The policy of appeasement and the road to war, including the Anschluss (1938), Munich Agreement (1938), the Nazi-Soviet Pact (1939), and the invasion of Poland

A 10-mark "assess" requires a thesis, developed paragraphs, and the Taylor-Overy debate.

Thesis

Appeasement contributed to the outbreak of war by emboldening Hitler, but the decisive cause was Hitler's deliberate ideological pursuit of war. Appeasement determined the timing, not the inevitability.

The case for appeasement as cause

Each concession encouraged the next aggression. The remilitarisation of the Rhineland (March 1936) went unchallenged. The Anschluss (12 March 1938) confirmed Britain and France would not move. The Munich Agreement (29 to 30 September 1938) handed Germany the Sudetenland, 35 Czech army divisions, and the Skoda armaments works. Chamberlain returned with "peace for our time." Hitler concluded the democracies would not fight.

The case for Hitler's agency

Richard Overy (The Origins of the Second World War, 1987) argues Hitler's foreign policy was driven by ideology: Lebensraum, racial war, and the destruction of the USSR. The Hossbach Memorandum (5 November 1937) outlined plans for war by 1943 to 1945. The occupation of rump Czechoslovakia (15 March 1939) was unprovoked; no accommodation could have satisfied Hitler.

The Taylor revisionist case

A.J.P. Taylor (The Origins of the Second World War, 1961) argued Hitler was an opportunist, not a master planner, and that war over Poland was partly the result of British guarantees. Taylor's view is largely rejected but remains a key historiographical reference.

Conclusion

Appeasement was a strategic error that emboldened Hitler, but war originated in Hitler's ideological programme. Overy, not Taylor, sets the modern scholarly consensus.

A 5-mark "explain" needs three significances developed with evidence.

Strategic surrender

The Munich Agreement (29 to 30 September 1938) between Hitler, Chamberlain, Daladier, and Mussolini handed Germany the Sudetenland without Czech participation. Czechoslovakia lost its border fortifications, 35 trained army divisions, and the Skoda armaments works (then producing one-third of Czech military output). The country was strategically defenceless.

High point of appeasement

Chamberlain returned waving a paper signed with Hitler ("I believe it is peace for our time"). British public opinion was initially supportive. Six months later, the German occupation of Prague (15 March 1939) ended that support. Chamberlain pivoted to the guarantee of Polish independence (31 March 1939).

Encouragement of further aggression

Hitler told his generals at Munich that he was disappointed; he had wanted to crush Czechoslovakia by force. The Polish guarantee and the Nazi-Soviet Pact followed within a year. Munich convinced Stalin that the western powers would not stand with him against Germany, paving the way for the August 1939 pact.

Richard Overy describes Munich as "the price for postponing war by twelve months." Markers reward strategic detail (Skoda works), Chamberlain's quote, and the link to subsequent events.

A 4-mark "outline" rewards an accurate, dated sequence with brief significance. Aim for one mark per correctly dated and located crisis.

Model answer. Between 1936 and 1939 a series of escalating crises marked the failure of appeasement. In March 1936 Hitler remilitarised the Rhineland in breach of Versailles and Locarno; Britain and France did not respond. In March 1938 the Anschluss united Austria with Germany, again unopposed. At the Munich Agreement (29 to 30 September 1938) Britain and France ceded the Sudetenland to Germany without Czech participation. In March 1939 Germany occupied the rump of Czechoslovakia (Prague), ending British support for appeasement and prompting the British guarantee of Poland (31 March 1939). The Nazi-Soviet Pact (23 August 1939) cleared the way for the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, and Britain and France declared war on 3 September 1939.

Marking criteria. Full marks require four or more correctly dated crises in sequence (Rhineland, Anschluss, Munich, Prague/Poland) with a phrase of significance for each. Two to three marks for a partial or partly mis-dated sequence; one mark for naming events without dates or order.

A 3-mark "define and identify" question wants a precise definition (1 mark) plus two developed reasons (1 mark each).

Model answer. Appeasement was the British and French policy of conceding to Germany's revisionist territorial demands, in the hope that a satisfied Germany would not start a general European war. Two reasons drove it. First, the trauma of the Great War (880,000 British dead) made another mass war politically unthinkable, and Britain had not rearmed during the Depression. Second, there was a moral and strategic case: by 1938 the Treaty of Versailles was widely regarded in Britain as unjustly harsh, so German demands for the self-determination of ethnic Germans (in Austria and the Sudetenland) appeared reasonable, while imperial over-stretch meant a European war risked inviting Japan to strike in the Pacific.

