0:00:02 > 0:00:06On a clear autumn day, the swastika is unfurled over Cardiff City Hall.
0:00:06 > 0:00:09It looks like a still from a movie
0:00:09 > 0:00:13imagining a Nazi invasion of Britain, but this really happened.
0:00:13 > 0:00:18In October 1938, the swastika flew over Cardiff.
0:00:18 > 0:00:21It's a startling reminder of the respect, even admiration,
0:00:21 > 0:00:24that some felt towards Hitler.
0:00:24 > 0:00:27This is the story of the extraordinary links
0:00:27 > 0:00:32between Wales and the Nazi regime, a tale of intrigue and espionage.
0:00:32 > 0:00:35It reveals how the Third Reich sought to exploit
0:00:35 > 0:00:38an ambivalence that stretched across Welsh politics,
0:00:38 > 0:00:43from radical firebrands to elder statesmen but, ultimately,
0:00:43 > 0:00:47the Germans' belief that they could recruit the Welsh to their cause
0:00:47 > 0:00:52would prove fatally damaging, not to Wales, but to the Nazis themselves.
0:00:52 > 0:00:59This programme contains some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting
0:01:02 > 0:01:06During the 1930s, Europe found itself in political
0:01:06 > 0:01:11and economic turmoil following the 1929 Wall Street crash.
0:01:11 > 0:01:15In Germany, which was particularly badly hit,
0:01:15 > 0:01:18National Socialism appeared to offer a solution to the failures
0:01:18 > 0:01:22of capitalism through totalitarian state control.
0:01:22 > 0:01:25What Fascism does is
0:01:25 > 0:01:30it unites that desire for order with a sense of patriotism,
0:01:30 > 0:01:32patriotic purpose, imperial destiny.
0:01:32 > 0:01:36What Hitler and the Nazis promised, of course, was a way forward.
0:01:43 > 0:01:46In 1933, one Welshman got a rare glimpse into the heart
0:01:46 > 0:01:51of the political revolution that was sweeping Germany.
0:01:51 > 0:01:55Born in Barry and educated at Aberystwyth, Gareth Jones was
0:01:55 > 0:01:57a journalist, an accomplished linguist
0:01:57 > 0:02:01and aide to former premier David Lloyd George.
0:02:01 > 0:02:06In February 1933, Jones travelled to Germany on a fact-finding
0:02:06 > 0:02:08mission to investigate Nazism.
0:02:08 > 0:02:11He arrived in Leipzig as Hitler became Chancellor.
0:02:11 > 0:02:15His notebook gives a first-hand account of the trip.
0:02:15 > 0:02:20"A car drives through the snow. Out steps a very ordinary-looking man.
0:02:20 > 0:02:23"It is a mystery to me how he has his appeal.
0:02:23 > 0:02:26"Looks like a middle-class grocer."
0:02:29 > 0:02:33Jones joined Hitler and his entourage in a flight to Frankfurt.
0:02:34 > 0:02:39"If aeroplane should crash, whole history of Germany would change.
0:02:39 > 0:02:43"Hitler is a few feet away, Goebbels behind him."
0:02:44 > 0:02:47Jones spoke at length with Joseph Goebbels,
0:02:47 > 0:02:51Hitler's Minister of Propaganda, describing him as...
0:02:51 > 0:02:54"A little man with remarkably lively eyes, very dark
0:02:54 > 0:03:00"with great sense of humour. Narrow head, like a South Wales collier."
0:03:00 > 0:03:04In Goebbels' diary, he doesn't use his name, Gareth Jones,
0:03:04 > 0:03:07but he refers to him as Lloyd George's secretary.
0:03:07 > 0:03:12Clearly, he felt that by talking to Gareth,
0:03:12 > 0:03:16he was maybe opening up a conduit, or a way of impressing
0:03:16 > 0:03:19an influential political figure in Britain.
0:03:19 > 0:03:22In Frankfurt, Hitler addressed 25,000 supporters
0:03:22 > 0:03:24at an election rally.
0:03:24 > 0:03:27"Masses of young people waving little flags,
0:03:27 > 0:03:29"then Hitler outstretched his hands.
0:03:29 > 0:03:31"Pandemonium."
0:03:31 > 0:03:34They harnessed modern propaganda.
0:03:34 > 0:03:38They used music, movement, drama, spectacle
0:03:38 > 0:03:42to create a magical, entrancing experience
0:03:42 > 0:03:45for people who were actually present at those rallies.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48"Imagine the enthusiasm of an Eisteddfod,
0:03:48 > 0:03:50"add national passion,
0:03:50 > 0:03:52"14 years' defeat, humiliation,
0:03:52 > 0:03:56"wants of middle classes, inflation, war guilt."
