Road to War: Nazi State and Foreign Policy (1933-1939)

Manchuria Invasion: Hitler noticed the lack of League of Nations support during the Manchuria invasion.
Hitler's Main Goal: To destroy the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.
- This treaty would return lands taken from Germany.
Hitler's Idea: All German speakers should be under one Reich.
- 11 million in Poland, Czechoslovakia (Sudetenland), and Austria.

The Plan: Even more ambitious – Lebensraum.
- Germany to take its rightful place in Europe, needed land.
Land Acquisition: The land was to be obtained in the East from ‘inferior races’ to the Aryans, the Slavs – Poles, Ukrainians, Russians, etc.
- Slavs were to be used as slave labor to their Aryan overlords.
- The fertile land of the East was to be used to settle Germans and all the resources of the USSR.
Ideology: In this Reich, Jews-Bolsheviks were to be removed from Eastern Europe.

Consolidation of Power: In 1933, Hitler was still consolidating power so internationally, Germany, was still weak.
First Moves: Leaving the League of Nations and the World Disarmament Conference.
Hitler’s Approach: To take aggressive action but follow up with peaceful statements to Britain and France.
- Hitler believed the allies wanted peace and used this as an advantage.
- He was also unpredictable in his foreign policy i.e. signing 10-year pact with Poland.

Austria: Hitler dearly wanted the 7 million Austrians in the German Reich.
- Austria was Hitler’s homeland.
- Austrian Nazis encouraged an Anschluss (union between Austria and Germany).
1934, Austrian Chancellor Dollfuss: Murdered by Nazis – evidence Nazis were to move in.

1935, Saar: Comes back into Reich – massive coal and ore reserves.
Rearming Germany: Hitler also starts to rearm the Germany Forces opening and increasing Germany’s standing forces form $100K$ to $600K$ army.
Stresa Front: Italy, Britain, and France created the Stresa Front to prevent Germany from further breaking Versailles Treaty.
- However quickly fell apart as each nation made separate agreements with Germany or furthered its foreign policy.
- Britain allowed Germany to have a navy $35\%$ that of Britain which broke the Versailles treaty.
- France started looking for allies in the East – USSR and Czechoslovakia.

Hitler: Ennobled by his successful foreign policy against the allies and isolating France.
March 1936: Remilitarized the Rhineland with a small force.
- Hitler bluffed and the allies blinked.
- At this time, France was much stronger than Germans and could have easily opposed this.
- France saw this as a threat and appealed to England while English saw this as Germany taking back their rightful territory.
- Hitler also supported Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia which Mussolini was grateful for.

Rome-Berlin Axis: Germany and Italy signed the Rome-Berlin Axis in October 1936.
Spanish Civil War: 1936 Germany and Italy also supported the Nationalists in Spanish Civil War wanting to prevent a Communist socialist government in Spain and a place to play with their toys.
Anti-Comintern Pact: Germany also signed a pact with the militaristic Japanese state in 1936, the Anti-Comintern Pact to prevent the spread of Communism.
1937 Japan: Japan invaded China and Britain did nothing. Americans concerned, but British focused on appeasement.
- Neville Chamberlin signaled to Hitler that the best way to achieve his aims was to negotiate and not be aggressive basically giving Hitler the Green Light to do what he wanted.

Treaty of Versailles: Germany and Austria were not allowed to merge under Treaty of Versailles.
Feb 1938: Hitler bullied Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg into releases Nazis from jail and making Seyss-Inquart, main Nazi in Germany Austria, Minister of Interior.
- Schuschnigg gave in and then held a plebiscite in March on whether Austria was to remain independent or joining Germany.
- Hitler could not have his plan of annexing Austria thwarted knowing most Austrians did not want to join.
- He demanded Schuschnigg’s resignation and replaced him with Seyss-Inquart and canceled the plebiscite.
- Schuschnigg appealed to Italy and Britain but neither would help so he resigned.
12 March 1938: Austria became part of Germany.

Czechoslovakia: The failure of Appeasement Hitler’s next target was Czechoslovakia.
- The Sudetenland Nazis were encouraged to set up anti-government campaign and claim that ethnic Germans were being treated badly.
- Because of this, Germany demanded that plebiscite be held in Sudetenland land for union with Germany.
- Britain and France agreed and Czech Leader Benes also agreed.
- When Chamberlain met Hitler again in September was shocked that Hitler no longer wanted plebiscite but immediate transfer of Sudetenland to Germany.
- Chamberlain was angry with Hitler’s flip flop and aggression.

Czechs mobilized their army and Britain signaled to prepare the Navy.
Hitler’s bluff was being called but Mussolini suggested the main powers meet in Munich 1 Oct 1938.
France and Britain caved and agreed to the immediate transfer of Sudetenland to Germany with a stipulation that Hitler was not to invade rest of Czechoslovakia (he occupied it 6 months later).
Czech Leader Benes was not invited to this meeting and resigned.
New Czech leadership without friends gave in.
Chamberlain infamous ‘peace in our time speech’.

Stalin read the room correctly and saw that the western democracies were not willing to stand up to Hitler and certainly would not support the USSR against Hitler.
March 1939, finally dawned on Chamberlain that Hitler was not to be trusted and Britain's policy of appeasement ended.
April Britain and France both signed pact with Poland knowing this was Hitler’s next target to return German lands.
Hitler began his usual troupe of the Germans being attacked by Poles.
24 August 1939, Hitler signs pact with USSR stunning the world.
- Agreement not to attack each other for 10 years, but a secret clause where Poland would be divided by the two.
- Hitler now saw the opportunity to attack Poland.

Hitler now turned his sights on Poland.
Having been appeased for the last 3 years, Hitler though that allies would give in again.
Theory that his Military was freaking out thinking pushing too hard that they were not ready.
Controversy causes of the war with most believing Hitler to blame other believe appeasement therefore allies were responsible.
Appeasement seen a playing for time – controversial A.J.P Taylor theory.