June 28 in Sarajevo
We'll start with the facts and work back: it may make it all the easier to understand how World War One actually happened. The events of July and early August 1914 are a classic case of "one thing led to another" - otherwise known as the treaty alliance system.
The explosive that was World War One had been long in the stockpiling; the spark was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. (Click here to view film footage of Ferdinand arriving at Sarajevo's Town Hall on 28 June 1914.)
Ferdinand's death at the hands of the Black Hand, a Serbian nationalist secret society, set in train a mindlessly mechanical series of events that culminated in the world's first global war.
Austria-Hungary's Reaction
Austria-Hungary's reaction to the death of their heir (who was in any case not greatly beloved by the Emperor, Franz Josef, or his government) was three weeks in coming. Arguing that the Serbian government was implicated in the machinations of the Black Hand (whether she was or not remains unclear, but it appears unlikely), the Austro-Hungarians opted to take the opportunity to stamp its authority upon the Serbians, crushing the nationalist movement there and cementing Austria-Hungary's influence in the Balkans.
It did so by issuing an ultimatum to Serbia which, in the extent of its demand that the assassins be brought to justice effectively nullified Serbia's sovereignty. Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Secretary, was moved to comment that he had "never before seen one State address to another independent State a document of so formidable a character."
Austria-Hungary's expectation was that Serbia would reject the remarkably severe terms of the ultimatum, thereby giving her a pretext for launching a limited war against Serbia.
However, Serbia had long had Slavic ties with Russia, an altogether different proposition for Austria-Hungary. Whilst not really expecting that Russia would be drawn into the dispute to any great extent other than through words of diplomatic protest, the Austro-Hungarian government sought assurances from her ally, Germany, that she would come to her aid should the unthinkable happen and Russia declared war on Austria-Hungary.
Germany readily agreed, even encouraged Austria-Hungary's warlike stance. Quite why we'll come back to later.
One Thing Led to Another
So then, we have the following remarkable sequence of events that led inexorably to the 'Great War' - a name that had been touted even before the coming of the conflict.
Austria-Hungary, unsatisfied with Serbia's response to her ultimatum (which in the event was almost entirely placatory: however her jibbing over a couple of minor clauses gave Austria-Hungary her sought-after cue) declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914.
Russia, bound by treaty to Serbia, announced mobilisation of its vast army in her defence, a slow process that would take around six weeks to complete.
Germany, allied to Austria-Hungary by treaty, viewed the Russian mobilisation as an act of war against Austria-Hungary, and after scant warning declared war on Russia on 1 August.
France, bound by treaty to Russia, found itself at war against Germany and, by extension, on Austria-Hungary following a German declaration on 3 August. Germany was swift in invading neutral Belgium so as to reach Paris by the shortest possible route.
Britain, allied to France by a more loosely worded treaty which placed a "moral obligation" upon her to defend France, declared war against Germany on 4 August. Her reason for entering the conflict lay in another direction: she was obligated to defend neutral Belgium by the terms of a 75-year old treaty.
With Germany's invasion of Belgium on 4 August, and the Belgian King's appeal to Britain for assistance, Britain committed herself to Belgium's defence later that day. Like France, she was by extension also at war with Austria-Hungary.
With Britain's entry into the war, her colonies and dominions abroad variously offered military and financial assistance, and included Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and the Union of South Africa.
United States President Woodrow Wilson declared a U.S. policy of absolute neutrality, an official stance that would last until 1917 when Germany's policy of unrestricted submarine warfare - which seriously threatened America's commercial shipping (which was in any event almost entirely directed towards the Allies led by Britain and France) - forced the U.S. to finally enter the war on 6 April 1917.
Japan, honouring a military agreement with Britain, declared war on Germany on 23 August 1914. Two days later Austria-Hungary responded by declaring war on Japan.
Italy, although allied to both Germany and Austria-Hungary, was able to avoid entering the fray by citing a clause enabling it to evade its obligations to both.
In short, Italy was committed to defend Germany and Austria-Hungary only in the event of a 'defensive' war; arguing that their actions were 'offensive' she declared instead a policy of neutrality. The following year, in May 1915, she finally joined the conflict by siding with the Allies against her two former allies.
Click here for more extensive information detailing who entered the war - and when.
The Tangle of Alliances
Such were the mechanics that brought the world's major nations into the war at one time or another. It's clear from the summary above that the alliance system was as much at fault as anything in bringing about the scale of the conflict.
What was intended as a strictly limited war - a brief war - between accuser and accused, Austria-Hungary and Serbia, rapidly escalated into something that was beyond the expectations of even the most warlike ministers in Berlin (and certainly Vienna, which quickly became alarmed at spiralling events in late July and sought German reassurances).
It's possible to delve deeply into European history in the quest to unearth the roots of the various alliances that were at play in 1914. However, for our purposes it serves to date the origins of the core alliances back to Bismarck's renowned intrigues, as he set about creating a unified Germany from the loose assembly of German confederated states in the 1860s.
Bismarck's Greater Germany
Bismarck, first Prime Minister of Prussia and then Chancellor of the German Empire (once he had assembled it), set about the construction of Germany through high politics judiciously assisted by war against Austria and France.
Appointed Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Prussia by Kaiser Wilhelm I in 1862, Bismarck was consumed with a desire to achieve the creation of a German Empire out of the collection of smaller German states largely led by Austria's influence (another German-speaking nation).
His first step was to oust Austria as the prime influence among these German states. He achieved this by engineering war with Austria in 1866 over disputed territory in the duchy of Holstein (much against the wishes of his own Kaiser).
