Nazi Foreign Policy - Timeline aims Flashcards
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened on October 14 1933
- Germany leaves the League of Nations and Disarmament Conference in Geneva.
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What was the League of Nations
- An international body established in 1920 to encourage disarmament and diplomacy and prevent war.
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened on January 26th 1934
- Germany and Poland signed a Non-Aggression Pact.
- The Pact meant that Poland could not join the USSR in an attack on Germany
- -Poland stood between Germany and the USSR and was, therefore, a useful ally-
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened in Autumn 1936
- Visit to Britain - Hitler sent Ribbentrop to London as Germany’s new ambassador with the specified objective of securing an agreement with Britain.
- Hitler was committed to the idea of a British alliance as a way of securing his long-term aim of crushing the USSR.
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened on November 1st 1936
- Rome-Berlin Axis - following the Outbreak of Spanish Civil War
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What was the Rome-Berlin Axis
- Following the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, Germany and Italy announced the Rome-Berlin Axis,
- which promised mutual support short of war and political, economic and ideological cooperation.
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened on November 25th 1936
Anti-Comintern Pact
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What was the Anti-Comintern Pact
- Germany and Japan established the Anti-Comintern (anti-communist) Pact,
- which outlined the amount of aid to give if an attack by the USSR seemed likely
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
How was the Anti-Comintern Pact useful to Germany
- Relations between Japan and the USSR had broken down
- following Japan’s defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese war
- so it was useful for Germany to have an ally geographically on the east of the USSR
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What happened on May 22nd 1939
Germany and Italy signed the Pact of Steel
Making Strategic Alliances with other countries
What was the Pact of Steel
- Germany and Italy were both committed both to close economic ties and promised mutual military aid/support in the event of war
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What happened on July 25th 1933
- Failed Nazi putsch and political coup in Austria.
- Mussolini responded by moving 40,000 Italian troops to the Austro-Italian frontier
- (Austria was an important buffer state between Germany and Italy).
What is a coup
- a sudden, violent, and illegal seizure of power from a government.
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What happened on March 16th 1935
- Rearmament:
- Germany announced the existence of a Luftwaffe (the German air force)
- introduced conscription
- announced it was rearming inc a peacetime army of 550,000
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What happened on June 18th 1935
- Britain and Germany signed the Naval Agreement
- This ignored the ToV and allowed Germany to have a navy 35% of the strength of the British fleet
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What began in 1936
Hitler’s “Four Year Plan” focused on the creation of a war economy
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What happened on March 7 1936
Re-militarisation of the Rhineland
What was the re-militarisation of the Rhineland
- German troops re-occupied the Rhineland, going against both the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and Locarno Pact (1925).
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What happened on March 11-13 1938
- The Anschluss
- Following a rush and poorly executed invasion of Austria, the country was absorbed into Germany.
- The Germans quickly extended anti-Jewish legislation to Austria.
Breaking/ Overturning the ToV
What became evident in summer 1939
- Extent of German rearmament:
- Hitler had 103 infantry divisions of 15,000 to 18,000 men
- This included 3000 tanks
- The navy was small put powerful
- The air force had grown to around 2000 fighter and bomber planes and crew
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on January 13th 1935
- Saar plebiscite - people voted to join Germany
- The Saarland, for the previous 15 years, had been under the control of the League of Nation
- This represented a great propaganda success for the Nazis
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on 29-30th September 1938
- The Munich Agreement - a conference attended by Germany, Italy, Britain and France.
Here, the Sudetenland was ceded to Germany.
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on October 1st 1938
The Czech crisis - Germany took the Sudetenland.
There were 3.5 million Sudeten Germans in the border region of Czechoslovakia.
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened in March 1939
- Invasion of Czechoslovakia - Germany invaded and occupied further regions of Czechoslovakia - Bohemia and Moravia.
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on 1st Septemebr 1939
- Germany invaded Poland
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on April 9th 1940
- Germany invaded Denmark & Norway
Creation of Lebensraum for German people
What happened on April 10th 1940
- Germany invaded Belgium & the Netherlands
What was the Hossback Conference, November 1937
- Hossbach Conference -
- Hitler addressed the chiefs of armed services and Foreign Minister Neurath. He outlined three war scenarios.
- The conference revealed how Hitler’s policy was changing from one centred on diplomacy to one where military force could play a greater part
What was the Nazi-Soviet Pact
- Germany and the USSR signed a Non-Aggression Pact
- They agreed:
- to refrain from going to war with each other
- to invade Poland
- to divide eastern Europe between the spheres of influence of both powers
What took place on August 23, 1939
Nazi-Soviet Pact
What is a Sphere of influence
- a country or area in which another country has power to affect developments though it has no formal authority.
Germany invaded Poland.
