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Appeasement
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===Postwar politicians=== {{Main|Lesson of Munich}} Statesmen in the postwar years have often referred to their opposition to appeasement as a justification for firm, sometimes armed, action in international relations. ==== United States ==== U.S. President [[Harry S. Truman]] thus explained his decision to enter the [[Korean War]] in 1950, British Prime Minister [[Anthony Eden]] in his confrontation of [[Egypt]]ian [[President of Egypt|President]] [[Gamal Abdel Nasser]] in the [[Suez Crisis]] of 1956, U.S. President [[John F. Kennedy]] his "[[Cuban Missile Crisis|quarantine]]" of [[Cuba]] in 1962, U.S. President [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] in [[Vietnam War|his resistance]] to [[communism]] in [[Indochina]] in the 1960s, U.S. President [[Ronald Reagan]] in [[1986 United States bombing of Libya|his air strike]] on [[Libya]] in 1986, and U.S. President [[Donald Trump]] in the [[drone strike]] that led to the [[Assassination of Qasem Soleimani|assassination]] of [[Qasem Soleimani]] in 2020.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Beck |first=Robert J. |date=1989 |title=Munich's Lessons Reconsidered |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2538858?origin=crossref |journal=International Security |volume=14 |issue=2 |pages=161–191 |doi=10.2307/2538858|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref name="Pompeo blames">{{cite web|last=Cummings|first=William|title=Secretary of State Pompeo blames current tension with Iran on 'Obama administration's appeasement'|url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/01/05/pompeo-blames-obama-iran-situation/2818151001/|access-date=18 October 2020|website=[[USA Today]]}}</ref> ==== Vietnam ==== After the [[Viet Minh]] won the [[Battle of Dien Bien Phu]] in 1954, U.S. President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] wrote in a letter to British Prime Minister Churchill, "We failed to halt Hirohito, Mussolini and Hitler by not acting in unity and in time. That marked the beginning of many years of stark tragedy and desperate peril. May it not be that our nations have learned something from that lesson?" Similarly, President Lyndon Johnson said to defend the Vietnam War, "Everything I knew about history told me that if I got out of Vietnam and let [[Ho Chi Minh]] run through the streets of [[Saigon]], then I'd be doing exactly what Chamberlain did in World War II. I'd be giving a big fat reward to aggression".<ref name="Abandon Munich" /> ==== Cuba ==== During the [[Cuban Missile Crisis]], U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff [[Curtis LeMay]] and various hawks within the [[Kennedy administration]] for an air strike on Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba compared Kennedy's hesitance to do so to appeasement. That was partially a jab at Kennedy's father [[Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.]], who had supported appeasement while he was [[U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom]] and later supported a negotiated surrender to Germany during the [[May 1940 War Cabinet Crisis]] and the [[Battle of Britain]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Dobbs|first=Michael |title=One minute to midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro on the brink of nuclear war|date=2008|isbn=978-1-4000-4358-3|edition=1st |location=New York|oclc=176951842}}</ref><ref name="Abandon Munich" /> ==== Soviet Union ==== During the [[Cold War]], the "lessons" of appeasement were cited by prominent conservative allies of Reagan, who urged him to be assertive in "[[rollback|rolling back]]" Soviet-backed regimes throughout the world. [[The Heritage Foundation]]'s [[Michael Johns (policy analyst)|Michael Johns]], for instance, wrote in 1987 that "seven years after Ronald Reagan's arrival in Washington, the United States government and its allies are still dominated by the culture of appeasement that drove Neville Chamberlain to Munich in 1938."<ref>Johns, Michael (Summer 1987). "Peace in Our Time: The Spirit of Munich Lives On", ''Policy Review''.</ref> Some conservatives even compared Reagan to Chamberlain after his withdrawal of the [[Multinational Force in Lebanon]] because of the [[1983 Beirut barracks bombing]].<ref name="Abandon Munich" /> ==== Argentina ==== British Prime Minister [[Margaret Thatcher]] invoked the example of Churchill during the [[Falklands War]] of 1982: "When the [[American Secretary of State]], [[Alexander Haig]], urged her to reach a compromise with the [[Argentina|Argentines]] she rapped sharply on the table and told him, pointedly, 'that this was the table at which Neville Chamberlain sat in 1938 and spoke of the [[Czechs]] as a faraway people about whom we know so little'".<ref>{{cite book|title=Thatcher|first=Kenneth|last=Harris|isbn=0-00-637457-3|page=135|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|year=1988}}</ref> Thatcher, along with U.S. National Security Advisor [[Brent Scowcroft]], made similar arguments after the [[Invasion of Kuwait|1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait]] and the planning for the [[Gulf War]].<ref name="Abandon Munich" /> The spectre of appeasement was raised in discussions of the [[Yugoslav wars]] of the 1990s.<ref>Vuilliamy, E. (1998). "Bosnia: The Crime of Appeasement", ''International Affairs '', 1998, pp. 73–91.</ref> ==== Iraq ==== U.S. President [[George W. Bush]] and British Prime Minister [[Tony Blair]] also cited Churchill's warnings about German rearmament to justify their action in the run-up to the 2003 [[Iraq War]].<ref name=ChurchillCollege>{{cite web|title=Appeasement: The Gathering Storm (Teachers Exercises)|url=http://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/archives/churchill_era/exercises/appeasement/|publisher=Churchill College Cambridge|access-date=11 September 2008|archive-date=16 April 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080416020732/http://www.chu.cam.ac.uk/archives/churchill_era/exercises/appeasement/|url-status=dead}}</ref> ==== Syria ==== In 2013, [[Obama|Obama administration]] officials such as Secretary of State [[John Kerry]] and Secretary of Defense [[Chuck Hagel]] claimed that a failure of the United States to intervene in the [[Syrian Civil War]] after the [[Ghouta chemical attack]] would be an act of appeasement towards [[Bashar al-Assad]].