The resulting war lasted just seven weeks - hence its common title 'The Seven Weeks War' - and ended with the complete dominance of the supremely efficient Prussian military.
In a peace mediated by the French Emperor, Napoleon III, Bismarck extracted from Austria not only Schleswig and Holstein, but also Hanover, Hesse, Nassau and Frankfurt, creating the North German Federation. As importantly, Bismarck had successfully displaced Austria in the spheres of influence over the many small German states.
Having assembled a united assembly in the north Bismarck determined to achieve the same in the south - and so unite all of the German states under the Prussian banner.
How to achieve this? Bismarck resolved that war with the French, a common enemy, would attain his aims.
First, he needed to engineer a credible reason for war. Thus, in 1870, Bismarck attempted to place a Hohenzollern prince on the throne in Spain. Napoleon III, fearful of the prospect of theoretical war on two fronts - for the Hohenzollern prince was a relative of Kaiser Wilhelm I - objected.
Bismarck turned up the diplomatic heat by releasing, on 14 July 1870, a doctored version of a telegram ostensibly from the Kaiser to Bismarck himself, called the Ems Telegram. The effect of the telegram was to simultaneously insult both France and Prussia over their inability to resolve the dispute over the Spanish throne.
Napoleon III, facing civil revolt at home over quite unrelated matters, and receiving encouraging noises from his military commanders, responded by declaring war against Prussia five days later, on 19 July 1870.
Once again, as was the case against Austria, the Prussian military machine demolished the French forces. Napoleon III, who personally led his forces at the lost Battle of Sedan, surrendered and was deposed in the civil war that boiled over in France, resulting in the Third French Republic.
Meantime the Prussian forces laid siege to Paris between September 1870 and January 1871, starving the city into surrender.
The consequences of the war were numerous. Aside from the usual territorial gains - France ceded both Alsace and Lorraine to Prussia and was forced to pay swingeing reparations (equivalent to around $1 billion today) - the southern German states agreed to an alliance with their northern counterparts, resulting in the creation of Bismarck's cherished German Empire.
Bismarck's Need for Alliances
Bismarck's creation of a unified Germany was of direct relevance to the outbreak of war some 43 years later, since it resulted in the assembly of the key alliances that later came into play.
For, having achieved his life's aim, Bismarck's expansionary plans were at an end. He had secured what he wanted, and his chief desire now was to maintain its stability. He therefore set about building European alliances aimed at protecting Germany from potentially threatening quarters.
He was acutely aware that the French were itching to revenge their defeat at the earliest opportunity - and the loss of Alsace and Lorraine to Prussia would prove to be a lasting sore. Indeed, the French plan for war in 1914, Plan XVII, was largely based around the recapture of Alsace and Lorraine in the shortest possible time - with disastrous consequences.
Britain's Splendid Isolation
Bismarck did not initially fear an alliance between France and Britain, for the latter was at that time in the midst of a self-declared 1870s policy of "splendid isolation", choosing to stay above continental European politics.
If not Britain then, how about Russia and, conceivably, beaten foe Austria-Hungary?
The Three Emperors League & Dual Alliance
He began by negotiating, in 1873, the Three Emperors League, which tied Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia to each other's aid in time of war. This however only lasted until Russia's withdrawal five years later in 1878, leaving Bismarck with a new Dual Alliance with Austria-Hungary in 1879.
This latter treaty promised aid to each other in the event of an attack by Russia, or if Russia aided another power at war with either Germany or Austria-Hungary. Should either nation be attacked by another power, e.g. France, they were to remain - at the very least - benevolently neutral.
This alliance, unlike others, endured until war in 1914. It was this clause that Austria-Hungary invoked in calling Germany to her aid against Russian support for Serbia (who in turn was protected by treaty with Russia).
The Triple Alliance
Two years after Germany and Austria-Hungary concluded their agreement, Italy was brought into the fold with the signing of the Triple Alliance in 1881. Under the provisions of this treaty, Germany and Austria-Hungary promised to assist Italy if she were attacked by France, and vice versa: Italy was bound to lend aid to Germany or Austria-Hungary if France declared war against either.
Additionally, should any signatory find itself at war with two powers (or more), the other two were to provide military assistance. Finally, should any of the three determine to launch a 'preventative' war (a euphemism if ever there was one), the others would remain neutral.
One of the chief aims of the Triple Alliance was to prevent Italy from declaring war against Austria-Hungary, towards whom the Italians were in dispute over territorial matters.
A Secret Franco-Italian Alliance
In the event the Triple Alliance was essentially meaningless, for Italy subsequently negotiated a secret treaty with France, under which Italy would remain neutral should Germany attack France - which in the event transpired.
In 1914 Italy declared that Germany's war against France was an 'aggressive' one and so entitled Italy to claim neutrality. A year later, in 1915, Italy did enter the First World War, as an ally of Britain, France and Russia.
Austria-Hungary signed an alliance with Romania in 1883, negotiated by Germany, although in the event Romania - after starting World War One as a neutral - eventually joined in with the Allies; as such Austria-Hungary's treaty with Romania was of no actual significance.
The Reinsurance Treaty
Potentially of greater importance - although it was allowed to lapse three years after its signature - Bismarck, in 1887, agreed to a so-called Reinsurance Treaty with Russia.
This document stated that both powers would remain neutral if either were involved in a war with a third (be it offensive or defensive).
However, should that third power transpire to be France, Russia would not be obliged to provide assistance to Germany (as was the case of Germany if Russia found itself at war with Austria-Hungary).
