Daily News: Paths to War
By: Shelby Weber
Germany
Adolf Hitler believed that Germans belonged to an Aryan race. He believed that Germany is capable of building a great civilization and needs more land for it. The Treaty of Versailles has limited the power of Germanys power. Hitler did not stop there, he was heading in the steps of indirect violation of the Treaty. He expanded the army from 100,000 troops to 550,000. France, Great Britain, and Italy all condemned against Germany but then got to caught up with their own problems and did nothing further. Hitler was convinced that the Western states have no intension of using force to maintain the Treaty. So he sent troops into Rhineland which was a demilitarized area, so that means Germans are not allowed to have weapons there. France wants to use force but Great Britain wont help. Britain just said that Germans were only "going into their own back garden." Now Britain is beginning to practice the appeasement policy which is based on belief that if European states satisfied the reasonable demands of dissatisfied powers, the dissatisfied powers would be content. Hitler then gained new allies, Benito Mussolini of Italy. Hitler proclaimed that Germany was once again "world power". He threatened Austria with invasion. Hitler's next move was to destruct Sudetenland in northwestern Czechoslovakia. Hitler got control over Bohemia and Moravia in Czechoslovakia. Britain started to see the danger of Hitler and offered Poland protection. Both France and Britain realized that only the Soviet Union was powerful enough to help contain Nazi aggression. They began political and military negotiations with Joseph Stalin, the Soviet dictator. Hitler worries that the Soviets might make an alliance which could lead to a two-front war for Germany, so Hitler made his own agreement with Stalin. Hitler then shocking the world by announcing the nonaggression pact so he has the freedom to attack Poland.
Japan
The Japanese soldiers disguised themselves as Chinese as they blew up small sections of the Manchurian Railway, by Mukden. They did this to blame the Chinese so the Japanese could take all the Manchuria in a series of rapid military advances. Manchuria has a lot of resources the Japanese need. After this conquest, the Japanese commits to the expansionist policy which is a policy of enlarging the Japanese Empire. After about a year, they formed Manchuria into a separate state and renamed it Manchukuo. They placed Henry Pu Yi as a puppet ruler, on the throne. Some worldwide protest against the Japanese led to the League of Nations to send investigators. Japan then withdrew from the League and the United States refused to recognize the Japanese takeover but was unwilling to threaten force. Now Japan is continuing to takeover the eastern part of Inner Mongolia and areas in north China around Beijing. Then the war with China, Chiang Kai-shek tried to avoid Japan so they could work on the Communist. But after Japan started to take over China, Chiang ended against Communists and went against Japan. Japan was not planning on going against China but when they did, they really did. Chiang was losing a lot of people but refused to surrender so he moved his government upriver. Japan hoped to force Chiang to agree to join a New Order in East Asia, comprising Japan, Manchuria, and China. Where Japan would attempt to establish a new system of control. Japan then launches attack on China and demanded the right to exploit economic resources in French Indochina. The United States objected and warned Japan that they would apply economic sanctions which is restrictions intended to enforce international law. Japan did not know what to do because they didn't want to lose raw materials from the U.S. After a lot of debate of Japan, they decided on to launch a surprise attack on U.S. and European colonies in Southeast Asia.