Expert: Anthony - 8/30/2009

Question
What are the causes of World War II?

Answer
Hi,

Please excuse me for the delayed response, as I do not have constant access to the internet.  The answer to your question is quite detailed and I'll try and summarise it to the best of my ability.

1. The Treaty of Versailles - was unfair to Germany and placed a lot of restrictions on a proud nation as Germany.  Besides a heavy war indemnity, Germany had to accept war guilt of WW1 and had a restriction placed by the Allies on the size of their army.  Land belonging to Germnya was distributed amongst the Allies.

2. Failure of the League of Nations - The League set up in 1919 to prevent further wars was a failure as all countries did not join it i.e. USA.  Further, the League had no power and no army and was powerless to prevent any disputes between countries i.e. when Japan invaded China (Manchuria) and Italy invaded Abyssinia.

3. Policy of Appeasement - The British and French governments followed a policy of appeasement as far as Hitler was concerned when it involved other countries i.e. Austria, Czechoslavakia etc.  Their impotency encouraged Hitler to believe that they couldn't stop him and he moved from scrapping one clause of the Treaty of Versailles to another, until it was too late.  Eventually, the British and rench governments acted when Hitler's forces invaded Poland in 1939, but that marked the beginning of WW2.

4. Hitler's aims: Hitler had always wanted a greater living space for the Germans and with most of the land lying to the east of Germany, the war with Russia was inevitable.  It also meant ensuring that France and Britain had been dealt with first and that involved war.

5. The Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis: If Germany wanted land on the eastern front, Italy desired supremacy in Africa and Japan in Asia.  With all three countries being hostile to communism (USSR) and to the democratic powers of Britain and France, their common goals brought them together and pushed the world into another global conflict.

This is a summary.  If you need more detailed information and have acces to the internet, you could look up the following sites:

http://www.rpfuller.com/gcse/history/6.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_World_War_II

Regards,