In the 70’s, I was taught that he followed appeasement up through the annexation, and then changed his approach, but it was too late to be effective. He was criticized for being to soft early, not for changing his mind nor was the fact that he changed tactics ignored. Is that not what is taught now?
What I was taught, though I am an old geezer and things may have changed, is that Chamberlain was a wuss. He was soft all the way and the people of England pushed him aside for someone with guts.
Probably. As mentioned earlier in this thread, the Soviet Union did invade Afghanistan in 1979.
What I’ve heard, possibly here, is that by appeasing Hitler, Chamberlain wanted to buy some time so his army would be ready by the time the (inevitable) war happened. He did pursue a policy of rearmament at the same time as his policy of appeasement.
Germany was also arming at the time, and grew immeasurably stronger as a result of gaining the Sudetenland, the Skoda Works, and the Czech gold reserves. Chamberlain appeased Germany because he thought he could avoid war, and didn’t care about the moral dimension of sacrificing another country to Nazi occupation. He was wrong, and he deservedly pays the price in terms of his historical reputation.
Off topic, do you have a cite for this?
In the 20th century it was certainly in the top 5. Three million plus in Vietnam alone, all the Cold War paranoia aiding and abetting in South America, Indonesia etc.
Totally and completely outclassed by China, Germany and the USSR though.
Well, when you have a son at age 63 and he has sons in his seventies, stuff like this can happen.
Re: the US acquisition of the Panama Canal…I took a cruise to the Canal last year, and in the days approaching arrival at the Canal, the ship’s on-board television would run (repeatedly) any documentaries they could get their hands on concerning the canal’s construction – from such wild-eyed radical sources as A&E and The History Channel. All of them were quite open and candid about TR’s and the US role in the Panama revolution.
So it’s not exactly a big secret.
Without necessarily differing from your assessment, Churchill put a kinder spin on it.
Let’s not forget that Daladier of France was present at Munich too.
Although this is moderately cool, it’s not like they remember going to visit Grandpa Tyler in the White House. *That *would be cool.
This weak sauce is what we get from SmashTheState? For shame! How about taking on the super-organism properly? “There rarely has been any nation-state whose hands were not unrelentingly drenched in the blood of innocents.”
That’s much more anarchically-correct and it’s closer to the truth.
So every single death in Vietnam is attributable to the United States, even when VC guys were pulling the trigger? We could charge Britain with every death in WWII and goose their body count.
And Japan. So to be in the top 5, we have to be worse than every other nation on Earth–worse than the Khmer Rouge, worse than Sudan in Darfur, worse than Belgium in the Congo, worse than Great Britain and France in the many colonial rebellions (including Vietnam) they suppressed and attempted to suppress, worse than Turkey in Armenia. Whatever, dude.
Your main point aside, Britain was not fighting an agressive war in WWII, while we certainly were in Vietnam.
WTH?
We invaded the North and took over their country? Did we even try?
We invaded the South, on the pretext that we were defending them from the North.
Why not? Britain declared war on Germany before Germany declared war on Britain. What business was it of Britain’s who ran Poland?
Oh please.
You can definitely make the argument that the current SV government shouldn’t have been supported (I certainly would). You can make the argument it was stupid (I would). You can be critical of actions taken once we were involved to prop up the government and their fortitude for the war. You can be critical of the damn stupid ‘Domino Theory’…
…but we invaded the South? Please.
Henry I, Henry II and Henry III? and at least five more Henrys! 
“The Last Article”. I remember reading it in the 6th(?) annual Year’s Best Science Fiction collection, but it also appears in Turtledove’s collection Kaleidoscope.