September 29-30, 1938

Anniversary of Infamous Munich Agreement

Chamberlain shaking hands with Hitler over the Munich agreement, 1938

September 29-30 marks the 86th anniversary of the infamous Munich Agreement signed between the governments of Britain and France, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy in 1938. The Agreement handed over Czechoslovakia to occupation by Nazi Germany and dismemberment by other powers. It was the culmination of the reactionary appeasement policy followed by the British government and its allies. This policy was designed to encourage and reward fascist aggression in general, such as Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia, and particularly to encourage Nazi Germany to expand eastwards, to occupy territories such as the Ukraine, as well as the Soviet Union.

The British government had long hoped fascism would crush Bolshevism and the construction of the world’s first socialist state. The Soviet Union, faced with Nazi aggression, called on Britain and France to sign a mutual assistance pact with military clauses, based on its long held and principled policy of collective security against such aggression. The governments of Britain and France refused this offer, preferring instead to appease Hitler and Mussolini. They met in Munich without the participation of the governments of Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union, having already demanded that the government of Czechoslovakia should not invoke its mutual defence agreement with the Soviet Union.

The Munich Agreement was a great betrayal by the governments of Britain and France, not only of the people of Czechoslovakia, but the people of all countries of Europe and the rest of the world. Winston Churchill said at the time: “The partition of Czechoslovakia under pressure from England and France amounts to the complete surrender of the Western democracies to the Nazi threat of force. Such a collapse will bring peace of security neither to England nor to France… It is not Czechoslovakia alone which is menaced, but also the freedom and the democracy of all nations.” In Parliament he condemned Prime Minster Chamberlain, who had contemptuously referred to “a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing,” saying: “You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour and you will have war.” The Munich Agreement which, amongst other things, ceded Czechoslovakia’s important armaments industry to Hitler, sealed the fate of Europe. A year later Britain and France again refused to sign the collective security pact proposed by the Soviet Union. This led directly to Hitler’s occupation of Europe and the outbreak of World War II in September 1939.

Left: Chamberlain arriving at Oberwiesenfeld airport to sign the agreement in Munich, 1938.
Right: Chamberlain waves the infamous Munich piece of paper, “peace for our time.”