Mistakes and Myths: The Allies, Germany, and the Versailles Treaty, 1918–1921*
For nearly forty years, historians of twentieth-century diplomacy have argued that the Versailles treaty was more reasonable than its reputation suggests and that it did not of itself cause the Depression, the rise of Hitler, or World War II. Their efforts have had little effect, despite Margaret MacMillan’s best-selling Paris 1919. The distorted view of The Economic Consequences of the Peace and J. M. Keynes’s other works still dominates both the Anglo-American historical profession and the English-speaking educated public, though Zara Steiner pointed out in The Lights That Failed that the Versailles treaty was the mildest of the 1919–20 settlements. Despite scholarly opinion, condemnation of the Versailles treaty continues without cease. The latest addition to an immense literature, The Versailles Treaty and Its Legacy, by Edward M. Bennett and the late Norman A. Graebner,
'Ambulant amateurs': the rise and fade of the Anglo-German Fellowship
This thesis chronicles the fortunes of the Anglo-German Fellowship, the British society founded in 1935 that advocated friendship with Hitler’s Germany up to its suspension in October 1939 following the outbreak of war. Drawing on newly discovered and previously overlooked primary sources, thematic and chronological methods are combined to explore how the Fellowship’s leaders played a bigger role in the diplomatic crises of the late 1930s than previously acknowledged. Supported by its sister organisation in Germany, the Fellowship attracted support from British royal, political, diplomatic, aristocratic, business, financial, military, sporting and intelligence elites with its membership reaching nine hundred by 1938. Funded by business and financial interests and patronised by Anglo-German royalty, it was influenced by the German high command, welcomed by elements of the British establishment and infiltrated by British, German, Russian and Jewish intelligence agents. 
 
To the extent it has been covered in the secondary literature, those assessing the Fellowship have classed it alongside the nasty, the eccentric and the irrelevant within ‘the Fellow Travellers of the Right’ tradition. This thesis challenges those stereotypes, arguing that it has been consequently misinterpreted and underestimated both by scholars and in popular culture over the last eighty years. Using primary sources to build an objective prosopography of its membership, evidence is offered that the Fellowship was more than a fringe pressure group and dining club and achieved international credibility as a lobbying body, diplomatic intermediary and intelligence-gathering tool. 
 
Having surveyed the heritage of earlier transnational friendship societies, this thesis examines the business and economic motives, on both sides of the North Sea, in founding the Fellowship, before charting how it then recruited support from across the political spectrum. Arranging landmark meetings between British politicians and the National Socialist leadership, it proved itself as a conduit for diplomatic dialogue with Germany. The central chapters probe the prosopography to highlight the Fellowship’s penetration of the British Establishment before lifting the lid of respectability to measure the extent to which it harboured pro-fascist and anti-Semitic enthusiasts for Hitler’s Germany. 
 
As the narrative moves into the final three years before war, two chapters explore how the Fellowship accessed the central political and diplomatic bodies in both countries including Downing Street, the houses of parliament, British political parties, Hitler’s Chancellery, the NSDAP, both foreign ministries and their embassies while simultaneously establishing dialogue with those opposing Hitler’s regime and challenging the wisdom of appeasement. Finally, the organisation’s legacy is examined to ask whether, by developing a different flavour of appeasement to Chamberlain’s, it offered a real alternative to war and whether this contributes to the continuing discourse surrounding inter-war appeasement.
Weimar and the rise of Hitler
List of Abbreviations.- Preface to the First Edition.- Introduction to the Fourth Edition.- The Lost War.- The German Revolution.- The Foundations of the New Republic.- The Republic Makes Peace.- 1919 1922: Years of Crisis and Uncertainty.- Hitler and Republican Instability.- Ruhr Occupation and Inflation.- Towards Recovery.- The Semblance of Stability: 1924 1929.- The End of the Republic.- Hitler's Success and Weimar's Failure.- Chronological Table.- Bibliography.- Index.