Munich Agreement

The Munich Agreement, signed in the early hours of 30 September 1938, allowed Nazi Germany to annex the Sudetenland, the border regions of Czechoslovakia where many ethnic Germans lived. Britain, France, Germany and Italy concluded it without the participation of Czechoslovakia itself. It has become the defining example of appeasement, the policy of granting concessions to an aggressive power in the hope of preserving peace, and its name remains shorthand for the dangers of yielding to threats.

The crisis grew out of Hitler's ambition to unite German-speaking peoples under one Reich. Germany had absorbed Austria in the Anschluss of March 1938, and Hitler next turned to the Sudetenland, which had been placed inside Czechoslovakia after the First World War. Konrad Henlein's Sudeten German Party, which received support from Berlin, pressed demands for autonomy that escalated as negotiations went on. Czechoslovakia was a democracy with a capable army, strong border fortifications and an alliance with France, as well as a pact with the Soviet Union. Yet France was reluctant to fight without British backing, and Britain's prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, was determined to avoid another continental war, which memories of 1914-1918 made almost unthinkable.

Chamberlain flew to Germany several times in September 1938 to negotiate with Hitler, who raised his demands at each stage. As a deadline approached and war seemed imminent, Mussolini proposed a conference in Munich. There, Chamberlain, French premier Édouard Daladier, Hitler and Mussolini agreed that German troops would occupy the Sudeten territories in stages. Czechoslovak representatives were left waiting and were pressed to accept the outcome. Returning to London, Chamberlain waved a paper bearing Hitler's signature and declared that he believed it meant "peace for our time." The phrase is often misattributed to Churchill, who in fact denounced the settlement in Parliament as a total and unmitigated defeat.

The consequences were swift. Czechoslovakia lost its defensive frontier, much of its industry and a large share of its territory, with Poland and Hungary also taking slices. In March 1939 Germany occupied the remainder of the Czech lands, showing that Hitler's aims went beyond uniting Germans. Britain and France then guaranteed Poland's independence, and when Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939, the Second World War began.

Historians still debate Munich. Critics argue that it sacrificed a viable ally and strengthened Hitler at a moment when his generals were uneasy about risking war. Defenders note that Britain and France were underprepared, that dominion and public opinion opposed war, and that the delay allowed rearmament, particularly of the Royal Air Force. Whatever the verdict, the agreement shaped postwar thinking about how democracies should respond to aggression.