Munich Agreement

In the early hours of 30 September 1938, the leaders of Germany, Britain, France and Italy signed an agreement in Munich allowing Nazi Germany to annex the Sudetenland, the German-speaking border regions of Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovakia itself was not invited to the talks, and neither was the Soviet Union. Hailed at the time as a triumph that had preserved peace, the deal became the classic example of appeasement: within six months Hitler had seized the rest of the Czech lands.

Czechoslovakia was created in 1918 out of the collapsing Austro-Hungarian Empire. More than three million Germans, almost 23 per cent of the population, lived within its borders, mostly in the mountainous fringes of Bohemia and Moravia that they called the Sudetenland. They had not been asked whether they wanted to join the new state, and the Great Depression hit their export industries especially hard. In 1933 Konrad Henlein set up the Sudeten German Party, which soon won most German votes and became, by 1935, the second-largest party in the country. The border regions also held Czechoslovakia's main fortifications, making them vital to its defence.

After Germany's annexation of Austria earlier in 1938, Adolf Hitler turned on Czechoslovakia, demanding self-determination for the Sudeten Germans while secretly planning an invasion, codenamed Operation Green, for no later than 1 October. The British prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, flew to meet Hitler at Berchtesgaden on 15 September. Britain and France then pressed Czechoslovakia to give up all areas where Germans made up more than half the population, offering in return to guarantee what remained. A week later, at Bad Godesberg, Hitler raised his terms, demanding the territory by 28 September. German-backed forces had already begun fighting in the border districts, and Poland and Hungary pressed their own territorial claims.

With war apparently close, a conference opened in Munich on 29 September. Hitler, Chamberlain, the French premier Édouard Daladier and Benito Mussolini reached agreement that day and signed it at about 1:30 am on 30 September. The plan, formally put forward by Mussolini, closely followed Hitler's Godesberg demands: German troops were to finish occupying the Sudetenland by 10 October, with an international commission to decide other disputed districts.

Czechoslovakia was told that it could fight Germany alone or accept. Its government gave way the same day, and President Edvard Beneš resigned on 5 October. Before leaving Munich, Chamberlain had Hitler sign a short statement promising that their two countries would never go to war again, and on his return to London he declared that he had brought "peace for our time". Large crowds cheered him, and opinion polls taken in Britain, France and the US showed majority support for the deal.

Czechoslovakia's neighbours took their share. Poland seized a small border area in October, and the First Vienna Award of 2 November 1938 handed southern Slovakia and part of Subcarpathian Ruthenia to Hungary. In March 1939 Slovakia declared independence as a German client state, and on 15 March German troops occupied the remaining Czech lands, which became the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Germany gained Czechoslovakia's arms industry, tanks and weapons.

Winston Churchill, a leading critic of the agreement, later argued that Britain and France should have stood up to Hitler over Czechoslovakia and sought Soviet help. Talks between the Soviet Union and the Western powers broke down after Munich, and in 1939 Moscow made its own bargain with Berlin, the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In 1942 Britain declared itself no longer bound by the agreement, which Germany had destroyed, and the Free French proclaimed it void from the start. After the war the Sudetenland was returned to Czechoslovakia and most of its German-speaking population was expelled. Today "Munich" stands for the folly of trying to buy off aggressive dictators.

Our 1938 map shows Nazi Germany and Czechoslovakia, today's Czech Republic and Slovakia, in the year of the crisis, and the 1945 map shows the region after the war.