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Upon his return from Germany on September 30, 1938, having signed an agreement with Hitler on the annexation of Czechoslovakia, Neville Chamberlain addressed a massive British audience: 'Dear friends... I believe that we have achieved peace for our day . Go home and have a happy dream'. Winston Churchill replied: 'You have chosen dishonor and you will face war.' The story of the events leading up to the Munich agreement and its aftermath has never been told from the point of view of the Czechoslovak people. Drawing on sources not consulted until now, including press, memoirs, private diaries, army plans, cabinet files and radio recordings, P. E. Caquet presents one of the most embarrassing episodes in modern European history. Among the most shocking revelations are the figures of the arms arsenal and of the French and Czechoslovak military forces before Munich: the supremacy of Germany was a mere appearance and, therefore, the policy of appeasement was unnecessary. This is an exciting tale of diplomatic intrigue, perhaps the closest thing to a moral drama that history can provide. The Czechoslovak government was a Cassandra in its own country, the only one who could see Hitler's threat realistically and understand that the appeasement attempts were as disastrous as they ultimately turned out to be. In his devastating analysis, Caquet recalls Czechoslovakia's sterile struggle against its annihilation and the complacency with which its supposed allies acted.