"War became inevitable by 1939 and, when it came, it was a surprise to hardly anyone." Assess the validity of this view.

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"War became inevitable by 1939 and, when it came, it was a surprise to hardly anyone." Assess the validity of this view.Historical debate surrounding the war has provided various interpretations of its causes and origins, some of particular relevance to the view in question. The inevitability of the war - how far it was inevitable, and if it was at which point it became so - is a point of contention which depends upon the view one takes of many other factors: for example, if one took the intentionalist view of Hitler's role in the war as "master-planner", one would view war in 1939 as inevitable because it was planned by Hitler; if one were a Marxist historian one might view the incidence of the war as "historically inevitable" in much the same way that Khrushchev in Source A takes the view that the Nazi-Soviet Pact was historically inevitable, although perhaps not for entirely the same reasons. Later historiography, particularly after AJP Taylor's Origins of the Second World War, would dispute the "inevitability" of war in 1939 and certainly the idea that Hitler was a master-planner - for if he were not, actions by other powers perhaps may have prevented war at that point; or perhaps the conditions of the international system after World War I made World War II very probable if not inevitable, Hitler or no Hitler.It is possible to sustain an adequate level of support for the view that war became inevitable by 1939. Firstly, if one accepts that war did eventually become inevitable, it is possible to argue that it was not before 1939. Source B, which dates from 1936, indicates a willingness on the part of Hitler to operate within a conciliatory and collective international system, and although he had acted unilaterally and without
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diplomatic consultation in remilitarising the Rhineland, opinion in Europe was largely persuaded that Hitler was entirely justified in doing so. It is also the case that the German forces were not at this point nearly strong enough to adequately defend Germany from a military response by France and/or Britain. Had such a united response occurred it is conceivable that Germany would have remained weakened and deterred from acquiring or even asserting any more of its demands, particularly territorial ones. The same is true of many other aspects of European relations before 1939 - for example, had Britain not made the ...

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