0:03:56 > 0:03:59They were looking for a saviour
0:03:59 > 0:04:01who would eliminate
0:04:01 > 0:04:06or rub out the stain and humiliation of defeat in the First World War
0:04:06 > 0:04:10and, at the same time, give them a Germany that was worth living in.
0:04:10 > 0:04:14And certainly, by the mid-'30s, Hitler had started to do that.
0:04:14 > 0:04:17In articles he wrote for the Western Mail,
0:04:17 > 0:04:21Jones reported favourably on the German government's efforts
0:04:21 > 0:04:24to address unemployment, but he was outspoken in his criticism
0:04:24 > 0:04:27of the Nazi Party's anti-Semitism.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31Gareth picked up on this, and at a point when many people,
0:04:31 > 0:04:34both in Germany and outside Germany,
0:04:34 > 0:04:37were trying to downplay this,
0:04:37 > 0:04:41he saw, clearly, that it was at the heart of Nazi ideology.
0:04:41 > 0:04:44"Hitler accuses the Jews of Machiavellian intentions
0:04:44 > 0:04:47"upon the life of the world.
0:04:48 > 0:04:50"The most brutal and also the pettiest methods
0:04:50 > 0:04:54"are adopted to drum hatred of the Jews into the German people."
0:04:54 > 0:04:57It's noticeable it should be people in Wales
0:04:57 > 0:05:02reading the Western Mail who were getting some of the most accurate
0:05:02 > 0:05:05insightful, perceptive reporting of Nazi Germany
0:05:05 > 0:05:08anywhere outside Germany at this point.
0:05:10 > 0:05:12However, David Lloyd George,
0:05:12 > 0:05:15known to millions as the man who had won the Great War,
0:05:15 > 0:05:19appeared blind to the dangers that Gareth Jones perceived.
0:05:19 > 0:05:21Like many politicians of the time,
0:05:21 > 0:05:25Lloyd George admired aspects of the new National Socialist regime in Germany,
0:05:25 > 0:05:27and the admiration was reciprocated.
0:05:29 > 0:05:31Hitler himself had this tremendous admiration
0:05:31 > 0:05:34for those he had fought against in the First World War.
0:05:34 > 0:05:39He had this sense of - very genuine sense of - comradeship.
0:05:41 > 0:05:45In 1936, Lloyd George was invited to meet Hitler
0:05:45 > 0:05:48in his Alpine retreat at Berchtesgaden.
0:05:48 > 0:05:50- OLD NEWSREEL:- 'Once they hated him,
0:05:50 > 0:05:53'now Lloyd George is a welcome guest in Germany.'
0:05:53 > 0:05:57David Lloyd George was really an old man by that period.
0:05:57 > 0:05:59He was a disappointed old man,
0:05:59 > 0:06:03he's a man who felt he'd been spurned by the British people,
0:06:03 > 0:06:05and he was looking for people
0:06:05 > 0:06:06who would admire him.
0:06:06 > 0:06:08And, of course, in Germany
0:06:08 > 0:06:10they played to that.
0:06:10 > 0:06:12'How well he looks!
0:06:12 > 0:06:13'The man whom the Germans regarded
0:06:13 > 0:06:15'as the greatest force against them of the war.'
0:06:15 > 0:06:17'Now he is their friend.'
0:06:17 > 0:06:19Lloyd George shared Hitler's passion
0:06:19 > 0:06:24to bring the economic depression in Western Europe to an end.
0:06:24 > 0:06:26He thought that Hitler
0:06:26 > 0:06:30could explain things to us
0:06:30 > 0:06:33in a way which we could possibly benefit from.
0:06:33 > 0:06:37I suspect that he saw in David Lloyd George an opportunity
0:06:37 > 0:06:43to say, "Look, even those who put us in this situation
0:06:43 > 0:06:46"have actually now become our admirers."
0:06:46 > 0:06:48Lloyd George wrote of Hitler,
0:06:48 > 0:06:49"He is a born leader of men.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52"The George Washington of Germany."
0:06:52 > 0:06:54I think looking back we would see this as a mistake
0:06:54 > 0:06:56on the part of Lloyd George.
0:06:56 > 0:06:59An unfortunate propaganda coup for Hitler,
0:06:59 > 0:07:02but, of course, Lloyd George was not alone
0:07:02 > 0:07:04in making visits to Hitler
0:07:04 > 0:07:07or saying things which in retrospect look rather foolish.
0:07:08 > 0:07:13Hitler's admirers included newspaper barons like Lord Rothermere
0:07:13 > 0:07:15and even the future king Edward VIII.
