I am wondering if anyone has a source or knows what terms Germany was offering in its peace initiatives of 1939-1940.
As I understand it Hitler made peace overtures after the fall of poland and again after the fall of France but I have never been able to find what the terms of these agreements were.
I've also have tried in the past to find out what the so-called peace initiatives by Hitler in this period were, and what I found was this.
Hitler on the 6th October 1939, after the defeat of Poland, made a speech in which he threatened both Britain and France with the dire consequences if they didn't attempt to seek peace with Germany, but he didn't at any time state what his conditions for a peaceful settlement were.
On the 19th July 1940, after the fall of France, Hitler made a two hour long speech to the Reichstag, which is the speech associated with his so-called peace offer, in which he rambled on about how the war was every body's else's fault apart from Germany's, how the German's forces had won, and how light the losses had been, and a number of threats directed towards Britain if it continued with the war and some slurs directed at Churchill, then at the very end he made these comments;
"
"In this hour I feel it to be my duty before my own conscience to appeal once more to reason and common sense, in Great Britain as much as elsewhere. 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.
Possibly Mr Churchill will again brush aside this statement of mine by saying that it is merely of fear and doubt in our final victory. In that case, I shall have relieved my conscience in regards to the things to come"
and that's it, no details on what conditions or terms he would consider.
Its seems that Hitler as the victor, took the view that his defeated foes should come to him to seek terms before he stated what those terms were. This had the advantage that once the Allies had taken the political decision to come to terms it would be far more difficult for them to withdraw from negotiations if they found the terms more punishing than expected.
ps; There are a number of claims that some negotiations went on using unofficial channels via neutral embassies, but there seems to be no worthwhile evidence that the German's made their demands for a peace settlement any clearer to the British government via these channels, and its not even clear that the Nazi leadership had made up its mind about the details either ,except for Hitler making vague statements to his friends that he didn't want to destroy the British Empire.
