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Munich Agreement, which was to have grave consequen -
ces: in a bid to achieve “peace in our time” Daladier and
Chamberlain allowed themselves to be pressured into conceding
the Sudetenland to Germany. This policy of appeasement
represented a major foreign policy victory for Hitler.
Mussolini’s state visit
to Munich – Hitler
and the Italian dictator
in front of the
Temples of Honour
(in the background
the “Führerbau”),
25 September 1937
both states with a vital basis for pursuing their expansionist
interests. This was one of the reasons why Mussolini made
several state visits to Munich. In September 1937 the Nazi
regime used a visit by “Il Duce” for a display of national
consciousness and military strength. This demonstration of
combat-readiness went hand in hand with an aggressive
German foreign policy, which included military intervention
in the Spanish Civil War of 1936–37 and the annexation
of Austria in March 1938.
At the height of the Sudeten crisis in Czechoslovakia a meeting
was held in September 1938 attended by Hitler, Musso -
lini, the French Prime Minister Edouard Daladier and the
British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. This meeting,
held in the “Führerbau”, resulted in the conclusion of the
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The “Führerbau” and the Party Administration Building
located on the south side of Brienner Straße 42, where the
files on NSDAP members were kept, were built according
to plans by the architect Paul Ludwig Troost (1878–1934).
After 1957 the former “Führerbau” became the University
of Music and Performing Arts. The former Administration
Building has housed the Central Institute for History of Art
since 1947.
The “Führerbau” of the NSDAP (left), completed
in 1937, was the venue for the Munich Agreement.
The “four powers conference” (from l. Cham ber -
lain, Daladier, Hitler, Mussolini) on 29 September
1938 sealed the fate of the Sudetenland, handing
it over to the German Reich. Great Britain and
France hoped thus to avert war.
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