Germany and the Great Depression

The great Depression is considered one of the worst periods of times in the 20th Century. The Great Depression was a global economic break-down and during those times almost every country that was affected by, had a change in government. For example in the USA, people where starving and as a result the government had to issue ration tickets for food to the people. With regards to Germany and the Great Depression we will be reviewing the impact of inflation, unemployment, the uprising of people, the rise of nationalism and the Nazi party and the eventual change of government that brought about dramatic changes in the country, in Europe and the whole world.


Germany at the time was entering into one of its worst economic crisis in their History. The reparations they had to pay to the Allies as a result of the Treaty of Versailles were so tough that the country was on its knees. The Government had to constantly print more and more money in order to pay for their depts. As a result the value of the German Mark decreased dramatically and also the prices were constantly increasing. Germany entered into a state of hyperinflation and as a result in some extreme cases people were burning their money in order to warm themselves up as they didn’t care about the money because they felt that it was worth almost nothing.

It should be noted that during the Great Depression countries had generally very high unemployment rates which were constantly rising. There are estimates that there were several millions of people unemployed across the world and six million in Germany alone. As a result, people started to question how effective were their governments as they couldn’t bring about stability, create jobs and enforce democracy. The people became unhappy with their governments and started to look for other types of government because of the high unemployment rates, the lack of work prospects, the money supply, and the resources, in general, that were available.

It was, therefore, not a surprise that very soon there were signs of social unrest and people took to the streets. In 1932 the worst of such outbreaks took place occurred at Königsberg, the capital of East Prussia. On August 1st, just a few hours after the results of the elections had been made known the Nazis took to the streets and introduced their reign of terror. According to reports the Nazis started this, apparently by their failure to obtain a parliamentary majority in the elections. They took to the streets stoning shop-windows, burning gasoline stations and attempting to destroy democratic or socialist newspaper offices by fire. At the same time sought out prominent members of the Socialist and Communist parties who were murdered or assaulted in their homes. The uprising had began but it was no longer a simple uprising complaining about inflation and unemployment but it was evident that it was driven by nationalism and hate.

In many countries around the world, during the time of the Great Depression the government structure changed. People were feeling that it was their government’s fault that the Great Depression was happening and that their lives became miserable. As a result they started looking at different ideologies and government types. In Germany, before the Great Depression, the Democratic Party was the most popular party and the people loved it. The Communist and Nazi parties where unpopular, at the time, and had only a few followers. During the Great Depression, however, things began to change. The German people felt that their government, lead by the Democratic Party, was largely responsible for the economic collapse.

As a result of this the Nazi and the Communist parties in Germany were attracting more support, becoming more popular and getting stronger. Obviously the growth of popularity for the Nazi and Communist parties was based on two very opposing ideologies. The Nazis based their arguments on nationalism and blamed the Western Allies for the hard World War I reparations as well as targeting the rich Jewish Germans for controlling the economy of the Country. On the other hand, the Communist Party drew it support for the large unemployed group of people and based its arguments of social injustice. Both these parties naturally attracted support and were becoming very popular. Unfortunately for the Communist Party was not able to compete with their rivals, the Nazis, and they only increased by a small percentage whereas the Nazi party in 1932 became the biggest and strongest party in all of Germany. As a result in 1933 the Nazi Party won the elections and Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Hitler used propaganda very cunningly in order to increase his own and his party’s popularity to an extent that the German people believed that the only hope they and the country had was with Hitler. Suddenly the German people felt that they found their Messiah to lead them out of the greatest gloom in their history.

As a conclusion, we can see that the global Great Depression came about at the worst possible time for Germany. The country had just lost World War I and was forced to pay very harsh reparations. In addition to this, Germany needed to re-build its economy and when the Great Depression arrived Germany was totally unprepared and on its knees. The Great Depression caused hyperinflation and huge unemployment to Germany and this inevitably resulted to people uprising as well as dramatic increase of Nationalism. Unfortunately this brought the Nazi Party into power and the result for Germany, Europe and the whole World were the cataclysmic events that led to World War II.

