Beware the Powerful Giving "Protection"

Events 85 years ago have surprising resonance in this moment

Today, April 1st, marks the 85th anniversary of a curious moment in the history of the BBC. Eight days from now — April 9th — will feature another 85th anniversary, this one much more historically important.

Both events are interesting history in themselves, I think you’ll agree. But they also have an unexpected resonance in events unfolding right now.

Let’s start with what happened 85 years ago today, on April 1st, 1940.

Across the airwaves of the BBC’s German-language service came an unmistakable voice: Adolf Hitler was delivering a grand address before an immense audience.

“I hereby declare that I have now made my last territorial demands in Europe,” Hitler solemnly stated. “But beyond that I have now to state certain claims of a maritime nature.”

By that moment in 1940, Hitler had carried out the Anschluss with Austria, extracted the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia, occupied the remainder of Czechoslovakia and set up a “Protectorate” to govern it, then invaded Poland on September 1st, 1939. That invasion prompted France and Britain to declare war on Germany. But after defeating Poland, and giving half to the Soviet Union, Hitler had stopped his expansion.

Germany launched no offensives. Neither did the Allies. For months, there was little fighting anywhere. People called it the “Phoney War.” Or “Sitzkrieg.”

And now Hitler was announcing he had no more territorial demands in Europe? This was big news.

In his address, Hitler discussed a number of points and plans that I’ll skip to get straight to those “claims of a maritime nature.” They were “maritime” because they involved the other side of the Atlantic.

“I am most grateful for Mr. Roosevelt’s interest in European affairs,” Hitler said. “I am proving my gratitude by declaring a German protectorate over the United States. New York, today an insignificant port, will become a centre of world trade. I shall make America a blossoming garden.”

The audience roared. “Heil! Heil!”

“American architecture and gangsterdom shall henceforth bear my face. I shall take my seat in the White House and make it a Brown House, so help me God!”

Yes, it was an April Fool’s gag.

And a successful one: Journalists at CBS actually called the BBC in a panic because they had missed this momentous speech.

“Hitler” had been played by Martin Miller, a Jewish actor who had fled Austria and started doing Hitler impersonations at a cabaret for German-speaking refugees in London. The BBC commissioned Miller to write and deliver this gag. It was a hit, so the BBC got Miller to deliver a series of German addresses mocking der Führer.

Martin Miller as der Führer

The key to successful satire is accuracy. However exaggerated it may be, what is presented must look, feel, and smell like the person being spoofed. And that’s exactly what Miller achieved with touches large and small. A key Hitlerism that Miller used to good effect were references to “protection.”

“In the United States there are national minorities loosely connected by race and tradition with the German Reich,” Miller’s Hitler declares. “In Chicago alone, there are 324,000 Czechs, and those Czechs keep asking themselves ‘why can’t we come under the Protectorate?’ [The Reich-controlled puppet government of Czechoslovakia.] And in the well-known city of New York, there are 476,000 Poles. They have a right to be protected by Germany and I shall enforce that right.”

This joke only works if you know that Hitler never boasted about launching unprovoked wars and conquering his neighbours but rather always insisted he was acting to “protect” others.

Germany had to have the Sudetenland to “protect” ethnic Germans.

Germany had to seize the remainder of Czechoslovakia — and put it under a “Protectorate” — to stop ethnic conflict between Czechs and Slovaks and state collapse (which was fomented by Germany.)

Germany had to invade Poland to protect ethnic Germans and put a stop to Polish attacks (which were staged by Germany.)

Anyone familiar with Hitler’s speeches knew that Germany never sought territorial conquest. Heavens, no! Hitler only acted out of concern for others.

Hence the joke: Hitler was promising to “protect” Czechs and Poles in America the same way he was protecting them in Europe.

For a German-speaker familiar with seven years of Hitler’s lies, that sounded both absurd and plausible. Which is why that April Fool’s gag worked.

German soldiers enter Denmark.

Eight days later, on April 9th, 1940, the “Phoney War” ended — when Germany launched a sudden assault on Denmark and Norway.

And how did the German government describe those unprovoked attacks on studiously neutral countries?

You can see it quoted in the headline below.

From the Baltimore Sun, April 10th, 1940:

When leading Nazis were put on trial at Nuremberg following the war, the principal accusation was that they had committed “crimes against peace” by launching “wars of aggression” — meaning invasions not justified under international law. That made the explanations for the invasions central to the trial.

Thus, a memorandum setting out exactly what Germany had said and done to Denmark was prepared.