0:07:15 > 0:07:18But the leader of Britain's home-grown fascist movement
0:07:18 > 0:07:19was Oswald Mosley,
0:07:19 > 0:07:23a one-time Labour MP who had briefly been close to Aneurin Bevan.
0:07:23 > 0:07:25Mosley had split with the party
0:07:25 > 0:07:28and created the British Union of Fascists.
0:07:28 > 0:07:31'In the lives of great nations
0:07:31 > 0:07:35'comes a moment of decision, comes a moment of destiny.'
0:07:35 > 0:07:40The BUF tried to attract support in South Wales, searching for
0:07:40 > 0:07:41an image of poverty stricken Britain
0:07:41 > 0:07:43for a propaganda film they came
0:07:43 > 0:07:44to Merthyr Tydfil.
0:07:44 > 0:07:47Merthyr Tydfil, of course, was one of those towns
0:07:47 > 0:07:50in south Wales that was suffering horrendously
0:07:50 > 0:07:51from the economic depression.
0:07:51 > 0:07:55So it was not unsurprising that a place like Merthyr might have
0:07:55 > 0:07:59been seen as a happy hunting ground for the British Union of Fascists.
0:08:00 > 0:08:03One of those in South Wales who responded
0:08:03 > 0:08:06to the appeal of the BUF was Jeffrey Hamm of Pontypool.
0:08:06 > 0:08:08He joined the party in 1935,
0:08:08 > 0:08:12and after the war became Oswald Mosley's private secretary,
0:08:12 > 0:08:14and main cheerleader in Britain.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18And if you had had good strong government...
0:08:18 > 0:08:22Jeffrey Hamm explained his motivation for joining the BUF
0:08:22 > 0:08:26as being a conviction that something needed to be done to tackle
0:08:26 > 0:08:29the widespread unemployment that he could see
0:08:29 > 0:08:32about him, and that had actually affected him personally.
0:08:32 > 0:08:37We've got the same problems now as we had in the '30s...
0:08:38 > 0:08:41In Wales, Jeffrey Hamm was the exception.
0:08:41 > 0:08:45The socialist stronghold of the South Wales coalfields
0:08:45 > 0:08:48greeted fascism with hostility.
0:08:48 > 0:08:51In 1936, there was an attempt to halt a fascist rally at the
0:08:51 > 0:08:53Winton Field in Tonypandy,
0:08:53 > 0:08:56and there's a big antifascist demonstration.
0:08:56 > 0:09:00So it becomes extremely difficult for the British Union of Fascists
0:09:00 > 0:09:05to stage anything really in the South Wales valleys.
0:09:05 > 0:09:07The strength of the trade union movement
0:09:07 > 0:09:09prevented the British Union of Fascists
0:09:09 > 0:09:13from gaining any real foothold in South Wales.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16But while fascism remained a minority concern here,
0:09:16 > 0:09:20elsewhere in Europe, the far right was on the march.
0:09:20 > 0:09:24In 1938, Western leaders appeased Hitler's military expansion,
0:09:24 > 0:09:26by signing the Munich Agreement
0:09:26 > 0:09:30which handed Germany a section of Czechoslovakia
0:09:30 > 0:09:32in return for the promise of peace.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35The Munich Agreement was greeted all over the country with huge relief.
0:09:35 > 0:09:37Enormous relief.
0:09:38 > 0:09:40It was a very ephemeral emotion,
0:09:40 > 0:09:42but it was a genuine emotion.
0:09:45 > 0:09:49To mark the occasion, the Conservative Lord Mayor of Cardiff,
0:09:49 > 0:09:52Oliver Cuthbert Purnell, ordered the flags of the four countries
0:09:52 > 0:09:56who had signed the agreement to be flown over the city -
0:09:56 > 0:09:59and so, the swastika was raised.
0:09:59 > 0:10:03Within about, I think just over 24 hours,
0:10:03 > 0:10:07two Labour councillors went up and pulled it down again.
0:10:07 > 0:10:10Nonetheless, it was restored a day or two later.
0:10:11 > 0:10:14The mayor said of those who'd removed the flag,
0:10:14 > 0:10:17"I despise people who add to the risks of possible war.
0:10:17 > 0:10:21"There is such a thing as being a traitor to peace."
0:10:21 > 0:10:24The 1930s is only a few years after the end of the worst cataclysm
0:10:24 > 0:10:26in military history.
0:10:28 > 0:10:31People were petrified of the idea of another war.
0:10:31 > 0:10:35How could you have been brought up in that generation,
0:10:35 > 0:10:39and looked on a new war with any kind of equanimity.
0:10:39 > 0:10:41With any kind of confidence.
