"The most important aim of foreign policy 1933-1936 was to overthrow the terms of the Treaty of Versailles". How valid is this statement to Nazi foreign policy in this period?

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A2 History - Mrs Wilkenson

"The most important aim of foreign policy 1933-1936 was to overthrow the terms of the Treaty of Versailles". How valid is this statement to Nazi foreign policy in this period?

Adolf Hitler being 'fuhrer' , meant he was the main attributer in policy-making especially with regards to the Nazi foreign policy. Nazi foreign policy originally came mostly from Hitler's ideas and from his writings in his book 'Mein Kampf.' His aims were established from as early as 1920 and you could say they were quite solid in terms of what his actual long-term goals were. The Nazi party, Hitler and the German people were still full of great hatred after being blamed for the events of World War One, and later with the introduction of the Treaty of Versailles (TOV) enforced onto Germany by the three main world powers, only made matters worse.

Hitler's foreign policy not only appealed to him but in general appealed to most German people who had been through many years of discontent, they saw his national policies as fresh and new and a way of getting out of the mess that Germany had originally put it self in by the signing of the TOV. The TOV deprived Germany of ever being a big power in the distant future again at the time owing to the fact that France was incredibly bitter and wanted great punishment to be given. Hitler like many others saw the TOV as extremely unfair, badly judged and also badly written and rushed. He believed that it should be scrapped and was going to take whatever methods he had to in order to delete the rules set by it. When Germany left the League of Nations in 1933 which Hitler mostly blamed France's attitude for, he cunningly held a plebiscite declaring what he had done and successively gained more than 95% approval as a result. In 1935 he officially announced that Germany were once again beginning a rearmaments program, the re-introduction of conscription and acknowledged the commencement of the German air force which were all great violations of the treaty.
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With all this occurring, the western democracies called a meeting at Stresa in Italy to discuss any measures that could be taken against Germany. The Stresa Front as it came to be known proved to be quite unsuccessful as in 1935 Britain and Germany signed the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, which guaranteed Britain naval superiority. It also allowed Germany to build up its navy up to 36% in size of that of the British and also allowed submarines to be built and included as well. This put Britain in a risky position as firstly this was very much against ...

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