OxfordAQA IGCSE World History: International Relations Depth Studies (9245)

This guide covers Paper 1 International Relations Depth Studies, one of two papers in OxfordAQA International GCSE History (9245), a new qualification for teaching from September 2026, first examined May/June 2028.

Where this fits in 9245

Paper 1 focuses on international relations, split into a source-based section and a knowledge-based section. It pairs with Paper 2, Studies in Change, which instead traces change over a longer historical period. Paper 1 names six options in total, and a candidate studies exactly two: one from a choice of two in Section A, and one from a choice of four in Section B — there is no prohibited combination.

Syllabus coverage

OXFORDAQA INTERNATIONAL GCSE HISTORY (9245) — PAPER 1 INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS DEPTH STUDIES

Section A (source-based, choose 1 of 2):

• Peacemaking and the League of Nations, c1919-1939
• Crises of the Cold War, 1960-1975

Section B (knowledge-based, choose 1 of 4):

• The origins of the First World War, c1890-1915
• Hitler’s foreign policy and the origins of the Second World War, 1933-1941
• The origins and development of the Cold War, 1945-1960
• Détente and the collapse of communism, c1969-1991

Section A carries all of this paper’s source-handling marks; Section B is assessed on knowledge and explanation alone.

How to approach it

Because depth studies reward detailed, specific knowledge rather than broad overview, build a solid factual base for your chosen depth study – key dates, individuals, events and their consequences – rather than relying on general historical background. International relations topics typically ask candidates to weigh multiple causes or consequences against each other, so practising structured, evaluative answers (rather than narrative retelling) is valuable preparation. Confirm with your centre which option they teach in each section, since only one of the two Section A options and one of the four Section B options will apply to you.

Official syllabus

OxfordAQA International GCSE History (9245) specification PDF — oxfordaqa.com.

Section A’s pre-released sources

Section A is entirely source-based and carries all of this paper’s source-handling marks — a quarter of the whole qualification. A booklet of three of the five sources is released in advance: on 1 February for the May/June series, or 1 July for the October/November series. The other two sources are unseen and appear only in the exam. No notes or annotations may be brought into the exam; a clean copy of all five sources is provided on the day, so preparation means building familiarity and contextual knowledge, not memorising annotations you cannot bring in.

Section A has four questions, all testing source skills (AO3), as the specification describes them: Question 1 (4 marks) uses an unseen source’s content and/or provenance and your contextual knowledge to support a given claim; Question 2 (6 marks) explains a difference between an unseen source and a pre-released one; Question 3 (8 marks) evaluates how a source is useful to a historian studying a given issue, using its content, provenance and your own knowledge (the specification states that evaluating its limitations, how it is not useful, is not required); and Question 4 (12 marks) analyses and evaluates a given issue or development using a range of the sources, unseen and pre-released, together with your own knowledge. Reliability on its own is not a separate question type.

What Section B requires

Section B tests explanation and judgement, not recall of a narrative. Every Section B option opens with a 3-mark item that is point-marked – one mark for each relevant feature identified, up to the maximum – before the recurring explanation and judgement question types: explain why something happened, and assess how far one factor was responsible. Chronology matters only insofar as it supports causation.

Two habits raise marks reliably: always support a claim with specific detail — a date, a name, a figure, a treaty clause — and always weigh factors against one another rather than listing them.

Peacemaking and the League of Nations

The Treaty of Versailles (1919) imposed on Germany the war guilt clause (Article 231), reparations later fixed at £6.6 billion, an army capped at 100,000 with no air force, submarines or tanks, demilitarisation of the Rhineland, and territorial losses including Alsace-Lorraine, the Polish Corridor and all colonies.

The Big Three wanted different things — Clemenceau security and revenge, Lloyd George a balance preserving trade, Wilson his Fourteen Points and self-determination — and the treaty satisfied none of them fully, which is itself a standard exam judgement.

The League of Nations succeeded in the 1920s in smaller disputes (Aaland Islands, Upper Silesia) and in humanitarian work, but failed over Manchuria (1931) and Abyssinia (1935). Its structural weaknesses were the absence of the USA, the requirement for unanimity, the lack of an army, and the slowness of its procedures.

The road to war, 1933-39

Hitler’s foreign policy aims — overturning Versailles, Lebensraum, and union with Austria — met a policy of appeasement.

1933  Germany leaves the League and the Disarmament Conference
1935  Conscription reintroduced; Anglo-German Naval Agreement
1936  Rhineland remilitarised -- no Allied response
1938  Anschluss with Austria
1938  Munich Agreement: Sudetenland ceded
1939  Rest of Czechoslovakia occupied -- appeasement abandoned
1939  Nazi-Soviet Pact; invasion of Poland; war

Appeasement is defensible on the arguments that Britain was militarily unready, that public opinion feared another war, that Versailles was widely thought unjust, and that the USSR seemed a greater threat. Against it: each concession strengthened Hitler and convinced him the democracies would not fight.

The Cold War

Origins lie in ideological opposition, wartime conferences (Yalta and Potsdam), and mutual mistrust deepened by the atomic bomb.

Key developments: the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan (1947), the Berlin Blockade and Airlift (1948-49), NATO (1949) and the Warsaw Pact (1955), the Berlin Wall (1961), and the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962) — the closest approach to nuclear war, resolved by the removal of Soviet missiles in exchange for a US pledge not to invade Cuba and the quiet withdrawal of missiles from Turkey.

Worked example (Section B)

Section B’s knowledge-based essays follow this shape. Section A’s League of Nations and Cold War options have no knowledge-only essay like this one: Section A is entirely source-based, so its usefulness question is Question 3 (8 marks), and its 12-mark Question 4 asks you to evaluate a given issue or development using a range of the sources together with your own knowledge.

“Appeasement was the main reason Hitler was not stopped before 1939.” How far do you agree?

SUPPORTING   each concession (Rhineland, Anschluss, Sudetenland) cost Hitler
             nothing and convinced him the democracies would not fight

OTHER FACTORS
  Hitler's own aims      -> Lebensraum and overturning Versailles were fixed
                            goals regardless of how others responded
  British rearmament     -> Britain was militarily unready until the late 1930s
  Public opinion         -> widespread fear of repeating 1914-18
  Versailles resentment  -> many in Britain believed Germany's claims had merit
  Nazi-Soviet Pact       -> removed the risk of a two-front war Hitler feared

JUDGEMENT  appeasement enabled each step, but Hitler's own expansionist aims
           were the underlying driver -- a leader without those aims would
           not have tested the democracies' patience at all

The judgement, not the list, carries the top band.

Common mistakes

Narrating events without explaining causation. Making claims with no specific supporting detail. Treating appeasement as simple cowardice with no counter-argument. Confusing the Truman Doctrine with the Marshall Plan. Answering “how far” questions without reaching a judgement. Evaluating a source by its type alone rather than its content and provenance.

Quick revision checklist

• State the main terms of Versailles and the differing aims of the Big Three.
• Explain the League’s successes, its failures over Manchuria and Abyssinia, and its structural weaknesses.
• Sequence 1933-39 with dates and assess appeasement from both sides.
• Explain the origins of the Cold War and the key crises to 1962.
• Answer “how far” questions by weighing factors and reaching a supported judgement.
• Evaluate sources on content, provenance and purpose, not type alone.