0:10:41 > 0:10:42With any kind of patriotism even.
0:10:42 > 0:10:46So it became almost, but not quite, peace at any price.
0:10:46 > 0:10:48And, of course, Hitler exploited that.
0:10:49 > 0:10:53Many were appalled by the establishment appeasement of Hitler.
0:10:54 > 0:10:58Goronwy Rees, a brilliant Oxford scholar from Aberystwyth,
0:10:58 > 0:11:02had witnessed the rise of the Nazi state as a young man in Berlin in 1934.
0:11:04 > 0:11:09Rees was an immense enthusiast for Germany as a civilisation.
0:11:09 > 0:11:11Germany as culture.
0:11:11 > 0:11:14He was genuinely shocked and appalled at what
0:11:14 > 0:11:17he saw as the barbarisation of a great European civilisation.
0:11:17 > 0:11:19He was very alarmed by what National Socialism would imply
0:11:19 > 0:11:21for the future of Germany,
0:11:21 > 0:11:24and of Europe, in general.
0:11:24 > 0:11:27Back in Britain, where he became assistant editor of the Spectator,
0:11:27 > 0:11:31Rees felt the Western powers' policy of appeasement
0:11:31 > 0:11:34left only one credible alternative to Nazism.
0:11:34 > 0:11:39He thought that, in essence, the only hope for civilisation
0:11:39 > 0:11:44against the new barbarism embodied by Nazi Germany
0:11:44 > 0:11:46was that the Soviet Union be bolstered.
0:11:46 > 0:11:48Rees's friend, Guy Burgess,
0:11:48 > 0:11:51who would later be unmasked as a KGB agent,
0:11:51 > 0:11:54persuaded him to support the Soviet struggle against Hitler
0:11:54 > 0:11:56by spying for them.
0:11:57 > 0:12:01The Soviet Union was keen to know what influential establishment figures
0:12:01 > 0:12:04thought of the likelihood of Britain going to war.
0:12:04 > 0:12:07He was a fellow of All Souls College, Oxford
0:12:07 > 0:12:09which included some very notable people
0:12:09 > 0:12:11amongst their fellows and graduates,
0:12:11 > 0:12:13including Geoffrey Dawson the editor of The Times,
0:12:13 > 0:12:15and Sir John Simon, the Home Secretary.
0:12:15 > 0:12:20And what Rees essentially did was to pass on tittle-tattle
0:12:20 > 0:12:22from All Souls College to the Soviets.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28Goronwy Rees was right about the folly of appeasement,
0:12:28 > 0:12:31within six months Hitler tore up the Munich Agreement
0:12:31 > 0:12:33and occupied Czechoslovakia.
0:12:33 > 0:12:36As the world stood on the brink of another global conflict,
0:12:36 > 0:12:40many were stunned when the Soviet Union supported Hitler
0:12:40 > 0:12:43by signing a non-aggression treaty with Germany.
0:12:43 > 0:12:45The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact
0:12:45 > 0:12:49shocked an awful lot of people who believed that Russia
0:12:49 > 0:12:52was the bastion of integrity against fascism.
0:12:52 > 0:12:56The idea that they would have an agreement was beyond comprehension,
0:12:56 > 0:12:58and so an awful lot of people
0:12:58 > 0:13:01actually left the Communist Party at that point.
0:13:01 > 0:13:04For Goronwy Rees, who'd been spying for the Soviets
0:13:04 > 0:13:06in the cause of anti-fascism,
0:13:06 > 0:13:09the Nazi-Soviet pact was a hammer blow.
0:13:09 > 0:13:12At that juncture he decided he was not going to pass on
0:13:12 > 0:13:14any more information to the Soviet Union
0:13:14 > 0:13:17and, if you will, the scales fell from his eyes.
0:13:20 > 0:13:22When war was declared,
0:13:22 > 0:13:23many in the British Communist Party -
0:13:23 > 0:13:26who had been instructed by Moscow to oppose the conflict -
0:13:26 > 0:13:28also faced a dilemma.
0:13:30 > 0:13:33They were torn between their anti-fascist principles,
0:13:33 > 0:13:35and party loyalty.
0:13:35 > 0:13:38The president of the South Wales Miners' Federation
0:13:38 > 0:13:39is a man called Arthur Horner,
0:13:39 > 0:13:42a card-carrying member of the Communist Party.
0:13:42 > 0:13:44Horner recognises the dilemma that he faces.
0:13:44 > 0:13:48He does not want to lead the South Wales miners into a position
0:13:48 > 0:13:50whereby they see the war as an imperialist war
0:13:50 > 0:13:52that is none of their business,
0:13:52 > 0:13:54because he recognises the threat of fascism.
