ABSTRACT
This essay was first published as a review of J.W. Wheeler-Bennett, Munich: Prologue to Tragedy (London, Macmillan, 1948), in the Manchester Guardian (15 May 1948). The review is notable for Alan Taylor's comment, 'If after 1936 there ever was a chance of stopping Hitler without war, Munich was the moment; but perhaps there was no such moment'. Sir John Wheeler-Bennett (1902-75) was long associated with the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), editing the annual Documents on International Affairs, 1929-36, and came to know most leading German politicians while living in Berlin in 1929-34. After the Second World War he lived at Garsington Manor, taught at New College, Oxford and was a founding fellow of St Antony's College, Oxford.