Bismarck's intention was to avoid the possibility of a two-front war against both France and Russia.
A decidedly tangled mesh of alliances; but the Russian Tsar, Nicholas II, allowed the Reinsurance Treaty to lapse in 1890 (the same year the new German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, brought about the dismissal of his veteran Chancellor, Bismarck).
Franco-Russian Agreements
The year after the Reinsurance Treaty lapsed Russia allied itself with France. Both powers agreed to consult with the other should either find itself at war with any other nation, or if indeed the stability of Europe was threatened.
This rather loosely worded agreement was solidified in 1892 with the Franco-Russian Military Convention, aimed specifically at counteracting the potential threat posed by the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy.
In short, should France or Russia be attacked by one of the Triple Alliance signatories - or even should a Triple Alliance power mobilise against either (where to mobilise meant simply placing a nation on a war footing preparatory to the declaration of hostilities), the other power would provide military assistance.
British Emergence From Splendid Isolation
Meanwhile, Britain was awaking to the emergence of Germany as a great European power - and a colonial power at that. Kaiser Wilhelm's successor, Wilhelm II, proved far more ambitious in establishing "a place in the sun" for Germany. With the effective dismissal of Bismarck the new Kaiser was determined to establish Germany as a great colonial power in the pacific and, most notably, in Africa.
Wilhelm, encouraged by naval minister Tirpitz, embarked upon a massive shipbuilding exercise intended to produce a naval fleet the equal of Britain's, unarguably by far and away the world's largest.
Britain, at that time the greatest power of all, took note. In the early years of the twentieth century, in 1902, she agreed a military alliance with Japan, aimed squarely at limiting German colonial gains in the east.
She also responded by commissioning a build-up in her own naval strength, determined to outstrip Germany. In this she succeeded, building in just 14 months - a record - the enormous Dreadnought battleship, completed in December 1906. By the time war was declared in 1914 Germany could muster 29 battleships, Britain 49.
Despite her success in the naval race, Germany's ambitions succeeded at the very least in pulling Britain into the European alliance system - and, it has been argued, brought war that much closer.
Cordial Agreements: Britain, France - and Russia
Two years later Britain signed the Entente Cordiale with France. This 1904 agreement finally resolved numerous leftover colonial squabbles. More significantly, although it did not commit either to the other's military aid in time of war, it did offer closer diplomatic co-operation generally.
Three years on, in 1907, Russia formed what became known as the Triple Entente (which lasted until World War One) by signing an agreement with Britain, the Anglo-Russian Entente.
Together the two agreements formed the three-fold alliance that lasted and effectively bound each to the other right up till the outbreak of world war just seven years later.
Again, although the two Entente agreements were not militarily binding in any way, they did place a "moral obligation" upon the signatories to aid each other in time of war.
It was chiefly this moral obligation that drew Britain into the war in defence of France, although the British pretext was actually the terms of the largely forgotten 1839 Treaty of London that committed the British to defend Belgian neutrality (discarded by the Germans as "a scrap of paper" in 1914, when they asked Britain to ignore it).
In 1912 Britain and France did however conclude a military agreement, the Anglo-French Naval Convention, which promised British protection of France's coastline from German naval attack, and French defence of the Suez Canal.
Agreements Set, The Occasional Minor War...
Such were the alliances between the major continental players. There were other, smaller alliances too - such as Russia's pledge to protect Serbia, and Britain's agreement to defend Belgian neutrality - and each served its part in drawing each nation into the coming great war.
In the interim however, there were a number of 'minor' conflicts that helped to stir emotions in the years immediately preceding 1914, and which gave certain nations more stake than others in entering the world war.
Russian War With Japan: Shock Japanese Victory
Ever since Russia declined Japan's offer in 1903 for each to recognise the other's interests in Manchuria and Korea, trouble was looming.
The Japanese launched a successful attack upon Russian warships in Korea, at Inchon, and in Port Arthur, China. This was followed by a land invasion of both disputed territories of Korea and Manchuria in 1904.
Among other set-pieces, the Japanese astonished the western powers by destroying the entire Russian fleet at the Battle of Tsushima (27-28 May 1905) for the loss of two torpedo boats - a humiliating Russian defeat.
The U.S. President, Theodore Roosevelt, mediated a peace agreement between Japan and Russia, one that resulted in material gains for Japan and with note being taken in Berlin of the fallacy of the myth of Russian "invincibility".
The scale of Russia's defeat in part contributed to the attempted Russian Revolution of 1905, and the battered and shaken Tsar, Nicholas II, was determined to restore Russian prestige (not least in the Romanov dynasty itself): and what better way to achieve this than through military conquest?
The Balkans, 1912: Italy Versus Turkey
Strife in the Balkans was nothing new. In 1912 it continued with war between Italy and Turkey, over the latter's African possessions. Turkey lost and was forced to hand over Libya, Rhodes and the Dodecanese Islands to the Italians.
The Balkans, 1912 (Part II): The First Balkan War
Turkey's troubles were not yet over. Having concluded peace with the Italians it found itself engulfed in war with no fewer than four small nations over the possession of Balkan territories: Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria - and later Montenegro.
The intervention of the larger European powers brought about an end to this the First Balkan War of 1912-13. Again Turkey lost out, shedding Crete and all of its European possessions.
The Balkans, 1913: The Second Balkan War
Later in the 1913, conflict erupted again in the Balkans, as Bulgaria, unsatisfied with its earlier spoils, fought with its recent allies in an attempt to control a greater part of Macedonia; and when the so-named "Young Turks" - Turkish army officers - denounced the earlier peace as unfair.
