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Winston Churchill and the death of Prince George, Duke of Kent


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Fair enough John.

Will replies to my other points and citations for your undocumented claims be forthcoming?

Will you list my undocumented claims and I will try to answer them.

John I pointed several of them out in a post a few pages back I’ll dig it up when I have a little more time but you can start with your claim that the pilot of Sikorski’s plane was wearing his life vest when the plane took off, this was contradicted by Irving. Also if you could provide the page number for your claim that Sikorski’s widow though he’d been assassinated in the online version or Irving’s book I (and perhaps others) would appreciate it (I did some quick text searches but couldn’t find it in the book)

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1. In chapter 14 you point out that between September 1939 and July 1940 there were no fewer than sixteen separately identifiable sets of negotiations between London and Berlin. Did you find any evidence that these negotiations carried on after the summer of 1940.

The last of attempt by Germany to make peace with Britain seems to have been in the first week of September 1940, a full year after the war had started and it seems clearly to have been a personal attempt by Hitler.

The War Cabinet was astonished to receive a ‘Most Secret’ encrypted telegram from Victor Mallet, British ambassador to Sweden. Mallet had been contacted by a Berlin barrister named Dr Ludwig Weissauer who, said Mallet, ‘is understood to be a direct emissary of Hitler’. Weissauer, explained the ambassador, ‘wishes me to meet him very secretly order to … talk on the subject of peace’.

At first, this approach was treated with some suspicion, as though the work of a crank. But Ludwig Weissauer turned out to be the chief legal counsel to the Nazi Party and Hitler’s own personal legal adviser.

Mallet went on to say that the emissary wished any conversations that took place to remain secret and said he would report back directly to Hitler in person. This strongly suggested that the initiative had originated with Hitler himself.

In the end this approach came to nothing, like all the others. The War Cabinet instructed Mallet to ignore the message.

It seems to me that this attempt failed for the same reason that all the other peace talks had failed: Churchill would sign a peace agreement with Germany but not with Hitler, while Hitler would sign a peace agreement with Britain but not with Churchill.

So it was not until late in 1940, when the bombs started falling both on London and Berlin, that Hitler finally accepted that he was never going to conclude a negotiated peace with Britain, that Churchill was probably leader for the duration and that the only way he could bring Britain to the negotiating table would be to conquer Russia. Hitler thus decided to implement his eastern strategy anyway on the grounds that, once Russia was defeated, Britain’s last hope would have been destroyed and Britain would then have no alternative but to get rid of Churchill, appoint Lloyd George or a similar figure as Prime Minister and sue for peace.

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Fair enough John.

Will replies to my other points and citations for your undocumented claims be forthcoming?

Will you list my undocumented claims and I will try to answer them.

John I pointed several of them out in a post a few pages back I’ll dig it up when I have a little more time but you can start with your claim that the pilot of Sikorski’s plane was wearing his life vest when the plane took off, this was contradicted by Irving. Also if you could provide the page number for your claim that Sikorski’s widow though he’d been assassinated in the online version or Irving’s book I (and perhaps others) would appreciate it (I did some quick text searches but couldn’t find it in the book)

The only book that I have that covers the case of Sikorski is Lynn Picknett, Clive Prince and Stephen Prior, Double Standards, 2001. The authors state on page 418: "Of all those on board, he (Edward Prchal) alone had put on his life jacket, but not, as was the usual practice, under his parachute harness, perhaps implying that he expected to crash into water rather than bail out from high in the sky."

The authors quote David Irving's "Accident" (page 148-49) as saying that Sumner Wells, the US Under-Secretary of State, said that Sikorski was assassinated. He goes onto say that Sikorski's believed that Churchill had ordered her husband's death (page 168 of "Accident").

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Fair enough John.

Will replies to my other points and citations for your undocumented claims be forthcoming?

Will you list my undocumented claims and I will try to answer them.

John I pointed several of them out in a post a few pages back I’ll dig it up when I have a little more time but you can start with your claim that the pilot of Sikorski’s plane was wearing his life vest when the plane took off, this was contradicted by Irving. Also if you could provide the page number for your claim that Sikorski’s widow though he’d been assassinated in the online version or Irving’s book I (and perhaps others) would appreciate it (I did some quick text searches but couldn’t find it in the book)

The only book that I have that covers the case of Sikorski is Lynn Picknett, Clive Prince and Stephen Prior, Double Standards, 2001.

Below is a link to Irving’s book about it.

The authors state on page 418: "Of all those on board, he (Edward Prchal) alone had put on his life jacket,

As I pointed out in an earlier post Irving quoted the person who recovered the body as saying one of Sikorski’s aides was wearing his life vest and parachute (not that they did him any good) thus contradicting their claim Prchal was the only one to be wearing a life vest (1). It’s hard to believe they were unaware of this since they quote from the book.

but not, as was the usual practice, under his parachute harness, perhaps implying that he expected to crash into water rather than bail out from high in the sky."

Nothing there about him having the vest on when the plane took off. A witness cited by Irving says he wasn’t wearing it at the time but rather had it “hung over the back of his seat where it would be handy if required” as was his SOP. Will you withdraw that claim?

Do they cite a source for their claim that wearing his vest over his over his parachute harness “perhaps impl(ied) that he expected to crash into water”? Do any naval aviators back this notion? (2) Did they advise their readers that although it might have been “the usual practice” according to someone who knew him Prchal never did? To me it ‘implies’ that as Irving’s witness was correct and he had his “Mae West” close at hand “where it would be handy if required”

The authors quote David Irving's "Accident" (page 148-49) as saying that Sumner Wells, the US Under-Secretary of State, said that Sikorski was assassinated.

