Comments on: Friday, 16 September 1938

By: Airminded · Monday, 26 September 1938

Airminded · Monday, 26 September 1938 — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:57:06 +0000

[...] Guardian’s diplomatic correspondent (p. 9) as ‘fantastic’. At Berchtesgaden, a week and a half ago, Hitler said he wanted only those districts where Sudetens were a majority of the population. This [...]

By: Airminded · Wednesday, 21 September 1938

Airminded · Wednesday, 21 September 1938 — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 06:30:25 +0000

[...] indicated when he returned from Munich last week, Chamberlain is to fly back to Germany to meet with Hitler a second time. (Above headlines are from [...]

By: Brett Holman

Brett Holman — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 09:02:34 +0000

I’ve got The Aeroplane lined up too, so be warned that you may encounter some Grey if you keep reading these posts!

By: Erik Lund

Erik Lund — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 17:37:03 +0000

I think it was just before the election was called… but I was running through _Flight_ pretty fast at the time, and mainly registered the controversy. So there is some sense in which the flight did mark MacDonald going over to the “dark side.”
As for the letter versus leader thing, something is percolating through my thick skull, and anyway it is in Poulsen’s character to defend the PM on something like this. I’m almost tempted to look up _The Aeroplane_’s take. Except that it would too insane and vicious to be much good for my mental health.
Anyway, Poulsen _is_ going to start complaining in the next few months, and won’t be back in the government’s camp until sometime in December…

By: Brett Holman

Brett Holman — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 08:10:23 +0000

I didn't know about MacDonald's flight -- why was he in a rush? Something to do with the formation of the National Government? I was just looking at the Flight thing yesterday, actually -- to be pedantic, it was a reader who complained; a leading article (well, paragraph) defended the choice of an American aircraft as the best available in the circumstances, and doubted that the Germans were going to think any less of British airpower as a result! See here.

By: Erik Lund

Erik Lund — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 16:38:23 +0000

Though speed can be an issue, too, as in Ramsay MacDonald’s unfortunate flight down from Glasgow in 1931, which clearly left him vulnerable to mind-control rays from C. G. Grey –or at least SABAC.
And having said that, MacDonald’s flight was controversial because he took an RAF plane. There was controversy at the time, IIRC (or, more accurately, _Flight_ complained), because Chamberlain used an American-made commercial plane rather than one of the odd duck British types in the King’s Flight.

By: CK

CK — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 11:56:13 +0000

“Developments@berchtesgaden.”

Truly, the Sudeten crisis is an immense source of band-names.