Sudeten Germans demand autonomy

© CTK Konrad Henlein

After the „annexation“ of Austria, Adolf Hitler turns to his next objective: the disintegration of Czechoslovakia and the incorporation of the majority-German Sudetenland into the German Reich. To bring this about he makes the compliant chairman of the Sudeten German Party, Konrad Henlein, his main instrument. At Hitler’s behest Henlein repeatedly makes new demands which the government in Prague cannot possibly fulfil. One such instance occurs on 24 April 1938 when he proposes a series of demands for Sudetenland autonomy at a meeting of the Sudeten German Party.