State of the War: filed 7 October 1939

State of the War

Filed 7 October 1939, 08:00 GMT

Hitler has offered Britain and France a European peace conference and warns that if they refuse, the war goes on. London’s evening papers have already said no. This is everything that has reached us between 06:00 and 21:10 yesterday, and where it stands as you read this.

Yesterday · Friday 6 October

06:00	Berlin radio says Hitler has flown to Warsaw to review the German troops who took the Polish capital.
07:30	Moscow publishes its pact with Latvia. It gives the Soviet Union naval bases at the Latvian ports of Libau and Windau, airfields, and a coastal artillery base, and runs for ten years.
14:00	Japan recalls General Hiroshi Oshima, its ambassador in Berlin, the Associated Press reports from Tokyo. Oshima has long argued for a military alliance between Japan, Germany and Italy.
14:30	Hitler proposes a European peace settlement “on a comprehensive basis” in an 80-minute speech to the Reichstag, and warns that if Britain and France refuse it, the war goes on.
15:00	Hitler says the old Polish state will not be restored and Germany has no further claims on France. He wants a conference of the leading European nations on security and limiting arms.
15:10	The German High Command says the last Polish army force has surrendered at Kock, a small town north of Lublin in eastern Poland, under General Franciszek Kleeberg.
21:00	London’s evening papers reject Hitler’s offer. The Evening Standard prints a single word, “No”, over its editorial. Neville Chamberlain is expected to give the government’s answer in the Commons on Tuesday.
21:10	French semi-official sources say Hitler offers nothing new, and call the speech “forced” and “demagogic”, the Associated Press reports from Paris.

“Then we shall fight. And let those who consider war to be the better solution reject my outstretched hand.” Adolf Hitler, to the Reichstag in Berlin.

Not confirmed

Berlin says about 8,000 men have laid down their arms at Kock. The figure comes only from the German High Command, and the Polish side has yet to confirm it.

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