Editing Czechoslovakia (section)

=== Interwar period ===
During the period between the two world wars Czechoslovakia was a democratic state. The population was generally literate, and contained fewer alienated groups. The influence of these conditions was augmented by the political values of Czechoslovakia's leaders and the policies they adopted. Under [[Tomas Masaryk]], Czech and Slovak politicians promoted progressive social and economic conditions that served to defuse discontent.

Foreign minister Beneš became the prime architect of the Czechoslovak-Romanian-Yugoslav alliance (the "[[Little Entente]]", 1921–38) directed against Hungarian attempts to reclaim lost areas. Beneš worked closely with France. Far more dangerous was the German element, which after 1933 became allied with the Nazis in Germany.

Czech-Slovak relations came to be a central issue in Czechoslovak politics during the 1930s.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Teich |first1=Mikuláš |last2=Kováč |first2=Dušan |last3=Brown |first3=Martin |title=Slovakia in History |date=2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-80253-6 |page=159 }}</ref> The increasing feeling of inferiority among the Slovaks,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/nazis-take-czechoslovakia|title=Nazis take Czechoslovakia|website=HISTORY|date=5 November 2009 |language=en|access-date=12 February 2020}}</ref>{{Failed verification|date=November 2022}}  who were hostile to the more numerous Czechs, weakened the country in the late 1930s. Slovakia became autonomous in the fall of 1938, and by mid-1939, Slovakia had become independent, with the [[Slovak Republic (1939–1945)|First Slovak Republic]] set up as a [[satellite state]] of Nazi Germany and the far-right [[Slovak People's Party]] in power .<ref>{{cite book |last1=Teich |first1=Mikuláš |last2=Kováč |first2=Dušan |last3=Brown |first3=Martin |title=Slovakia in History |date=2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-80253-6 |pages=175–177 }}</ref>

After 1933, Czechoslovakia remained the only democracy in central and eastern Europe.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Handbook on Policing in Central and Eastern Europe|editor1=Gorazd Mesko |editor2=Charles B. Fields |editor3=Branko Lobnikar |editor4=Andrej Sotlar}}</ref>