Why had international peace collapsed by 1939?

1. Remilitarisation of the Rhineland

1.1. 1936 → Hitler took a risk by moving troops into the Rhineland area. He knew what he was facing but had chosen the right time and place to do it.

1.2. The demilitarization of the Rhineland was one of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and also accepted in the Locarno Treaties.

1.3. France had just signed a treaty with the USSR - the Mutual Assistance Treaty) to protect each other against German rearmament.

1.4. Hitler used this agreement as an excuse to claim that Germany was under threat, facing encirclement, so he should be allowed to place troops in his own frontier.

1.5. Many people in Britain felt that he had a right to station his troops (Hitler knew this) → confident enough to know that Britain would not intervene.

1.6. The German army had orders to pull out if the French acted against them.

1.7. Germany's army was no match for the French army.

1.8. The attention of the League of Nations was on the Abyssinian crisis. They condemned Hitler's action. Couldn't do anything else.

1.9. The French were about to hold an election but none of the leaders was prepared to take responsibility for plunging France into a war.

1.10. France didn't know how weak the German army was besides France refused to act without British support so Hitler's gamble paid off.

2. Rearmament

2.1. Hitler came to power in 1933

2.2. he reorganized Germany's armed forced and drafted thousands of unemployed workers when he reintroduced conscription.

2.3. he was delivering his promise to solve unemployment, rearm Germany and challenge the treaty of Versailles

2.4. rearmament began in secret at first

2.5. he withdrew from the League of Nations after not getting what he expected in the Disarmament Conference.

2.6. in 1936 he reintroduced conscription

2.7. rearmament was a popular move in Germany and it boosted Nazi support

2.8. Britain thought that if Germany had a strong army they would be a good barrier against communism. Britain had already signed a naval agreement with Hitler allowing it to increase its navy up to 35% of the British one even knowing this was against the terms of the Treaty.

3. The Saar

3.1. The Saar region had been run by the League of Nations since 1919. The treaty had promised a plebiscite for 1935 where the people could vote if they wanted to belong to Germany or to France.

3.2. Hitler and his minister Goebbels organized an enormous campaign to convince people to vote for the Reich

3.3. 90% of the population voted to return to the German rule. It was a great success for Hitler.