Evaluate the successes and failures of the Paris Peace conference in creating a stable European Community in the post WWI era.

The Paris Peace Conference is considered by many people as a complete failure as it did not succeed to bring about long-term peace and as a result, twenty years later, the world was led to an even bloodier war, WWII. However, one needs to be objective and fair by trying to understand the conditions at the time and analyze everything. We will analyze who were the Key Players and how their conflicting interests influenced the future of Europe and we will focus on key decisions such as reparations on Germany, the formation of the League of Nations and arms restrictions in order to be able to conclude if these were successful or failed to achieve results.

The first problem with the Paris Peace Conference was the fact that although 32 countries participated, Germany and Russia were not amongst those nations. This was problematic because by excluding Germany (the looser of WWI) this created the feeling the decisions made were one-sided and that the Treaty was unfair to them. Russia also did not participate as it was under a Communist regime and their government was not recognized and not fully functional after their revolution. Therefore, all the major decisions were made by the Big 3 nations of the USA, France and England. Moreover, each of the big 3 nations had it own specific interests regarding the eventual outcome of the Paris Peace Conference.

These conflicting interests of the Big 3 Powers are considered by many as a major cause of the failure of the Paris Peace Conference and it is therefore important to understand them. The USA tried to be impartial and focused its attention in trying to create international cooperation through the creation of the League of Nations and also demanded self-determination to be recognized for many ethnic people which led to the creation of new states in Europe. At the same time France was the most aggressive and demanded revenge and punishment for Germany. France pushed hard for the severe reparations and the initial 5 to 6 billion dollars of reparations imposed on Germany in 1919 were increased to 40 billion by 1921. This is considered by many as the Key cause of Germany’s economic collapse a few years later which opened the door to Hitler and led to the rise of the nationalism and the Nazis with the known catastrophic results. France also demanded an independent Rhineland which further infuriated the German people. England, on the other hand, wanted Germany to pay but it not wish to destroy them. England pushed and achieved a reduction of the German fleet in order to protect its own Navy and at the same time succeeded in expanding their Empire by getting the overseas German lands. It is clear that the big powers each wanted a solution to fit their own needs and as a result of this the Paris Peace Conference ended with a short-term peace which did not hold for long.

As mentioned above the very high reparations imposed on Germany proved catastrophic for the country and led to its economic collapse during the Great depression. Similarly, reparations imposed on Austria, Hungary and Bulgaria also affected negatively those countries. The decision of reparations, in conjunction with the Great depression, is considered by many as a big mistake as economies were destroyed and there was huge unemployment and people struggled to survive. All these conditions created fertile ground for the rise of nationalism and a lot of social problems. It is not surprising, therefore, that after WWI the winning nations decided not to repeat their mistake of WWI reparations and they assisted the losing countries like Germany and Japan to revive and rebuilt their economies and societies.
One of the outcomes of the Paris Peace Conference was the creation of the League of Nations. As mentioned earlier, this was the idea of the American President, Woodrow Wilson. Unfortunately for him, the Congress and the American people were not in support of this. The American constitution did not allow this, plus the American people did not wish to engage themselves in anything such alliances which might lead them to war again. Eventually America never joined the League of Nations. Although the initial 32 countries of the League of Nations increased to 60 by the 1930’s it did not succeed to guarantee peace as decisions were to be taken unanimously. For example when Japan invaded Manchurian in China all the countries voted against Japan and the war did not stop but Japan simply left the League. Also the fact that the League of Nations did not have the military means to stop any aggression made it just an idealist body.

