To What Extent was World War II caused by the Failure of the League Nations? (pre)

History Essay, Study Question:

To What Extent was World War II caused by the Failure of the League Nations?

World War II was brought on by numerous factors that together finally made the war unavoidable. The League of Nations which was created after the First World War and this group of countries were not really a cause of the war, but even though they might have had the power to stop it before it was too late, they did not.

The League of Nations consisted of countries in Europe, which wanted to prevent war from occurring again. The strongest forces in this organization were Britain and France. One of the errors that might have led to their failure was that they would let neither Germany nor Russia join until later on when you might say it was too late. Also the way they chose to handle disputes when they occurred were in a way of appeasement, not by military force. I think this is a great way of thinking, if you join and fight there will be a war right? But if you try to appease and compromise there might be ways to stop a disputed from ending in a global war! But this way of politics did not work out in this case as we have seen, the war did break out, and when the League of Nations, or what was left of it, finally got fully involved against Germany with military force, Germany had already grown to strong and a full scale world war broke out.

Of course other factors also played in, Adolf Hitler in Germany, Mussolini in Italy and other war leaders were chosen in Japan as a response to the global economic depression. People of these countries were eager for better times, better economy and a strong leadership which could work the country out of the state of depression. Therefore such leaders got popular and could take control of their countries and build up military forces, preparing for war. As this was ignored by the League of Nations which was the peacemakers, countries like Germany, Italy and Japan could build strong military forces without anyone trying to oppose them. Finally Germany marched in to Austria which had been forbidden by the League of Nations, and they were still met by appeasement and compromise. Same thing happened when Italy with military force invaded Ethiopia, not one country from the League of Nations tried to stop them by military force, as they wanted to solve everything without war.

This is why you can argue that the League of Nations to a high extend let the war occur, but the fact is that they were not guilty for starting the war, they did not cause the war but simply let it happen without opposition, until it was too late.