1938 - Political Events
Political Events
Firing squads execute 21 Soviet leaders March 13 after an 11-day show trial in which the men were forced to confess and found guilty of treason. Included is former Third International head Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin, 49, whose novel How It All Began, written in prison, will be published years hence.
France's Chautemps government falls March 10 after 9 months in office; Léon Blum tries to form a new Popular Front cabinet but resigns under pressure April 10; Edouard Daladier, now 52, heads a new radical socialist cabinet that is farther to the right. Camille Chautemps refuses to serve in the new government.
Adolf Hitler vows to "protect" the 10 million Germans living outside the Reich, annexes Austria March 14 in what is called the "Anschluss", and engineers an April 10 plebiscite that shows that 99.75 percent of Austrians desire union with the Third Reich (see 1934). The Austrian Anschluss draws protests from Britain and France, but Germanophobic British Foreign Office official Robert G. Vansittart, 57, has been sidelined into an unimportant position January 1 to keep him from pushing his rearmament views. Foreign Secretary Sir Anthony Eden resigns from Prime Minister Chamberlain's cabinet and is succeeded February 25 by Edward F. L. Wood, 1st earl of Halifax, who as lord privy seal last November visited Adolf Hitler and Hermann Goering. Nobel pacifist Carl von Ossietzky dies at a Berlin sanatorium May 4 at age 48.
Hungary's premier Kálman Darányi resigns May 13 as pressure increases from right-wing extremists. He becomes president of the legislature and is succeeded as premier by banker Béla Imrédy, who will collaborate closely with the Nazis until his resignation next year. Polish forces occupy the Teschen area of Czechoslovakia October 2, having sent a note September 29 demanding cession of the territory seized by the Czechs in the Polish-Russian war of 1920. Poland champions Hungarian claims in Slovakia and Ruthenia.
"I am convinced that it is wiser to permit Germany eastward expansion than to throw England and France, unprepared, into a war at this time," writes Charles A. Lindbergh September 23 to U.S. Ambassador to Britain Joseph P. Kennedy. Lindbergh has been living abroad to escape publicity since the kidnapping and murder of his infant son in 1932; he has visited Nazi Germany six times since 1936, received a decoration earlier this year from Hermann Goering for services to world aviation, and has made surveys of British, German, and Soviet airpower; Britain could not possibly win a war in Europe, he argues, not even with U.S. aid.
The British and French appease der führer at Munich September 29 by permitting him to take the Sudetenland, a 16,000-square-mile territory that covers nearly a third of Czechoslovakia and contains a third of her inhabitants. "This is the second time in our history that there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honor," says Prime Minister Chamberlain on his return from Munich. "I believe it is peace for our time." Knowing all too well how woefully unprepared Britain is for a war, he has offered some French, Belgian, and Portuguese colonies in Africa to Hitler (the BBC suppresses that news) and tries to make the best of a humiliating situation, meeting with his supporters at the Cliveden estate of New York-born London Observer proprietor Waldorf Astor, now 59, in Buckinghamshire; Parliament endorses the concessions that Chamberlain has made despite opposition from a small minority that includes Nobel Peace Prize winner Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil, now 73 (see 1939).
British intelligence director Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair prepares a dossier on Adolf Hitler in December at the request of the foreign office (see Sinclair, 1923). Now 65, Sir Hugh says Hitler has the characteristics of "fanaticism, mysticism, ruthlessness, cunning, vanity, moods of exaltation and depression, fits of bitter and self-righteous resentment, and what can only be termed a streak of madness; but with it all there is a great tenacity of purpose, which has often been combined with extraordinary clarity of vision." His suggestion that Hitler may try to get around the Maginot Line and invade France via the Lowlands and Switzerland is communicated to Washington, infuriating the assistant under-secretary of the Foreign Office Sir George Mounsey, who writes, "These secret reports, if accurate, are usually borne out by our own information and therefore, while harmless, of little value, whereas, if inaccurate they may lead to serious consequences. If action is taken on them the whole international atmosphere may be poisoned and the policy of appeasement jeopardised."
