If I remember my history correctly, the French, ironically enough, did want to go to war over that move into the Rhineland.
The view of the 1936 French government was, “Let’s smack that little mustache right off his face” on the theory that it would prevent further aggressive moves by the Nazis in the future.
But the Brits said, “No, we’d rather not. Pip, pip, cheerio and all that.”
Blunder #1 by the British in the run-up to WWII.
I believe Hitler issued orders that the Germans would retreat if they so much as heard a shot from the French.
That’s not to say, they wouldn’t have gone down the path they ultimately did, had it happened that way, but who knows?
C’mon, if what you say is true the French could’ve taken Germany by themselves. It’s not like the UK was holding a gun to their head and, to put things into perspective, the BEF was 1/10th of the Allied force during the battle of France and under French command orders. Ironically the French had better tanks and more divisions than the Germans but woeful tactics, but then the same could have been said about British tactics of the time and US as well.
If the German divisions had poured over the Canadian border in 1939 we’d be holding this conversation in German, at that time the US military was a basket case.
Any road, Germany wasn’t prepared to go to war in 36 so it wouldn’t have, and in 39 it was still 4-5 years away from a new European let alone all out global war. Poland forced their hand.