Interwar Period
One potential result of World War I was an expansion of Switzerland itself during the Interwar Period. In a referendum held in the Austrian state of Vorarlberg on 11 May 1919 over 80% of those voting supported a proposal that the state join the Swiss Confederation. However, this was prevented by the opposition of the Austrian Government, the Allies, Swiss liberals, the Swiss-Italians and the Swiss-French.
However Liechtenstein managed to exclude itself from Austria in 1918 and signed a monetary and customs union with Switzerland that effectively guaranteed its independence. In 1920, Switzerland joined the League of Nations.
In 1934 the Swiss Banking Act was passed. This allowed for anonymous numbered bank accounts, in part to allow Germans (including Jews) to hide or protect their assets from seizure by the newly-established "Third Reich".
In 1936 Wilhelm Gustloff was assassinated at Davos; he was the head of the Nazi Party's "Auslands-Organisation" in Switzerland. The Swiss government refused to extradite the alleged assassin David Frankfurter to Germany. Frankfurter was sentenced to 18 years in prison but was pardoned in 1946.
Read more about this topic: Switzerland During The World Wars
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“If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of Revolution; when the old and the new stand side by side, and admit of being compared; when the energies of all men are searched by fear and by hope; when the historic glories of the old can be compensated by the rich possibilities of the new era?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)