user: write an essay about the Munich Agreements for a masters degree level in european history

assistant: Here is an essay about the British Actions leading up to the Munich Agreements of 1938. 

	In the 1930s, there was no greater threat to Britain than Adolf Hitler’s Germany. In 1933 Germany officially withdrew from the League of Nations and disarmament conferences, and by 1935 Germany officially disclosed what was already known—that it had undertaken a massive rearmament program in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. In March 1936 Germany flouted the terms of the Locarno Treaty, remilitarizing the Rhineland. By 1938 Hitler had accomplished the Anschluss with Austria and was turning his sights toward Czechoslovakia and other Eastern European territories. Yet in response Britain chose to appease Germany, to offer concessions, often one-sided, in hopes of satiating Germany’s revisionist demands. The British approach to German rearmament, for example, was not merely or even primarily to rearm Rhetoric of Appeasement itself in response, but to negotiate treaties that would guide and limit its armament. Britain pursued bilateral and multilateral disarmament and arms control treaties with the Nazi regime, such as the Anglo-German Naval Treaty(1935) that limited German naval acquisitions to 35 percent of Britain’s own forces, and pushed Germany to negotiate an air pact as well. Britain also strove to satisfy Germany’s territorial demands, believing that a sustainable peace mandated the revision of Eastern European boundaries. As early as 1936 officials were suggesting that Germany be allowed to annex “Austria, Memel, and Danzig” and that the British should agree to a “peaceful evolution” of Czechoslovakia’s boundaries. The British also considered returning colonies stripped from Germany by the Treaty of Versailles.

	British prime minister Neville Chamberlain and French premier Edouard Daladier met with the Czech president, Eduard Benes, at the Munich Conference in 1938 and persuaded Benes to give up the Sudetenland in exchange for Hitler’s promise that “this is the last territorial claim I have to make in Europe.” In the wake of Munich, appeasement appeared a policy triumphant. Having pulled back from the brink of war, British politicians and the public agreed that negotiations with Hitler had worked, that revision could be accomplished through talk and not violence, and that there indeed could be, according to Chamberlain, “peace in our time.” Winston Churchill knew better: “England and France had to choose between war and dishonor. They chose dishonor; they will have war.” 

	The Munich Agreement was the high point and greatest failure of appeasement diplomacy. No country wanted to go to war over the Sudetenland and in 1939 no European country, especially Czechoslovakia, had the military might to stop Hitler. Had the European powers intervened after Germany took the Rhineland, they might have halted Hitler’s expansion. By 1939 it was too late. The appeasement strategy could only delay war, not prevent it.

user: Can you summarize that?

assistant: Here is a summary of the essay about the British Actions leading up to the Munich Agreements of 1938. 


In the 1930s, Britain faced a significant threat from Germany led by Hitler. Despite Germany's violation of international treaties and its massive rearmament program, Britain chose to appease Hitler through negotiation and concession, hoping to satisfy Germany's demands. The British government pursued disarmament and arms control treaties, as well as offering to revise Eastern European boundaries. The Munich Conference in 1938 saw British and French leaders persuade the Czech president to give up the Sudetenland in exchange for Hitler's promise of no further territorial claims. The Munich Agreement was seen as a success for appeasement, but Churchill warned that it was a choice between war and dishonor and that war would come. The appeasement strategy only delayed the inevitable, and by 1939 it was too late to intervene and stop Hitler's expansion.