Trial of the Major War Criminals before International Military Tribunal ...

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(c) The "Sudetendeutsche Partei" (SDP).
The Czechoslovak election system is based on Party represen-
tation. HENLEIN, therefore, changed the German Home Front into
the "Sudetendeutsche Partei" (Sudeten Germans' Party), for the
purpose of participation in the General Elections of May 1935 for
the National Assembly.
Economic distress owing to the trade crisis increased the suscep-
tibility of the German population in Czechoslovakia for the new
German Messiah and HENLEIN won a resounding victory over all
other German parties.
When the election results were made known-the .Henleinists
won 44 seats in the Chamber of Deputies to the National Assembly-
HENLEIN sent a loyalty telegram to President Masaryk.
(5) The Policy and Tactics of the "Sudetendeutsche
Partei".
(a) 1935-1936: Still "for Democracy".
HENLEIN continued to present himself as a friend of democracy
especially in London where he lectured in 1935 at Chatham House
in the Royal Institute of International Affairs. He stated there that
he refused the totalitarian principle and that he was in favour of
"an honest democracy7'. "We want a democracy such as is recom-
mended by Masaryk", he emphasized. He denied "Nazism" or
"Hitlerism" to be a doctrine "suitable for exportation", he rejected
anti-Semitism.
(b) 1937: For complete Autonomy of Sudeten Germans
but still .within the framework of the
Czechoslovak Republic.
In 1937 HENLEIN struck a somewhat shriller note than before
demanding, without defining "complete Sudeten autonomy". The
"Sudetendeutsche Partei" laid draft proposals before Parliament
amounting to Little short of creating a state within a state. The whole
document, though moderately worded, was already based on totali-
tarian principles.
(c) 1938: For Nazism and for Incorporation of the
Sudeten Areas into the German Reich.
After the occupation of Austria (March 1938) the Henleinists
openly jubilated. Nearly all German "Activist parties" were now