Non-Agreesion Agreement with Britain & France instead of Hitler-Stalin Pact?

What would have been necessary between 1937 and whenever WWII starts to get an agreement between Germany and Britain & France instead of Germany and Russia at the outset of WW II? Maybe not one as good as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (like when it comes to resources delivered for instance) and does not even have to be a formal public treaty but can as well be a secret memorandum or the like. But has to be good enough as an agreement so Hitler will dare the gamble and turn East instead of West when WWII kicks off.

Basically a reversal of the OTL where Russia successfully diverted Germany into a war against France first and instead have Britain / France successfully divert Germany into a war against Russia first. Not saying that this will then turn out well or any better for Germany than OTL - just curious what would have been necessary for such an "East First" opening of WWII in Europe after Germany got the Rhineland back.


Necessary changes from Germany's side:

Some of these are rather obvious. Not dissolve Czechoslovakia for instance after promising not to. But what else would be necessary to have Britain & France consider a non-agression agreement with Germany? Would that necessitate Germany not annexing Austria? Or if that were tollerated at least not going for the Sudetenland? What about Germany's involvement in the Spanish Civil War? What about Germany's ties with Italy?

How many of the above will Germany have to avoid or tone down at least to make a non-agression agreement in the West possible?


Necessary changes from France & Britain's side:

Some of these are rather obvious again. For instance France & Britain not guaranteeing Poland's borders but other urging Poland into an alliance with Germany or throwing Poland outright under the bus. But besides that, France also had a defense agreement with Russia at that time. That one was surely not worth much to Stalin in OTL, but I guess France on the other hand would have had reservations to let it go. Britain maybe less so though.

What political changes would have been necessary in Britain & France to consider playing Germany off against Russia to buy time for themselves?


No changes from Russia

I'd like to ask the above under the assumption that not much in Russia changes. I.e. Stalin does not go on an agressive spree before WWII kicks off and remains his paranoid and cautions self. Russia may still keep its involvement in the Spanish Civil War, but that is about as far as it goes with sticking its head out and does its best to not antagonize Britain.
 
Not occupying rest of Checkoslovakia is the crucial aspect from Germany's side. Throw in a delayed invasion of Poland and solid russian athrocities, maybe even occupation in Finland.
Then you got The Soviet as the bad guys and need to make them attack Poland or Romania. My personal favorite and maybe a TL one day is a molotov -Ribbentrop pact where Germany opt out of the joint attack.
 
Not occupying rest of Checkoslovakia is the crucial aspect from Germany's side. Throw in a delayed invasion of Poland and solid russian athrocities, maybe even occupation in Finland.
Then you got The Soviet as the bad guys and need to make them attack Poland or Romania. My personal favorite and maybe a TL one day is a molotov -Ribbentrop pact where Germany opt out of the joint attack.

Except Stalin wasn't dumb and only started his attack two weeks after the Germans initiated hostilities. He would never risk being seen as the sole aggressor against which Europe could unite.
 
Throw in solid russian athrocities, maybe even occupation in Finland. Then you got The Soviet as the bad guys and need to make them attack Poland or Romania.

As said in my original post: I ask this question in a situation where exactly that is not the case. I.e. Stalin not antagonizing the West.

So anyone with ideas what would have been necessary between Germany, Britain and France for an (however uneasy) peace in the West and Germany turning against Russia first (be it together with Poland - or thru it)?
 
I don't think this is possible without the West being more antagonized. So if Stalin isn't supplying the extra antagonism, I can only think of (1) more spy scandals or something that make Western governments feel like they are actively being subverted. More than they already did OTL, anyhow. and (2) more homegrown Communist terrorism and civil war. Or anarchist, I don't think British and French elite and public opinion was making very fine distinctions between various flavors of the revolutionary left. So what if, say, the Spanish Civil War goes differently, Franco dies or something, its much more chaotic, and a fervent revolutionary leftist government emerges as the victor, with plenty of lurid executions and purges and camps and things, and maybe even hostilities with France as it launches some kind of revolutionary foray into France in support of local French uprisings. It doesn't even need to result in a full-scale war: we could suppose something like enthused French leftists launching a rebellion in Paris with some support in provincial cities and with attacks over the border from Spain that the spanish government later disavows, but it takes France 6 months or so to fully restore order, the government shifts pretty hard to the right as a result, and the government is very wary of Spain, eager to make a deal with Hitler to free up soldiers to protect against the menace from the south, and eager to make a deal with Hitler to sic Hitler on the Russians, both as a way of keeping Hitler occupied but also because the French don't see a real distinction between the Spanish rojos and the Russian bolsheviks, even though the two groups loudly denounce each other.

It may be harder to get Britain to actually agree to a non-aggression pact that the public understands is a carte blanche for agression in eastern Europe, but the British public might simply accept a non-agression pact joyfully, without understanding the implications, and when Germany does move, they would probably accept protestations from politicians that Britain must keep its word. But even if Britain doesn't sign such a pact, agreement from France would be enough. Britain wouldn't move alone.

Edit: I think any pact would need some kind of weasel language in protecting Poland. Maybe an agreement from Germany that it warrants not to send armed forces into Poland except as necessary to German defense against Poland, and in any event Germany guarantees the long-term, permanent (but, implicitly, not the short-term and temporary) independence of Poland. Or a promise that any final adjustment of sovereignty of non-aggressor states in Eastern Europe will be undertaken according to international arbitration and negotiation.
 
What would have been necessary between 1937 and whenever WWII starts to get an agreement between Germany and Britain & France instead of Germany and Russia at the outset of WW II? Maybe not one as good as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (like when it comes to resources delivered for instance) and does not even have to be a formal public treaty but can as well be a secret memorandum or the like. But has to be good enough as an agreement so Hitler will dare the gamble and turn East instead of West when WWII kicks off.

Basically a reversal of the OTL where Russia successfully diverted Germany into a war against France first and instead have Britain / France successfully divert Germany into a war against Russia first. Not saying that this will then turn out well or any better for Germany than OTL - just curious what would have been necessary for such an "East First" opening of WWII in Europe after Germany got the Rhineland back.


Necessary changes from Germany's side:

Some of these are rather obvious. Not dissolve Czechoslovakia for instance after promising not to. But what else would be necessary to have Britain & France consider a non-agression agreement with Germany? Would that necessitate Germany not annexing Austria? Or if that were tollerated at least not going for the Sudetenland? What about Germany's involvement in the Spanish Civil War? What about Germany's ties with Italy?

How many of the above will Germany have to avoid or tone down at least to make a non-agression agreement in the West possible?


Necessary changes from France & Britain's side:

Some of these are rather obvious again. For instance France & Britain not guaranteeing Poland's borders but other urging Poland into an alliance with Germany or throwing Poland outright under the bus. But besides that, France also had a defense agreement with Russia at that time. That one was surely not worth much to Stalin in OTL, but I guess France on the other hand would have had reservations to let it go. Britain maybe less so though.

What political changes would have been necessary in Britain & France to consider playing Germany off against Russia to buy time for themselves?


No changes from Russia

I'd like to ask the above under the assumption that not much in Russia changes. I.e. Stalin does not go on an agressive spree before WWII kicks off and remains his paranoid and cautions self. Russia may still keep its involvement in the Spanish Civil War, but that is about as far as it goes with sticking its head out and does its best to not antagonize Britain.

Forget about it. France and Britain wanted to maintain the balance of powers and the frontiers established at the treaty of Versailles. Hitler wanted to undo it in order to unite all germanic people in the german nazi Reich.
 
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