Between May and July 1913 Bulgaria's former allies beat back the new aggressor, Bulgaria, and Romania captured the Bulgarian capital Sofia in August. Beaten and having surrendered on 10 August 1913, Bulgaria also lost Adrianople back to Turkey.
Troubled Peace in the Balkans
Despite the re-establishment of peace in the Balkans, nothing had really been settled and tensions remained high. The numerous small nations that had found themselves under Turkish or Austro-Hungarian rule for many years stirred themselves in nationalistic fervour.
Yet while these Balkan nations sought their own individual voice and self-determination, they were nevertheless united in identifying themselves as pan-Slavic peoples, with Russia as their chief ally.
The latter was keen to encourage this belief in the Russian people as the Slav's natural protectors, for aside from a genuine emotional attachment, it was a means by which Russia could regain a degree of lost prestige.
Unsettled Empires
Come 1914, trouble was not restricted to the smaller nations outlined above. The Austro-Hungarian empire was directly impacted by troubles in the Balkans and, under the ageing Emperor Franz Josef, was patently struggling to maintain coherence of the various diametrically opposed ethnic groups which fell under the Austro-Hungarian umbrella.
As such, the assassination of Franz Ferdinand by the Serbian nationalist secret society, the Black Hand, provided the Austro-Hungarian government with a golden opportunity to stamp its authority over the region.
Russia, ally of the Slavs - and therefore of Serbia - had been struggling to hold back full-scale revolution ever since the Japanese military disaster of 1905. In 1914, while the Tsar himself was reluctant, his government saw war with Austria-Hungary as an opportunity to restore social order - which indeed it did, at least until the continuation of repeated Russian military setbacks, Rasputin's intrigue at court and food shortages combined to bring about the long-threatened total revolution (which, encouraged by Germany, brought about Russia's withdrawal from the war in 1917).
Then there is France. Almost immediately following her defeat by Prussia in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, together with the humiliating annexation by the newly unified Germany of the coal-rich territories of Alsace and Lorraine, the French government and military alike were united in thirsting for revenge.
To this end the French devised a strategy for a vengeful war upon Germany, Plan XVII, whose chief aim was the defeat of Germany and the restoration of Alsace and Lorraine. The plan was fatally flawed, and relied to an untenable extent upon the "élan" which was believed to form an integral part of the French army - an irresistible force that would sweep over its enemies.
Germany's Path to War
As for Germany, she was unsettled socially and militarily. The 1912 Reichstag elections had resulted in the election of no fewer than 110 socialist deputies, making Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg's task in liaising between the Reichstag and the autocratic Wilhelm, not to mention the rigidly right-wing military high command, next to impossible.
Bethmann Hollweg, who became most despondent, came to believe that Germany's only hope of avoiding civil unrest sooner rather than later lay in war: preferably a short, sharp war, although he did not rule out a European-wide conflict if it resolved Germany's social and political woes.
This outlook on life fuelled his decision of 6 July 1914 - whilst the Austro-Hungarian government was weighing its options with regard to Serbia - to offer the former what has been commonly referred to as "a blank cheque"; that is, an unconditional guarantee of support for Austria-Hungary no matter what she decided.
Germany's military unsettlement arose in the sense that Kaiser Wilhelm II was finding himself largely frustrated in his desire to carve out a grand imperial role for Germany. Whilst he desired "a place in the sun", he found that all of the bright areas had been already snapped up by the other colonial powers, leaving him only with a place in the shade.
Not that Wilhelm II was keen upon a grand war. Rather, he failed to foresee the consequences of his military posturing, his determination to construct both land and naval forces the equivalent - and better - than those of Britain and France (with varying success).
However his government and his military commanders assuredly did anticipate what was to come. A plan to take on both Russia and France, a war on two fronts, had long been expected and taken into account.
The so-called Schlieffen Plan, devised by former Army Chief of Staff Alfred von Schlieffen, had been carefully crafted to deal with a two-front war scenario. The plan, which very nearly succeeded, outlined a plan to conquer France, to knock her out of the war, on a 'Western Front', within five weeks - before, the Germans calculated, Russia could effectively mobilise for war on the 'Eastern Front' (which they estimated would take six weeks).
It is often speculated - and argued - that the plan would have succeeded but for the decision of the then-German Chief of Staff in 1914, Helmuth von Moltke, to authorise a critical deviation from the plan that, it is believed, stemmed from a lack of nerve, and crucially slowed the path towards Paris - with fatal consequences (and which ended in static trench warfare).
Still, the German plan took no real account of Britain's entry into the war. The German government gave no credence to the possibility that Britain would ignore her own commercial interests (which were presumably best served by staying aloof from the conflict and maintaining her all-important commercial trading routes), and would instead uphold her ancient treaty of obligation to recover violated Belgian neutrality.
For a fuller explanation of the powers' war plans, and of their upshot, click here.
British Dithering
It is also suggested that Germany would have backed away from war had Britain declared her intentions sooner. Believing that Britain would stay out of the coming conflict, and would limit herself to diplomatic protests - after all, Britain was under no strict military obligation to France - Germany, and Austria-Hungary, proceeded under the belief that war would be fought solely with France and Russia.
The British Government, and its Foreign Minister, Sir Edward Grey, attempted to mediate throughout July, reserving at all times its right to remain aloof from the dispute. It was only as the war began that the British position solidified into support for, ostensibly, Belgium.
