What Was the Anglo Naval Agreement

On May 22, 1935, the British cabinet voted to accept Hitler`s offers as soon as possible. The British ambassador to Germany, Sir Eric Phipps, advised them not to ignore the possibility of reaching an agreement with Hitler. British Admiral Chatfield also believed that the agreement should be seriously considered, regardless of the reaction of the France. ww2dbaseIn indirect, this also helped the future Axis powers in Japan; With a potentially powerful German navy, the British must now maintain a strong presence in the North Atlantic and are therefore unable to meet the demand for a strong naval presence in their large Pacific colonies of Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. Das am 18. In June 1935, the agreement between Germany and Britain, which limited the size of the German navy to 35% of that of British Commonwealth I, was often criticized for the damage it had caused to Britain`s efforts. The France and Italy formed a common front against Hitler`s unilateral rejection of the colony of Versailles, which also led to the bitterness of relations between Britain and France at a time when Anglo-French unity vis-à-vis Germany was essential. Nevertheless, the agreement had a broader meaning: it was part of the extensive but ultimately futile efforts to control naval arms control in the interwar period, and at the same time an important first step in Britain`s cowardly policy of Nazi Germany, which became known as appeasement. Ribbentrop arrived in London on 2 June 1935. Talks began on Tuesday, September 4. In June 1935, at the Admiralty office with Ribbentrop at the head of the German delegation and Simon`s delegation to the United Kingdom. [39] Ribbentrop, determined to succeed in his mission no matter what, began his talks by saying that the UK could either accept the 35:100 ratio by the weekend as “firm and immutable,” or the German delegation would return home and the Germans would build their navy to the size they wanted.

[36] [40] Simon was visibly upset by Ribbentrop`s behavior: “It is not customary to set such conditions at the beginning of negotiations.” Simon left the talks. [40] On June 5, 1935, the British delegation changed its mind. In a report to the British Cabinet, he was “definitively of the opinion that, in our own interest, we should accept this offer from Mr. Hitler as long as it is still open. If we now refuse to accept the offer for the purposes of these talks, Mr. Hitler will withdraw the offer and Germany will try to build a level above 35%. Given Germany`s past and its known ability to become a serious naval rival of that country, we can regret not taking advantage of this opportunity. [41] Also on June 5, during talks between Sir Robert Craigie, the Naval Expert of the British Foreign Office and Head of the US Department of the Federal Foreign Office, and Ribbentrop`s deputy, Admiral Karl-Georg Schuster, the Germans admitted that the ratio of 35:100 would be expressed in tonnage of ships, with the Germans increasing their tonnage up to the tonnage of the United Kingdom in various categories of warships. [39] In the afternoon of the same day, the British Cabinet voted in favour of adopting the 35:100 ratio, and Ribbentrop was informed of the Cabinet`s adoption in the evening.

[41] (a) The ratio of 35:100 is supposed to be a lasting relationship, i.e. the total tonnage of the German fleet will never exceed a percentage of 35 of the total tonnage of the naval forces as stipulated in the Treaty, of the members of the British Commonwealth of Nations or, if there are no contractual restrictions of the members of the British Commonwealth of Nations in the future. In the 1920s, Hitler`s foreign policy thinking underwent a radical change. At the beginning of his political career, Hitler was hostile to the United Kingdom and regarded it as an enemy of the Reich. However, after opposing the French occupation of the Ruhr region in 1923, the United Kingdom classified the United Kingdom as a potential ally. [17] In Mein Kampf, and even more so in its sequel, Second Book, Hitler sharply criticized the German government before 1914 for launching a maritime and colonial challenge to the British Empire and, in Hitler`s view, for unnecessarily upsetting the United Kingdom. [18] According to Hitler, the United Kingdom was another “Aryan” power whose friendship could be won by a German “renunciation” of naval and colonial ambitions against the United Kingdom. [18] In exchange for such a “renunciation,” Hitler expected an Anglo-German alliance directed against France and the Soviet Union, and Britain`s support for German efforts to acquire living space in Eastern Europe. As a first step towards the Anglo-German alliance, Hitler had written in Mein Kampf his intention to seek a “maritime pact” by which Germany would “renounce” any challenge by the navy against the United Kingdom.

[19] Until 1938, the Germans had only the threat of the agreement to abandon it in order to pressure London to accept continental Europe as Germany`s legitimate sphere of influence. [57] At a meeting on April 16, 1938 between Sir Nevile Henderson, the British ambassador to Germany, and Hermann Goering, he stated that this had never been appreciated in England, and he bitterly regretted that Mr. Hitler had ever accepted at the time without getting anything in return. .