Last Years
P. Munch's last years were not happy ones. As the occupation wore on, and especially after the liberation in 1945 his record as foreign minister came under severe attack from many sides. In late 1945 he had to subject to the indignity of prolonged interrogation by a Parliamentary Committee set up to investigate the circumstances surrounding the occupation. Up until his death in 1948 there were repeated suggestions that he should be put on trial for negligence (and even treason). However, when the parliamentary commission delivered its final report in 1953, Munch was largely exonerated.
This did not, though, stop the continued blaming of Munch for the situation Denmark had been in. His policies were largely disowned by the political elite (his own Radical party the only exception). 'Never again a 9 April' ('Aldrig mere en 9. April') became a mantra for Danish politicians, and gradually a new bipartisan consensus emerged between the Liberals, Conservatives and Social Democrats regarding Danish foreign and security policy, which would lead to membership of NATO in 1949.
Read more about this topic: Peter Rochegune Munch
Famous quotes containing the word years:
“Where has it all gone? I remember that twenty years ago there were geese and cranes and ducks and grouse here, clouds of them!... And there are far fewer animals. Wolf and fox are rare, brother, not to mention bears or mink. There used even to be moose!”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“So here I am, in the middle way, having had twenty years—
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of l’entre deux guerres—
Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure....”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)