Am I correct in my assumption that they failed to inform their readers that Irving wrote "He (Wells) thought the Russians lurked somewhere behind all this"? (3) Given that and the above I have serious doubts about their credibility.

He goes onto say that Sikorski's believed that Churchill had ordered her husband's death (page 168 of "Accident").

If you could give the page number for the online version OR quote that snippet (enabling me to find it via text search) I would appreciate it.

Len

1) http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.ph...st&p=109504 - this is the source for all my claims and quotes in this post except footnote 3

2) Evan I think your ‘2 cents’ would be quite valuable on this question perhaps you could ask some ‘old timers’].

3) http://www.fpp.co.uk/books/Accident/1967.pdf Pgs 134 - 5

EDIT added page numbers to footnote 3, typo fixed

Edited by Len Colby
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2. You rightly point out on page 218 that as late as 27th May 1940 Churchill was telling the cabinet that he was willing to do a deal with Hitler in order to get a peace settlement. The language of cabinet was very different from his public speeches at the time. You quote the German general as saying: “If we smash England militarily, the British Empire will collapse. Germany will not benefit from this.” This is of course true. Do you agree that the common enemy was the Soviet Union and if that was the case, these negotiations would have taken place right up to Operation Barbarossa taking place?

Hitler’s thinking at this time appears to me to be something along these lines: England is not in much of a position to damage German strategic interests, which lie in Eastern Europe. To damage Britain militarily would not benefit Germany strategically, but it could harm German strategic interests by making potential enemies such as America Japan and Russia stronger, especially in the middle east and far east.

Britain (through the agency of Churchill) is holding out against signing a peace treaty because it thinks Russia will engage and defeat Germany (or keep Germany busy long enough to re-arm and perhaps get America into the war). Therefore, by attacking Russia, Hitler is killing two birds with one stone. First, implementing Germany’s principal geopolitical aim of establishing a new land-based empire in the centre of the Eurasian landmass (as foreshadowed by Halton Mackinder in "The geographical pivot of history" and passed on through Karl Haushofer and Rudolph Hess to Hitler). Second, removing all hope for England of Russia riding to the rescue and, thus, forcing Britain to get rid of Churchill and sue for peace.

I have to say, I can’t fault this strategy. I can’t help feeling it would certainly have worked had Hitler not become fatally obsessed with taking Stalingrad. With Russian oil and other raw materials at his disposal, there would have been nothing to stop Hitler implementing his Eurasian strategy and no hope for Britain except compromise.

I agree that Russia was the "common enemy" in the sense that it was the strategic policy of the Nazis and many of their British supporters to eliminate communism and carve the world up into two great empires, one sea based and one land based, under the control of the "master race" ie the Teutons and their Anglo-Saxon cousins. I’m not sure whether Hitler would have bothered talking to the British again after having taken the decision to implement Barbarossa in the next Spring, as he would presumbly have though his military victory over Russia would do his talking for him.

I also point out in the book that the British War Cabinet was labouring under a fatal delusion in 1940. They believed that Germany had over reached itself economically and that no great power, even one as strong as Germany, could keep its economy on a war footing for very long. The cabinet thought that the more they played for time, the more likely it was that that the German economy would collapse. In fact, Germany was so strong ecnomically that it didn’t even both to go onto a war footing until 1943.

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2. You rightly point out on page 218 that as late as 27th May 1940 Churchill was telling the cabinet that he was willing to do a deal with Hitler in order to get a peace settlement. The language of cabinet was very different from his public speeches at the time. You quote the German general as saying: “If we smash England militarily, the British Empire will collapse. Germany will not benefit from this.” This is of course true. Do you agree that the common enemy was the Soviet Union and if that was the case, these negotiations would have taken place right up to Operation Barbarossa taking place?

Hitler’s thinking at this time appears to me to be something along these lines: England is not in much of a position to damage German strategic interests, which lie in Eastern Europe. To damage Britain militarily would not benefit Germany strategically, but it could harm German strategic interests by making potential enemies such as America Japan and Russia stronger, especially in the middle east and far east.

Britain (through the agency of Churchill) is holding out against signing a peace treaty because it thinks Russia will engage and defeat Germany (or keep Germany busy long enough to re-arm and perhaps get America into the war). Therefore, by attacking Russia, Hitler is killing two birds with one stone. First, implementing Germany’s principal geopolitical aim of establishing a new land-based empire in the centre of the Eurasian landmass (as foreshadowed by Halton Mackinder in "The geographical pivot of history" and passed on through Karl Haushofer and Rudolph Hess to Hitler). Second, removing all hope for England of Russia riding to the rescue and, thus, forcing Britain to get rid of Churchill and sue for peace.

I have to say, I can’t fault this strategy. I can’t help feeling it would certainly have worked had Hitler not become fatally obsessed with taking Stalingrad. With Russian oil and other raw materials at his disposal, there would have been nothing to stop Hitler implementing his Eurasian strategy and no hope for Britain except compromise.

I agree that Russia was the "common enemy" in the sense that it was the strategic policy of the Nazis and many of their British supporters to eliminate communism and carve the world up into two great empires, one sea based and one land based, under the control of the "master race" ie the Teutons and their Anglo-Saxon cousins. I’m not sure whether Hitler would have bothered talking to the British again after having taken the decision to implement Barbarossa in the next Spring, as he would presumbly have though his military victory over Russia would do his talking for him.

I also point out in the book that the British War Cabinet was labouring under a fatal delusion in 1940. They believed that Germany had over reached itself economically and that no great power, even one as strong as Germany, could keep its economy on a war footing for very long. The cabinet thought that the more they played for time, the more likely it was that that the German economy would collapse. In fact, Germany was so strong ecnomically that it didn’t even both to go onto a war footing until 1943.

