The Neville Chamberlain "Peace For Our Time" Diplomacy Award

We've often felt that the world needs to recognize those who practice naive, overly idealistic diplomacy. We would call it the Neville Chamberlain "Peace For Our Time" Award.

Who was Neville Chamberlain?

Neville Chamberlain was Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1937 until June 1940. Today he is remembered primarily for his policy of appeasement, which essentially meant giving Adolf Hitler anything he wanted in order to avoid war with Germany. The perhaps most infamous example of appeasement came in September 1938, when Chamberlain agreed to let Nazi Germany absorb a portion of Czechoslovakia. The Czechs were not consulted. Chamberlain returned from his Munich meeting with Hitler waving a treaty which he said insured "Peace for our time."

Less than one year later Nazi Germany invaded Poland, starting World War II.

Was Chamberlain really a boob, or was he dealt an impossible hand?

History books often portray Neville Chamberlain as a naive, foolish leader who was duped by Hitler. It's pretty easy to argue this position, since his appeasement policy failed to prevent war. More recently some have argued that Chamberlain was not really such a fool. They argue that he didn't trust Hitler, but he needed to buy time to rebuild Britain's military. There is some evidence to support this view. Britain's military was indeed been allowed to deteriorate dangerously after World War I. Even worse, its arms production capacity was also greatly diminished. The situation was so bad that in 1936 when an expected naval arms limitation treaty failed to materialize, Britain could not redesign its new King George V battleships to take larger guns simply because there were not enough skilled draftsmen to prepare the plans. Chamberlain was a vocal proponent of rearmament even before he became prime minister, and during his time in office concrete steps were taken to correct Britain's military weakness. Large numbers of the new Hawker Hurricane and Supermarine Spitfire fighters were ordered, and these became the backbone of the RAF's Figher Command in World War II. The Lancaster heavy bomber also originated in this period. When British aircraft production capacity was exhausted, more aircraft were purchased from the United States. Construction of the King George V battleships, Illustrious class aircraft carriers, and numerous smaller warships was started.

There were also strategic reasons to delay war with Germany for as long as possible. Japan, once an ally of Great Britain, was by the 1930s an aggressive military power. War with Japan seemed increasingly probable, and Britain lacked the power to fight Germany and Japan simultaneously.

Whether motivated by foolishness or desperation, Chamberlain's appeasement policy was undeniably a failure. His story should serve as a cautionary tale about the limits of diplomacy.

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