Britain and France followed a policy of Appeasement, this means that the policy of attempting to avoid war by making concessions. It is particularly associated with British policy towards Hitler in the 1930s. In 1938 war seemed imminent, with Mussolini’s help a final meeting was held in Munich on 29 September. While Europe strained itself the great leaders of Britain, Germany, France and Italy decided on the fate of Czechoslovakia. On the 29 September they decided to give in and give Hitler what he wanted. The whole world found out on that day that the Sudetenland belonged to Germany now. The Czechs and the USSR were kept in the dark. This is known as the Munich Agreement. Britain and France gave in because of the fear of war. From the naval agreement in 1935 for the next three years Britain followed a policy of giving Hitler what he wanted, a policy which became known as Appeasement. Neville Chamberlain is the man most associated with this policy although he did not become Prime Minister till 1937. Many other British politicians were also in favour of it, they wanted to proceed with this policy because some of them thought that the Treaty of Versailles was unfair, they wanted to stop the spread of Communism and they did not want another horrific war as World War One.
Stesemann started the unravelling of the Peace Treaty called the Treaty of Versailles, he began to work quietly but steadily, on reversing some of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. Particularly those concerning reparations and Germany’s eastern frontiers. The Treaty’s problems were that it allowed Germany to get back on her feet if it had not, Germany would be still paying the reparations and the wars would not have happened. The Treaty did not have strong subject that could have held it up the government used it as a shield to get their own way. The Treaty then made a large mistake they thought that Germany should be allowed to rearm itself and even worse they thought that Hitler was bringing stability to Germany so they let him stay. They saw Hitler as a person who hated communism; he would be an ally on their side to get rid of communism.
In March 1939 the USSR opened talks with France and Britain to discuss ways of preventing Nazi aggression, but France and Britain were afraid to set up a united front against Hitler. The talks broke down in July, on 23 August to everyone’s astonishment, the USSR and Germany signed the Nazi-Soviet Pact. They agreed not to fight each other and to divide Poland up between them. On 1 September 1939 Hitler invaded Poland; he knew that he could because of the Nazi-Soviet Pact the USSR would not act against him. Hitler did not believe that Chamberlain and Daladier, the “men of Munich” would go to war to defend Poland. Hitler had just underestimated the two, on 3 September 1939, Great Britain and France declared war on Germany but to me they declared war on the Nazis and Hitler.
After World War One there was a determination to make sure another war did not happen. It was agreed that a League of Nations would be set up. The League was there to stop aggression from any country, try to get countries to co-operate, encourage getting rid of weapons, improve living and working conditions throughout the word, etc … The League of Nations failed because it did not have any real power it did not have powerful members, not that many countries found the League intimidating such as Japan, it took over China and the League could not do anything about it even though China had asked for help. The Corfu incident were two Italians where killed by bandits. Greece asked the League to investigate but Italy invaded Corfu so Greece had to give in and pay up. The Ruhr, Germany could not pay the reparations to France so France invaded instead of going to the League. Memel, a German port near Lithuania, after Vilna Lithuania seized Memel this was accepted by the League. Vilna was seized by Poland as most were Polish. The League protested but the conference of Ambassadors amended Vilna to Poland.
So, therefore I conclude that the International Peace Treaty collapsed in 1939 because of the five main reasons I have given above, the Treaty should not have let Germany get back on her feet and the Treaty should have had much more respect than it did, that is why countries took advantage of it and so did individuals.
