Shields 1

Jacquelyn Shields
ENR World History­Period 1
Mrs. Curtin
18 February 2015
What If Essay
World War II was a tragic event in history, which engulfed almost the entire world in war. A major cause of World War II came from aftermath of World War I. The Treaty of
Versailles, signed after the war, laid these consequences in Germany’s hands. It left them with a huge amount of debt and many limitations were put in place to keep Germany from regaining power. Under the power of Adolf Hitler, Germany went against a lot of rules the Treaty of
Versailles implemented, which slowly helped them gain strength and attention from enemy nations who were a part of the signing.
First off, they gained strength by the decision of building up an enormous army. With this army, they sent troops into the Rhineland, which was the first rule of the Treaty of Versailles they ignored. At the same time, Italy and Japan began to expand their empires in similar method to Germany. With the same motive of expanding their land, Germany made alliances with Italy and Japan, which then became known as the Axis Powers. This was another tactic they used that was against the treaty, which attempted to keep Germany from gaining a stronger army. As the aggression continued, Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister, and the League of
Nations did nothing to stop it. Chamberlain used methods of appeasement to try to please Hitler because he did not want to go to another war. Also, an alliance with the Soviet Union made
Germany even more powerful. Both wanted control of different regions of Poland, but as they

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were about to attack, France and Britain jumped in and this was the unannounced start of World
War II.
Once World War II started, Germany quickly advanced to the front of the pack of world power. The League of Nations and the United States were both still very skeptical towards stopping Hitler and the Nazis. After Winston Churchill came into power, though, Germany had met its match. With a great amount of power with his own, Churchill supplied the British with all new aircrafts, that were of much greater quality than Germany’s. Meanwhile the United States stayed neutral and out of the picture, until Japan brought them into the war when they attacked
Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. The United States immediately declared war on Japan and soon after the Germans recognized the vulnerability of the U.S. and declared war on us. In return the United States declared war back on Germany, and fought the war on foot with them and a war in the sea with Japan. In Europe, Germany was waging a war against Britain, the Soviet
Union, and the United States. Germany was receiving little help from Japan because they had to deal with the nuclear bombs that the United States dropped on them, and Italy was not a big enough power to effectively help Germany. Bit by bit, Germany became weaker and lost much of their power, until the Allied Powers were able to pull through again and defeat the world dominating hungry Nazis.
After many years of building up a strong new army from World War I and violating basically every part of the Treaty of Versailles, the Germans were defeated once again. The
Allied Powers with their strong alliance and powerful teamwork, were able to slowly disintegrate the so called Nazi Empire in Germany.

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If Chamberlain stood up to Hitler at the Munich Conference, Hitler would have either tried another approach to get what he wanted, or he may have just stopped trying to exceed in his idea of world domination. He could have devised another plan to seek out the land he wanted, and this could have been for the worse, or for the better. If Chamberlain stood up to him, maybe other countries and the League of Nations would have started fighting back against Hitler. This then would have caused Hitler to take a step back, making him more vulnerable to surrender.
World War II