Was the Policy of Appeasement correct?

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Was the Policy of Appeasement correct?

Fifteen years after the end of the Great War, Adolf Hitler had risen to power becoming the Chancellor of Germany promising to make Germany great again by abolishing the treaty of Versailles. During the interwar period, the allied countries in Europe (Britain and France) had become economically poor and so they did not have many military resources. Appeasement is "the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and compromise, thereby avoiding the resort to an armed conflict which would be expensive, bloody, and possibly dangerous.”. It was introduced by Stanley Baldwin but taken to a new level by Neville Chamberlain. In this case, it referred to meeting Hitler’s demands, hoping that he will be placated maintaining peace in Europe. WWI had been the ‘war to end all wars’ and after seeing the horrors of this war the majority of the British public thought that appeasement was the correct policy to follow, however appeasement was definitely the wrong policy for Britain to follow.

Firstly, appeasement meant that Germany could gain enough power to start another war; the main aim of the treaty of Versailles was to stop Germany from doing this. In the treaty of Versailles, it was explicitly stated in the military clause that ‘Germany cannot have an air force or an army of over 100,000 men’. In 1933, the year Hitler is elected chancellor, Hitler directly violates this clause by rearming Germany. If Britain or France had opposed of this now, then no war would have started as Germany did not have the resources to beat a major country that have not had their military limited.

Nevertheless, intervening now would mean that Germany had to be eternally shamed for their defeat in WWI. Stepping in as soon Germany started to rebuild itself would be treating Germany as if it was a little child who had to be constantly watched and could not be trusted with too much power. Just after the treaty of Versailles, there was Punch magazine depicting Germany as a naked child from the treaty of Versailles. Now if Britain had stepped in and not followed the policy of appeasement and stopped Germany from rearming themselves, it would have been the equivalent the naked child trying to get some clothes to make itself less vulnerable and Britain taking the clothes away from Germany making sure that she is always vulnerable. This ideology is portraying Germany as a sub-human who should be eternally shamed for the work of previous generations, a moral argument against appeasement.

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Furthermore, if Britain had decided to use force to intervene, they could have lost the battle with Germany even with the help of the French. The two main factors contributing to this theory are: the German army is very specialised and the Wall Street crash. The fact that the German arm is highly specialised means that they can recruit people very quickly and they could be able to outmanoeuvre the British even though their army is much bigger. The Wall Street crash a few years earlier had crippled Britain’s economy meaning that they could no longer concentrate on the military. ...

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