The impact of the First World War

1. The impact of the First World War History of Germany Lecture 5 ChMick@aol.com

2. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences

3. Foreign Policy of William II • New Course: ‘place in the sun’, world power, dominance on continent • Great Britain: Germany tries in vain to win over GB to form an alliance, conflicts in colonial questions, navy policy, GB forms Entente Cordiale with France in 1904 • France: containment fails (Morocco), France no longer isolated, conflicts: Alsace-Lorraine, German dominance in Central Europe, colonial questions • Russia: refuses to renew Reinsurance Treaty, makes an alliance between France and Russia (1892) and England and Russia (1907) possible • Austria: supports Austrian policy on Balkans • Italy: Triple Alliance (Austria, Germany, Italy) 1882

4. German blank cheque to Austria French blank cheque to Russia General Russian mobilisation Austria decides to go to war against Serbia German ultimatum to Russia and France Germany declares war on Russia and France, dynamics of alliances German invasion in Belgium England declares war on Germany

5. Interpretations • War was forced upon Germany – traditional German view • All nations were equally responsible, pessimistic view of inevitability of war widespread, fatal automatism of alliance systems – alternativeGermanview • Germany and Austria-Hungary were alone responsible – view of Allies • German government, military & economic elites were preparing for war at least since 1912 – aim: world power and territorial gains in the east and the west (FritzFischer)‘FischerControversy’ • Social imperialism – traditional elites feel under pressure to change social and political order to prevent reform – wage war to divert attention from domestic problems, overcome polarisation of German society (Hans-UlrichWehler)

6. Interpretations Government (Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg): wage a limited war to stabilise alliance system and political system, taking the risk of a major war but not wanting it. Playing with fire Army (Chief of Staff Helmuth von Moltke): wage a preventive war as early as possible before military strength of Russia and France becomes overwhelming (expected to be the case in 1916) Right-wing nationalists, conservatives and some industrialists: fear of revolution or victory of Social Democrats in next election. Either revocation of universal male suffrage, suppression of Social Democracy and dictatorial rule or end of old political and social order, universal suffrage for Prussian Landtag, responsibility of government to the Reichstag, perhaps social revolution Intellectuals, some of the middle class: cultural pessimism, expectation of war, rejuvenation of nation, new exciting time victorious war – best way to solve the stalemate, stabilising effect, national unity,

7. YES Polarisation of society Semi-absolutist constitution Conservatives not willing to reform political system Isolation of Social Democracy Strength of reactionary agrarian elites Political weakness of middle classes Radicalisation of nationalism Role of radical non-parliamentarian pressure groups Irresponsible personal rule of Emperor (advisors) Role of arch-conservative Prussia (see suffrage) and its bureaucrats – retarding factor Prussian Army – growing role, not controlled by parliament NO Rule of law Universal suffrage Largely free press Growing role of parliament and increasing self-confidence of deputies Begin of constructive role of social-democratic deputies in parliament / cooperation with left liberals Growing strength of SPD as democratic party, loss of revolutionary drive Was the German Empire doomed?

8. AUGUST 1914 “during the days of mobilization the society (Gesellschaft) which had existed transformed itself into a community (Gemeinschaft).” The German sociologist Emil Lederer in 1915 "How the artist, the soldier in the artist, would have praised God for the collapse of the peaceful world, with which he was so fed up, so utterly fed up. War! We found it cleansing, freeing, and a monstrous hope. Of this the poets spoke, only of this.“ Thomas Mann in 1914 Recommended reading: Jeffrey Verhey, The Spirit of 1914: Militarism, Myth, and Mobilization in Germany (New York, 2000)

9. Speech of Emperor Wilhelm II from the Balcony of the Royal Palace, Berlin, August 1, 1914 “I thank you from the bottom of my heart for the expression of your loyalty and your esteem. When it comes to war, all parties cease and we are all brothers. One or another party has attacked me in peacetime, but now I forgive them wholeheartedly. If our neighbours do not give us peace, then we hope and wish that our good German sword will come victorious out of this war!”

10. Speech of Wilhelm II from the Balcony of the Royal Palace, Berlin, July 31, 1914 “A momentous hour has struck for Germany. Envious rivals everywhere force us to legitimate defense. The sword has been forced into our hands… And so I commend you to God. Go forth into the churches, kneel down before God, and implore his help for our brave army.”