It reads in part:

On the 9th of April, 1940 at 4.20 hours the German Minister [ambassador] appeared at the private residence of the Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs accompanied by the Air Attache of the Legation. … The Minister said at once that Germany had positive proofs that Great Britain intended to occupy bases in Denmark and Norway. Germany had to safeguard Denmark against this. For this reason German soldiers were now crossing the frontier and landing at various points in Zealand including the port of Copenhagen; in a short time German bombers would be over Copenhagen; their orders were not to bomb until further notice. It was now up to the Danes to prevent resistance as any resistance would have the most terrible consequences. Germany would guarantee Denmark territorial integrity and political independence. Germany would not interfere with the internal government of Denmark, but wanted only to make sure of the neutrality of the country. For this purpose the presence of the German Wehrmacht in Denmark was required during the war.

Germany’s invasions weren’t aggression.

In fact, Germany was acting to prevent British aggression against poor Denmark and Norway.

Germany was protecting its neighbours, you see. By invading them.

The Danish minister answered bluntly.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs declared in reply that the allegation concerning British plans to occupy Denmark was completely without foundation; there was no possibility on anything like that. The Minister for Foreign Affairs protested against the violation of Denmark's neutrality which according to the German Minister's statement was in progress. The Minister for Foreign Affairs declared further that he could not give a reply to the demands, which had to be submitted to the King and the Prime Minister, and further observed that the German Minister knew, as everybody else, that the Danish armed forces had orders to oppose violations of Denmark's neutrality so that fighting presumably already took place.

In reply the German Minister expressed that the matter was very urgent, not least to avoid air bombardment.

In Norway, the government quickly abandoned Oslo and Bergen to the Germans but, supported by the British, kept fighting the Germans in the far north until late May, after the disaster in France. The Germans installed a puppet government led by Vidkun Quisling (hence “Quisling” became a synonym for “traitor”) but real power lay with the occupying German military — which remained in Norway for the rest of the war to “protect” the country from the threat of British invasion.

Geography rendered Denmark indefensible so the Danes quickly surrendered. Hitler turned Denmark into what historians have called “a model protectorate”: Denmark’s existing government was permitted to continue in office, the King would remain on the throne, and Danes would be in charge of domestic affairs. Hitler’s intention was to use Denmark as proof that in countries which accepted the new Nazi order, life would go on much as it had before.

It did not last. The Germans increasingly interfered in Danish internal affairs, notably by demanding the passage of anti-Semitic laws preparing the way for the Holocaust. The population and government resisted. Finally, in 1943, the Danish government was scrapped and the reality of German domination was made naked. (To their eternal credit, the Danes then smuggled almost the entire Jewish population by boat to neutral Sweden.)

J.D. Vance extends a grasping hand in Greenland.

That was the history. Here is the contemporary resonance I mentioned.

Donald Trump now insists that Denmark must hand over Greenland to the United States and he has explicitly and repeatedly refused to rule out using military force to make that happen. Trump seems entirely unconcerned that any such use of force would be a major crime under international law. He is equally unconcerned that Denmark is a fellow member of NATO, so seizing the island would trigger Article 5 of the NATO treaty, compelling all NATO members to rally to Denmark’s defence — putting the United States in the curious position of having to fight itself.

Why is it so important that the United States own Greenland?

Trump has been talking about buying Greenland since his first term but only after winning in November did he raise the possibility of invasion. His first statement was a social media post (of course) in December. It reads: “For purposes of National Security and Freedom throughout the World, the United States of America feels that the ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.”

Trump himself hasn’t elaborated much on that point. But Trump sent vice-president J.D. Vance and his wife to Greenland — without first asking permission for a visit from the Greenlandic government — and Vance spelled out the US position in more detail. I’ll try to sum it up here as generously as I can.

The weakening of the Arctic ice pack — thanks to anthropogenic climate change Trump denies — means the Arctic Ocean will increasingly be a navigable body of water in the future, and shipping over the top of the world instead of around it can greatly reduce journey times. In addition, substantial deposits of oil and minerals will likely be increasingly exploitable. Hence, Greenland’s geostrategic relevance is rising. And keeping it from being dominated by China or Russia is in the interests of the US, Canada, and Europe.

I think all that background is universally accepted. But the administration’s spin on it is anything but.

“A lot of other countries have threatened Greenland, have threatened to use its territories and its waterways to threaten the United States, to threaten Canada, and of course to threaten the people of Greenland,” said vice-president J. D. Vance when he announced he would visit Greenland. “We want to invigorate the security of the people of Greenland because we think it’s important to protecting the security of the entire world.”

Around the same time, Donald Trump said, “we need Greenland, very importantly, for international security — we have to have Greenland. It's not a question of 'Do you think we can do without it?' We can't," Trump said. "We're not relying on Denmark or anybody else to take care of that situation."

In Greenland, Vance told reporters, "Denmark has not kept pace and devoted the resources necessary to keep this base, to keep our troops, and in my view, to keep the people of Greenland safe from a lot of very aggressive incursions from Russia, from China and other nations.”

So the message is clear. The United States must protect Greenland to from Russia, China, and “other nations,” in order to ensure the security of the United States — as well as the security of Greenland, Canada, Europe and the world.

There are a few problems with this argument.