0:13:54 > 0:13:57So he carefully manages a particular conference
0:13:57 > 0:14:02to enable the South Wales miners to, essentially, back the war effort.
0:14:06 > 0:14:09If the war presented a dilemma for those on the far left,
0:14:09 > 0:14:13it was equally problematic for the Welsh nationalist movement.
0:14:13 > 0:14:17To support the war, would necessarily mean supporting Britain.
0:14:17 > 0:14:24To oppose the war outright would lead to consequences for the party
0:14:24 > 0:14:28under wartime restrictions, of course.
0:14:29 > 0:14:32In 1938, Plaid Cymru declared its position on the war
0:14:32 > 0:14:34would be one of neutrality.
0:14:36 > 0:14:38Plaid's official position on the Second World War,
0:14:38 > 0:14:41which is that Wales should be neutral,
0:14:41 > 0:14:45is very problematic, and looks politically naive.
0:14:45 > 0:14:49It might've been consistent with their interpretation of Welsh history
0:14:49 > 0:14:52and the course of English imperialism,
0:14:52 > 0:14:54but, of course, Hitler's Germany
0:14:54 > 0:14:56is a very, very different beast indeed
0:14:56 > 0:14:58from British Empire.
0:14:58 > 0:15:01But for one man, there was little difference between Nazism
0:15:01 > 0:15:04and the British Empire of old.
0:15:04 > 0:15:07Saunders Lewis led Plaid Cymru for 13 years
0:15:07 > 0:15:09and remained a dominant figure
0:15:09 > 0:15:13after he stood down as party president in 1939.
0:15:13 > 0:15:16Lewis expounded his views on international affairs
0:15:16 > 0:15:19in a column called Cwrs y Byd, The Course of the World,
0:15:19 > 0:15:23in the Welsh weekly newspaper Y Faner.
0:15:23 > 0:15:27"Is there any difference between the German policy and the new order
0:15:27 > 0:15:32"on one hand and the English policy and the old order on the other?
0:15:32 > 0:15:34"They are the same in all their essentials.
0:15:34 > 0:15:39"They are two economic empires competing for supremacy."
0:15:39 > 0:15:44He was convinced, I think, that, whichever side won,
0:15:44 > 0:15:46Wales would be the loser.
0:15:46 > 0:15:48If the Allies won,
0:15:48 > 0:15:53that would strengthen the British imperial project.
0:15:53 > 0:15:57It would prove that Britain, if you like, was top dog.
0:15:58 > 0:16:04Er, if the Axis powers won, then you were into, er...
0:16:04 > 0:16:06heaven alone knows what.
0:16:06 > 0:16:11It's Wales losing its identity in either eventuality.
0:16:12 > 0:16:16When the government introduced new powers in 1940 to imprison
0:16:16 > 0:16:19British fascists and other perceived undesirables,
0:16:19 > 0:16:21Lewis called Winston Churchill,
0:16:21 > 0:16:25"Britain's first dictator since Oliver Cromwell".
0:16:25 > 0:16:29This outspoken attitude drew criticism from many quarters.
0:16:29 > 0:16:35The Western Mail, at that time, regarded Plaid as traitors.
0:16:35 > 0:16:40There was some pretty vitriolic editorials about,
0:16:40 > 0:16:45um, Saunders Lewis and about Plaid Cymru's attitude towards the war.
0:16:45 > 0:16:49Plaid Cymru's neutrality helped fuel a perception in the '30s
0:16:49 > 0:16:52and early '40s that it was strengthening the cause
0:16:52 > 0:16:58of fascist dictators and even that it was itself a fascist party.
0:16:58 > 0:17:03A lot of the reason why historians have tried to find
0:17:03 > 0:17:07a fascist element in Plaid Cymru centres on the character,
0:17:07 > 0:17:10the personality of Saunders Lewis.
0:17:10 > 0:17:13Lewis was an ultraconservative traditionalist
0:17:13 > 0:17:15who opposed centralised state control
0:17:15 > 0:17:20and the leader cult that was being embraced in some European countries.
0:17:20 > 0:17:23He explicitly rejected the new creed of fascism,
0:17:23 > 0:17:26declaring that Plaid Cymru would fight to defend Wales
0:17:26 > 0:17:31against fascist dictatorship, but he also wrote that Plaid
0:17:31 > 0:17:34had gone "to the same source as the leaders of fascism
0:17:34 > 0:17:38"for living water to refresh the desert of our social life".
0:17:38 > 0:17:41What he meant by the wellsprings,
0:17:41 > 0:17:45the shared ground with the fascist project, were ideas of,
0:17:45 > 0:17:49if you like, blood and soil.
