Use the historical excerpt to answer the question. “I ask the fifty-two nations not to forget today the policy upon which they embarked [began] eight months ago, and on faith of which I directed the resistance of my people against the aggressor whom they had denounced [condemned] to the world. Despite the inferiority of my weapons, the complete lack of aircraft, artillery, munitions, hospital services, my confidence in the League was absolute. I thought it to be impossible that fifty-two nations, including the most powerful in the world, should be successfully opposed by a single aggressor. Counting on the faith due to treaties, I had made no preparation for war, and that is the case with certain small countries in Europe.”

—Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia
Address to the League of Nations in Geneva, June 30, 1936

This appeal was in response to which of the following events?