Despite all the failures of the Paris Peace Conference one could argue that they were inevitable given the conditions at the time. One cannot ignore German aggression and France’s fears. Therefore, one can argue that France rightfully demanded punishment for Germany. Certainly we cannot ignore the fact the Paris Peace Conference established the country borders in Europe which lasted for at least 20 years. If anything this was a success. Another success could be considered the distraction of the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires which led to the independence and self-determination for many people. In addition the military restrictions on Germany, Austria, Hungary and Bulgaria were significant. Especially the restrictions on Germany made a lot of nations feel at ease but unfortunately this did not last long.

To conclude, one could say that the Paris Peace Conference only managed to achieve short-lived results. The conflicting interests of the main Powers (USA, France and England) were not aligned and decisions such as the harsh reparations on Germany eventually proved to be a mistake. The formation of the League of Nations created a powerless body and although arm-restrictions led to a short-term peace, twenty years later the world entered into another major war.

Why were Germany and her allies unsuccessful in WW1

WW1 is one of the most famous and deadliest wars in history. It was during this War where the main battles may have been fought in Europe but it is considered as a World War as the allies and the colonies of the European countries became involved and were fighting each other. At the time Germany was one of the strongest countries, if not the strongest. However, Germany and her allies were eventually unsuccessful in winning WW1 mainly because of the failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies, the ineffectiveness of her Alliance System, the limitations of Germany’s economy, Germany’s geography and finally the entry of the USA in the War. These reasons will be analysed separately.

One of the key reasons that Germany and her Allies failed was the failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies. Before the war even started Germany prepared the von Schlieffen plan which was that in-case of a European war against France and Russia they will first attack France through Belgium and try to destroy it as soon as possible before Russia could mobilize. This would have enabled Germany to focus on the Eastern Front (Russia). However, when the war started Germany tried to execute the plan but it failed as they underestimated the resistance at the Western Front. At the same time Russia had mobilized much faster than Germany expected. In addition the German attack on Belgium, which was a neutral country, made Great Britain join the war and this also created a bad image of Germany for attacking a neutral country. The Germans persisted in executing such a high risk attack (like the von Schlieffen plan) but when they failed to succeed they were left no other option (they lacked any alternative strategies). For example when the Plan failed, Germany was basically stuck fighting in the trenches and only engaging in small attacks or defending until an opportunity came. The lack of alternative strategies demonstrates that Germany underestimated their enemies and they were over-confident that they will win. This indicates that there was a lack of strong military leadership on the Germany side.

Furthermore, Germany’s Allied system was ineffective. Before the war Germany was allied with Austro-Hungary and Italy. As soon as the war began Italy left and became neutral to Germany’s disappointment. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire joined Germany’s Alliance later but both were weak and not strong allies as compared to Entente Allies. On the other hand the Entente had a lot of allies and most of them were very strong. Therefore, Germany ended up having to give a lot more than they received from their allies. For example they had to provide money and soldiers. They also lacked communication with their allies. On the contrary, the Entente Allies were much organized militarily in the way that Britain and France had combined their troops in the war. For Germany and its allies every country ended up fighting on its own and uncoordinated.

In addition, although Germany was considered to be very strong, her economy and geography were limited. At the beginning of the war Germany had one of the best economies in the world, at the tie, but her economic resources were limited. A drawback for Germany was that its economy was because it was based on nationalism and it didn’t really have a formal tax system. Germany depended on the people donating money and goods to the government. Also since this was based on nationalism, it created a lot of problems later on when the war caused a lot of casualties and people started to became less nationalistic. Furthermore, their weapon manufacturing companies were privatized so the German government had to pay to get its weapons and ammunition. Although the German Empire was a fairly large empire, the problem was that it was in the middle of Europe and it had very little coastline that was suitable for big ports. When the war started Germany found itself completely surrounded and as a result they had to fight on a lot of fronts. For example they had to fight the Russians to the East, and the French and British to the West. Furthermore, the British fleet created a blockade on German ports which caused huge problems to Germany’s supply. Being totally surrounded and outnumbered, the more Germany waited the greater chance they had of loosing the war. The allies had arithmetically a greater number of people can could sustain the human loss whereas Germany couldn’t. Time was working against Germany…

