what is appeasement

Appeasement is a diplomatic policy of making political, material, or territorial concessions to an aggressive power to avoid conflict. The term is most often applied to the policy of appeasing Hitler and Mussolini, operating jointly at that time, during 1937 and 1938 by continuous concessions granted in the hope of reaching a point of saturation when the dictators would be willing to accede to international collaboration. The policy of appeasement was most closely associated with British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who sought to accommodate Italys invasion of Ethiopia in 1935 and took no action when Germany absorbed Austria in 1938. The policy was instituted in the hope of avoiding war, but it is now widely discredited as a policy of weakness. Despite the concessions made, Hitler was undeterred by appeasement and continued to expand German territory, leading to the outbreak of World War II.