LEARNING
ACTIVITY
Teacher material
The Munich Conference of 1938
Historical Notes
The context to and progress of the Conference
Germany:
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March 7th 1936: Hitler sent troops into the demilitarised Rhineland
Hitler’s ‘gamble’: German officers had orders to withdraw if they met
French resistance
Baldwin: ‘the Germans are merely walking into "their own back yard“’
In the Council of the League, only the Soviet Union proposed sanctions
against Germany
Hitler's occupation of the Rhineland had persuaded him that the
international community would not resist him
Italy
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Italy occupied Eritrea and Somalia
December 1934: clash between Italian and Abyssinian troops
When Italy demanded apologies and compensation, Abyssinia appealed
to the League
October 1935: attack on Abyssinia
The League declared Italy to be the aggressor and imposed sanctions, but
coal and oil were not included. Why not? It might provoke war
Albania, Austria and Hungary refused to apply sanctions; Germany and
the United States were not in the League
1938
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September 1938; Chamberlain to Berchtesgaden
Hitler: Sudetenland should be absorbed into Germany
Czechoslovakia would thus lose 800,000 citizens, much of its industry and
its mountain defences
Hitler informed Chamberlain that Germany would occupy the Sudetenland
The Czechoslovaks rejected the demand, as did the British and the
French
Mussolini persuaded Hitler to hold a four-power conference
On September 29, Hitler, Chamberlain, Daladier and Mussolini met in
Munich
They agreed that Germany would complete its occupation of the
Sudetenland, Czechoslovakia was told to submit
Hitler signed a peace treaty between the UK and Germany
Chamberlain returned to Britain promising "peace in our time”.
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LEARNING
ACTIVITY
Appeasement at the time
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Chamberlain's policy was popular until the failure of the Munich
Agreement
"Appeasement" had been a respectable term between 1919 and 1937
Wars were caused by large-scale armaments, in which case disarmament
was the remedy
Many believed that Versailles had been unjust
German minorities were entitled to self-determination and Germany was
entitled to equality in armaments
Most British Conservative politicians were in favour of appeasement, as
were some Labour politicians
Appeasement with hindsight
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Once war broke out, appeasement was blamed for the failure to stop the
dictators
Appeasement used to mean a ‘settlement of disputes’
After 1938: the granting from fear or cowardice of unwarranted
concessions in order to buy temporary peace at someone else's expense
(David Dilks)
In 1961 the view of appeasement as avoidable error and cowardice was
criticised by A.J.P. Taylor in The Origins of the Second World War
Taylor argued that appeasement was an active policy, and not a passive
one "men confronted with real problems, doing their best in the
circumstances of their time“
Chamberlain wanted to protect the world from war; besides he urged for
time: military and air power needed to be strengthened. Taylor’s views
were rejected by many historians
But he showed that there was continuity in British foreign policy after 1933
In the 1990’s, historians emerged who argued that appeasement was
probably the only choice for the British government in the 1930’s
However, it was poorly implemented, carried out too late and not enforced
strongly enough to constrain Hitler
Frank McDonough (Neville Chamberlain, Appeasement and the British
Road to War) - "Chamberlain's worst error," says McDonough, "was to
believe that he could march Hitler on the yellow brick road to peace when
in reality Hitler was marching very firmly on the road to war.“
Some postwar impact:
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North Korea invasion of South Korea 25-6-1950
US had avoided military engagement in the region
Truman: “I remembered how each time that the democracies failed to act,
it had encouraged the aggressors to keep going ahead”
"We will continue to take every honorable step we can to avoid general
war…. But we will not engage in appeasement…”
MacArthur: “Need no lessons from the successors of Neville Chamberlain"
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