On 25 August, no reply having been received from the German Government, President Roosevelt wrote again:
“I have this hour received from the President of Poland a reply to the message which I addressed to your Excellency and to him last night.”
The Polish reply is then set out.
“Your Excellency has repeatedly publicly stated that the aims and objects sought by the German Reich were just and reasonable.
“In his reply to my message the President of Poland has made it plain that the Polish Government is willing, upon the basis set forth in my message, to agree to solve the controversy which has arisen between the Republic of Poland and the German Reich by direct negotiation or the process of conciliation.
“Countless human lives can yet be saved and hope may still be restored that the nations of the modern world may even now construct the foundation for a peaceful and happier relationship, if you and the Government of the German Reich will agree to the pacific means of settlement accepted by the Government of Poland. All the world prays that Germany, too, will accept.” (TC-72 No. 127)
But Germany would not accept those proposals, nor would it pay heed to the Pope’s appeal on the same date, 24 August (TC-72 No. 139). It is an appeal in similar terms. There was yet a further appeal from the Pope on 31 August:
“The Pope is unwilling to abandon hope that pending negotiations may lead to a just pacific solution such as the whole world continues to pray for.” (TC-72 No. 141).
Those negotiations, on the last days of August, to which the Pope referred as “pending negotiations”, were unhappily, completely bogus negotiations insofar as Germany was concerned. They were put forward simply as an endeavor to dissuade England, either by threat or by bribe, from meeting her obligations to Poland. The final German “offers” were no offers in the accepted sense of the word. There was never any intention behind them of entering into discussions, negotiation, arbitration, or any other form of peaceful settlement with Poland. They were merely an attempt to make it easier to seize and conquer Poland than it would likely be if England and France were to observe the obligations they had undertaken.
(6) Events of the Last Week in August, 1939. This was the progress of those last negotiations: On 22 August the German-Soviet Pact was signed. On 24 August, orders were given to the German armies to march the following morning. After those orders had been given, the news apparently reached the German Government that the British and Polish Governments had signed a formal pact of nonaggression and of mutual assistance. Up until that time, the position was that the British Prime Minister had made a statement in the House of Commons and a joint communique had been issued, on 6 April, that the two nations would in fact assist one another if either were attacked; but no formal agreement had been signed.