Another important factor was the USA. Although the USA was not the strongest country at the time it was still considerable force. It had a lot of people, money and supplies whereas other countries like Germany were running out of these resources. Germany knew that if the USA decided to mobilize and started shipping troops to France then they will almost surely not win the war. Therefore knowing this fact, Germany launched a massive attack on France, tried to split the British and the French but this attempt was not successful. Germany could be blamed for causing the entry of the USA in the war as Germany’s U-boat campaign was sinking ships (including American ships) coming across the Atlantic. Germany also provoked the USA when rumors spread that Germany was planning an alliance with Mexico to enable them to taken back from the USA states like Texas and Arizona. The entry of the USA in the War greatly increased the morale of the Allied army as there were fresh soldiers fighting now and they were excited to join the fight. This increased the hopes and the spirit of all the other soldiers who were fighting at the front for so long. As soon as the Americans started bringing over troops to France they were shipping across some 20,000 troops per month which was a significant number. This was very important since a lot of the other courtiers were running out of trained troops and they resorted in putting young untrained people in the war.

Therefore, although Germany was very strong and powerful at the beginning of the war, she ended up paying for her mistakes and eventually lost the Great War. As we detailed above, Germany’s failure of the von Schlieffen plan and the lack of alternative strategies, as well as the ineffectiveness of her Alliance System, the limitations of Germany’s economy and geography and finally the entry of the USA all added up so that the War was lost. It is true however that during WW1 Germany fought really hard and persistent and it was amazing that they resisted defeat for so long given the combined strength of their opponents.

Imperialism as a leading cause of WWI

Historians have provided several arguments regarding the causes of WW1. The consensus of these arguments is that four Key factors caused WW1. These factors are: Militarism; Alliances, Nationalism and Imperialism. I personally believe that Imperialism was the most important cause of WW1 and in the following paragraphs I try to demonstrate through examples such as the rise of Industrialism, the Moroccan Crisis and the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia which all added up and eventually led to WW1.

Industrialism was on the rise before WW1 as major European countries wanted to have a lot of raw materials in order to boost their industrial output. However, most countries didn’t have the amount of raw material needed and therefore they had to expand and conquer other territories. The problem was that most of the known territories were already controlled by some European countries had which colonized them before. Especially in the 18th century, England and France were very successfully in controlling a lot of foreign territories. Germany at the same time wanted to expand in Africa, gain and control some territory in that continent so that it could to acquire more resources in order to sustain its thriving industry. Africa, however, was already controlled mainly by England and France. Germany thought that this was unfair, since the other two major countries had started colonizing earlier on and now the Germans also wanted to control some foreign territories too. In addition Germany wanted to have access to the oil-fields in Iraq so that its industry would have constant supply of oil. The Germans planned to use the existing Ottoman railway from Istanbul to Bagdad which was planned by German engineers. This was a big threat not only to the British but to the Russians as well. Therefore, as a result of the growth of industry during the years preceding WW1 all the major powers (including the Germans) were very keen to ensure that they could get their hands on as much supply of critical resources as possible in order to be able to sustain their growth. This factor added to the rest of the problems in Europe.

The Moroccan Crisis in 1912 can be described as a result of Imperialism. The 1912 crisis was an expansion of the previous crisis in Morocco (i.e. the First Morocco Crisis in 1905 and the Second Morocco Crisis in 1911). The French wanted to expand their influence into Morocco but at the same time the Germans also wished to have an influence in the area. The Germans moved a gunboat to the area in order to show their military strength. This created a lot of tension and as a result other countries like England, Russia, Spain, Italy and Austro-Hungary had to get involved to solve the problem .In the end, Germany had to pull back their gunboat and it was given less land than it was promised in Congo. The French remained in Morocco and the country became a protectorate to France officially in 1912. This created even more tension between the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. At the same time it resulted in strengthening the relationship of France and Britain which was exactly the opposite what the Germans wanted.

