Key+events+in+Nazi+foreign+policy

Key events in Nazi Foreign policy
 * What foreign policy steps were taken by Germany from 1933-1939 that led to the outbreak of WWII?


 * 1933:** Germany left the League of Nations
 * In October 1933 Hitler took his first foreign policy move when Germany withdrew from both the League of Nations and the World Disarmament Conference
 * 1934:** Attempted Nazi coup in Austria crushed and Poland and Germany sign an alliance
 * 1935:** Germany broke the military clauses of the Treaty of Versailles


 * 1936:** German troops reoccupied the Rhineland and Rome-Berlin Axis is signed
 * By 1936 Hitler felt that the time had come to test the French. In March three infantry battalions crosses the Rhine bridges and reoccupied the Rhineland, the area that was to be permanently demilitarised under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. The reoccupation was a big gamble, Hitler worked against the advice of his generals and in the knowledge that France had vastly superior forces if they chose to resist the Germans.
 * In Mein Kamf Hitler presents Italy as a natural ally and in 1936 this relationship was taking shape. A year earlier Italy invaded the north African state of Abyssinia and the League of Nations had sought to solve the problem by imposing economic sanctions against Italy. These sanctions failed but they had the effect of pushing the Italians closer to Germany. In 1936 both Germany and Italy sent forces to fight in the Spanish Civil War. The bond became closer between the two countries in 1937 when Mussolini made a visit to Germany thus the 'Rome-Berlin axis'


 * 1938:** Anshluss with Austria and Sudeten handed to Germany as a result of the Munich conference
 * Hitler always intended to unite the country of his birth (Austria) with Germany, which he now led. However a union between the two had been forbidden in the 1919 peace settlement. The events that led towards Anshluss, was actually done by Kurt von Schuchnigg and not Hitler; In early March 1938 Schuchnigg visited
 * 1939:** Rest of the Czech lands occupied by the Germans, German invaded Poland and WWII begins
 * 1939:** Rest of the Czech lands occupied by the Germans, German invaded Poland and WWII begins