-2-
Corridor but by granting Poland an autobahn to Gdynia across
German re-covered territory. He did not believe that this
eastward movement would result in general war: (a) partly
because France and England could not close in the gap between
Germany and themselves, and (b) partly because nobody would
fight for Poland. On the other hand, he thought the Poles
themselves would fight, rather than follow the surrender
technique of the Czechs. During the crisls of last September
the Germans had denuded East Prussia of troops and had made
no efforts to cover their left flank in Silesia. This could
only indicate close cooperation between Polish and German
General Staffs. I asked Major Black how long he thought it
would have taken the German Army to overcome Czech resistance.
He replied, "Not more than two weeks and probably less". The
Czech defenses such as they were were excellent, but there
were serious gaps in them which the Germans knew about. More
important, how ever, was the fact that the Czech plan of
defense was to protect the frontiers with approximately equal
strength everywhere rather than mass a preponderant strength
at some key positions. Thus if the Germans broke through at
any one point the collapse of the line followed. The German
military had told him after taking over the Czech Maginot-Line
that the war would have lasted even less than they had anticipated.