The term appeasement is used to describe the response of Western European governments to the expansionist activities of Germany and Italy under Hitler and Mussolini in the 1930s. Their attitude to give them what they wanted to prevent a war in Central Europe. The underlying facts was the belief of British and French politicians that their publics would never risk a repetition of the horrors of World War I.
The British government believed in appeasement till the day there was no other solution than to go to war on Germany. Appeasement ended on March 31, 1939, in response to new German demands, where Britain gave Poland a unilateral guarantee of its security, but this was insufficient to deter Hitler from invading her on September 1, so precipitating World War II.
The first time appeasement was introduced as means of keeping the peace and quiet in Europe was Mussolini's conquest of Abyssinia (1934-1936) and Hitler's reoccupation of the Rhineland (March 7, 1936). When Hitler the annexed Austria in February and March 1938, no effective attempts were made to prevent this "Anschluss" from occurring. Anschluss is a German word for union, and was an slogan in the battle to unite Germany and Austria. Clauses of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles expressly forbade Anschluss, and was thus they one of the times Hitler neglected the Versailles Treaty. On March 13, 1938, invited by Seyss-Inquart to prevent “disorder”, German troops and police flooded into Austria where no one resisted them in taking over. Hitler entered Vienna on March 14 to proclaim Anschluss, though to most observers the act looked more like straight annexation.
The British prime minister at this time was Neville Chamberlain (elected first time May 1937), who described his policy without shame as “active appeasement”. Faced with Hitler's next demand, that Germany should acquire the fringes of Czechoslovakia in which 3,500,000 of the inhabitants spoke German (Sudeten Germans), Chamberlain went several times to meet Hitler, the last on September 30, 1938, when he and the French prime minister, Daladier, flew to Munich. From there Chamberlain returned waving his notorious piece of paper, declaring that he had secured “peace in our time”. This treaty is known as the Munich Pact. The agreement was formulated and signed by Germany, Italy, France, and Britain at Munich, Germany. It secured the acceptance by Great Britain and France of the demand by Hitler that the German-speaking Sudetenland, was to be ceded to Germany, which it bordered.
In a series of negotiations that began in August 1938, cession of the Sudetenland to Germany had already been agreed upon in principle by the participants in the pact. Great Britain and France, desperate to avoid further war, had accepted Hitler's demands in return for his promise not to claim any other European territory.
Chamberlain believed that the concessions he had made to Germany over the Sudetenland would encourage Germany to settle down as a peaceful power in Europe. He returned to England the day after (September 30), waving a piece of paper and proclaimed: “peace in our time”. Even if Chamberlain truly believed in the peace, and Hitler had promised to not occupy any more land agreement averted war only temporarily.
Within six months of the signing the Munich Pact, the German army was in Prague (March 16, 1939) and Czechoslovakia had ceased to exist as German troops marched into rump Czechoslovakia and subsequently made most of the country a German protectorate, thus nullifying the Munich Pact and awakening British suspicions of Hitler's trustworthiness. For many Western nations the Munich Pact became the symbol of appeasement. The Munich Pact came to be seen as a symbol of the dangers of appeasement, and of the subsequent humiliation of Great Britain.
The British and French policy of appeasement—the concession to demands of the Nazi state in order to avoid war—ended with Hitler's invasion of Poland. Chamberlain recognised the failure of his policy and vowed support for Poland. As Germany invaded the Poland, Chamberlain led Great Britain into the war against the aggressor.
From this one can say that after Hitler had broken the pact, and showed that his honour was not to be counted on there was no other solution. The appeasement politics had to be abandoned to save their own skins and the souls of the poor people of Europe being gulped up by Hitlers Nazi-Germany on a full charge ahead.
Forside