Hence the oft-levelled criticism that had Britain come out clearly on the side of Belgium and France earlier in July, war would have been avoided: Germany would have effectively instructed Austria-Hungary to settle with Serbia, especially given the latter's willingness to co-operate with Austria-Hungary.
Whether this would have transpired given the German war machine's determination for war is of course unknown.
A Family Affair
The First World War has sometimes been labelled, with reason, "a family affair". This is derived from the reality that many of the European monarchies - many of which fell during the war (including those of Russia, Germany and Austria-Hungary) - were inter-related.
The British monarch George V's predecessor, Edward VII, was the German Kaiser's uncle and, via his wife's sister, uncle of the Russian Tsar as well. His niece, Alexandra, was the Tsar's wife. Edward's daughter, Maud, was the Norwegian Queen, and his niece, Ena, Queen of Spain; Marie, a further niece, was to become Queen of Romania.
Despite these familial relations - nine Kings attended Edward's funeral - European politics was all about power and influence, of protection and encirclement. Thus the tangled web of alliances which sprung up in the wake of the rise of the newly united German Empire in 1871.
Conclusion
This article has not by any means encompassed all of the suggested contributory factors that led inexorably to world war.
It has however attempted to pull together the main strands: Austro-Hungarian determination to impose its will upon the Balkans; a German desire for greater power and international influence, which sparked a naval arms race with Britain, who responded by building new and greater warships, the Dreadnought; a French desire for revenge against Germany following disastrous defeat in 1871; Russia's anxiety to restore some semblance of national prestige after almost a decade of civil strife and a battering at the hands of the Japanese military in 1905.
Having dealt with these topics, however briefly, feel free to further explore the First World War.com site to gain a wider perspective of what happened, when, and to whom. The How It Began section is probably as good a place as any to start. Click here to view a map of pre-war Europe.
Nazism or Naziism, officially called National Socialism (German: Nationalsozialismus), refers primarily to the totalitarian ideology and practices of the Nazi Party (National Socialist German Workers' Party, German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP) under Adolf Hitler. It also refers to the policies adopted by the government of Germany 1933 to 1945, a period in German history known as Nazi Germany or the "Third Reich".
On January 5, 1919, the party was founded as the German Workers' Party (DAP) by Anton Drexler.[1][2] Hitler joined the party in September 1919,[2][3] and became propaganda boss, renaming the party April 1, 1920,[4][5] and becoming party leader July 29, 1921.[5][2]
Nazism was not a precise, theoretically grounded ideology, or a monolithic movement, but rather a (mainly German) combination of various ideologies and groups, centred around anger at the Treaty of Versailles and what was considered to have been a Jewish/Communist conspiracy to humiliate Germany at the end of the First World War. It therefore consisted of a loose collection of incoherant positions focused on those held to blame for Germany's defeat and "weakness": anti-parliamentarism, ethnic nationalism, racism, collectivism,[6] eugenics, anti-Semitism, opposition to economic and political liberalism,[7] a racially-defined and conspiratorial view of finance capitalism,[8] and anti-communism. As Nazism became dominant in Germany, especially after 1933, it was defined in practice as whatever was decreed by the Nazi Party and in particular by the Führer, Adolf Hitler.
The term Nazi is derived from the first two syllables, as pronounced in German, of the official name of the German Nazi Party, the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei. The Nazis rarely referred to themselves as Nazis, and instead used the official term, Nationalsozialisten (National Socialists). Nazi was a pejorative term used by opponents of the movemement, especially in Southern Germany, and mirrors the term Sozi, a common and slightly derogatory term for the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands),[9] the Nazis' main opponents before obtaining power. When Hitler took power, the use of Nazi almost disappeared from Germany, although it was still used by opponents in Austria.[9]
Historical background
Nazi opinions, an extension of various philosophies, came together at a critical time for Germany; the nation had not only lost World War I in 1918, but had also been forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles, an intentionally devastating capitulation, and was in the midst of a period of great economic depression and instability. The Dolchstosslegende, or "stab in the back" legend, held that the war effort was sabotaged internally, suggesting a "lack of patriotism" had led to Germany's defeat (for one, the front line was off of German soil at the time of the armistice). In politics, criticism was directed at the Social Democrats and also the Weimar government (Deutsches Reich 1919-1933), which had been accused of selling out the country. The Dolchstosslegende led many to look at "non-Germans" living in Germany for potential extra-national loyalties, like the Jews, raising anti-Semitic sentiments, regarding the Judenfrage (German for the "Jewish Question"), at a time when the völkisch movement and a desire to create a Greater Germany were strong.