<ref name="Abandon Munich" /> ==== Iran ==== {{see also|Criticism of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action}} In May 2008, U.S. President George W. Bush cautioned against "the false comfort of appeasement" when dealing with [[Iran]] and [[Iranian President]] [[Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]].<ref>Thomas, E. (23 June 2008). "The Mythology of Munich", ''Newsweek'', Vol. 151, issue 25, pp. 22–26.</ref> Opponents of President [[Barack Obama]] later criticized the [[Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action]] as an act of appeasement with Iran.<ref>{{cite web|last=Loyola|first=Mario|date=12 January 2020|title=Obama Should Never Have Appeased Iran|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/01/obama-should-never-have-appeased-iran/604744/|access-date=18 October 2020|website=[[The Atlantic]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Picard|first=Joe|date=25 August 2015|title=Appeasing Iran?|url=https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/251828-appeasing-iran|access-date=18 October 2020|website=[[The Hill (newspaper)|The Hill]]}}</ref> U.S. Secretary of State [[Mike Pompeo]] later stated that the [[Foreign policy of the first Donald Trump administration|first Trump administration's foreign policy]] was "trying to correct for what was the Obama administration's appeasement of Iran."<ref name="Pompeo blames" /> ==== China ==== [[Tibetan independence movement|Tibetan separatists]] consider the policy of the West towards the [[People's Republic of China]] with regard to [[Tibet]] as appeasement.<ref>McRae, Penny (15 September 2009). "West appeasing China on Tibet, says PM-in-exile", AFP.</ref> ==== Russia ==== The minimal international reactions to the [[Chechen–Russian conflict|invasion of Chechnya]], the [[Russo-Georgian War|invasion of Georgia]] and the [[2014 annexation of Crimea]], as well as the [[Donbas separatism|conflict in the Donbas]], is seen by some as the cause that encouraged Russian president [[Vladimir Putin]] to conduct a [[Russian invasion of Ukraine|full-scale invasion of the rest of Ukraine in 2022]].<ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/the-lesson-of-crimea-appeasement-never-works/ | title = The lesson of Crimea: Appeasement never works | last = Goncharenko | first = Oleksiy | date = 27 February 2020 | website = Atlantic Council | access-date = 4 September 2023 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/putins-crimea-mythmaking | title = Putin's Crimea Mythmaking | last = Free | first = Anya | date = 2 March 2023 | website = Wilson Center | access-date = 4 September 2023 }}</ref> Some commentators have suggested that some [[NATO]] countries are following the policy of appeasement towards [[Vladimir Putin]]'s [[Russia]] by rejecting the support of [[Ukraine|Ukrainian]] [[Government of Ukraine|democracy]] through military operations and aid during the [[2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Appeasing Putin in Ukraine would be disastrous for European security|url=https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/appeasing-putin-in-ukraine-would-be-disastrous-for-european-security/|website=Atlantic Council|date=6 January 2022|access-date=5 March 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=NATO rejects Ukraine no-fly zone, unhappy Zelenskiy says this means more bombing|url=https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/nato-meets-ukraine-calls-no-fly-zone-hinder-russia-2022-03-04/|work=[[Reuters]]|date=4 March 2022|access-date=5 March 2022|first1=Simon|last1=Lewis|first2=Ingrid|last2=Melander}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=The west knows the cost of appeasement. We can't rule out any option for stopping Putin {{!}} Ian Bond|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/22/west-appeasement-putin-russia-ukraine|website=[[The Guardian]]|date=22 February 2022|access-date=5 March 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Bella |first=Timothy |date=25 May 2022 |title=Kissinger says Ukraine should cede territory to Russia to end war |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/05/24/henry-kissinger-ukraine-russia-territory-davos/}}</ref> ==== North Korea ==== {{Main|Sunshine Policy#Criticism}} ==== Afghanistan ==== {{Main|United States–Taliban deal}} The 2020 Doha Agreement between the United States and the [[Taliban]] without involvement of the then [[Islamic Republic of Afghanistan|Afghan government]] was criticized as the American appeasement of the Taliban. Over the [[War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)|American war in Afghanistan]], the United States and its [[NATO]] allies ([[ISAF]] and [[Resolute Support Mission|RSM]] periods) along with the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and its [[Afghan National Security Forces|national defense and security forces]] warred against the Taliban and its allied militant groups and later the [[Islamic State – Khorasan Province]]. After [[Donald Trump]] become the president, he decided to wrap up all military operations in [[Afghanistan]] and to begin negotiation with the Taliban, which culminated with the Doha Agreement on 29 February 2020. After President [[Joe Biden]] decided to [[2020–2021 U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan|withdraw all American troops]] from Afghanistan on 31 August 2021, the Taliban launched [[2021 Taliban offensive|their final offensive of the war]], which brought the fall of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, during which [[Kabul]] was [[Fall of Kabul (2021)|taken over]] by the Taliban on 15 August 2021. The United States completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan and the [[2021 Kabul airlift|evacuation of American citizens and residents and at-risk Afghans]] from [[Kabul International Airport]] on 30 August 2021.<ref>{{cite web |author1=Pavan Chaurasia |title=The Crocodile has been fed, yet again! |url=https://www.thestatesman.com/opinion/crocodile-fed-yet-1502995826.html |website=The Statesman |access-date=27 May 2024 |date=17 August 2021}}</ref>
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