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The Stresa Front, formally called the Final Declaration of the Stresa Conference, was an agreement between French prime minister Pierre Laval, British prime minister Ramsay MacDonald, and Italian prime minister Benito Mussolini on 14 April 1935. The agreement took its name from the town of Stresa, situated on the banks of Lake Maggiore in Italy, where the conference was held. Its aim was to reaffirm the Locarno Treaties and to declare that the independence of Austria "would continue to inspire their common policy". The signatories also agreed to resist any future attempt by the Germans to change the Treaty of Versailles. The Stresa Front began to break down after Britain signed the Anglo-German Naval Agreement in June 1935, in which Germany was given permission to increase the size of its navy. It collapsed completely in the aftermath of Italy's invasion of Abyssinia in October 1935. ==Background== After Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss was killed by German spies in July 1934, the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini assembled an army corps of four divisions on the Austrian border and threatened the German dictator Adolf Hitler with war in the event of a German invasion of Austria. The assassination of Dollfuss was accompanied by Nazi uprisings in many regions in Austria, resulting in further deaths. In Carinthia, a large contingent of northern German Nazis tried to seize power but were subdued by the Italian units nearby. So, the next year Mussolini promoted a conference in the Italian Alps in order to stop Hitler, when he wanted to rebuild the German military forces: a small lake-island facing Stresa - with a Renaissance villa called the Palazzo Borromeo - was chosen for the 3-day talks. The Stresa Front was triggered by Nazi Germany's declaration of its intention to build up an air force, to increase the size of its army to 36 divisions (500,000 men – much more than the original 96,000 prescribed by the Treaty of Versailles) and to introduce conscription, in March 1935. However British politicians did not want to attack or occupy Germany, and preferred to have agreements with him in order to maintain peace in Central Europe. Additionally, an anti-war sentiment was very strong among the British public. In February 1935, at a summit in London between the French Premier Pierre Laval and the British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald led to an Anglo-French communiqué issued in London that proposed talks with the Germans on arms limitation, an air part, and security pacts for Eastern Europe and the nations along the Danube.〔Messerschmidt, Manfred “Foreign Policy and Preparation for War” from ''Germany and the Second World War'' page 613〕 Furthermore, Mussolini believed that the signing of the Stresa Front would mean Britain and France would not interfere in the Abyssinia Crisis. Even though the increasingly belligerent Germany dominated discussions within the conference room, Mussolini was at his cleverest when outside. He discussed with Britain plans to pursue his aim of making Italy "great, respected and feared" through the invasion and conquest of Abyssinia and ultimately create an all-powerful empire. Mussolini made sure not to discuss his expansionist plans within the confines of the conference itself due to the possible risk of the Western democracies issuing a veto over it. Furthermore, Mussolini could not risk the conference being sidetracked from its main aim of reaffirming Locarno and opposing any more breaches of international agreements. With this said, Mussolini got his way with his plans for invading Abyssinia not being brought up. The ''Duce'' therefore regarded Britain's and France's silence as acquiescence to his colonial war and launched his invasion of Abyssinia in October 1935. The importance of this is not to be overlooked as it was the turning point for Mussolini concerning his foreign standing as he drifted away from Britain and France, and into the camp of Hitler's Germany. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Stresa Front」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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