HI136 The History of Germany
Lecture 6
The First World War
The July Crisis
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28 June: Archduke Franz Ferdinand
assassinated at Sarajevo.
5 July: Kaiser Wilhelm II offers
Germany’s unconditional support (the
‘blank cheque’) to Austria-Hungary.
23 July: Austria issues her ultimatum
to Serbia.
28 July: Austria-Hungary declares war
on Serbia. Russia orders ‘partial
mobilisation’ of her armed forces.
30 July: Russia orders general
mobilisation. Austria orders general
mobilisation.
1 August: Germany declares war on
Russia. France orders mobilisation.
2 August: Germany issues an
ultimatum to Belgium, demanding to
be allowed to move troops through
Belgian territory.
3 August: Germany declares war on
France. Italy proclaims her neutrality.
4 August: German troops cross the
Belgian frontier. Britain declares war
on Germany.
Interpretations
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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, would have a
stabilising effect and help foster national unity.
Interpretations
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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 – alternative German view
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 (Fritz
Fischer) ‘Fischer Controversy’
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-Ulrich
Wehler)
Popular enthusiasm and support for
Austria (Berlin, 4 August 1914)
August 1, 1914, in Berlin (1914) by Arthur
Kampf
“I thank all of you for the love and
loyalty that you have shown me
these past days. These were serious
days, like seldom before. Should it
now come to a battle, then there
will be no more political parties. I,
too, was attacked by the one or the
other party. That was in peace. I
forgive you now from the depths
of my heart. I no longer recognize
any parties or any confessions;
today we are all German brothers
and only German brothers. If our
neighbours want it no other way, if
our neighbours do not grant us
peace, then I hope to God that our
good German sword will see us
through to victory in these difficult
battles.”
Wilhelm II (1 August 1914)
Burgfriede
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A political truce called by the parties in the Reichstag for
the duration of hostilities.
Even the SPD agreed to this and voted for War Credits.
The SPD supported the war because:
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They had been convinced that this was a defensive war against
autocratic Russia.
Many Socialists were also patriots and were proud of Germany
and her achievements.
The party leadership hoped to gain political legitimacy through
supporting the nation in its hour of need.
The Schlieffen Plan
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Drawn up by General Alfred
von Schlieffen (1833-1913),
chief of the general staff from
1891 to 1905.
Designed to cope with the
prospect of a war on two
fronts.
Its objective was to quickly
knock out France, leaving the
German army free to face
Russia.
Several flaws in the plan,
which were compounded by
unexpected reverses once
operations commenced.
Failure of the Schlieffen Plan
The invasion of Belgium made Germany
seem like the aggressor and brought Britain
into the War.
The plan had not been updated to take
recent Russian and French military reforms
into account.
German troops charging into battle (above) and digging
in to defensive positions (below) in the west, 1914
Moltke weakened the thrust through
Belgium by diverting troops to Alsace and
Lorraine and East Prussia.
The Germans faced stiffer resistance than
anticipated – in particular they had not
expected to have to fight the British
Expeditionary Force (BEF).
The German advance halted at the First
Battle of the Marne (4-10 Sept. 1914) and
the Battle of the Aisne (15-18 Sept. 1914).
September-December: The ‘race for sea’.
By December 1914 the front had stagnated
into a 400 mile system of trenches running
from the Swiss border to the North Sea.
The War in the East, 1914-15
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Russia mobilised her troops more quickly than anticipated and
invaded East Prussia.
General von Prittwitz ordered a retreat to the Vistula on 20 August.
Displeased with this timid response, Moltke replaced Prittwitz with
Paul von Hindenburg.
Paul von Hindenburg (1847-1934)
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1847: Born at Poznan in Prussian
Poland, the son of an East
Prussian landowner.
Educated at cadet schools in
Wahlstadt and Berlin.
Fought at Königgrätz (1866) and
in the Franco-Prussian War.
1878: Joined the General Staff.
1905: Promoted to the rank of
General.
1911: Retired from active service.
22 August 1914: Brought out of
retirement to command the
German Eighth Army in East
Prussia.
Victory at Tannenberg and the
Masurian Lakes made him a
national hero.
In many ways the archetypal
Prussian Junker.
