The Chamberlain-Hitler Collusion

J.L. Granatstein, distinguished research professor emeritus of history
at York University, is the author of Who Killed Canadian History? and
co-author of The Canadian 100: The 100 Most Influential Canadians of the
20th Century and the Dictionary of Canadi

This is a book that challenges the conventional interpretations of the
events that brought on World War II, and it is fair to say at the outset
that the conventional wins. Indeed, although what we are given here is
presented as almost wholly new, much of what is said here—in a greatly
exaggerated manner—is well-known.

Clement Leibovitz, an Egyptian-born scientist who came to Canada in
1969, published an

earlier version of this book; it has been revised by Alvin Finkel, a
Canadianist, and made much more readable than that first version, though
the argument has not been altered. Readers are told that Neville
Chamberlain was no naif, buffaloed by a cunning Hitler. Instead, the
British prime minister believed he had a deal with the Nazi leader that
would see Germany turn eastward to satisfy its aspirations. To pit
Hitler against Stalin was the British goal, and the policy of
appeasement that resulted in the culminating meeting at Munich in
September 1938 was the ultimate result. But is this new? This argument
in fact is so well known as to be almost labelled conventional.
Certainly Stalin himself believed it, and every Marxist historian of the
era has said much the same; so too have anti-Marxists. The authors have
amassed substantial new data and given it their own spin, but they do
not truly present a new interpretation. Instead, their conspiracy-theory
approach wears thin very quickly, and weary readers will seek relief in
cold showers from overheated prose.