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Appeasement policy catalyst to the second world war
to what extent was the policy of"appeasement"responsible for starting WW2?
nazi soviet pact
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Nazi-Soviet Pact and Appeasement
The Nazi-Soviet was a non-aggression pact signed by the foreign
ministers of Germany and Russia on 23 August 1939.
When Germany and Russia reached this promise not to fight each other,
they made a secret pact to invade and divide Polandand give the Baltic
States to Russia.
By signing the Pact, Germany was able to invade Poland from the west
and the Soviet Union gained the eastern half of Poland as well as the
Baltic States as well as gaining time to prepare for war against
Germany.
Why was the signing of the Pact a surprise?
The signing of the pact was a total surprise because everyone knew
that Fascist Germany and the Communist Soviet Union were political
enemies.
In addition Hitler had sworn for years that he was the mortal enemy of
Bolshevism, so it was not surprising that the Pact came as a shock.
During 1939 Stalin had invited Britain to discuss a possible alliance
against Germany to prevent Hitler from carrying out his plans. At
first Britain had refused tal...
In the 1930s, European governments found it necessary to appease Hitler and Mussolini. Appeasement is the word that clearly sums up the policies and actions that were taken by the European governments. There were a few reasons that these concessions were offered by European countries: none of the countries wanted another World War, the devastating effects that the Great Depression had on each country, and the European governmental chaos and political turmoil was widespread.
Eventually, the three leaders decided to divide Germany up and occupy it until it was certain peace would be upheld. However, they did not discuss the exact date they would stop occupying Germany. As time went on, the Soviets didn’t want to leave and even built a blockade in Berlin separating East Berlin from West Berlin. This only added to the fuel of the Cold War’s fire. This derailed the plan of the Potsdam Conference, which was to eventually withdraw their occupation. For this reason, the impact of The Potsdam Conference was more successful then the Treaty of Versailles but was still not a successful outcome. The Potsdam conference inevitably leads to tension between US and Soviet Union and used Germany as a place to show their
with Hitler, which allowed him to increase his Navy by thirty – five percent than
There were substantial amount of people who despised the actions undertaken by the British government
Dictators used other’s ignorance to expand their empire. Rulers were becoming greedy and were willing to go to any lengths to get what they wanted. The aggression needed to be stopped before one person help complete power. The method of using appeasement wasn’t a strong enough tactic get rid of the issues. The world plunged into World War II because of agression from the Axis Powers and the most effective response to such aggression is collective security.
This meant that neither Germany, nor the Soviet Union, would invade the other country. This pact was made because the USSR wanted to remain at peace with Germany and secure time to build up their military, however, the pact did not last long (“Nonaggression Pact”). On June 22, 1941, Germany attacked the Soviet Union without provocation. This lead the Soviet Union to join the Allied side of the fight. They were accompanied by the United States, United Kingdom, France, and many others. Although Stalin had led his country into joining the Allies, there were always underlying tensions between the countries.
Other countries mainly Britain responded to Hitler’s actions with appeasement and by not stopping him early on with collective security it directly caused World War Two. Collective Security is when multiple countries work together to strengthen a country in need. Based off of document 6 Winston Churchill suggested that Britain, France, and other nations should come together and protect Czechoslovakia from Hitler to stop the growth of Nazi power. Collective Security could have prevented Czechoslovakia from coming into German control. While in accordance with document 9 nobody could openly oppose Hitler’s massive forces he had accumulated. Which is why they didn’t use collective security to protect Czechoslovakia. Instead they used The Munich Agreement to appease to Hitler. The Munich Agreement handed over Czechoslovakia in hopes it would diminish Hitler’s need to keep taking over surrounding countries. Stated in document 7 The Munich Agreement was unnecessary because Czech defenses were relatively strong and during this time Germany wasn’t at its zenith of strength. Also Hitler’s generals were going to try to overthrow Hitler if he attacked Czechoslovakia because the Generals believed it was a foolish endeavour that would mean the downfall of
Stalin did not trust the West, Britain and USA. because he remembered they had invaded Russia in 1919 and had ignored Stalin's appeal for a second front. Stalin was convinced they wanted the USSR to destroy itself when fighting Germany. At the end of the war, the Allies met at Yalta and later Potsdam.... ...