We seem to be in agreement about Churchill's actions in the summer of 1940. However, there is evidence that these negotiations were still taking place in 1941. For example, in 1959, Heinrich Stahmer, Albrecht Haushofer’s agent in Spain, claimed that meetings between Samuel Hoare, Lord Halifax and Rudolf Hess took place in Spain and Portugal between February and April 1941. The Vichy press reported that Hess was in Spain on the weekend of 20/22 of April 1941. The correspondence between British Embassies and the Foreign Office are routinely released to the Public Record Office. However, all documents relating to the weekend of 20/22 April, 1941 at the Madrid Embassy are being held back and will not be released until 2017.

Karl Haushofer was arrested and interrogated by the Allies in October 1945. The British government has never released the documents that include details of these interviews. However, these interviews are in the OSS archive. Karl told his interviewers that Germany was involved in peace negotiations with Britain in 1940-41. In 1941 Albrecht was sent to Switzerland to meet Lord Templewood (Samuel Hoare) the British ambassador to Spain. This peace proposal included a willingness to “relinquish Norway, Denmark and France”. Karl goes onto say: “A larger meeting was to be held in Madrid. When my son returned, he was immediately called to Augsburg by Hess. A few days later Hess flew to England.”

When Hess arrived in Scotland he asked to be taken to the Duke of Hamilton. The “middleman” mentioned in the earlier letter. In fact, Hamilton lived close to where Hess landed.

If Hamilton was the “middleman” who was he acted for. Was it George VI or Winston Churchill? Or were they working together on this? We also know that Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax acted as middleman in 1940-41. Hoare was Churchill’s ambassador to Spain. Is it possible that Churchill had not given permission for these talks to take place? If not, Hoare and Halifax were guilty of treason. The same claim could be made against the Duke of Hamilton.

According to Lieutenant-Colonel Malcolm Scott, Hess had told one of his guards that “members of the government” had known about his proposed trip to Scotland. Hess also asked to see George VI as he had been assured before he left Germany that he had the “King’s protection”. As I said earlier, according to the authors of “Double Standards” (2001) the Duke of Kent was with Hamilton at his home (Dungavel House) on the night that Hess arrived in Scotland. Was the Duke of Kent acting as the representative of the king or prime minister? The authors of Double Standards, who accept the view that Churchill remained a strong opponent of appeasement, believe the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Hamilton, Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax, were all working for George VI. They point out that Hamilton, as Keeper of the Royal Household, was very close to the king. However, is it credible that this is the case? For example, Duke of Kent and the Duke of Hamilton both served in the RAF during the war. Churchill arranged for both to be promoted soon after the arrival of Hess. By this time Churchill was either aware that both men were traitors or were acting on behalf of the government. Churchill’s actions following the arrival of Hess suggest the second of these two options.

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We seem to be in agreement about Churchill's actions in the summer of 1940. However, there is evidence that these negotiations were still taking place in 1941. For example, in 1959, Heinrich Stahmer, Albrecht Haushofer’s agent in Spain, claimed that meetings between Samuel Hoare, Lord Halifax and Rudolf Hess took place in Spain and Portugal between February and April 1941. The Vichy press reported that Hess was in Spain on the weekend of 20/22 of April 1941. The correspondence between British Embassies and the Foreign Office are routinely released to the Public Record Office. However, all documents relating to the weekend of 20/22 April, 1941 at the Madrid Embassy are being held back and will not be released until 2017.

Karl Haushofer was arrested and interrogated by the Allies in October 1945. The British government has never released the documents that include details of these interviews. However, these interviews are in the OSS archive. Karl told his interviewers that Germany was involved in peace negotiations with Britain in 1940-41. In 1941 Albrecht was sent to Switzerland to meet Lord Templewood (Samuel Hoare) the British ambassador to Spain. This peace proposal included a willingness to “relinquish Norway, Denmark and France”. Karl goes onto say: “A larger meeting was to be held in Madrid. When my son returned, he was immediately called to Augsburg by Hess. A few days later Hess flew to England.”

When Hess arrived in Scotland he asked to be taken to the Duke of Hamilton. The “middleman” mentioned in the earlier letter. In fact, Hamilton lived close to where Hess landed.

If Hamilton was the “middleman” who was he acted for. Was it George VI or Winston Churchill? Or were they working together on this? We also know that Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax acted as middleman in 1940-41. Hoare was Churchill’s ambassador to Spain. Is it possible that Churchill had not given permission for these talks to take place? If not, Hoare and Halifax were guilty of treason. The same claim could be made against the Duke of Hamilton.

According to Lieutenant-Colonel Malcolm Scott, Hess had told one of his guards that “members of the government” had known about his proposed trip to Scotland. Hess also asked to see George VI as he had been assured before he left Germany that he had the “King’s protection”. As I said earlier, according to the authors of “Double Standards” (2001) the Duke of Kent was with Hamilton at his home (Dungavel House) on the night that Hess arrived in Scotland. Was the Duke of Kent acting as the representative of the king or prime minister? The authors of Double Standards, who accept the view that Churchill remained a strong opponent of appeasement, believe the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Hamilton, Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax, were all working for George VI. They point out that Hamilton, as Keeper of the Royal Household, was very close to the king. However, is it credible that this is the case? For example, Duke of Kent and the Duke of Hamilton both served in the RAF during the war. Churchill arranged for both to be promoted soon after the arrival of Hess. By this time Churchill was either aware that both men were traitors or were acting on behalf of the government. Churchill’s actions following the arrival of Hess suggest the second of these two options.

