The invasion of Abyssinia took place in 1935-36 when Benito Mussolini, the Italian dictator invaded Abyssinia with no apparent reason. It was a diplomatic crisis which showed the league was weak and was one of the biggest failures, if not the biggest which ended Europe’s peace and allowed Italy to become more fascist and in the end to ally with Germany, dividing Europe in two and becoming two of the most powerful countries in the time.
Mussolini wanted to develop a modern roman empire and gain colonies in Africa, therefore he thought that by invading Abyssinia was going to be able to expand his empire and he believed that he was going to find resources like oil which will help Italy recover from the economic crisis and restore the Italian economy. He’d been working with France and Britain in 1953 against Hitler so he thought that if he invaded Abyssinia Britain and France would give him permission, besides he thought he had two perfect excuses to invade Abyssinia, first he wanted revenge for the defeat of Italy in 1896 in the battle of Adowa. Finally Mussolini already had issues against Abyssinia, since the Walwal incident, where approximately 107 Ethiopians and 50 Italians were killed. Italy claimed that his soldiers were attacked and therefore he wanted revenge and was going to invade Abyssinia. After the Walwal incident took place, the emperor of Abyssinia Haile Selassie appealed to the league asking for arbitration but the league’s response was poor and shortly after this the Minister of Foreign Affairs Pierre Laval of France and Foreign Secretary Samuel Hoare met with Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in Rome and signed the Hoare-Laval pact.
Even though both Italy and Abyssinia were members of the League of Nations, this didn’t do anything to avoid the invasion. The decision by the league took over a year and a year to get to