“Peace in our time” - comparing president trump's heroic ceasefire to the Munich conference of 1938

Written by: Vasco Ventura Rego

It's not uncommon for us to find similarities between our past and our present. The human mind has developed incredible pattern recognition capabilities, so it’s only natural. You'd think, however, that by recognizing these errors of the past and the similarities that can be drawn between past and present, we’d have learnt our lesson and know what to do. Well, think again! Very, and I mean very, often do we see painfully similar events and mistakes be repeated throughout history, birthing the expression “history repeats itself“. 

But since history isn't always the same (we didn’t have ICBMs and Atomic bombs 100 years ago), I prefer “history may not repeat itself, but it sure does rhyme!”. In this article, we’ll compare two distinct wars and events, with different people, and see how locations and time periods can change, but politics never does!

In the year of 1938, Europe seemed to be on the brink of war. Hitler threatened to invade Czechoslovakia with the aim of uniting the German-speaking people who lived in the Sudetenland with Germany. Czechoslovakia was protected by Britain and France, who promised to uphold its sovereignty and independence.

In late June of 2025, Israel and Iran were at the highest point of tensions they had ever been, with frequent missile strikes against both military and civilian targets in either nation. Israel claimed that Iran was a threat to global security, claiming they were developing WMDs. Iran had a very aggressive stance towards Israel's sovereignty, posting threatening messages on the social media platform X, calling for the destruction of Israel.

 To avoid a war, the then-prime minister of the UK, Neville Chamberlain, went to Munich in September of that year to negotiate a settlement between Germany and Czechoslovakia and avoid a war. Funnily enough, the Czechoslovaks were not represented at this meeting and had no say in its outcome. The conference decreed the Sudetenland would be given to Germany, so long as Hitler didn’t invade the rest of the country. 

To reduce tensions, President Trump attacked key bunkers with B2 bombers, in theory making Iran unable to produce nuclear weaponry. This would've removed Israel’s need to attack Iran and should've scared Iran into peace with America’s immense military capabilities. Shortly after the attack, Trump announced a ceasefire, which was too short, so there wasn’t a chance to host any proper negotiations or to allow armed forces to halt all operations. So short in fact, Iran denied agreeing or negotiating it. 

Chamberlain returned triumphant to the UK, waving his treaty and famously saying, “peace in our time”. War averted, peace assured, Chamberlain was a hero.

But regardless, Trump was a hero on American news channels, the Man who got in there, did the job, and ended the war.

6 months later, Hitler invades the rest of Czechoslovakia, violating the agreement and edging Europe closer to the Second World War. Britain and France did not come to the aid of Czechoslovakia, but it was the last straw, and on the 3rd of September 1939, 2 days after Hitler invaded Poland, France and Britain declared war on Germany. 

Not even two hours after the ceasefire was announced, an Iranian rocket struck a building in Israel, killing 6 civilians and injuring many more. Israel rapidly stated that it

would retaliate, and the ceasefire was over. Peace was no more. Now we only speculate how the conflict will develop.

We repeated our mistake, the lack of representation of both parties, and the poor implementation of the agreement. By giving Germany the Sudetenland immediately and without warning, Britain gave the Germans all of Czechoslovakia's fortifications and gave them no time to prepare new defenses to maybe stand a chance against a German invasion. By placing the ceasefire into effect immediately, without the agreement of both parties, the ceasefire could not be effectively communicated to all sectors of the army, not all planes and rockets could be grounded, and through the lack of preparation and rashness of the decision, Israel was given a pretext to continue the war.

We made the same mistake and got the same consequences. This way we highlight the importance of history, of learning it and studying it, so as not to repeat the mistakes of the past. Let’s hope President Trump reads his history books and does not commit the same mistake again. 

Oh and one last thing common to both, you can’t negotiate with a tyrant!

Sources:

Walsh, B. (2018) Cambridge IGCSE and O level History Option B: The 20th Century. Hodder Education

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica (2021, April 29). Munich agreement summary. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/summary/Munich-Agreement

N/A, (2025, June 23). Trump claims ceasefire reached between Israel and Iran. Al Jazeera. https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2025/6/23/trump-claims-ceasefire-reached-between-israel-and-iran

Regencia, T., Motamedi, M., Quillen, S., Sullivan, R., Harb, A., & Magee, C. (2025, June 25). Updates: Trump warns Israel not to attack Iran as fragile ceasefire holds. Al Jazeera. https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/liveblog/2025/6/24/live-trump-announces-ceasefire-no-confirmation-from-israel-iran