0:17:49 > 0:17:56The, er, loyalty to the past, that you have...you're indebted
0:17:56 > 0:18:01to your inheritance, but it was never a personality cult.
0:18:01 > 0:18:05Plaid Cymru was in no sense a fascist party,
0:18:05 > 0:18:08but Lewis's attitude towards Hitler was ambivalent,
0:18:08 > 0:18:11particularly regarding his treatment of the Jews.
0:18:13 > 0:18:16In 1933, while acknowledging that some Jews,
0:18:16 > 0:18:20whom he considered innocent, were being persecuted,
0:18:20 > 0:18:23Lewis had appeared to endorse Hitler's eradication
0:18:23 > 0:18:25of the financial strength of the Jews
0:18:25 > 0:18:28in Germany's economic life and had suggested
0:18:28 > 0:18:33that the British press was being paid to peddle Jewish propaganda.
0:18:33 > 0:18:38As the economy declined dramatically, so people were looking for scapegoats
0:18:38 > 0:18:43and the people who seemed to be riding above this were merchants,
0:18:43 > 0:18:48bankers, very often Jewish, and they became the scapegoats.
0:18:48 > 0:18:49SHOUTING AND JEERING
0:18:51 > 0:18:54Lewis had warned previously of what he called
0:18:54 > 0:18:57"dangerous and sinister Napoleonic Jews,
0:18:57 > 0:19:00"intent on conquering politics and the global economy."
0:19:03 > 0:19:07Now, with the world at war, he published his apocalyptic poem -
0:19:07 > 0:19:11Y Dilyw 1939 - or The Deluge 1939,
0:19:11 > 0:19:14in which he laid the blame for economic depression
0:19:14 > 0:19:18and conflict at the door of international finance.
0:19:18 > 0:19:24He speaks of the bankers on Wall Street with their "Hebrew snouts"
0:19:24 > 0:19:28or their Hebrew nostrils, "ffroenau Hebreig",
0:19:28 > 0:19:30er, "in the quarter's statistics"
0:19:30 > 0:19:35and they make the decision not to extend credit.
0:19:35 > 0:19:40That's where the roots of the war lie,
0:19:40 > 0:19:46and he chooses to emphasise their...their Jewishness.
0:19:46 > 0:19:50The range of controversial views Lewis expressed
0:19:50 > 0:19:53in his wartime journalism for papers like Y Faner
0:19:53 > 0:19:57made him a person of interest to the British authorities.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01The column was very regularly censored.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04Items were cut, er, and...
0:20:06 > 0:20:11..Saunders Lewis, the columnist, was being watched.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14The column was seen as potentially explosive.
0:20:14 > 0:20:17I don't think that they thought the Welsh Nationalist Party
0:20:17 > 0:20:22was in any way capable of undermining the state,
0:20:22 > 0:20:27but it could have a psychological effect on morale during wartime.
0:20:29 > 0:20:34Declassified intelligence documents, held at the National Archives,
0:20:34 > 0:20:37reveal what the authorities made of alleged subversives
0:20:37 > 0:20:40in the nationalist camp. In 1940, the Home Office drew up
0:20:40 > 0:20:44a list of suspects to be arrested in the event of an invasion.
0:20:44 > 0:20:49It included 156 Welsh residents, mostly Italian immigrants,
0:20:49 > 0:20:53suspected of siding with Hitler's ally Mussolini.
0:20:53 > 0:20:57But also singled out were six Plaid Cymru members,
0:20:57 > 0:21:01including Saunders Lewis and his successor as Plaid president,
0:21:01 > 0:21:04JE Daniel, who was denounced by officials at Bangor University.
0:21:06 > 0:21:09His intelligence file reads...
0:21:09 > 0:21:12"The ex-registrar of the University, who has known Daniel
0:21:12 > 0:21:16"for a great many years, described him as being very dangerous.
0:21:17 > 0:21:20"If the Germans landed in the Bangor district,
0:21:20 > 0:21:22"he would himself shoot Daniel."
0:21:24 > 0:21:28And the file on Saunders Lewis reported that...
0:21:28 > 0:21:31"When asked at an open meeting, on May 18th, 1940,
0:21:31 > 0:21:36"whether he would take up arms if the Germans invaded Wales, Lewis replied,
0:21:36 > 0:21:40"'I will answer that question when the Germans are in this country.'
0:21:41 > 0:21:44"I consider that this individual is dangerous
0:21:44 > 0:21:47"and should be arrested in the event of an invasion."
0:21:49 > 0:21:52But much of the testimony against Lewis, and the other five
0:21:52 > 0:21:57Plaid Cymru members, was gossip and hearsay from anonymous informants.