Although Hitler had joined the worker's party in September 1919,[2] and published Mein Kampf in 1925-1926 about the Aryan "master race" ("Herrenvolk"), the seminal ideas of Nazism trace back decades to previous groups and individuals, including the Völkisch movement, Guido von List, Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels, the List Society, the Germanenorden, and the Thule Society:
Guido von List (1849-1919) interpreted folk-tales, place-names and heraldic symbols as a secret code formulated by an ancient, advanced Aryan priesthood to pass on occult teachings during Christian persecution, and List claimed that sexual laws had prohibited breeding with racial inferiors as the foundation of the Aryan advanced race.[10]
Austrian Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels (1874-1954) broke with Catholicism to develop his own occult theology that a super-human race of creatures had led to the breeding of mankind;[10]
the Order of the New Templars (ONT) was founded in 1907 by Jorg Lanz and expropriated the name and symbolism of the Knight Templars, but required members posses Aryan physical characteristics and document their racial background.[10]
the List Society was formed in 1908 by Lanz and other followers of Guido von List to sponsor reading his works and spread ideas across Austria and Germany;[10]
the Germanenorden secret society with ONT and List members, symbolized by the swastika at 6 German cities in 1912, taught members about Nordic race superiority, Pan-German aspirations, and antisemitism;[11]
the Thule Society was formed in Munich in 1918 by ex-leader of the Germanenorden, Rudolf von Sebottendorff (1875-1945), a German engineer who became interested in occultism while in the Middle East, and Sebottendorff transformed Thule from a religious cult into political activists dedicated to destabilizing the Weimar Republic.[10]
Nazism refers to the ideology held by the National Socialist German Workers Party and its so-called "Weltanschauung" when in power from 1933 to 1945. Free elections in 1932 under Germany's Weimar Republic made the NSDAP the largest parliamentary fraction; no similar party in any country at that time had achieved comparable electoral success. Adolf Hitler's 30 January 1933 appointment to the chancellorship and his subsequent consolidation of dictatorial power, marked the beginning of Nazi Germany. During its first year in power, the NSDAP announced the Tausendjähriges Reich ("Thousand Years' Empire") or Drittes Reich ("Third Reich", a putative successor to the Holy Roman Empire and the German Empire). The Nazi regime ended with World War II (1945), when the party was declared a criminal organisation by the victorious Allied Powers and effectively destroyed.
Since 1945, Nazism has been outlawed as a political ideology in Germany, as are forms of iconography and propaganda from the Nazi era. However, "Neo-Nazis" continue to operate in Germany and abroad. Following World War II and the Holocaust, the term "Nazi" and symbols associated with Nazism (such as the swastika) acquired extremely negative connotations in Europe and North America. Calling someone a "Nazi" or suggesting ties to Nazism is considered an insult.[12] Many have compared opponents with Nazis to put their opponents in a negative light: a fallacy called "reductio ad Hitlerum."
See also: Godwin's law and fascist (epithet)
Ideological introduction
In terms of ideology, Nazism has come to stand for a belief in the superiority of an Aryan master race, an abstraction of the Germanic peoples. During the time of Hitler, the Nazis advocated a strong, centralized government under the Führer and claimed to be defending Germany and the German people (including those of German ethnicity abroad) against communism and so-called Jewish subversion. Ultimately, the Nazis sought to create a largely homogenous and self-sufficient ethnic state, absorbing the ideas of Pan-Germanism and pairing them with other abstract concepts, some related to social theory and even Nietzsche's Übermensch.
However, historians often disagree on the principal interests of the Nazi Party and whether Nazism can be considered a coherent ideology. The original National Socialists claimed that there would be no program that would bind them, and that they wanted to reject any established world view. Still, as Hitler played a major role in the development of the Nazi Party from its early stages and rose to become the movement's indisputable iconographic figurehead, much of what is thought to be "Nazism" is in line with Hitler's own political beliefs - the ideology and the man continue to remain largely interchangeable in the public eye. Some dispute whether Hitler's views relate directly to those surrounding the movement; the problem is furthered by the inability of various self-proclaimed Nazis and Nazi groups to decide on a universal ideology.
Nazism and Fascism
In both popular thought and academic scholarship, Nazism is generally considered a form of fascism - a term whose definition is itself contentious. The debate focuses mainly on comparisons of fascists movements in general with the Italian prototype, including the fascists in Germany. The idea mentioned above to reject all former ideas and ideologies like democracy, liberalism, and especially marxism (as in Ernst Nolte[13]) make it difficult to track down a perfect definition of these two terms. However, Italian Fascists tended to believe that all elements in society should be unified through corporatism to form an "Organic State"; this meant that these Fascists often had no strong opinion on the question of race, as it was only the State and nation that mattered. German Nazism, on the other hand, emphasized the Aryan race or "Volk" principle to the point where the state simply seemed a means through which the Aryan race could realize its "true destiny." Since a debate among historians (especially Zeev Sternhell) to see each movement, or at least the German, as unique, the issue has been settled in most parts showing that there is a stronger family resemblance between the Italian and the German fascist movement than there is between democracies in Europe or the communist states of the Cold War;[14] additionally, the crimes of the fascist movement can of course be compared, not only in numbers of casualties but also in common developments: the March on Rome of Mussolini to Hilter's response shortly after to attempt a coup d'etat himself in Munich. Also, Aryanism was not an attractive idea for Italians that had neither blond hair nor blue eyes, but still there was a strong racism and also genocide in concentration camps long before either was in place in Germany.[15] The philosophy that had seemed to be separating both fascisms was shown to be a result of happening in two different countries: since the king of Italy never died, unlike the Reichspräsident, the leader in Italy (Duce) was never able to gain the absolute power the leader in Germany (Führer) did, leading to Mussolini's fall. The academic challenge to separate all fascist movements has since the 1980s and early '90s been ground for a new attempt to see even more similarities.