In a political context, appeasement is the idea of pleasing an enemy in order to avoid conflict, such as war. This is what Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister, decided to do with Hitler in 1938 to avoid another European war. Some argue that appeasement was not a good idea because it gave Hitler what he wanted, but in other ways it was a very strategic move. Appeasement delayed war and showed that European countries could be responsible about political issues before jumping to conclusions. It also gave the countries more time to build up their armies to be prepared for any type of conflict. It was a fair thing to do because Germany had lost so much due to the Treaty of Versailles and deserved to recover. Appeasement was not a mistake because in the end everything turned out for the better.
The Development of the Cold War in Europe after 1945 After World War Two, there was an increasing interest in the idea of a United Europe. Soviet Russia and Western European Capitalist states had no common interests despite the wartime alliance, which was no longer valid. There was growing hostility between the United States and Soviet Russia that developed in to a Cold War. This essay will suggest that the development of the Cold War in Europe was a result of differences in political ideologies and a lack of compromise and agreement. It will discuss the ideals of Western Europe and that of Soviet Russia; the United States in support of liberty and freedom, and Communist Russia, who had shown a dislike towards Capitalism.
The invasion of Russia came as no surprise to the Soviets as Hitler made it evident on multiple occasions that he would invade the country. His future plans for the nation were set by his strategic, racial, economic and ideological motives:
The Nazi Economic Policy. A policy in which served as Germany’s crutches after being beaten down for so long. After WWI, Germany was left in a state of great need and poverty, and with their forms of Government no longer working a change needed to be made. Thus the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. Being in the state that Germany was in, the Nazis introduces many new economic policies which prepared them greatly for WWII. Although there are other factors which attributed to preparing Germany for war, the Nazi Economic Policy was the most attributable.
Hitler was able to use his countries momentum and his negotiation skills to achieve what he wanted for Germany and make a deal he knew that he was not going to honor and eventually lead to WWII. Prime Minister Chamberlain also needed to be aware of possible deception that he was likely going to face when dealing with Germany. “When German troops invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia in March 1929, Hitler’s promise that Sudetenland was his ‘last territorial demand’ was revealed for the lie it has always been. At best Chamberlain’s summit diplomacy has bought Britain another 11 months to prepare for war at the considerable expense of Czechoslovakia’s freedom”(Rathbone 19). In fairness, Chamberlin had avoided war for a period of time, but the consequences were much greater in the sense that war was inevitable and his people’s lack of faith.
There were also secret agreements that were made but kept secret until the end of the war. It was said that the Soviet Union were to enter the war against Japan two to three months after the end of the war in Europe. This was necessary in order for The Soviet Union to regroup because of the heavy causalities in Europe. The Soviet Union had a great advantage in the secret agreement. It received much land and did not have to do much in the end for it because of the use of the atomic bomb which ended the war much earlier then expected and the Soviet Union did not even have to fight Japan.
Justifying Appeasement Appeasement was the foreign policy followed by the British and French governments in the 1930s, whereby they did not attack or confront other governments, specifically that of Germany's, when international laws were breached, but rather gave into some of the demands to keep the peace. After the horror and dramatic loss of innocent lives (amassing over 3 million) in the First World War, both the French and the British governments were keen to avoid any more blood shed and their pacifist policies meant they started to take a very lenient attitude towards breached international laws. They knew that the general public, for whom the memories of war were still rife, thought the idea of another conflict unacceptable. When the Japanese invaded Manchuria in 1931, the League of Nations were unable to enforce any effective sanctions and when Mussolini invaded Abyssinia in 1936, the economic sanctions they managed to enforce had little effect. Without military threat the League of Nations had little power over countries who broke the laws and the British and French wanted to abstain from conflict, even if it meant no resolution was met.