0:21:57 > 0:22:01I mean, the whole idea of there being Plaid spies,
0:22:01 > 0:22:03er, for Germany during the war
0:22:03 > 0:22:05is just a nonsense. It's all smoke and mirrors.
0:22:05 > 0:22:08There was absolutely nothing there of any substance whatsoever.
0:22:09 > 0:22:12There's no evidence that MI5 considered
0:22:12 > 0:22:14the Welsh nationalist movement as a whole a threat,
0:22:14 > 0:22:17but they realised that the illusion of Welsh collaboration
0:22:17 > 0:22:20could prove a weapon in the espionage war.
0:22:20 > 0:22:25MI5 knew the Nazis believed they could exploit Celtic nationalism.
0:22:26 > 0:22:31Breton separatists had collaborated with the SS in occupied France
0:22:31 > 0:22:34and, in Ireland, President Eamon de Valera
0:22:34 > 0:22:37had declared the Republic neutral,
0:22:37 > 0:22:41but more militant Irish nationalists went further.
0:22:41 > 0:22:43The Irish Republican Army
0:22:43 > 0:22:47had completely thrown in its lot with the Nazis and had sent
0:22:47 > 0:22:50an important liaison officer to Berlin.
0:22:50 > 0:22:53Encouraged by this, German military intelligence
0:22:53 > 0:22:57tried to recruit sympathetic Welsh agents to their cause.
0:22:57 > 0:23:01This set the stage for a grand deception involving two Welshmen
0:23:01 > 0:23:04that would have a decisive impact on the outcome of the war.
0:23:04 > 0:23:10The first of these was Arthur Owens, a Pontardawe-born engineer
0:23:10 > 0:23:13whose work gave him access to naval shipyards across Europe.
0:23:13 > 0:23:16He successfully persuaded everybody that he spoke to that
0:23:16 > 0:23:21he strongly disliked the English and that "my enemy's enemy is my friend",
0:23:21 > 0:23:25er, he'd be perfectly willing to collaborate with the Germans.
0:23:25 > 0:23:29Owens was recruited by German military intelligence
0:23:29 > 0:23:33to provide intelligence on the capabilities of British forces.
0:23:33 > 0:23:35But Owens became a double agent,
0:23:35 > 0:23:38working for MI5 under the codename SNOW.
0:23:39 > 0:23:41When the Germans asked Owens
0:23:41 > 0:23:45to provide identification documents for new spies arriving in Britain,
0:23:45 > 0:23:49British intelligence seized a remarkable opportunity.
0:23:49 > 0:23:53Arthur Owens, in collaboration with MI5, was able to provide them
0:23:53 > 0:23:58with very dodgy information, which meant that every single German spy
0:23:58 > 0:24:01that was subsequently parachuted into England
0:24:01 > 0:24:05carried an identification card that had already been compromised.
0:24:06 > 0:24:11This enabled MI5 to intercept these Nazi spies and recruit them
0:24:11 > 0:24:15as double agents in an audacious operation called XX.
0:24:15 > 0:24:17By the end of the Second World War,
0:24:17 > 0:24:23the XX system involved over 80 double agents and, ultimately,
0:24:23 > 0:24:26when it came to major deception campaigns,
0:24:26 > 0:24:29such as persuading the Germans that the D-Day landings were going
0:24:29 > 0:24:33to take place in Calais, and not in Normandy, the double agents
0:24:33 > 0:24:37were responsible for saving tens of thousands of lives.
0:24:37 > 0:24:40As well as infiltrating agents into Britain,
0:24:40 > 0:24:43the Nazis had special plans for Wales,
0:24:43 > 0:24:46as Owens revealed to British intelligence after a meeting
0:24:46 > 0:24:50with his German handler, who was known as Dr Rantzau.
0:24:50 > 0:24:53Owens' MI5 case officer wrote...
0:24:53 > 0:24:56"Rantzau is anxious to get hold of a Welshman
0:24:56 > 0:24:59"who is a member of the Welsh Nationalist Party.
0:24:59 > 0:25:03"Apparently, Rantzau wishes to use this organisation
0:25:03 > 0:25:05"to create disturbances in Wales.
0:25:05 > 0:25:09"Once he has established this link, he proposes to supply them
0:25:09 > 0:25:14"with arms which will be brought up the Bristol Channel in a submarine."
0:25:14 > 0:25:18It was considered possible that a U-boot would be able to surface,
0:25:18 > 0:25:20just as they did on a fairly frequent basis
0:25:20 > 0:25:24in the Republic of Ireland, to come to Wales, lonely beach,
0:25:24 > 0:25:28off-load explosives, a group of very committed,
0:25:28 > 0:25:33politically active saboteurs would then distribute the explosives
0:25:33 > 0:25:35and undermine the British war effort.
