have a single-minded purpose -- the defense of the United States.

This nation is making a great effort to produce everything that is necessary in this emergency -- and with all possible speed. And this great effort requires great sacrifice.

I would ask no one to defend a democracy which in turn would not defend everyone in the nation against want and privation. The strength of this nation shall not be diluted by the failure of the Government to protect the economic well-being of its (all) citizens.

If our capacity to produce is limited by machines, it must ever be remembered that these machines are operated by the skill and the stamina of the workers. As the Government is determined to protect the rights of the workers, so the nation has a right to expect that the men who man the machines will discharge their full responsibilities to the urgent needs of defense.

The worker possesses the same human dignity and is entitled to the same security of position as the engineer or the manager or the owner. For the workers provide the human power that turns out the destroyers, and the (air)planes and the tanks.

The nation expects our defense industries to continue operation without interruption by strikes or lockouts. It expects and insists that management and workers will reconcile their differences by voluntary or legal means, to continue to produce the supplies that are so sorely needed.

And on the economic side of our great defense program, we are, as you know, bending every effort to maintain stability of prices and with that the stability of the cost of living.

Nine days ago I announced the setting up of a more effective organization to direct our gigantic efforts to increase the production of munitions. The appropriation of vast sums of money and a well coordinated executive direction of our defense efforts are not in themselves enough. Guns, planes, (and) ships and many other things have to be built in the factories and the arsenals of America. They have to be produced by workers and managers and engineers with the aid of machines which in turn have to be built by hundreds of thousands of workers throughout the land.

In this great work there has been splendid cooperation between the Government and industry and labor, and I am very thankful.

American industrial genius, unmatched throughout all the world in the solution of production problems, has been called upon to bring its resources and its talents into action. Manufacturers of watches, of farm implements, of linotypes, and cash registers, and automobiles, and sewing machines, and lawn mowers and locomotives are now making fuses, bomb packing crates, telescope mounts, shells, and pistols and tanks.

But all of our present efforts are not enough. We must have more ships, more guns, more planes -- more of everything. And this can only be accomplished if we discard the notion of "business as usual." This job cannot be done merely by superimposing on the existing productive facilities the added requirements of the nation for defense.

Our defense efforts must not be blocked by those who fear the future consequences of surplus plant capacity. The possible consequences of failure of our defense efforts now are much more to be feared.

And after the present needs of our defense are past, a proper handling of the country's peacetime needs will require all of the new productive capacity -- if not still more.

No pessimistic policy about the future of America shall delay the immediate expansion of those industries essential to defense. We need them.

I want to make it clear that it is the purpose of the nation to build now with all possible speed every machine, every arsenal, every (and) factory that we need to manufacture our defense material. We have the men -- the skill -- the wealth -- and above all, the will.

I am confident that if and when production of consumer or luxury goods in certain industries requires the use of machines and raw materials that are essential for defense purposes, then such production must yield, and will gladly yield, to our primary and compelling purpose.

So I appeal to the owners of plants -- to the managers -to the workers -- to our own Government employees -- to put every ounce of effort into producing these munitions swiftly and without stint. (And) With this appeal I give you the pledge that all of us who are officers of your Government will devote ourselves to the same whole-hearted extent to the great task that (which) lies ahead.

As planes and ships and guns and shells are produced, your Government, with its defense experts, can then determine how best to use them to defend this hemisphere. The decision as to how much shall be sent abroad and how much shall remain at home must be made on the basis of our overall military necessities.

We must be the great arsenal of democracy. For us this is an emergency as serious as war itself. We must apply ourselves to our task with the same resolution, the same sense of urgency, the same spirit of patriotism and sacrifice as we would show were we at war.

We have furnished the British great material support and we will furnish far more in the future.

There will be no "bottlenecks" in our determination to aid Great Britain. No dictator, no combination of dictators, will weaken that determination by threats of how they will construe that determination.

The British have received invaluable military support from the heroic Greek army and from the forces of all the governments in exile. Their strength is growing. It is the strength of men and women who value their freedom more highly than they value their lives.

I believe that the Axis powers are not going to win this war. I base that belief on the latest and best of information.

We have no excuse for defeatism. We have every good reason for hope -- hope for peace, yes, and hope for the defense of our civilization and for the building of a better civilization in the future.

I have the profound conviction that the American people are now determined to put forth a mightier effort than they have ever yet made to increase our production of all the implements of defense, to meet the threat to our democratic faith.

As President of the United States I call for that national effort. I call for it in the name of this nation which we love and honor and which we are privileged and proud to serve. I call upon our people with absolute confidence that our common cause will greatly succeed.

On the same day, a Luftwaffe air raid caused the "Second Great Fire of London in that city.

Post raid view from St. Paul's Cathedral, which survived the fire, looking towards the Old Bailey court, which also did.

Over 100,000 bombs fell on the city in the nighttime air raid. Deaths were surprisingly light, being under 200 in number, as the district hit was not one in which a large number of people lived.  The publishing industry was particularly hard hit by the raid, losing many of their publishing records as a result.

You can read more about the air raid and President Roosevelt's speech here:  

Today in World War II History—December 29, 1940

And more about that day in the war here:

Day 486 December 29, 1940

December 20, 1940. The world recoils.

 

"Behind this eight-foot concrete wall some 500,000 Jews will begin a new life in Warsaw's ghetto. By German decree, all Warsaw Jews are required to reside in the district, located in the central part of the conquered city. It surrounds more than 100 city blocks and closes off 200 streets and even street car lines."  New York World Telegram, December 20, 1940.

With the Christmas Season approaching, it was a grim day in many places where there were those who weren't acknowledging the message of the Price of Peace.  You can read more about that here.

Day 477 December 20, 1940

On this site we recall that already the Germans were butchering the Poles, and as can be seen from above, they were beginning a more systematic butchering of European's Jewish population.

The Germans also commenced the Liverpool Bitz, three days of horrific bombing of the city.

Post bombing photograph of Liverpool.

Even the Earth seemed to recoil against the violence. The first of two earthquakes occurred in New Hampshire.