Hi John,

It’s a puzzle isn’t it? On 26 May 1940, the war cabinet met under Churchill and Neville Chamberlain quoted Churchill in his diary entry as telling the cabinet, ‘if we could get out of this jam by giving up Malta and Gibraltar and some African colonies he would jump at it.’ Given Britain’s position this seems a reasonable conclusion on Churchill’s part and one might reasonably expect him and his colleagues to do everything in their power to further peace negotiations with Germany, whatever the circumstances, even if only as a distraction.

Yet among Churchill’s first actions on coming to power was to get rid of arch-appeasers Samuel Hoare (as ambassador to Madrid) and Lord Halifax (as ambassador to Washington.) As usual, the problem is that one can interpret this two ways. It could either be an unmistakable signal to Berlin that Britain was under new management and that there would be no peace treaty; or it could be a tough bargaining move, laying the groundwork for concessions for a peace treaty!

My own view is that the personal antipathy between Churchill and Hitler was what prevented a peace agreement. I can’t help feeling that, had either Churchill or Hitler stood aside in 1940, then Goering (or whoever) would very likely have concluded peace with Lloyd George (or whoever) and that this move would have been supported by many on both sides.

Hess may well have been duped by British Intelligence into thinking a peace treaty was possible, as Martin Allen contends, but it was in my view a deception that was only too close to the truth at the time. I agree with what I think is your view, that it was when postwar history came to be written that the "Fight on the beaches" rhetoric became the accepted version and all talk of peace negotiations was quietly forgotten.

Regards

Richard

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It’s a puzzle isn’t it? On 26 May 1940, the war cabinet met under Churchill and Neville Chamberlain quoted Churchill in his diary entry as telling the cabinet, ‘if we could get out of this jam by giving up Malta and Gibraltar and some African colonies he would jump at it.’ Given Britain’s position this seems a reasonable conclusion on Churchill’s part and one might reasonably expect him and his colleagues to do everything in their power to further peace negotiations with Germany, whatever the circumstances, even if only as a distraction.

Yet among Churchill’s first actions on coming to power was to get rid of arch-appeasers Samuel Hoare (as ambassador to Madrid) and Lord Halifax (as ambassador to Washington.) As usual, the problem is that one can interpret this two ways. It could either be an unmistakable signal to Berlin that Britain was under new management and that there would be no peace treaty; or it could be a tough bargaining move, laying the groundwork for concessions for a peace treaty!

It is a mistake to suggest that Churchill immediately got rid of his appeasers. In fact, he went out of his way to create a balanced cabinet. When Churchill took office he did not sack the arch-appeaser as foreign secretary, Lord Halifax. Instead he was allowed to hold onto his job. Churchill nominated Chamberlain as Leader of the House of Commons. Labour members of the war cabinet complained about this decision and so he became Lord President of the Council. However, he still remained in the government. So also did Sir John Simon, the third of the guilty men, who was given the job of Lord Chancellor.

Historians often claim that they only man to lose his job as a result of his appeasement policies was Samuel Hoare. Responsible for the Hoare-Laval Pact in 1935, he was forced to resign when the scheme was widely denounced as appeasement of Italian aggression. Hoare returned to the government under Chamberlain as Secretary of State for the Home Office. On the outbreak of the war in 1939 he joined the War Cabinet as Lord Privy Seal. Hoare lost this post when Churchill took power. However, Churchill sent Hoare to be British ambassador in Madrid. It was here that he carried out negotiations with the Nazis.

Duff Cooper, the man who resigned from the government over Munich only got the Ministry of Information. Yet, Lord Beaverbrook, who had used his newspaper empire to advocate appeasement right up to the outbreak of the war, was brought into the war cabinet as minister of aircraft production. Beaverbrook, who was considered to be Churchill’s most important adviser, was the leading figure, along with Lord Halifax, of what became known as the “Peace Party”. Beaverbook made it clear to friends in 1939 that the “British Jews were pushing the country into an unnecessary war” (Anne Chisholm and Michael Davie, Beaverbrook: A Life, page 347) and that entry into war was “mistaken and unnecessary” (A. J. P. Taylor, Beaverbrook, page 231).

Churchill also allowed Sir Stewart Menzies to remain as head of MI6. Menzies had been a strong advocate of appeasement. Menzies, like others on the far-right, believed the real enemy was communism and argued that Churchill should form a military alliance with Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union. As head of MI6 Menzies “had the right of access at any time of the day or night to the King, Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, making him the most powerful men in the country.” (Anthony Cave Brown, Bodyguard of Lies, pages 13-14). According to Scott Newton (Profits of Peace: The Political Economy of Anglo-German Appeasement, pages 124-127), Menzies was at the very centre of the peace group in Britain in 1940.

This was Churchill’s way of showing Hitler that he was willing to negotiate an end to the war. Hitler responded to this by making a speech in the Reichstag where he insisted that he was not his intention to destroy the British Empire and called for peace negotiations. “I consider myself in a position to make this appeal since I am not the vanquished begging favours, but the victor speaking in the name of reason. I can see no reason why this war must go on.” (Hitler, speech in the Reichstag, 19th July, 1940) This helps to explain why Hitler acted in the way he did at Dunkirk.

On 22nd May 1940 some 250 German tanks were advancing along the French coast towards Dunkirk, threatening to seal off the British escape route. Then, just six miles from the town, at around 11.30 a.m., they abruptly stopped. Hitler had personally ordered all German forces to hold their positions for three days. This order was uncoded and was picked up by the British. They therefore knew they were going to get away. German generals begged to be able to move forward in order to destroy the British army but Hitler insisted that they held back so that the British troops could leave mainland Europe.

