ABSTRACT
Many historians have minimized and downgraded the efforts of the German opposition to stiffen the pre-war British government's attitude toward Hitler. Chief of Staff of the Counter-intelligence, Major-General Hans Oster was one of the earliest and most determined of Hitler's opponents. His hatred of National Socialism led him to become one of the main organizers of the resistance, and author of early plans for the dictator's removal. When Ewald von Kleist visited Britain in the late summer of 1938, he talked with Lord Lloyd, Lord Vansittart, and Winston Churchill, then leader of the Opposition. The only slim chance left to prevent war was for Britain to act quickly and forcefully so as to leave not the slightest doubt that action by Hitler against Poland would bring on a full-scale war. Kleist knew very well the respect and awe with which Germans, including Hitler himself, regarded the British Navy.
