The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany

by William L. Shirer

Also, the Prime Minister promptly sent off a message to President Beneš in Prague warning that his information from Berlin “makes it clear that the German Army will receive orders to cross the Czechoslovak frontier immediately if, by tomorrow [September 28] at 2 P.M. the Czechoslovak Government have not accepted the German conditions.” But having honorably warned the Czechs, Chamberlain could not refrain from admonishing them, in the last part of his message, “that Bohemia would be overrun by the German Army and nothing which another Power or Powers could do would be able to save your country and your people from such a fate. This remains true whatever the result of a world war might be.” Thus Chamberlain was putting the responsibility for peace or war no longer on Hitler but on Beneš.