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Oswald was a Nazi sympathizer that went to the Berghof and met Hitler and Eva Braun. Germany was a country that Britain had open hostilities against. Oswald fraternized with the enemy.

Being what it was, how exactly did he escape treason charges? What he did seems to be the very definition of treason.

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    What did Mosley do that was actually treason? Having minority political views doesn't make you a traitor. Is there evidence that he conspired with other states against the interests of the UK?
    – KillingTime
    Commented Aug 29 at 10:14
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    Briefly reviewing the Wikipedia entry on Mosley, it appears that he formed a political party - which is explicitly not treason. I see no efforts to overthrow the UK government, but rather attempts to work within the structure of democratic government to chart a more fascist course - which he presumably felt was in the best interests of the country.
    – MCW ♦
    Commented Aug 29 at 11:01
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    @NeilMeyer - lots of people met with Hitler before the war. Hitler was the head of the German government.
    – Jon Custer
    Commented Aug 29 at 14:50
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    @MichaelHarvey - I'm not sure that supporting fascism (as a political party) before the war was 'disgraceful' - multiple European states had fascist governments, and similar factions were common across the rest of Europe and the US. The war and all it entailed, including the Holocaust, should not be applied in retrospect too strongly.
    – Jon Custer
    Commented Aug 30 at 14:10
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    @MichaelHarvey - I'm on a planet where historical analysis and understanding of the complex political background and actions of 1918-1939 should be done without imposing emotional responses to future actions.
    – Jon Custer
    Commented Aug 30 at 15:00

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Mosley didn't definitely commit treason under British law. The only conduct where a charge might have been found would be:

  • adhering to the sovereign's enemies, giving them aid and comfort, in the realm or elsewhere.

Since he didn't do anything like that after the outbreak of war, a charge wasn't available. British law tries hard not to punish people for thoughts or feelings, only for actions. The government sometimes decides not to hire people "on security grounds" because it feels their opinions make them liable to commit particular actions, but that's different from imprisoning or executing them.

Up to the outbreak of war, Hitler was the head of state of a foreign country that was presenting an increasing risk of war. Many people met him, but that isn't anything in itself which they could be punished for. Giving him military information would be espionage, but Mosley doesn't seem to have done that; passing on political gossip is not spying.

Since Mosley was regarded as presenting a risk in time of war, and was campaigning in favour of Hitler's "peace" offer of October 1939, he was detained without trial under Defence Regulation 18B from May 1940 to November 1943. This would not have been legal in peacetime. Most of the public seem to have approved of this. Other active fascists were likewise interned.

Hitler's October 1939 "peace" offer was not regarded as credible by the French or British governments of the time. He'd made many commitments while Chancellor of Germany, and broken many of them as soon as he had the military strength to do so.

A temporary peace would give Germany a chance to grow stronger. As a dictatorship, it appeared that Germany could commit more resources to a military build-up than a democratic state. Germany did not fully mobilise until years later, but that wasn't understood by its opponents at the time.

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  • Not sure about the last paragraph - Nazi Germany's failure to fully mobilize till late in the war is blamed for some of its defeats, while the UK was very successful at mobilizing (as both it and France were in World War One). It certainly needs some justification if you're going to claim that.
    – Stuart F
    Commented Sep 2 at 13:36
  • @StuartF: How's this? I need to correct Wikipedia, since it does not seem there was an offer in March 1940, but Mosley's page claims there was.
    – John Dallman
    Commented Sep 2 at 15:45

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