Some historians have argued that this is an example of another tactical error made by Hitler. However, the evidence suggests that this was part of a deal being agreed between Germany and Britain. After the war, General Gunther Blumentritt, the Army Chief of Staff, told military historian Basil Liddell Hart that Hitler had decided that Germany would make peace with Britain. Another German general told Liddell Hart that Hitler aimed to make peace with Britain “on a basis that was compatible with her honour to accept”. (The Other Side of the Hill, pages 139-41)

Minutes of the Cabinet meetings in May 1940 reveal Churchill’s strategy. As Clive Ponting argues: “Churchill argued in favour, not of continuing the war until victory, but of trying to get through the next two or three months before making a decision on whether or not to ask for peace.” (Clive Ponting, 1940: Myth and Reality, 1990, page 108)

Why then did these negotiations fail? We know from German sources that Hitler was willing to withdraw from all his European gains in exchange for “German friendly governments”. All Hitler wanted from Churchill was to be given a free-hand against the Soviet Union. Churchill also wanted Soviet communism destroyed. The only problem for Churchill concerned his image. He had portrayed himself as the warrior who was unwilling to negotiate and end to the conflict. Despite saving the lives of possibly millions of British people, he might also be seen as an appeaser who had cynically engineered the removal of Chamberlain in order to gain power. Churchill cared more about his political reputation, something he had only just got back, than he did about the fate of the British people (his plane was always kept ready to take him to Canada if Germany invaded the country).

I would argue that the evidence suggests that these negotiations went on right up to at least May 1941. When Hess arrived in Scotland on 10th May 1941 Churchill was quick to deny that the two countries were involved in peace negotiations. Hitler then made a similar statement. Both men were concerned to portray Hitler as a man who had a mental breakdown. However, evidence is available that indicates that Hitler was fully aware of Hess’s flight to Scotland.

Karlheinz Pintsch, Hess adjutant, was given the task of informing Hitler about the flight to Scotland. James Leasor found him alive in 1955 and used him as a major source for his book, The Uninvited Envoy. Pintsch told Leasor of Hitler’s response to this news. He did not seem surprised, nor did he rant and rave about what Hess had done. Instead, he replied calmly, “At this particular moment in the war that could be a most hazardous escapade.” (Roger Nanvell & Heinrich Fraenkel, Hess: A Biograthy, page 107)

Hitler then went onto read the letter that Hess had sent him. He read the following significant passage out aloud. “And if this project… ends in failure… it will always be possible for you to deny all responsibility. Simply say I was out of my mind.” Of course, that is what both Hitler and Churchill did later on. However, at the time, Hitler at least, still believed that a negotiated agreement was possible.

The following day Hitler knew that Churchill had refused to do a deal and then the cover-up began. Pintsch was now a dangerous witness and he was arrested and was kept in solitary confinement until being sent to the Eastern Front in 1944. He was captured by the Soviets and kept alive until being released in 1955. (James Leasor, The Uninvited Envoy, page 69).

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John I was wondering if you will withdraw your claim that Prchal was wearing his life vest when he took off? And if so what other evidence you will offer indicating that Sikorski’s plane was sabotaged?

Also in light of the apparent distortions I pointed out in my last post if you still find the authors of “Double Standards” credible?

Do you still believe that the man held for decades in Spandau wasn’t Hess? If so please respond to counter evidence I presented.

As for your theory that Churchill was secretly negotiating with Hitler till 1941 that seems more plausible and is better documented. Can you recommend what you think are the 1 or 2 best books on the subject (“best” in terms of documentation and thoroughness)?

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John I was wondering if you will withdraw your claim that Prchal was wearing his life vest when he took off? And if so what other evidence you will offer indicating that Sikorski’s plane was sabotaged?

Also in light of the apparent distortions I pointed out in my last post if you still find the authors of “Double Standards” credible?

The Sikorski story is only a side-bar to my main theory that Churchill was negotiating with Hitler until Germany invaded the Soviet Union. As I have said before, I have not read David Irvine’s book, “Accident”. However, as we already know from other threads on this thread, you would never believe anything Irvine wrote about anything because of his controversial views on fascism. I agree that Irving has a record of being selective in his use of evidence in order to produce theories that support his right-wing ideology. I detest everything about Irving but I still do not reject everything he says, especially when it is based on evidence found on the internet by you.

As far as “Double Standards” is concerned, I do not agree with all the theories the authors promote in the book (see below). However, the book is very well referenced and as far as I can tell, they do not try to mislead the reader.

Do you still believe that the man held for decades in Spandau wasn’t Hess? If so please respond to counter evidence I presented.

I have not got to this subject yet. But as far as I am concerned, the evidence suggests it was Hess in Spandau. I say that mainly by reading the letters Hess wrote in prison to his wife. If they were written by an impostor, they were very well done. She was convinced that they were from her husband and when she was finally allowed to meet him, she confirmed the man was Hess. The only concern she had was that his voice had appeared to change.

As for your theory that Churchill was secretly negotiating with Hitler till 1941 that seems more plausible and is better documented. Can you recommend what you think are the 1 or 2 best books on the subject (“best” in terms of documentation and thoroughness)?

I am not aware of a book on this subject but that does not say that one does not exist. This is a real taboo area in Britain as it would completely undermine our view of Churchill. The one book that I am aware of that tackles this subject is Clive Ponting’s “1940: Myth and Reality”. As the title suggests, it only covers the negotiations that went on in 1940. Ponting mainly relies on the minutes of cabinet meetings in 1940. As William O’Neill said in his review of the book when it was published in 1990: “Clive Ponting’s book stands just about every preconceived notion concerning Britain’s role in World War II on its head.” As T.S. Eliot once said “humanity cannot endure too much reality” and the book was largely ignored when it was published.