Nazi theory
Political Ideologies
Part of the Politics seriesAnarchism
Christian democracy
Communism
Communitarianism
Conservatism
Fascism
Feminism
Green politics
Islamism
Liberalism
Libertarianism
Nationalism
Social democracy
Socialism
Relationship to Political Parties:
Ideologies of parties
Parties by ideology
Politics Portal
This box: view • talk • edit
There was no 'complete', official theory of Nazism, anywhere. Hitler's political beliefs themselves were formulated in Mein Kampf (My Struggle, 1925). His views were composed of three main axes, which he dogmatically asserted: a conception of history as a "race struggle," which was influenced by social darwinism; anti-Semitism and the idea that Germany needed to conquer a "Lebensraum" ("living space") from Russia. His anti-Semitism, coupled with his anti-Communism, would give the grounds of his conspiracy theory of "judeo-bolshevism.[16]" Hitler first began to develop his views through observations he made while living in Vienna from 1907 to 1913. He concluded that there was a racial, religious, and cultural hierarchy, and he placed "Aryans" at the top as the ultimate superior race, while Jews and "Gypsies" were people at the bottom. He vaguely examined and questioned the policies of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, where as a citizen by birth, Hitler lived during the Empire's last throes of life. He believed that its ethnic and linguistic diversity had weakened the Empire and helped to create dissension. Further, he saw democracy as a destabilizing force because it placed power in the hands of ethnic minorities who, he claimed, "weakened and destabilized" the Empire by dividing it against itself. Hitler's political beliefs were then affected by World War I and the 1917 October Revolution, and saw some modifications between 1920 and 1923. They were then definitively formulated in Mein Kampf.[17]
Nationalism
The Nazi state was founded upon a racially defined "German people" and principally rejected the idea of being bound by the limits of nationalism;[18] that was only a means for attempting unlimited supremacy. In that sense, its nationalism and hyper-nationalism was tolerated to reach a world-dominating Germanic-Aryan Volksgemeinschaft. This is a central concept of Mein Kampf, symbolized by the motto Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer (one people, one empire, one leader). The Nazi relationship between the Volk and the state was called the Volksgemeinschaft ("people's community"), a late 19th or early 20th century neologism that defined a communal duty of citizens in service to the Reich (opposed to a simple "society"). The term "National Socialism", derives from this citizen-nation relationship, whereby the term socialism is invoked and is meant to be realized through the common duty of the individuals to the German people; all actions are to be in service of the Reich. In practice, the Nazis argued, their goal was to bring forth a nation-state as the locus and embodiment of the people's collective will, bound by the Volksgemeinschaft as both an ideal and an operating instrument. In comparison, non-national socialist ideologies oppose the idea of nations. For further information on national socialism and socialism, and Nazism and fascism, see Fascism and ideology.
Militarism
Nazi rationale also invested heavily in the militarist belief that great nations grow from military power and maintained order, which in turn grow "naturally" from "rational, civilized cultures". The Nazi Party appealed to German nationalists and national pride, capitalizing on irredentist and revanchist sentiments as well as aversions to various aspects of modernist thinking (though at the same time embracing other modernist ideas, e.g. admiration for engine power). Many ethnic Germans were deeply committed to the goal of creating the Greater Germany (the old dream to include German-speaking Austria) and some felt that the use of military force was necessary to achieve it.
Racism and discrimination
Main article: Nazism and race
The Nazi racial philosophy wholly embraced Alfred Rosenberg's Aryan Invasion Theory, which traced Aryan peoples in ancient Iran invading the Indus Valley Civilization, and carrying with them great knowledge and science that had been preserved from the antediluvian world. This "antediluvian world" referred to Thule, the speculative pre-Flood/Ice Age origin of the Aryan race, and is often tied to ideas of Atlantis. Most of the leadership and the founders of the Nazi Party were made up of members of the "Thule-Gesellschaft (the Thule Society)", which romanticized the Aryan race through theology and ritual.
Hitler also claimed that a nation was the highest creation of a "race", and "great nations" (literally large nations) were the creation of homogeneous populations of "great races", working together. These nations developed cultures that naturally grew from "races" with "natural good health, and aggressive, intelligent, courageous traits". The "weakest nations", Hitler said, were those of "impure" or "mongrel races", because they had divided, quarrelling, and therefore weak cultures. Worst of all were seen to be the parasitic "Untermensch" (Subhumans), mainly Jews, but also Gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and so called anti-socials, all of whom were considered "lebensunwertes Leben" ("Life-unworthy life") owing to their perceived deficiency and inferiority, as well as their wandering, nationless invasions ("the International Jew"). The persecution of homosexuals as part of the Holocaust has seen increasing scholarly attention since the 1990s.
According to Nazism, it is an obvious mistake to permit or encourage plurality within a nation. Fundamental to the Nazi goal was the unification of all German-speaking peoples, "unjustly" divided into different Nation States. The Nazis tried to recruit Dutch and Scandinavian men into the SS, considering them to be of superior "Germanic" stock, with only limited success. In a speech to SS leaders in October 1943, Himmler stated that, "There were no great figures -- this is the tragedy of the renewal movements in Holland, in Flanders, in Norway, and in Denmark -- able to win their people over to us and lead them into the Germanic political community today, according to their own political laws.... The select few who come to us, and fight in our Germanic volunteer units, ... are naturally some of the most valuable members of the Germanic nations. These men ... will be the old fighters of the greater Germanic community."[19]
Hitler claimed that nations that could not defend their territory did not deserve it. He thought "Slave races", like the Slavic peoples, to be less worthy to exist than "leader races". In particular, if a "master race" should require room to live ("Lebensraum"), he thought such a "race" should have the right to displace the inferior indigenous races.
"Races without homelands", Hitler proclaimed, were "parasitic races", and the richer the members of a "parasitic race" were, the more "virulent" the parasitism was thought to be. A "master race" could therefore, according to the Nazi doctrine, easily strengthen itself by eliminating "parasitic races" from its homeland. This was the given rationalization for the Nazis' later oppression and elimination of Jews, Gypsies, Czechs, Poles, the mentally and physically handicapped, homosexuals and others not belonging to these groups or categories that were part of the Holocaust. The Waffen-SS and other German soldiers (including parts of the Wehrmacht), as well as civilian paramilitary groups in occupied territories, were responsible for the deaths of an estimated eleven million men, women, and children in concentration camps, prisoner-of-war camps, labor camps, and death camps such as Auschwitz and Treblinka.