Furthermore, the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia in 1914 was the last drop which eventually overflowed the glass in the troubled area of the Balkans. Many consider the assassination of the Austro-Hungarian heir, Franz Ferdinand, by a Serbia nationalist (Gavrilo Princip) as the start of WW1. The Austro-Hungarian Empire y had long-standing disputes with Serbia especially as the Serbians started to take over territory in the Balkans from the collapsing Ottoman Empire. Austro-Hungarians served their ultimatum to Serbia shortly after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, and demanded parts of Serbia. The ultimatum was too severe and if the Serbs didn’t agree to the Austro-Hungarians threatened to attack. Eventually the Serbs didn’t accept the ultimatum and Austro-Hungary declared war. This can be considered as the beginning of WW1 because Serbia was an ally with Russia and the Russians were in the Triple Entente together with France and England. At the same time the Austro-Hungarian Empire was in the Triple Alliance with Italy and Germany. It was only a matter of time for the two major Alliances to fight each other.

The rise of Industrialization, the Morocco crisis and the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia are all elements of Imperialism which was a key factor causing friction between the European powers in early 20th century. I believe the Imperialistic inspirations the great powers were the leading cause of WW1.

To what extent was Germany already at war with Europe by 1914

It is true that by 1914 Germany was already involved in a heads-on race with England, France and Russia (Triple Entente). To better appreciate this one should understand the events that pre-dated the First World War.

Following the appointment to power (1890) of Kaiser Wilhelm II, the new ruler clearly aimed to make Germany the biggest force in Europe. By 1914 Germany was producing 2/3’s of Europe’s steel and over half of its coal as well as leading in new industries such as in electrical goods and chemicals.

The Kaiser recognized that for Germany to be a true force the country had to have a strong navy. The German Navy League was created in 1898 and heavy investments were directed in building up a strong navy. The British, which had the strongest navy at the time, became very concerned and increased battleship production in order to keep the lead over Germany. In 1909 there were negotiations between England and Germany about the Navy race but there was no progress and the relationship between the 2 countries became severely damaged.

The German’s never had good relationship with France and when in 1911 France troops were send to Morocco at the Sultan’s request the Germans consider this as a French takeover and a conflict to Germany’s interest for expanding in Africa. Germany sent a gunboat but the British fleet was put on alert and only Germany lost out put as a result the British and French a naval agreement between them.

Germany’s expansion ambitions included the support of Austro-Hungarian rulers. In 1908 -09 there was a crisis in the Balkans between the Austrians and the Serbians which were backed by the Russians. Germany stood by its ally Austria and forced Russia, which was weak after the war with Japan, to back down in 1909.

Therefore it is clear that Germany and its allies by becoming strong and establishing an aggressive foreign policy, it has led itself in isolation and with enemies in the East (Russia) and in the West (England and France). Although the war had not began Germany was heading that direction.

The unification of Germany was inevitable regardless of Bismarck’s role

Bismarck was a man that helped Prussia became strong, dominate the other German states and also helped in the unification of Germany. Put I don’t think that he is the reason that Germany united so I agree that the unification of Germany was inevitable regardless of Bismarck’s role. The main reasons that they united were because they were in an economic union, they all have a common language Prussia was expanding and taking other states, some joined for protection and they also went to war with other countries.

The Zollverein was an economic union that almost all the German states joined. The Zollverein will have made formed a sort of trust between the states and eventually became a political union. Also they have a common language

Prussia was a expanding and conquering other states. So some states may have joined for protection from Prussia or other enemies. Also some states joined because Prussia went to war with other countries such as Austria and France and she was victorious.

Even without Bismarck Germany would have united they may not have united at that exact time without Bismarck they were going to unite later on. Bismarck help Germany unite and he is not the only reason why they united and Germany would have united anyway.