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O intelligent person thought that Chamberlain had “ saved peace” at ° Munich. Each after his fashion be- _ 8an to prepare for the coming war. © : In - Britain, apart from such obvious tasks as rganisation for sabotage and propaganda was set up: 74it was known as Section Nine of the Secret Service. ') This was the organisation that became -known later as “Baker-street,” or, jocularly, “The Baker-street Gestapo.” Till now Guy Burgess had done secret’ work on an oopasional and free-Jance basis only, In December 1938 he w4s offered a regular job in Section Nine. He was so convinced that war was coming that he ~ defided to resign from the B.B.C., though he was, warned that there was no guarantee of more than six months’ em- 5 ployment with Section Nine. THE SECRET—FROM GERMANY | N_ retrospect, It {s clear that. in the year after Munich, the only hope of peace still lay in gemifine and serlous Anglo-Soviet negotiations, and 4Jso that Chamberlain and Halifax had no genuine and seripus intention to negotiate. From captured German documdnts published since the war, we know the reason for an attitude that now seems criminally ----- — Negligent and casual. During the jong and dilatory negotiations with the Russians, Sir Horace Wilson and other . British spokesmen were secretly negotiating also with the Nazis. The British Parliament and eople—bemused for a time by unich but shocked by Hitler's Tape of Creghostovakta—and the Cabinet 1yit would have been hogrified t@learn that on July bo Si Horace Wilson was seekin by}a non-dgression pact wifli Hifer, to Yenable Britain to fd hefseif of er commitments a-vls Poland.” oy ‘or these particular discus- signs were: kept secret from phe Chbinet, and even from fhe reign Secretary Hallfax, lalifax did indeed learn fof m8 2 humiliatingly rougd- way. secret organisa- ‘ton found out about item from ® German source, A high official of the organisa- tion took the matter so seriousty that he called personally at the Foreign Ofer with evidence of ‘Was Ro! chiel’s was Ing on behind his VERDICT What history said © doubt it was for reasons of discretion that ag few people as possible were told of the talks, In & minute dated August 3 the German Ambassador in London, Dircksen, reported that Sir Horace Wilson had “ex- tations with Germany. “The greatest secrecy as negessary at the present stade ” —HWecause, in Direksen’s nm Words, “ everyone who came put in {favour of adjustment with _ — ermany was regarded as raitor and branded @s such.” Chamberlain and Wilson we ot. of course, conscious an leliberate traitors to Britain. Like others to whom the name has been applied, they were working for agreement with @ foreign Power which happened at the time to be unpopular, It is, however, important— particularly when one of the Regotiators holds the highest office in the State—that the policy thus clandestinely worked for should be. whether popular or not: correct—that 1s, thet it should be in the true Interests _ of the people on whose behalf the negotiators presume to act. The verdict of history under ; which Chamberlain and Wilson stand. condemned. simply that they were wrong. . Even the declaration of war on September 3, 1939, meantyno "Guy Burgess: 4 Portdntt : wit} Backoround.” by mM 3 inortig” by Weldenield bed » hhort eldenfeld dn © Ivicoten, prite tas 6d os