One: What Vance said about “a lot of other countries” having threatened Greenland is a lie. There simply are no Chinese or Russian threats or incursions or even the slightest whiff of anything like that.

Former Swedish prime minister Carl Bildt put it succinctly in a tweet:

Two: Vance’s inclusion of Canada on the list of countries supposedly threatened because Greenland’s security is at risk is particularly odd given that Canada really is being threatened … by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance.

Three: As a NATO ally, Denmark is more than willing to listen to any American proposal for enhanced security in Greenland. The American military base Vance visited is proof of that. When the Americans asked to put it in Greenland in the 1950s, Denmark said yes. Denmark always says yes to the United States. During the Cold War, when Denmark had an official policy banning nuclear weapons from its territories, the US privately asked a Danish prime minister if they could quietly overlook Denmark’s policy in Greenland. The Danish prime minister unofficially agreed and turned a blind eye. That’s how cooperative Denmark has been. And is to this day.

So what is needed to secure Greenland that Denmark isn’t willing to do or won’t allow the Americans to do? Trump and Vance have never answered that question. It’s hard not to conclude there is no answer to that question — and that the Trump administration’s expressed desire to “protect” Greenland is as sincere as Hitler’s wish to “protect” Denmark and Norway.

Yes, I know that’s provocative. But I’m not done.

In fact, there is a good argument that despite being utterly disingenuous, Hitler’s argument was nonetheless superior to Trump’s.

In April, 1940, Germany, Britain, and France were at war. The Germans had been buying their iron ore mostly from France. With that supply cut off, they were dependent on iron ore mined in the north of Sweden and shipped to Germany, mostly via German ships departing from the northern Norwegian port of Narvik but also by ship across the Baltic.

The British wanted to cut that supply but Denmark, Sweden, and Norway were all neutral. So they could only hit German shipping in the North Sea or the Baltic outside their territorial waters, and German ships could use Norwegian territorial waters to get almost the entire way to Germany. So going after German shipping meant constantly risking violations of Scandinavian neutrality. It was also probably futile. So the British drew up a plan to stop the flow of iron ore to Germany by invading Norway. The British dubbed it Plan R 4.

There were no real threats to Denmark but, as Plan R 4 shows, there were threats to Norwegian neutrality. So the Germans weren’t inventing something out of whole cloth in order to create a pretext for “protecting” Norway. Rather, they were inflating it and disingenuously using it for their own purposes.

Trump and Vance, on the other hand, are just making stuff up.

Now, I understand that some people will be shocked and appalled that I am discussing Trump’s foreign policy in the context of Hitler’s military threats, aggression, and lies. But please don’t scoff it off. If it is misleading to note that both men used/use “protection” as a pretext for aggression that is illegal under international law — the sort of aggression we hanged Nazis for — it should be easy to explain why. Please use the comments below to enlighten me.

But if you find yourself struggling to distinguish the two cases, please consider that the comparison isn’t so absurd. That there is a fundamental principle of international law involved, a principal that is essential for the prevention of war. And we should no more accept this behaviour now, when Trump and the USA do it, than when Hitler and Germany did it.

PS: The 85th anniversary of the invasion of Norway reminded me of some local history near Bracebridge, the Canadian town where my dear old mum lives.

After Norway was occupied, Norwegian service members and others who managed to escape to Britain enlisted in the British military. Within the Royal Air Force, four Norwegian squadrons of fighter planes were formed. They performed brilliantly in the war.

Those pilots were trained in “Little Norway,” a camp just outside Bracebridge.

Today, Muskoka’s tiny airport is used mostly by private jets shuttling the well-heeled to their 1,500 square metre “cottages.” But in that tiny airport, for those who care to look, there are monuments to Little Norway.

At this critical moment in history, when the Western alliance has been cast into doubt by an ignorant old fantasist and the amoral and craven careerists who surround him, it is worth recalling the bitter lessons of the Second World War. And why collective defence came to be.

As Norman Angell wrote in 1942 — when all the nations of Europe had been conquered by the Nazis, or were fighting for their lives, and even the United States had finally entered the war — mutual defence is the only way to truly ensure peace and prevent war altogether.

As Angell wrote:

That surely is the lesson of Europe. These states of continental Europe have perished as free nations because each said in effect: "We refuse to be concerned in defending the security of the rights of others; we will defend only our own." Because all said this in one form or another, they were all at Hitler's mercy; at his mercy however much they armed. A Norway or a Denmark might devote 90 per cent of all its national resources to arms and still be at his mercy. The more these democracies armed while refusing to co-operate for mutual defense, the better were the Nazis pleased; for they knew that, given this one condition of separate and individual defense, the arms they piled up would by their inevitable conquest become instruments of Nazi power.

That is why NATO exists. That is why Denmark, Norway, Canada and 28 other countries are allies.

That is why — no matter what the United States does — Denmark, Norway, Canada and the rest should remain allies.

Now and forever.