The way I see it the Nazi-Soviet pact was partly responsible for the outbreak of WW2 because even though it was the spark that lit the bonfire there were more serious causes rather than this one and also because the Allies and Germany had been “playing” with the idea of war for a long time before the pact.
Despite the fact that the pact was the straw that broke the camels back, it wasn’t itself the main cause of the war; there were other conflicts that generated much more tension between both of the groups. One of those conflicts was, for example, the arms race or rearmament involving Germany and Britain. Another one of those conflicts was the Nazi expansion previous to the declaration of war, which produced a confrontation and massive fear in France. Furthermore, secret pacts concerning France and Britain generated concerns and thoughts of war all over Europe.
In addition to this, the Allies and the Axis had been toying with the idea of war all over Europe, it wasn’t that the pact generated everything and war broke out of nowhere. The truth is that both sides knew that war would break out eventually but they didn’t know when. Furthermore, neither side was confident enough of their power and tried to avoid the military confrontation for a while but the pact was a perfect viable excuse to declare war because Germany had been warned that if they expanded once more they would be at war.
All in all, from my standpoint I believe that the Nazi-Soviet pact was partly responsible for the outbreak of WW2 because there were more important and serious conflicts and also due to the fact that the feeling of War in Europe had been there for a long time.
Group G, Luca Lombardo, Nacho Salaverri and Ricardo Levene
FEEDBACK FROM GROUP B
