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Robert Vansittart
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Robert Vansittart : Black Record
'I have been reading Sir. Robert Vansittart's little book "Black Record". I have found it very interesting. He certainly has no use for the Germans, and I am wondering whether a place can be found for him at the Peace conference. He warns up that after defeat Germany will be full of self pity and will try to organize sympathy, and says that as usual there will be fools among us willing to listen. Indeed as proof of this attitude I notice there has already been a protest against this book in Parliament, and a request for its banning. When this war is over the Battle of Words will begin and the world be fill[ed] with the sound of clamouring tongues.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Print: Book
Robert Vansittart : Black Record
'I suppose I retained this view for about nine months. My thoughts have now radically changed, and this is due in a marked degree to the reading of Sir Robert Vansittart's "Black Record" that I really woke up, and eliminated from my system all the ridiculous ideas I had about the German man and woman being "a decent person just like you and me". There was a saying in the last war which should never have been forgotten "once a German always a German". This is [an] almost eternal truism, for I am convinced now that the average German revels in brutality and perfidiousness, taking the view that ends justify the means.'