0:25:35 > 0:25:38MI5 decided that, if the enemy wanted
0:25:38 > 0:25:41a treacherous Welsh nationalist, they'd give them one.
0:25:42 > 0:25:44They sent Gwilym Williams,
0:25:44 > 0:25:47a retired Swansea police officer, to accompany SNOW
0:25:47 > 0:25:50on his next rendezvous with the Germans in Belgium.
0:25:50 > 0:25:54When Gwilym Williams was interviewed in Antwerp over
0:25:54 > 0:25:57the course of three days, he was told quite clearly
0:25:57 > 0:26:01that, in the event of Hitler winning the war,
0:26:01 > 0:26:04Wales would get independence.
0:26:05 > 0:26:08MI5 had instructed Williams to tell the Germans
0:26:08 > 0:26:12he had a small army of Welshmen waiting, ready to collaborate.
0:26:12 > 0:26:15According to his Secret Service case notes...
0:26:15 > 0:26:19"GW stated that he had about 30 men in South Wales
0:26:19 > 0:26:21"upon whom he could rely.
0:26:21 > 0:26:25"They discussed arrangements for the moving of some of these Welshmen
0:26:25 > 0:26:28"into factories in England for sabotage purposes.
0:26:28 > 0:26:33"They also wanted some advice on the landing of explosives in Wales
0:26:33 > 0:26:36"and it was decided that Oxwich Bay was the best spot.
0:26:36 > 0:26:39"They also suggested that they should drop pamphlets in Welsh
0:26:39 > 0:26:41"for propaganda purposes."
0:26:41 > 0:26:44They had all sorts of schemes for blowing up dams,
0:26:44 > 0:26:49for poisoning the water supply. These were very ambitious plans
0:26:49 > 0:26:54which, ultimately, MI5 was able to exercise complete control over.
0:26:54 > 0:26:58Gwilym Williams' fake accounts of Welsh national sentiment
0:26:58 > 0:27:00hoodwinked German intelligence
0:27:00 > 0:27:04into overestimating their chances of success.
0:27:04 > 0:27:09They developed a very false image of the Welsh people -
0:27:09 > 0:27:13lonely countryside, safe houses in the middle of nowhere,
0:27:13 > 0:27:16a safe haven for other agents to be able to flee
0:27:16 > 0:27:19in the event that they were escaping the authorities.
0:27:19 > 0:27:23Um, they believed that there was a reliable large network,
0:27:23 > 0:27:26just simply waiting to go into action.
0:27:26 > 0:27:32This is probably the reason why people have since thought there was
0:27:32 > 0:27:37a Nazi infiltration in Wales, right, but these people were fictitious.
0:27:37 > 0:27:39This shadow world of Welsh Nazis,
0:27:39 > 0:27:43conjured up by British intelligence, helped the Allies win the war.
0:27:43 > 0:27:47But throughout the '30s and early '40s, ambivalence towards Nazism
0:27:47 > 0:27:50among key figures in Wales had been all too real.
0:27:50 > 0:27:53To understand that ambivalence,
0:27:53 > 0:27:57it's perhaps best to view events through the prism of the times.
0:27:57 > 0:28:00In the wake of the slaughter of the First World War,
0:28:00 > 0:28:03Europe was desperate to avoid another catastrophe.
0:28:05 > 0:28:09It's extremely difficult to understand the context
0:28:09 > 0:28:12in which politicians at the beginning of the 1930s
0:28:12 > 0:28:15might have held more favourable or optimistic views of Germany,
0:28:15 > 0:28:19and it also renders very problematic understanding the mindset
0:28:19 > 0:28:23of the appeasing politicians, who, you know, had the avoidance of war,
0:28:23 > 0:28:27the avoidance of conflict, really as their guiding principle.
0:28:27 > 0:28:31And in a world where faith in old certainties had been shattered
0:28:31 > 0:28:34by the Great War and economic depression,
0:28:34 > 0:28:36it's perhaps not surprising
0:28:36 > 0:28:39that many were grasping for radical new solutions.
0:28:39 > 0:28:44Some people went along a journey which took them to the right.
0:28:44 > 0:28:46Others to the extreme left.
0:28:46 > 0:28:49And it took some years before it settled down.
0:28:49 > 0:28:52I think that tells you an awful lot about the...
0:28:52 > 0:28:56uncertainties of politics in the 1930s.
0:28:56 > 0:28:58We have learned an awful lot from that period
0:28:58 > 0:29:01and I think our politics has changed accordingly.