Hitler on the fall of Singapore

[dragos03]

In the memoirs of Raoul Bossy, the Romanian ambassador to Berlin (March 1941-June 1943), I found an interesting comment by Hitler on the fall of Singapore. Bossy accompanied marshall Antonescu on his visit to Hitler on 11 February 1942 at Gorlitz.

Hitler told us about the fall of Singapore, the mighty British stronghold in the Far East. Most of the Germans present seemed happy about it, while the Romanians were quite reserved. Hitler remained silent.
I was placed on his right at the table and told him on a low voice: "The city has fallen too fast. This is unpleasant for the prestige of the white race."
He replied on the same low tone: "I completely agree with you. This news doesn't make me very happy."
Then, he added loudly: "Nothing of this would have ever happened, and Britain would have retained its empire, if only they accepted my peace offer."

[phylo_roadking]

He would have been a hell of a lot more happy if he'd known Churchill's reaction. John Colville records this and the subsequent fall of Tobruk after only three days as being Churchill's lowest emotional points during the war. As far as he and those immediately around him were concerned, it had almost destroyed their faith in the regular British Army, which had after all beeen defeated in Norway, France, now the Far East AND the Western Desert after many months of success against only the Italians. Until El Alamein rebuilt the Army's morale and view of itself as a force that could BEAT the German Army, the War Cabinet was actually very downbeat about longterm prospects.