Why did Britain take so long to start fighting Hitler?

Answer 1

The so-called 'appeasement policy' embodied by British prime minister Neville Chamberlain has been much reviled afterwards, but not many stop to consider that at the time he had a number of very sound reasons not to go to war:

- England had no allies it could rely on: France only cared about and prepared for its own defence, the US were firmly isolationist, Russia could not be relied on and Stalin and the Communists were not trusted anyway, and all other European countries were either poorly armed, wanted to stay out of harm's way or were fascist themselves

- England had a strong fleet, but not a strong European army that could be a match for Hitler's Wehrmacht - as proved to be the case when the British fought the Germans in 1940 and had to quickly draw back and repatriate from Dunkirk

- Hitler's territorial claims were often directed at territories and countries that had been 'created' by the Allies in the Versailles peace treaty of 1919. By now Britain had come to realize that many of the lines drawn then had been arbitrarily drawn and that for instance the "Anschluss" with Austria had been something the German-speaking Austrians had themselves wanted in 1919, but had then been denied by the Allies. Other territories had been German until 1918. Of course none of this was any justification for Hitler's actions, but it made it difficult for Britain to use the argument of "infringement on the ancient rights of other countries"; Britain would be only fighting - on its own - to enforce the Allies' decisions about Eastern Europe

- On a more opportunistic note, Hitler's territorial ambitions were directed eastwards, away from Britain. It almost stood to reason that finally Hitler's ambitions would clash with Russian interests, which might get these two countries start a war with each other. With little to no sympathy for either the Communists or the Nazis, Britain would be happy to watch the two countries fighting - and weakening - each other.

Of course, with the 20/20 vision that is hindsight we now say that Chamberlain was being naive. But we have to remember that Hitler made a big show of being "reasonable" and only wanting to redress the wrongs of Versailles. Had Hitler been a 'normal' man and a shrewd politician and had he quit at that point while he was (far) ahead, history might have proven Chamberlain right.