1. Mid-term Exam. EUH4280/ Second World War Questions relating to the Interwar period.

2. Major Political trends  Fate of liberalism in Europe: examples?  Major political, and economic forces in Italy and Germany which gave rise to fascism and Nazism during the 1920s and 1930s.  Examples from Italy?  Examples from Germany?

3. Post-war obstacles to peace  To what extent can the outbreak of the Second World War be attributed to the Treaty of Versailles and other post-World War I treaties?  What were the specific aspects of these treaties which were most problematic?  What impact did the re-drawing of the map of Europe have on general European affairs?

4. Western democratic responses to Fascism/Communism  Was Appeasement a deliberate surrender to Hitler’s and Mussolini’s efforts to revise radically the post-war status quo in Europe? (Key terms to define: “appeasement”, and rival foreign policies, “collective security”. )

5. “Renegade countries?”  Even less so than the democratic powers of France and Great Britain, none of the “totalitarian” regimes in the inter-war years (Germany, Italy, and the Soviet Union) appeared willing to obey the conventions of international diplomacy as defined by bodies like the League of Nations. Why?

6. Count-down to War  Summary of the major diplomatic events between 1938 and 1939 which contributed to Hitler’s decision to go to war over the Polish question.  Anschluss of 1938  Czech crisis of 1938  Spanish Civil War

7. War Begins…  What was the so-called Phoney War? Summarize what happened during this period and then be prepared to explain how this phase of the war shaped the course of the next one (1940-1941).

8. First Stage: Chronology  1 September, 1939 -- Outbreak of war: what were Hitler’s war aims in 1939?  Allied response to invasion of Poland.  November, 1939-March, 1940 -- Russo-Finnish war  April-May, 1940 -- Scandinavian interlude (Hitler invades Denmark, Norway)