Clive Ponting is an interesting character. In 1984 he was a civil servant in the Ministry of Defence (MoD). He leaked two documents to the Labour MP, Tam Dalyell, about the sinking of an Argentine naval warship General Belgrano, a key incident in the Falklands War of 1982. The documents revealed that the General Belgrano had been sighted a day earlier than officially reported, and was steaming away from the Royal Navy taskforce, and was outside the exclusion zone, when the cruiser was attacked and sunk.

Ponting admitted revealing the information and was charged with a criminal offence under Section 2 of the 1911 Official Secrets Act. Ponting main defence was that of “public interest”.

During the court case the judge famously told the jury: “"the public interest is what the government of the day says it is". The jury disagreed and he was acquitted. The Ponting case was seen as a landmark in British legal history, raising serious questions about the validity of the 1911 Official Secrets Act and the public's "right to know". The Conservative government reacted by tightening up UK secrets legislation, introducing the 1989 Official Secrets Act and removing the public interest defence which Ponting had successfully used to avoid being convicted.

By the way, a question for you Len, do you think CIA chief William Colby was murdered in 1996.

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John I was wondering if you will withdraw your claim that Prchal was wearing his life vest when he took off? And if so what other evidence you will offer indicating that Sikorski’s plane was sabotaged?

Also in light of the apparent distortions I pointed out in my last post if you still find the authors of “Double Standards” credible?

The Sikorski story is only a side-bar to my main theory that Churchill was negotiating with Hitler until Germany invaded the Soviet Union. As I have said before, I have not read David Irvine’s book, “Accident”. However, as we already know from other threads on this thread, you would never believe anything Irvine wrote about anything because of his controversial views on fascism. I agree that Irving has a record of being selective in his use of evidence in order to produce theories that support his right-wing ideology. I detest everything about Irving but I still do not reject everything he says, especially when it is based on evidence found on the internet by you.

Actually I wasn’t contesting Irving’s evidence in this case I was citing it. Our feelings towards him are actually quite similar I also think “that Irving has a record of being selective in his use of evidence in order to produce theories that support his right-wing ideology. I detest everything about Irving but I still do not reject everything he says”. In this case I cited direct quotes from eyewitnesses quoted in the book, it’s hard to see how they could have been mistaken so either 1) they lied, 2) Irving made up the quotes or 3) what they say is correct.

See if you find where I have ever indicated that I “would never believe anything Irvine wrote about anything” rather that just like you question his credibility and motives. As part of his fascist agenda he has tried to ‘rehabilitate’ the Nazis and blemish the reputation of the Allies. Accident it seems was one of his first attempts at doing so, he wanted to implicate Churchill and the British in the Sikorski crash. Therefore he would have had no reason to fake evidence or use questionable evidence that undermined his theory so option “1)” above is highly unlikely “2)” doesn’t make any sense leaving us only with “3)”.

I don’t know why an online version of a book (hosted on the author’s website) would be considered less authoritative than a printed one, quite to the contrary the former can quickly and easily consulted by anyone reading this thread.

I think you should wihdraw the claim about Prchal not just because it is contradicted by Irving’s witnesses but because it is not supported by the quote you cited to document it.

As far as “Double Standards” is concerned, I do not agree with all the theories the authors promote in the book (see below). However, the book is very well referenced and as far as I can tell, they do not try to mislead the reader.

They did mislead their readers in a few instances and it’s hard to believe it was an oversight because the contrary evidence is found in Irving’s book which they cite a few times and is AFAIK the only book about the crash.

1) They said Prchal was the only person on the plane wearing a life vest, Irving quoted the diver who recovered the body as saying one of Sikorski’s aides was wearing his as well.

2) They said Prchal’s wearing his life vest over his parachute harness was contrary to standard procedure and said this indicated he might have expected the plane to crash in water. Irving quoted a British officer who knew Prchal as saying the pilot never wore his life vest but kept it close at hand. Thus it wasn’t normal procedure for Prchal to have his vest under his parachute harness and him being found with it over the harness is perfectly understandable.

3) They cite Sumner Wells as saying he thought the plane was sabotaged but don’t tell their readers he suspected the Russians not British were responsible.

It sounds like they are guilty of what you accuse Irving i.e. they are “selective in [their] use of evidence in order to produce theories that support” their thesis.

Do you still believe that the man held for decades in Spandau wasn’t Hess? If so please respond to counter evidence I presented.

I have not got to this subject yet. But as far as I am concerned, the evidence suggests it was Hess in Spandau. I say that mainly by reading the letters Hess wrote in prison to his wife. If they were written by an impostor, they were very well done. She was convinced that they were from her husband and when she was finally allowed to meet him, she confirmed the man was Hess. The only concern she had was that his voice had appeared to change.

That’s curious because your previous posts on the topic would lead your readers into believing you thought Hess was killed along with the duke in the 1942 Scottish crash and was replaced by a double.

By the way, a question for you Len, do you think CIA chief William Colby was murdered in 1996.

I’m as I’ve said numerous times before no relation (the family name was Cohn but my grandmother preferred to have non-Jewish surname after her husband was taken to a concentration camp). I have never really looked into his death. Though some of the circumstances seem suspicious I haven’t heard of a reasonable motive. In any case I don’t know enough about his death to come to an informed opinion.

