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Y218: International Relations 1890–1941

Dictators and Appeasers in Europe 1929–1941: the Depression, Mussolini and appeasement

  • 3 things to know
  • Unit group 2

Overview

Recall questions on the Depression and international relations, Mussolini’s aims, the Abyssinian War and Hoare-Laval, Italian policy to 1940, appeasement and its motives, the Rhineland, Munich and the end of appeasement.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started
Numbers

Trace Italian foreign policy from 1936 to 1940.

Process

Give five reasons why Britain pursued appeasement.

Evaluation

Give one argument for and one against Chamberlain's decision at Munich.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    How did the Great Depression damage international relations?

    Model answer

    Collapsing trade and rising tariffs set states against each other, governments turned inward, reparations were abandoned and disarmament talks broke down, American opinion retreated into neutrality legislation, and states without resources of their own began to look to conquest instead.

  2. 2

    What were Mussolini's aims in foreign policy by the mid-1930s?

    Model answer

    He wanted prestige, an empire in Africa, dominance of the Mediterranean and the Balkans, and recognition as an equal of the other great powers.

  3. 3

    Why did the Abyssinian War of 1935–1936 transform the international situation?

    Model answer

    Britain and France tried to satisfy Mussolini and uphold the League at the same time, imposed sanctions that excluded oil and left the Suez Canal open, and so failed on both counts: the League was discredited and Mussolini turned towards Hitler.

  4. 4

    What was the Hoare-Laval Pact and why did it matter?

    Model answer

    It was a secret Anglo-French proposal to give Mussolini much of Abyssinia; when it leaked, public outrage forced both ministers out and exposed the democracies as willing to buy off an aggressor at a victim's expense.

  5. 5

    Trace Italian foreign policy from 1936 to 1940.

    Model answer

    Mussolini intervened in Spain, formed the Axis with Germany in 1936 and joined the Anti-Comintern Pact, left the League, invaded Albania in 1939 and signed the Pact of Steel, stayed out of the war in September 1939 and then joined in June 1940 as France fell.

  6. 6

    Define appeasement as practised by Britain and France in the 1930s.

    Model answer

    It was the policy of settling the dictators' grievances by negotiation and concession, in the belief that reasonable demands satisfied would remove the causes of war.

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Sort every topic into what you know and what you do not, then drill only the weak ones.

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Rapid timed gap-fills on the terms and numbers you need to recall without thinking.

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Assemble a full-mark answer from its marking points, in the order an examiner wants them.

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TrueFalse

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Spot the fault in a statement. The traps are the mistakes students actually make.

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Short focus games to reset attention, so the next set lands better than the last.

Every question in Y218: International Relations 1890–1941, on a schedule.

Attempt a question from memory, write the correct version, then attempt it again. Levo records the jump between your first attempt and your last, and brings each question back on the day you are due to forget it.

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