The War in the East, 1914-15
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Russia mobilised her troops more quickly than anticipated and
invaded East Prussia.
General von Prittwitz ordered a retreat to the Vistula on 20 August.
Displeased with this timid response, Moltke replaced Prittwitz with
Paul von Hindenburg.
The Russians defeated at the Battle of Tannenburg (26-31 August
1914) and the Battle of the Masurian Lakes (9-14 September 1914).
Hindenburg became a public hero, promoted to Field Marshal and
placed in command of the whole Eastern Front.
Further campaigns in 1915 penetrated deep into Russian territory,
driving into Poland and the Baltic States and capturing Warsaw and
Vilna.
The Schlieffen Plan turned on its head – a war of movement in the
east, while the western front stagnated.
The ‘Easterners’:
Hindenburg, Ludendorff, Hoffmann and Mackensen by Oskar Bruch
Trench Warfare
The Battlefield in the Argonne Forest (1916)
Postcard: Resting in the Trenches,
c. 1914
Trench Warfare
German troops attacking, July 1916 (Top Left), posed
photograph of a ‘Storm Trooper’ (Bottom Left), German
soldier wearing First World War trench armour (Above)
Ernst Jünger
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“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...”
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“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.”
In Stahlgewitten (‘Storm of Steel’, 1920)
Erich Maria Remarque
The Home Front
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The world’s first ‘total war’.
Banks and export industries badly disrupted, while the
Allied blockade made it difficult for Germany to import
food and vital raw materials.
Occupation of industrial areas of northern France and
Belgium offset this to some extent,
But still severe shortages.
Necessitates state intervention in the economy.
State Intervention
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Walter Rathenau (1867-1922), industrialist
and founder of the Kreigsrohstoffabteilung
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1915: Kreigsrohstoffabteilung
(Raw Materials Department, KRA)
– ensures the acquisition, storage
and distribution of materials vital
to the war effort.
1915: Bread rationing introduced.
1916: Zentral-EinkaufsGesellschaft (Central Purchasing
Company) – acquisition of goods
from neutral countries.
1916: Reichsgetreidstelle
(Imperial Gain Office) – controlled
food supplies and issued ration
cards .
Hindenburg Programme (1916) –
Intended to concentrate industry
on the production of munitions.
Auxiliary Service Law (1916):
Government
could
conscript
workers and decide where they
should work.
War Finance
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Germany already had a large budget deficit before 1914.
Taxation not sufficient to finance the war, and proposals
to raise taxes vetoed on political grounds and the fiscal
privileges of Junkers continued unabated.
Only 16% of the cost of the war met by taxation.
War financed by printing money and war loans.
This led to massive inflation – by 1918 the mark had lost
75% of its value.
Also a fall of real wages (20% in war industry, 40% in
other branches).
Food Shortages
By the autumn of 1916 food shortages,
Inflation and mounting casualties
beginning to effect the public mood.
1916-17: The ‘Turnip Winter’ –
exceptionally cold weather and a poor
potato harvest lead to a severe food
and fuel crisis.
Between 1916 and 1917 deaths from
hypothermia and starvation rose from
121,000 to 293,000.
Infant Mortality at 50% by 1918.
Above Left: The first mobile kitchen
(Gulaschkanone) in Berlin, c. 1916. Below Left:
Queuing for food, 1917.
Mobilisation for ‘total war’
Measures:
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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 Oberste
Heeresleitung (OHL) –
Hindenburg and Ludendorff – loss
of influence for civil government –
strengthening of army influence.
Failures:
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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.
Propaganda
Propaganda
“Help us to Triumph: Buy War Bonds!”
Poster by Fritz Erler (1916)
Poster showing Wilhelm II and his assertion
that he had never sought war (1915)
“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!”
Ernst Lissauer, Hassgesang gegan England (1914)
1916
Breaking the Stalemate
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No agreement over how the stalemate in the west should
be ended and the war won.
Hindenburg & Ludendorff – pushed for an all-out
offensive in the east to knock Russia out of the war
before turning their attention to the west.
Falkenhayn – believed the war could be won in the west
and put his faith in an attack on sections of the front held
by the French.
Influential voices in the Admiralty pushing for the
introduction of unrestricted submarine warfare (sinking
all shipping entering Allied waters).