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Post 69 of this thread (pg 5)

However, I intend to argue that Churchill ordered the assassinations of the Duke of Kent and Rudolf Hess to protect his own historical reputation. If he had not done so, our view of Winston Churchill today would be very different.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.ph...st&p=103855

Post 70 of this thread (pg 5)

What about Hess’s son and wife why would they repeatedly visit the imposter? Do think they a) couldn’t tell the difference or B) went along with the ruse?
Do you still believe that the man held for decades in Spandau wasn’t Hess? If so please respond to counter evidence I presented.

I have not got to this subject yet. But as far as I am concerned, the evidence suggests it was Hess in Spandau. I say that mainly by reading the letters Hess wrote in prison to his wife. If they were written by an impostor, they were very well done. She was convinced that they were from her husband and when she was finally allowed to meet him, she confirmed the man was Hess. The only concern she had was that his voice had appeared to change.

Correct me if I’m wrong John I believe it was Hess himself not his jailers who prevented his relatives from visiting him.

Do you still think the Duke was murdered or did you change your mind about that as well?

Edited by Len Colby
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Part 17

There is clearly enough evidence to show that peace negotiations were going on with Germany until the arrival of Hess in May 1941. The real issue is whether Churchill was aware of these negotiations. It has been suggested that the peace-party, led by Sir Stewart Menzies, the head of MI5, was carrying out negotiations without the knowledge of Churchill (Anthony Cave Brown, Bodyguard of Lies, 1976). If this was the case, I would have thought that Churchill would have exposed the plot and punished the conspirators. However, Churchill did not do that, in fact he promoted members of the peace-party (Duke of Hamilton, Lord Beaverbrook, Duke of Kent) or gave them jobs that made it easier from them to negotiate with the enemy (Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax).

Other historians have argued that the peace negotiations with Nazi Germany was part of a Churchill inspired SOE plot (Martin Allen, The Hitler Deception, 2003 and John Harris, Hess: The British Conspiracy, 1999). This makes more sense but I fail to understand why Churchill covered-up this story rather than taking credit for such a successful operation.

I am of the opinion that both these theories are incorrect. I believe that Churchill was fully aware of these negotiations and he gave his approval to this attempt to bring the war to an end. Therefore I agree with Clive Ponting’s assessment that Churchill was aware that in 1940 he only had two viable options, a negotiated peace or being defeated by Germany (Clive Ponting, 1940: Myth and Reality, 1990). However, as I pointed out earlier, Ponting’s book only goes up to 1940. What was Churchill up to in 1941? Did Rudolf Hess come to Britain because he had been assured he was negotiating with Churchill? If that is the case, why did Hess not reveal this during the Nuremberg Trials?

Some historians take the view that the Hess that appeared at the Nuremberg Trials was an imposter (Hugh Thomas, The Murder of Rudolf Hess, 1979 and Lynn Picknett, Clive Prince and Stephen Prior, Double Standards, 2001). That Hess had been murdered in order to keep him from talking about these peace negotiations. It is argued in Double Standards that Hess and Prince George, Duke of Kent were murdered together on 25th August 1942, when their aircraft crashed into Eagles Rock near Dunbeath, Caithness, Scotland. I am willing to accept that this theory explains the death of Prince George, I am not convinced that the Hess that appeared at the Nuremberg Trials, was an imposter. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, the content of the letters written by Hess while in captivity. Secondly, the identification of Hess by his wife and his close friends. The photographic evidence of Hess pre-1941 and post-1941 also suggests to me that he was who he says he was.

Therefore, it is necessary to explain why Hess did not reveal what he knew about these peace negotiations during the Nuremberg Trials? One important clue to this is the way he responded to his other defendants. For example, when he came face to face with Herman Göring at Nuremberg, Hess remarked: “Who are you”? Göring reminded him of events that they witnessed in the past but Hess continued to insist that he did not know this man. Karl Haushofer was then called in but even though they had been friends for twenty years, Hess once again failed to remember him. Hess replied “I just don’t know you, but it will all come back to me and then I will recognise an old friend again. I am terribly sorry.” (Peter Padfield, Hess: The Führer’s Disciple, page 305).

Hess did not recognise other Nazi leaders. Ribbentrop responded by suggesting that Hess was not really Hess. When told of something that Hess had said he replied: “Hess, you mean Hess? The Hess we have here?” (J. R. Rees, The Case of Rudolf Hess, page 169).

However, Major Douglas M. Kelley, the American psychiatrist who was responsible for Hess during the trials, stated that he did have periods when he did remember his past. This included a detailed account of his flight to Scotland. Hess told Kelley that he had arrived without the knowledge of Hitler. Hess claimed that “only he could get the English King or his representatives to meet with Hitler and make peace so that millions of people and thousands of villages would be spared.” (J. R. Rees, The Case of Rudolf Hess, page 168).

One suggestion is that Hess was pretending he had amnesia and was trying to distance himself from the actions of his fellow Nazis. This does not make any sense to me. In fact, the documentary record shows that he was not guilty of war crimes. In fact, most of the war crimes took place after he had left Germany in 1941.

I believe the answer to this question relates to a visit by American psychiatrist Dr Donald Ewen Cameron, who had been sent by Allen Dulles to assess Hess’s fitness to stand trial. At the time Cameron was working for the OSS. According to one source, Dulles had told Cameron, that he believed the Hess he was about to examine was not the real Hess. According to Dulles, he had been told that the real Hess had been secretly executed on Churchill’s orders. (Gordon Thomas, Journey into Madness, 1993, pages 167-68).