British intelligence learns that the Germans have adopted a seemingly "unbreakable" code that employs a machine with a series of electrical rotors that translate Morse code into what appears to be gibberish and can be deciphered only by a similar machine operated by the recipient of the message being sent. Originally devised in 1918, used up to now for commercial purposes, and improved for military use, the "Enigma" code scrambles a message in any of 150 quadrillion ways; the ultra-secret Code and Cipher School established at Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, in 1919 recruits chess champions, mathematicians, and crossword puzzle experts through an anonymous letter placed in the Daily Telegraph (the purpose of their work will remain a mystery to the cryptographers for decades). Mathematician Alan M. Turing is among those enlisted to break the Germans' "Enigma" code (see science, 1936), but its complexity defies efforts to decipher it (see 1939).
Lockheed Aircraft Corp. receives a contract to produce Hudson bombers for Britain's Royal Air Force (RAF), the largest single order yet placed with any U.S. aircraft manufacturer (see transportation, 1932). By 1941 Lockheed will have 17,000 employees, a number that will peak at 94,329 in 1943 but fall back to 17,000 in 1946 (see Missile Systems Division, 1954).
Northrop Aircraft is founded by John K. Northrop, now 42, whose company was acquired last year by Douglas Aircraft (see 1928).
McDonnell Aircraft is founded by former Glenn L. Martin project engineer James S. (Smith) McDonnell, Jr., 39, who will make McDonnell a leading producer of military aircraft (see transportation, [McDonnell-Douglas], 1967).
Britain and Ireland resume friendly relations after concluding a 3-year agreement to remove tariff barriers (see 1935). Britain turns over coastal defense installations to Eire, and Dublin agrees to pay £10 million to satisfy land-annuity claims.
Spanish insurgents sever Loyalist territory in Castile from Barcelona and Catalonia, the opposing forces remain deadlocked along the Ebro River through most of the summer, a great insurgent drive begins in Catalonia December 23, and the Loyalists are forced back toward Barcelona. Italy has withdrawn some troops following an Anglo-Italian pact signed April 16, but a force of 40,000 remains to support Generalissimo Francisco Franco.
London announces postponement of any Palestine partition January 4 (see 1930), British authorities execute Jewish terrorist Solomon ben Yosef June 29, Arab markets are bombed in Jerusalem, Haifa, and Jaffa either by Jewish or Arab terrorists, 20 Jews are massacred October 2 at Tiberias, and Arab extremists seize Bethlehem and the old section of Jerusalem, which are retaken by British troops October 10 and October 18, respectively. A new British commission reports November 9 that all partition proposals are impractical, and by year's end there are 25,000 to 30,000 British troops in Palestine (see 1939).
Turkey's president Kemal Atatürk dies at Dolmabahce November 10 at age 57 after a 15-year regime in which he has established a modern republic. Unanimously elected to succeed him in a vote by the national assembly is Prime Minister Ismet Inönü, now 54, who has been responsible for many of the reforms accomplished since 1923 and will be president until 1950.
Benito Mussolini demands France's colonies of Corsica and Tunisia in December.
Japanese forces in China follow up their 1937 successes by taking Qingdao (Tsingtao) January 10 after the Chinese have destroyed some Japanese factories in the area. Japanese troops advance along the Hankou (Hankow) Railway and through Shangxi (Shansi) Province, reach the Huanghe (Yellow River) March 6, but suffer several reverses as communist guerrillas retain control of the countryside. The National Mobilization Law enacted by the Diet in March brings new recruits, but the Battle of Tai-er-zhuang (Taierchwang) in April ends with the Japanese suffering their first major defeat in modern times: some 200,000 Chinese regulars and guerrillas under the command of Gen. Li Zong Ren (Li Tsung-jen) trap a 60,000-man Japanese force advancing southward on Xuzhou in Jiangsu Province, killing 20,000 of the enemy and capturing great quantities of equipment before the Japanese can break out to the north. The victory boosts Chinese morale, but Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoye appoints Tokyo-born general Hideki Tojo, 53, his minister of war in July and Xiaman (Amoy) falls to the Japanese May 10.
Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek summons U.S. cryptographer Herbert O. Yardley, now 49, to break the code of the Japanese invaders (see 1929). Police in Shanghai's foreign concessions round up terrorist followers of Sun Yaxing during the summer, concession authorities hand the men over to the city police (who collaborate with the Japanese), the terrorists are taken to police headquarters at 76 Jessfield Road, and Sun Yaxing is among those shot. Japanese and Russian forces clash on the Chinese-Siberian border from July 11 to August 10, Japanese troops land at Bias Bay near Hong Kong October 12, Guangzhou (Canton) falls October 21, Hangkou (Hankow) October 25. Capturing Guangzhou permits the Japanese to cut the Guangzhou-Hankou Railway that supplies Chinese forces in the interior with war matériel from abroad. "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun," says communist leader Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung) November 6, and Prince Konoye issues a proclamation in November declaring Japan's aim for "a new order in East Asia."
Indian revolutionary Subhas Chandra Bose wins election as president of the Indian National Congress, defeating Mohandas K. Gandhi's nominee. Now 41, Bose matriculated at Cambridge, scored high on civil service exams, returned to India, became a disciple of the late Chittaranjan Das, was arrested by the British in a 1925 roundup of terrorists, contracted tuberculosis in a Mandalay prison, gained release in 1927, worked with Jawaharlal Nehru for complete independence, was arrested again and jailed for civil disobedience, was elected mayor of Calcutta, and has recently traveled for his health in Europe, visiting Indian students and meeting with political leaders who included Adolf Hitler. Seeing that a war in Europe is imminent, he warns against dragging India into any world conflict (see 1939).
Siamese general Luang Phibunsongkhram takes power as a military dictator in December (see 1935). Now 41, he has been minister of defense since 1934, promoted ultranationalist military ideas, adopts a chauvinistic anti-Chinese policy in domestic affairs and a pro-Japanese policy in foreign affairs (see 1940; Thailand, 1939).
The U.S. Supreme Court overturns its 1842 ruling in Swift v. Tyson April 25. In Erie Railroad v. Tompkins it upholds a state court's award of $30,000 in damages to a man whose arm was torn off by an open railcar door as he walked beside the tracks; lawyers for the railroad have claimed that the state court had no jurisdiction, Justice Brandeis writes the majority opinion, Justice Cardozo has been absent following a stroke, Justices Butler and McReynolds dissent, and the 6-to-2 decision will stand into the next century, establishing the rule (in Brandeis's words) that "except in matters governed by the Federal Constitution or by acts of Congress, the law to be applied in any case is the law of the State . . . There is no Federal General Common Law."
The Dies Committee (to Investigate Un-American Activities) begins in May to study Nazi activities in the United States but soon turns to investigating communist activities. Rep. Martin Dies, 36, (D. Texas) has turned against the New Deal, which he originally supported; while most of his committee's charges will be based on hearsay, circumstantial evidence, or slander, chairman Dies will claim that it is more effective than the FBI in exposing communist subversion (see 1947).
Bolivia and Paraguay sign a definitive peace agreement at Buenos Aires July 21, ending the Chaco War that began in 1928 (see 1935). Carlos Saavedra Lamas has negotiated the pact, under whose terms Bolivia loses even more territory than the most extremist Paraguayans demanded 3 years ago. Argentinian investors profit handsomely from Paraguay's territorial gains.
Puerto Rico's Popular Democratic Party is founded July 22 at Barranquitas by native son Luis Muñoz Marín, 40, whose patriot father, the late Luis Muñoz Rivera, was born in the place. Muñoz Marín grew up in San Juan and Washington, D.C. (where his father was Puerto Rico's resident commissioner until his death in 1916), worked as a freelance writer at New York, and has edited his father's newspaper La Democracia as well as serving in the Puerto Rican senate. He has favored breaking up the island's large estancias for distribution among poorer farmers and has been able through his contacts with the Roosevelt administration to obtain appropriations for Puerto Rico (see 1940).
The Declaration of Lima adopted December 24 by representatives of 21 American nations meeting at a Pan-American conference in Peru pledges the Western Hemisphere neighbors to consult in the event that the "peace, security, or territorial integrity" of any state is threatened; they reaffirm absolute sovereignty in the face of fears that Europe's fascist powers may attempt takeovers in the Americas.
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