Shades of Appeasement
The United States finds itself at a political crossroads in its dedication to international involvement. Meanwhile, its predominant strategic adversaries – predominantly Russia and China – have grown increasingly aggressive in their subversion of the international rules-based order emplaced by the U.S. and its allies since the end of World War II (WWII). Whether in taking actions above the point of armed conflict in places like Ukraine, below it in the waters surrounding Taiwan, or through proxies in the Middle East, the world is progressively falling into chaos.
Many, rightly, see the need for change – but there is one option being considered that is grossly misguided. Across the American electorate, there is a quickly growing argument that the United States should make concessions to aggressive foreign powers to prevent armed conflict. These voices are following a concept known as appeasement, which, as the late Henry Kissinger defined it, is a “foreign policy of pacifying an aggrieved country through negotiation in order to prevent war.” But as proven by the countless examples of appeasement’s failures, from the infamous example of the Munich Agreement of WWII to the general indifference more recently displayed by the international community after Russia’s invasion of Georgia, such things lead to further conflict.
History of Appeasement
The classic example of appeasement is the Munich Agreement, which was a treaty between Great Britain, France, and Nazi Germany which gave Germany control over the Sudetenland; territory that belonged to Czechoslovakia, in return for a guarantee by Hitler that Germany would not invade more territory. This agreement was formed without the participation of the Czechoslovak government and forced them to hand over large parts of their lands. The British Prime Minister at the time, Neville Chamberlain said “My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honor. I believe it is peace for our time.” Unfortunately, Chamberlain was wrong, and Germany would go on to invade the rest of Czechoslovakia. In September of 1939, less than a year after the Munich Agreement was signed, Germany invaded Poland, kicking off World War Two. Chamberlain’s appeasement of Nazi Germany failed to prevent another great war; all it did was give Germany more time to build up its military forces without arousing suspicion from the Allies. If Britain and France had threatened to declare war if Germany invaded the Sudetenland, Germany would have had less time to build up its military, it would have lacked Czechoslovak resources at the start of the war, and Czechoslovakia would have still had its heavily fortified border regions from which it could better defend itself against the German invasion. If German aggression was properly deterred, World War 2 may have been much shorter and less deadly.
Once again, appeasement was used in 2008 following a Russian invasion of Georgia, a small country in the Caucasus Mountain range. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the newly independent state of Georgia struggled to deal with internal separatist movements, and in the 1990s two of them, those of Abkhazia and South Ossetia revolted against the Georgian state with the backing of the Kremlin. Russian “peacekeepers” then inserted themselves to maintain de facto control. Years later, in 2008, following explosions in South Ossetia which both sides blamed on one another, war resumed between the Georgian government and separatist forces backed by Russian troops. The Russians and their separatist allies took many Georgian towns and cities, and a new ceasefire was negotiated, refreezing the conflict with much more territory under Moscow’s influence. During this round of conflict in 2008, the West did little to support the Georgian government, and helped orchestrate the ceasefire which greatly benefited the Russians. In addition, after the ceasefire the Georgian government requested defensive weapons to protect its land if Russia ever attacked again, a request which the Bush administration denied. Finally, when Barrack Obama became president the next year, he introduced a “Russia Reset” policy which essentially forgot Russia’s past transgressions and tried to start anew. Instead, all it did was appease Russia’s demands, allowing Moscow to get away with its invasion, and giving Vladimir Putin a green light for his future actions in Ukraine.
Are there cases for appeasement though? Are the criticisms of it so absolute? Is the U.S. – having shouldered the burden of leading and upholding the international order since the fall of the Berlin Wall – wrong to look at some form of disengagement, or some level of warming relations with authoritarian adversaries? One might start by exploring another two historical examples.
Morell Island
One is lesser known, taking place in the vast and remote reaches of the South Atlantic in the 1980s- namely, the British appeasement towards Argentina before the Falklands War. Often this does not jump to people’s minds when thinking of the folly of appeasement. What they remember is the British armada leaving Portsmouth within days of Argentina’s takeover of South Georgia and the Falkland Islands. They remember Prime Minister Thatcher’s – the “Iron Lady’s” – resolve to take them back. But less remembered was Britain’s somewhat dulled response to Argentina building a military base on sovereign British territory in the prelude to the Falkland Islands War.