Marking criteria. One mark for an accurate definition stressing concession to avoid war. One mark for each of two distinct, developed reasons drawn from: war-weariness, the rearmament gap, the discredited Versailles settlement, imperial over-stretch, distrust of the USSR after the Purges, or the weakness of the League after Abyssinia.

A 5-mark "explain" needs a clear cause-and-effect chain with specific evidence, not narration.

Model answer. The Munich Agreement (29 to 30 September 1938) shifted the European balance of power decisively towards Germany. Strategically, Czechoslovakia lost the Sudetenland, which contained its mountain border fortifications, around 35 trained army divisions, and the Skoda armaments works (then producing roughly one-third of Czech military output); the country was left defenceless and was absorbed entirely within six months. Diplomatically, Munich convinced Hitler that Britain and France would not fight, emboldening him towards Poland. It also signalled to Stalin, excluded from the conference, that the western powers would not stand with the USSR, which helped push him towards the Nazi-Soviet Pact (23 August 1939). Richard Overy describes Munich as buying peace for only twelve months at a heavy strategic price.

Marking criteria. Five marks require three developed significances (military stripping of Czechoslovakia; emboldening of Hitler; alienation of Stalin) with specific evidence such as the Skoda works or the 35 divisions, and a clear "balance of power" framing. Three to four marks for two significances with some evidence; one to two marks for general comment without strategic detail.

An 8-mark "assess the usefulness" question rewards judgement built from origin, motive, content and corroboration, woven with own knowledge. Do not merely summarise the source.

Model answer. Source A is a paraphrase of the Hossbach Memorandum, the minute taken by Colonel Friedrich Hossbach of Hitler's address of 5 November 1937 to his War Minister, service chiefs and Foreign Minister. For a historian investigating whether Hitler planned for war, it is highly useful in several respects but must be used with care.

In origin, it is a near-contemporary internal record of Hitler's own words to his most senior commanders, not propaganda for a public audience, which strengthens its evidentiary value about genuine intentions. Its content is strikingly explicit: the pursuit of Lebensraum by force and a timetable of the mid-1940s align closely with what actually happened, lending it predictive weight. It corroborates other evidence of intent, such as the Schmundt minute of 23 May 1939 in which Hitler told his generals that war with Poland was unavoidable.

Its usefulness is limited by reliability questions. The memorandum survives only as a 1943 copy of Hossbach's later reconstruction, not a verbatim transcript, so exact wording is uncertain. A.J.P. Taylor (The Origins of the Second World War, 1961) dismissed it as bluster intended to bully the generals into rearmament, not a war plan. Against this, Richard Overy (The Origins of the Second World War, 1987) and D.C. Watt (How War Came, 1989) have restored its weight as evidence of intentionality. On balance the source is very useful: even allowing for its transmission problems, it documents an aggressive, expansionist programme from Hitler's own mouth that later events confirm.

Marking criteria. Top marks (7 to 8) require a sustained judgement on usefulness that integrates origin/motive (internal record), content, and corroboration, weighs the reliability limitation (1943 copy, Taylor's scepticism), and deploys accurate own knowledge (Hossbach context, the 23 May 1939 conference, Overy vs Taylor). Mid marks (4 to 6) describe the source and give a partial judgement. Low marks (1 to 3) merely paraphrase the source or comment generally on Hitler.

A 25-mark essay is marked on a sustained, evidence-based argument that directly answers "to what extent" and weaves historiography throughout. The strongest answers reach a clear judgement rather than sitting on the fence.

Band 6 plan.

• Thesis. Appeasement was a serious contributory cause that emboldened Hitler and determined the timing of war, but the decisive cause was Hitler's deliberate ideological drive for a war of conquest; appeasement shaped how and when war came, not whether it came.
• Argument 1 (appeasement as enabling cause). Each unanswered concession lowered the threshold for the next aggression: Rhineland (March 1936), Anschluss (March 1938), Munich (September 1938). Evidence: the stripping of Czech fortifications, the 35 divisions and the Skoda works at Munich; Chamberlain's "peace for our time." Historiography: R.A.C. Parker (Chamberlain and Appeasement, 1993) argues realistic alternatives existed and were rejected for political reasons.
• Argument 2 (Hitler's agency as the decisive cause). Hitler's programme of Lebensraum and racial war made a general war his goal, not an accident of diplomacy. Evidence: the Hossbach Memorandum (5 November 1937); the unprovoked occupation of Prague (15 March 1939); the Schmundt minute (23 May 1939). Historiography: Richard Overy (The Origins of the Second World War, 1987) treats the war as the product of Hitler's intentions.
• Argument 3 (contingency in 1939). The final crisis also turned on miscalculation: the British guarantee of Poland (31 March 1939) and the Nazi-Soviet Pact (23 August 1939). Historiography: A.J.P. Taylor (1961) stresses an opportunist Hitler and contingent decisions; D.C. Watt (How War Came, 1989) shows the diplomacy of 1939 was genuinely contingent without exonerating Hitler.
• Judgement. Appeasement bears real responsibility for the timing and the favourable conditions, but Overy's reading - war as the deliberate fruit of Hitler's ideology - sets the modern consensus; Taylor's pure revisionism is largely rejected.

Model paragraph (Argument 2). While appeasement created the conditions for aggression, the decisive cause of war lay in Hitler's own deliberate programme. As early as the Hossbach conference of 5 November 1937, Hitler told his service chiefs that Germany's survival demanded living space won by force by the mid-1940s, a goal that no concession could satisfy because it required conquest, not negotiation. This intentionality is confirmed by the occupation of Prague on 15 March 1939: unlike the Sudetenland, the rump of Czechoslovakia contained no German-majority population to "liberate," so the seizure exposed appeasement's central assumption - that Hitler sought only the revision of Versailles - as false. Richard Overy (The Origins of the Second World War, 1987) accordingly reads the war as the product of Hitler's ideology of Lebensraum and racial war, against A.J.P. Taylor's (1961) portrait of a mere opportunist. The point is decisive: even a firmer Britain and France would have faced a leader committed to eventual war, which is why appeasement is best understood as a policy that mistimed and mismanaged a conflict it did not originate.

Marker's note. Band 6 answers sustain a single judgement on "to what extent," support every claim with precise evidence (dates, the Skoda works, the Hossbach and Schmundt records), and use named historians (Overy, Taylor, Parker, Watt) as analytical tools rather than name-dropping. Markers penalise narrative drift, undated assertions, and essays that describe appeasement without ever measuring its responsibility against Hitler's agency.

A 25-mark "evaluate" essay must judge the relative significance of the two events, not simply describe them, and sustain that judgement with evidence and historiography.

Band 6 plan.

• Thesis. Both agreements were pivotal, but they operated differently: Munich was the high-water mark of appeasement that emboldened Hitler and removed Czechoslovakia as a strategic asset, while the Nazi-Soviet Pact was the immediate enabling condition that made the invasion of Poland possible; the Pact was the more proximate trigger, Munich the deeper cause.
• Argument 1 (significance of Munich). Strategic surrender (Sudeten fortresses, 35 divisions, Skoda works) and the psychological effect on Hitler and Stalin. Historiography: Overy on Munich as buying twelve months at a price; Parker on rejected alternatives.
• Argument 2 (significance of the Pact). It removed the threat of a two-front war for Germany and partitioned Eastern Europe via the secret protocols, directly enabling the 1 September invasion. Historiography: Robert Service (Stalin, 2004) on Stalin buying time after the Purges; Roger Moorhouse (The Devils' Alliance, 2014) on the depth of cooperation.
• Argument 3 (the link between them). Munich's exclusion of Stalin helped produce the Pact: a causal chain runs from Munich to Moscow. This shows the two events are not separate but sequential.
• Judgement. The Pact was the decisive immediate cause of the Polish invasion, but it was made possible by the strategic and diplomatic landscape Munich created; Munich is the more significant in the longer chain of causation.
• Model paragraph (Argument 3). The two agreements are best understood as links in a single chain rather than separate episodes. By excluding the USSR from the Munich Conference in September 1938, Britain and France signalled to Stalin that they would neither consult nor defend him, a lesson reinforced when Anglo-Soviet military talks stalled through the summer of 1939. Stalin therefore had every strategic reason to seek his own accommodation with Germany, which arrived in the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 23 August 1939 and its secret protocols dividing Eastern Europe. Robert Service (Stalin, 2004) reads the Pact as Stalin buying time to rebuild a Red Army gutted by the Purges, while Roger Moorhouse (The Devils' Alliance, 2014) shows how substantively the two regimes then cooperated. The significance is therefore cumulative: Munich did not merely precede the Pact, it helped cause it, and together they cleared Hitler's path to invade Poland on 1 September 1939.

Marker's note. Top-band answers weigh the two events against each other rather than describing each in turn, trace the causal link between them, and reach a defensible judgement about relative significance. Markers reward the secret protocols, the Skoda detail, and historians used analytically; they penalise a "tell the story" structure that never evaluates.