7. Neville Chamberlain is remembered for appeasement of Hitler
During the years prior to the invasion of Poland in 1939, Adolf Hitler gradually achieved several steps which corrected, as Hitler saw it, the draconian terms of the Versailles Treaty. In hindsight, one would think there were several opportunities for the British government to step in and stop Hitler’s expansion of the German Reich. The reality of the times was Great Britain was still struggling with the effects of the Great Depression, and it was militarily unprepared to engage the Germans on its own. Its ally, France, demonstrated little political resolve, and there was little opposition when the Germans occupied the Saarland in 1935. Britain needed time to prepare for what appeared would be armed conflict with Germany, in the late 1930s only its navy was ready for war. The radar installations which saved the British during the Battle of Britain were still under construction.
Chamberlain tried to buy time through negotiation, and without a more belligerent France at his side, he had to consider Hitler’s demands as to how they affected Britain alone. Chamberlain also attempted to strengthen British ties with Italy, going so far as to establish private communication with Mussolini, in the hope that improved relations with the British Empire would weaken Italian links with Germany. There is no doubt that Chamberlain’s primary goal was the avoidance of another war on the European continent, but the political and international realities of the time dictated his policies of appeasement (a word he himself used). When Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, Chamberlain informed Parliament that all blame for the war was Hitler’s, and pushed for Great Britain to honor its commitments to the Poles.