11. Take up the sword of justiceSir John Bernard Partridge, 1914-1918152 x 98.6 cm Germania, Friedrich August von Kaulbach 1914, 192 x 147 cm DHM, Berlin

12. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences

13. The Western Front 1914

14. 1915

15. Warfare on the Western Front Machine guns in a trench, preparing an attack on Fort St. Catherine 1915

16. Forest near Ypern Ruins of Lens

17. Poison Gas British soldiers blinded by an attack of poison gas lined up awaiting treatment

18. Verdun 1916

19. Verdun 1916

20. Fractures

21. Storm of Steel Battle as inner experience 1922 In battle, the animal ascends as the secret horror at the soul’s base, shooting high as a consuming flame, an irresistible rapture that intoxicates the masses, a godhead enthroned above the hosts... We’ve been harnessed and chiselled, but we are also such as swing the hammer and guide the chisel, we are at once the smith and the flashing steel Ernst Jünger

22. Erich Maria Remarque Otto Dix: The Attacker, 1916

23. The Eastern Front 1914-1917

25. 1917 1915 1916

26. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences

27. Destroy this mad brute / Enlist U.S. ArmyUSA, 1917/18 Souvenez-vous!Remember!Paris, 1917

28. Anti-German UnionLondon, founded 1915

29. We Barbarians1914-1918DHM, Berlin Are We Barbarians?Berlin, 1914-1918

31. “French and Russian, they matter not,A blow for a blow, a shot for a shot,We fight the battle with bronze and steel,And the time that is coming Peace will seal.You we will hate with a lasting hate,We will never forego our hate,Hate by water and hate by land,Hate of the head and hate of the hand,Hate of the hammer and hate of the crown,Hate of seventy millions choking down.We love as one, we hate as one,We have one foe and one alone-- • ENGLAND!” Hasslied by Ernst Lissauer (excerpt). Originally published in Jugend, 1914, translated by Barbara Henderson in The New York Times.

32. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences

33. Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg Erich Ludendorff

34. Revolutions in Russia Alexander Kerenski Vladimir I. Lenin

35. 1918

36. Brest-Litovsk, February 1918

37. German Spring Offensive 1918

38. 1918

39. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences

40. War financed by printing money and war loans Taxation of war profits only in 1916 Fiscal privileges of Junkers continue unabated 16% of cost of war was met by taxation Black market Fall of real wages (20% in war industry, 40% in other branches) Mobilisation for ‘total war’ IMeasures Failures uneven distribution of burden – unfair Inflation: in 1918 the German mark had lost 75% of its value

42. War Raw Materials Office: coordination of industrial products Food rationing in 1915 War Food Office 1916 Substitutes – clothes with paper fibres Gaps in the labour force filled by women (emancipation – double burden) Auxiliary Labour Law (1916): Government could conscript workers and decide where they should work ‘Dictatorship’ of OHL – Hindenburg and Ludendorff – loss of influence for civil government – strengthening of army influence Scarcity of clothing, soap, food Agricultural production fell, meat consumption only 12% of pre-war level Malnutrition and starvation – ‘turnip winter’ 1916/17 (consequence: up to 750,000 dead) Polarisation: pro ‘Siegfrieden’ (victorious peace) with far reaching war aims, pro peace without contributions and annexations Middle Classes: pauperisation, living conditions closer to working class – but many now more nationalist, angst (loss of status) Working Class: spontaneous strikes in 1916 and 1917 Mobilisation for ‘total war’ II Measures Failures

43. War Economy Women workers in ammunition factory Child`s vestClothes made out of substitute materials, 1916/17, Paper

44. First urban mobile kitchen (Gulaschkanone) in BerlinBerlin, around 1916

45. Anstehen nach Lebensmittelnum 1917 Queuing for food, 1917

46. 1916 War of attrition in the west 1917 Blockade and submarine warfare 1917 USA enter the war 1917 (Feb./Oct.) Russian Revolutions Dictatorship of OHL (Hindenburg, Ludendorff) Hunger winter of 1916/17 Founding of USPD (Peace Now) Reichstag – across party lines (constitutional reform, ‘Peace Resolution’) War weariness Looking for scapegoats: – Jews (growing anti-Semitism) – Social Democrats Political events 1916-1917

47. Verhandlungen des Deutschen Reichstages, July 19, 1917On July 19th, Reichstag Deputy Matthias Erzberger introduced a peace resolution which was passed, 212 votes to 126 “… The Reichstag strives for a peace of understanding and a lasting reconciliation of peoples. Any violations of territory, and political, economic, and financial persecutions are incompatible with such a peace. … However, as long as the enemy governments refuse to agree to such a peace, as long as they threaten Germany and her allies with conquest and domination, so long will the German people stand united and unshaken, and they will fight until their right and that of their allies are made secure. …”

48. 1918 US President Woodrow Wilson: 14 Points 1918 (March) Peace Treaty of Brest-Litovsk 1918 Spring Offensive Collapse of the Western front from August 8, 1918 Strikes of armaments workers (January): peace and democracy Preparation of Armistice: majority of parties in government Reform in October, parlamentarisation of constitution Demand: abdication of the Emperor Political events 1918

49. Schedule • The Road to War • The Course of the War 1914-1917 • Hate Propaganda • Victory and Defeat • The Home Front • Revolution • Conclusion: Lasting Consequences