Appeasing Hitler: Chamberlain, Churchill and the road to war

Abstract

What should we do about dictators who threaten their neighbours and seize their territory? It is as much of a question today as it was in the 1930s, which witnessed the rise of Hitler and Nazism. The Treaty of Versailles, signed 100 years ago, was intended to set the seal on the war to end all wars. Yet only 20 years later Europe and beyond were plunged into a Second World War. Tim Bouverie's brilliant and meticulously researched account of the vain attempts to appease Hitler reads like a thriller, though demonstrating strong academic rigour. There is no doubt that Versailles punished Germany through the loss of territory and colonies, and through reparations and limits on military power. It sowed in German minds the seeds of injustice that Hitler was able to exploit. Mussolini's invasion of Abyssinia, in an attempt to build an Italian empire in Africa, and the failure of the League of Nations to react, convinced Hitler that Germany could acquire new territories with impunity. Hitler gambled that Britain and France would fail to react to the occupation of the Rhineland in 1936, despite their military superiority at the time. Early warnings from Winston Churchill and Sir Horace Rumbold, the British Ambassador in Berlin, about the long-term intentions of Hitler and the brutality of the Nazi regime fell on the deaf ears of Prime Ministers Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain.