Causes of WWII

The first 200 words of this essay...

World War II was directly and solely attributable to the Treaty of Versailles. Discuss.

While the treaty of Versailles is a major factor for the cause of the Second World War, I believe it was an initiator to the buildup to the outbreak of the war but definitely was not directly and solely attributable to it. There are several major factors such as the economic crisis, Hitler's foreign policy and the justification of appeasement followed by Britain and France, then the failure of the league of nation to function which led to international peace breakdown and finally the ideological differences between the European countries.

The argument which suggests that Versailles treaty led to the Second World War would have to say that the treaty was harsh for Germany to accept, and resulting in east-central Europe composed of mutually hostile small states (Purdue 1999, p.13). Perhaps the first impact it had on Germany was psychological as it was hard for the German public to accept that their military lost when 'no foreign armies had appeared on German soil' (Purdue 1999, p.28). The main terms of the treaty were paying a huge amount of reparation for the war which