During the 1970s and 80s, tensions heated up between Argentina and Great Britain over a territorial dispute concerning several groups of islands in the South Atlantic and Southern Oceans. In 1976, Argentinian forces set up a base on Morell Island (also known as Thule Island), part of the British held Southern Thule Islands. The base had scientific equipment, an Argentine flag, and could support 50 personnel. It was built without the permission of the British government, meaning that its construction was an infringement upon British sovereignty over the islands. The Argentine military also cut off the fuel supply to an airport in the neighboring Falkland Islands, another set of British held islands under dispute. These were aggressive actions which broke international laws and norms. Argentina most likely took these actions to achieve two aims: first was to weaken Britain’s claim to the islands by interfering with their territorial integrity, and second was to test Britain’s resolve so they would know how it would respond to Argentine aggressions. Britain did eventually send a small flotilla of naval ships to remove the Argentine personnel from the island and dismantle the base; however, it is a little bit more complicated than that.
The author recently communicated with Rear Admiral Chris Parry of the Royal Navy (ret.), confirming that the Royal Navy did not remove the Argentine presence from the Southern Thule Islands until 1982, 6 years after the base was set up. For those six years, the base was allowed to remain, infringing upon British sovereignty. Although there were no outright concessions made and the British did eventually succeed in getting the Argentinians to abandon their base, action was taken years too late and did not go far enough, strengthening Argentina’s claim over the British held islands in the South Atlantic. Britain’s proportionate and overdue response failed to deter further aggression in the future; or as the Imperial War Museums puts it in their video ‘Why Argentina thought Britain wouldn’t fight for the Falklands’, “For Britain, the response to all these crises had been proportionate, but to the Argentinians, they appeared token at best. All this pointed to one glaring conclusion, that an invasion of the Falklands would meet no British counter.” In 1982, Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands, and Britain did respond, starting a conflict that unnecessarily cost people their lives. Just as the Imperial War Museums argues in their video, if Britain’s response to earlier aggressions had been stronger and sought more than simply undoing Argentine advances, all-out war might have been deterred.
The Cold War
Others might point to the Cold War between the U.S. and USSR as a form of appeasement, with neither side coming to direct blows against one another. Fighting instead through proxies and under the deterrent effect of mutually assured nuclear destruction, both sides avoided the larger scale hot war between superpowers that would have likely eclipsed the destruction incurred by previous world wars. But although they are correct that some minimal levels of appeasement can help prevent conflict, they are missing a massive piece of context. The difference between the Cold War and the aforementioned examples of appeasement is that Cold War appeasement was made with the knowledge that the USSR was still an adversary, and that by appeasing Moscow it was no guarantee that they would stop expanding, whereas in the previously mentioned cases, there was an assumption of long lasting peace. I like to call this short-term vs long-term appeasement, with the short term being a method to manage escalation whilst still competing with an adversary, whereas the long term is appeasing to build long-lasting peace. Long term appeasement is not an effective strategy and rarely works. And as the previous example from the South Atlantic highlights, neither does short-term.
Modern-day Applicability
Appeasement, as a long-term solution is, in general, not an effective strategy to prevent war. Even if it buys a little time, it tells pariahs that their actions will be tolerated, allowing them to take more and more until finally the world is forced to react, by which time the aggressor state is much better prepared for war. Instead, to prevent armed conflict, states that adhere to the rules based international order need to stay true to their ideals, and to stand up to aggressive actors. Global leaders must also reach a consensus that malicious actors corrupted by authoritarianism are not to be trusted, that they are an enemy, not a friend; and that any agreements reached with them should not be with an assumption that it will bring long-lasting peace, because it won’t. Through such actions and assumptions, a reputation of consistency is built with a strong deterrent to back it up. This leaves no room for pariahs to weave their way through and take advantage of the rules-based order.
In the current state of international affairs, such lessons can most directly be applied in the cases of Ukraine, Taiwan, and the South China Sea. The west must continue to supply Ukraine with the weapons it needs to defeat Russia, for if it fails, Russia will continue to threaten the security and territorial integrity of its neighbors. Perhaps next there will be a new chapter in the Russo-Georgian conflict. If Ukraine loses due to a cutting of western support, Russia will know that in any future military conflicts all it needs to do is to hold out until the west grows weary of aiding the victim state, and then it will achieve victory. The U.S. must maintain a clear commitment to Taiwan’s defense, for if it falters, China may take advantage of the opportunity to advance its claim over the island. Furthermore, international law must be maintained in the South China Sea. China cannot be allowed to enforce its claims over the sea, because if those claims become the de facto reality, all the international laws developed in the modern system will lose credibility and may grow irrelevant. These conflicts and disputes are challenges which the new U.S. president will have to deal with, and he must maintain the international system and not appease aggressors. There are many other cases where an anti-appeasement stance could, and should, be used, but these are three of the most prominent.
Appeasement is not a pathway to peace. As the new president begins his time in the White House, he should not listen to the voices telling him to step back and let authoritarian rulers have their way with the world. The United States must work with other democratic states to uphold the rules-based international order and to protect the ideals of freedom and democracy which America was built upon.
