The Cause of World War II: The Great Depression and The League of Nations

World War II was a mass destruction that had ever occurred. This miserable event could have been prevented, but due the following reasons the prevention failed. The great depression was a barrier in preventing WWII; large numbers of unemployed people made leaders like Hitler much more appealing that they could otherwise be. The League of Nations could not do anything while aggressor nations successfully used force to get what they wanted as it lacked effective armed forces. Another reason that neglected the growth of fascist nations and led to WWII was the appeasement policy, which suggested giving into the demands of aggressive powers.

The Great Depression, which started in 1929 created vast unemployment and poverty. As a result, people chose to have communist, fascist and Nazi governments which promised to solve all of their problems. This was a great opportunity for dictators like Hitler and Mussolini; they attracted people who were in need of solutions. Since countries in Europe were occupied with economic problems caused by the depression, they didn’t want to interfere with the problems of each other presuming that it would cause another war and cost them major losses similar to WWI. So the growth of the axis countries war ignored and the axis countries taking this as an advantage started expanding their territories. Consequently the following was stated “… isolationism was adopted by many countries and became a major cause of World War II” (Bolotta 131). In the view of all these facts the depression was a cause WWII.

The League Nations was established to solve disputes among countries all around the world, but it never served its purpose during the time when the fascist nations started to invade other countries. Although the League was President Wilson’s dream, the United Stated never joined it. Canada joined the League but was in the world of problems caused by the depression, therefore it did not take on an active role in the organization. This was the time when Japan took upper hand and started invading Manchuria – the league did nothing to stop Japan!

The Canadian Prime Minister’s attitude towards this was “…Canada isn’t an important member of the League… what can one man do who represents only ten and a half million people?” (Bolotta 131). This shows how ignorant the members of the League were. Besides this, there is another reason that the League of Nations failed to prevent WWII, the countries worldwide were suffering due to the Great Depression and this had weakened many countries; good examples of this are Britain and France. These countries joined the League but did nothing because their armed forces were weakened as a result of WWI and they couldn’t build weapons because of their economic problems. Hence, the League of Nations failed to stop aggressive countries because isolationist attitudes were adopted in countries and the effect of the Great Depression Weakened it, and this inattentiveness led to WWII.

The Policy of Appeasement which was supposed to stop the power-craving dictators by giving into their demands evidently, motivated these countries to become more powerful and to conquer more land. Neville Chamberlain the British P.M. adopted this policy because he believed that Hitler would stop his invasions but Hitler’s promises were worthless. He made promises to get what he wanted, and the leaders at that time believed Hitler and were misled. For instance Mackenzie King – he visited Hitler in Germany and returned with a good impression of Hitler. He described Hitler as “a man of deep sincerity” (Bolotta 136) meaning that Hitler was determined to avoid any future war.

One of the political leaders who was not tricked by Hitler was Winston Churchill who was to be future P.M. of Britain at that time, he remarked, “there is no doubt that Hitler had a power of fascinating men… it is better to keep away from him.” (Bolotta 137). However, P.M. Churchill was ignored and Austria was taken over in 1938. Soon Hitler focused on Sudentenland as it was rich in natural resources and had a good defence (mountains) for war. Many politicians believed that the terms of the Treaty of Versailles as being too strict so giving in to Hitler’s demands was fair, accordingly Britain and France agreed. After this Hitler had more confidence and invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia and moved onto Poland but it was a world war. The policy gave room to the Nazis, dishonoured the Treaty Versailles and caused a war where as, it’s intension was to avoid a war.

In conclusion, World War II that could have been prevented simply slipped out of hand, because of the Depression, the role of the League of Nations and the unwise Appeasement Policy. The Great Depression lessened the power of the allied nations and made the axis leaders appealing as they guaranteed prosperity. The nations that joined the League were inactive since they were short of soldiers, and in addition to that, they did not have sufficient artillery and weapons due to their economical struggle.

The appeasement policy, which was adopted in fear of another war, was an advantage for the Nazis. Seeing that they had no one to oppose them, the Nazi army openly marched into other territories. It appeared as if Britain and France did not have much regard for the Treaty of Versailles themselves as they gave into the demands of Hitler by following the Appeasement policy. World War II could have been easily prevented, but soon took place due to the negligence of the western nations.