Verdun (1916)
Offensive against the fortress of
Verdun intended to ‘bleed the
French white.’
Feb.-June 1916: 315,000 French
and 281,000 Germans killed, but
the French held on.
The ‘Silent Dictatorship’
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The Kaiser increasingly sidelined in political and military
matters.
By 1916 Bethmann-Hollweg under pressure from the
right and struggling to maintain the political consensus.
The increasingly unpopular Falkenhayn dismissed in
August 1916.
Replaced by Hindenburg as Chief of the General Staff,
with Ludendorff as Quartermaster General.
They have huge popular support and use this to
increasingly control political and economic, as well as
military, affairs.
Thus, from the summer of 1916 onwards, Germany was
ruled by a military dictatorship.
1917
1917
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January: Unrestricted submarine warfare resumed.
Growing war-weariness amongst the population.
July: Peace resolution passed by the Reichstag.
“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.”
Matthias Erzberger, speech to the Reichstag, 19 July
1917
1917
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January: Unrestricted submarine warfare resumed.
Growing war-weariness amongst the population.
19 July: Peace resolution passed by the Reichstag.
July: Bethmann-Hollweg resigns as Chancellor, replaced
by George Michaelis and then Count Hertling.
Feb./March: First Russian Revolution.
6 April: The USA declared war on Germany.
May-June: Mutinies in the French Army.
Oct./Nov.: Second Russian Revolution – Bolsheviks
come to power promising to end the war.
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918)
Source: G. Layton, From Bismarck to Hitler: Germany, 1890-1933
1918
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January: 400,000 Berlin workers go on strike.
March: Spring Offensive launched.
The Kaiserschlacht (‘Kaiser’s Battle’),
March-July 1918
Source: P. J. Haythornthwaite, The World
War One Sourcebook
1918
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January: 400,000 Berlin workers go on strike.
March: Spring Offensive launched.
July: Allied counter-attack → collapse of the western
front.
September:
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Peace feelers sent out to the Americans
Prince Max von Baden appointed Chancellor
26 October: Reform of the Constitution.
3 November: Naval Mutiny at Kiel.
7 November: German plenipotentiaries cross enemy
lines.
9 November: Republic proclaimed in Berlin.
11 November: Armistice signed.
CASUALTIES OF THE WORLD WAR
Known dead
Russia
Seriously
wounded
Otherwise
wounded
Prisoners or
missing
2,762,064
1,000,000
3,950,000
2,500,000
1,611,104
1,600,000
2,183,143
772,522
1,427,800
700,000
2,344,000
453,500
AustriaHungary
911,000
850,000
2,150,000
443,000
Great Britain
807,451
617,714
1,441,394
64,907
Serbia
707,343
322,000
28,000
100,000
Italy
507,160
500,000
462,196
1,359,000
Turkey
436,924
107,772
300,000
103,731
Rumania
339,117
200,000
......
116,000
Belgium
267,000
40,000
100,000
10,000
United
States
107,284
43,000
148,000
4,912
Bulgaria
101,224
300,000
852,339
10,825
15,000
10,000
30,000
45,000
4,000
5,000
12,000
200
Japan
300
........
907
3
Total
9,998,771
6,295,512
14,002,039
5,983,600
Germany
France
Greece
Portugal
Lasting Consequences of the War
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Loss of life = changes to the labour force, lower birth rate
etc.
Psychological effects:
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‘War Neuroses’
The Dolchstoßlegende (‘Stab in the Back’ Myth)
The Stab in the Back Myth
“At this time, the secret
intentional mutilation of the
fleet and the army began as a
continuation of similar
occurrences in peacetime. . . .
An English general said with
justice: ‘The German army
was stabbed in the back,’ No
guilt applies to the good core
of the army. Its achievements
are just as admirable as those
of those of the officer corps.
Where the guilt lies has
clearly been demonstrated.”
Paul von Hindenburg
Election poster for the DNVP (1924)
Lasting Consequences of the War
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Loss of life = changes to the labour force, lower birth rate
etc.
Psychological effects:
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‘War Neuroses’
The Dolchstoßlegende (‘Stab in the back’ myth)
Split in the left.
Germany a revisionist power.
Economy: Inflation and reparations, loss of industrial
territory.
Bad starting point for first German democracy!