As I have said, I do not believe the story about the execution of Hess. However, it is true that Dulles did arrange for Cameron to visit Hess. Dr J. R. Ress, one of Hess’s English doctors mentions it in his book on his work at Nuremberg (J. R. Rees, The Case of Rudolf Hess, page 141). He claims that Cameron arrived on 13th November, 1945.

Some members of the Forum will have heard of Dr Donald Ewen Cameron before. Yes, he is the same Cameron who was recruited by Allen Dulles in 1957 to run Project MKULTRA. Documents released in 1977 show that MKULTRA was a CIA-directed "mind control" program. It seems that Cameron’s interest in brainwashing dated back to his work with Dulles in the OSS during the Second World War.

I would argue that Cameron had been sent to Nuremberg to help Churchill and the British intelligence services with a problem. Cameron’s task was to remove Hess’s memory of past events. This is why Hess was unable to recognize his former friends and colleagues at Nuremberg. Cameron next job was to provide Hess with a new memory about events dating back to May 1941. That is why Hess is able to provide Major Douglas M. Kelley with a comprehensive account of his trip to Scotland.

The problem with this brainwashing experiment was that there was no way of knowing how long Hess would be able to remember the past as provided by Dr. Cameron. That is why Hess had to be kept in solitary confinement for the rest of his life. That is the reason why Hess was not allowed to talk about anything that happened before 1945 with anybody, including his own family.

That is also the reason why Hess was murdered on 17th August, 1987. Why 1987 and not some earlier date? Well, the British had been hiding behind the claim that the Soviets were blocking Hess’s release. However, Mikhail Gorbachev told German journalists in February 1987, that he was going to give permission for the release of Hess (Peter Padfield, Hess: The Führer’s Disciple, page 328). The West German newspaper Bild reported that Hess was going to be released on his 93rd birthday on 26th April 1987. (Bild, 21st April, 1987) Hess knew differently, he told Abadallah Melaouhi, his nurse, that the “English will kill me” before I am released. (BBC Newsnight, 28th February 1989).

The British did indeed block his release (Sir Christopher Mallaby, Deputy Secretary of the Cabinet Office, quoted by Hugh Thomas in the documentary “Rudolf Hess: The Appalling Truth). Gorbachev told Margaret Thatcher that he would expose the British hypocrisy by withdrawing the Soviet guards from Spandau Prison. It was then decided that Hess had to die as he could not be allowed to speak in public about what he knew about the peace negotiations that had taken place in 1941.

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Wow! That was a 'trip'! Cameron was the Dr. Strangelove of the MK/ULTRA Project, for sure, and I had NEVER heard he had been sent to tamper with Hess' mind.....but it seems he was, and that is most interesting....someone trying to erase his memory after getting all he knew. I'd strongly urge anyone interested in Hess to read: Martin Allen's The Hilter/Hess Deception. What is in it plus Cameron seems to open up the doors here!.......along with the interesting information above on Hess being 'terminated' to protect some secrets of the Brits who were at his death the only ones' with anything much to hide about it all. Mind-control rears it's weird and ugly head in all too many covert operations from the War to present.

It gets even more interesting when you examine Cameron's life in more detail. Cameron's defenders argue that he was unaware of the CIA funding of his project. Yet we now know that he worked for the OSS during the war and in 1945 it was Allen Dulles who sent Cameron to assess Rudolf Hess.

It is worth looking at what Hess was up to before the war. In 1938 he was appointed Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at Albany State Medical School. It was at Albany that Cameron conducted research into sensory deprivation and memory. In 1943 he went to Canada and established the psychiatry department at Montreal's McGill University and director of the newly-created Allan Memorial Institute. Yet according to the CIA Cameron was only recruited for UKULTRA in 1957. It seems that the OSS set him up on this project as early as 1943.

It was during this time that Cameron developed the theory that mental patients could be cured by treatment that erased existing memories and by rebuilding the psyche completely. According to his research assistant, Dr. Peter Roper, "He (Cameron) had a technician called Leonard Rubenstein who modified cassettes so there was an endless tape, it could keep repeating itself for hours at a time. If Cameron could give a positive message, eventually a patient would respond to it." Cameron would play the tapes to his patients for up to 86 days, as they slipped in and out of insulin-induced comas. The treatment was known as "psychic driving" and attempted to wipe clean the unsuspecting patients' memories and implant other memories on a "clean slate". , treatment that was seen as the researcher's potential legacy. Cameron seems to have been building on the work he carried out on Rudolf Hess.

As it was illegal for the CIA to conduct operations on American soil, Cameron was forced to carry out his experiments at the Allan Memorial Institute in Canada. The CIA arranged funding via Cornell University in New York.

Cameron had to commute to Montreal every week to carry out his work. According to official documents, Cameron was paid $69,000 from 1957 to 1964 to carry out MKULTRA experiments at the Allan Memorial Institute. Documents released in 1977 revealed that thousands of unwitting subjects were tested on as part of the MKULTRA program.

Dr. Peter Roper later claimed that Cameron and his team had visits from senior military officers "who briefed us on brainwashing techniques". One newspaper journalist later claimed in the Sunday Times that "using techniques similar to those portrayed in the celebrated novel the Manchurian Candidate, it was believed that people could be brainwashed and reprogrammed to carry out specific acts."

According to the journalist, Craig Howie (The Scotsman, 6th January, 2006): "Roper blames "politics" in the psychiatric profession for Cameron's sudden departure "under a cloud" from the Allan, in 1964, four years before the end of his contract. There was no farewell, no gift, he went - as it were - out the back door without any noise. All his research was tossed out."

I wonder if this had anything to do with the JFK assassination that took place a few months earlier. It might also be significant that Donald Ewen Cameron died in 1967.

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