Eugenics
Main article: Nazi eugenics
The belief in the need to purify the German race lead them to eugenics; this culminated in the involuntary euthanasia of disabled people and the compulsory sterilization of people with mental deficiencies or illnesses perceived as hereditary.
Anti-Semitism
Further information: Racial policies of the Third Reich
According to Nazi propaganda, the Jews thrived on fomenting division amongst Germans and amongst states. Nazi anti-Semitism was primarily racial: "the Jew is the enemy and destroyer of the purity of blood, the conscious destroyer of our race;" however, the Jews were also described as plutocrats exploiting the worker: "As socialists we are opponents of the Jews because we see in the Hebrews the incarnation of capitalism, of the misuse of the nation's goods."[20]
An estimated 100,000 homosexuals were arrested after Hitler's rise to power in the 1930s. Of those, 50,000 were suspected to be incarcerated in concentration camps, making for 5,000 to 15,000 deaths. According to Harry Oosterhuis, the Nazis' view towards homosexuality was ambiguous, and should not be viewed in the context of "race hygiene" or eugenics. Völkisch-nationalist youth movements were long suspected to be attracting homosexuals due to the preaching of Männerbund (male bonding); in practice, Oosterhuis says, this meant that the persecution of homosexuals was more politically motivated than anything else.[21] For example, the homosexuality of Ernst Röhm was well known at the time and basis for satire and jokes. Röhm was killed chiefly because he was perceived as a political threat, not for his sexuality.
Religion
Further information: Positive Christianity
Hitler extended his rationalizations into a religious doctrine, underpinned by his criticism of traditional Catholicism. In particular, and closely related to Positive Christianity, Hitler objected to Catholicism's ungrounded and international character - that is, it did not pertain to an exclusive race and national culture. At the same time, and somewhat contradictorily, the Nazis combined elements of Germany's Lutheran community tradition with its Northern European, organic pagan past. Elements of militarism found their way into Hitler's own theology, as he preached that his was a "true" or "master" religion, because it would "create mastery" and avoid comforting lies. Those who preached love and tolerance, "in contravention to the facts", were said to be "slave" or "false" religions. The man who recognized these "truths", Hitler continued, was said to be a "natural leader", and those who denied it were said to be "natural slaves". "Slaves" – especially intelligent ones, he claimed – were always attempting to hinder their masters by promoting false religious and political doctrines.
Anti-clericalism can also be interpreted as part of Nazi ideology, simply because the new Nazi hierarchy was not about to let itself be overode by the power that the Church traditionally held. In Austria, clerics had a powerful role in politics and ultimately responded to the Vatican. Although a few exceptions exist, Christian persecution was primarily limited to those who refused to accommodate the new regime and yield to its power. The Nazis often used the church to justify their stance and included many Christian symbols in the Third Reich (Steigmann–Gall). A particularly poignant exemplar is the seen in the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
Volkism was inherently hostile toward atheism: freethinkers clashed frequently with Nazis in the late 1920s and early 1930s. On taking power, Hitler banned freethought organizations and launched an “anti-godless” movement. In a 1933 speech he declared: “We have . . . undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations: we have stamped it out.” This forthright hostility was far more straightforward than the Nazis’ complex, often contradictory stance toward traditional Christian faith.[22]
Anti-capitalism
Nazi thinking had an anticapitalist (and especially anti-finance capitalist) direction.[23] The "Twenty-Five Point Programme" of the Nazi Party from 1920 listed several economic demands. Included in these demands were, "that the State shall make it its primary duty to provide a livelihood for its citizens," "the abolition of all incomes unearned by work," the ruthless confiscation of all war profits," "the nationalization of all businesses which have been formed into corporations," "profit-sharing in large enterprises," "extensive development of insurance for old-age," "land reform suitable to our national requirements," and to achieve this and other aims, "the creation of a strong central state power for the Reich."[24] However, the degree to which the Nazis supported this programme in later years has been questioned. Several attempts were made in the 1920s to change some of the program or replace it entirely. For instance, in 1924, Gottfried Feder proposed a new 39-point program that kept some of the old planks, replaced others and added many completely new ones.[25] Hitler refused to allow any discussion of the party programme after 1925, ostensibly on the grounds that no discussion was necessary because the programme was "inviolable" and did not need any changes. At the same time, however, Hitler never voiced public support for the programme and many historians argue that he was in fact privately opposed to it.[citation needed] Hitler did not mention any of the planks of the programme in his book, Mein Kampf, and only talked about it in passing as "the so-called programme of the movement".[26]
Party spokesman Joseph Goebbels insisted in 1932 that the NSDAP was a "workers' party" and "on the side of labor and against finance".[27] Hitler said that the Nazis were "We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance".[28] However, he was clear to point out that Nazism "has nothing to do with Marxian Socialism," saying that "Marxism is anti-property; true Socialism is not."[29] He further said that "I absolutely insist on protecting private property... we must encourage private initiative".[30] Nevertheless, he wanted property to be regulated to make sure "benefit to the community precedes benefit to the individual".[31] Attacks were made on what Hitler called "pluto-democracy," which was claimed to be a conspiracy by Jews to favor democratic parties in order to keep capitalism intact.[32]
Other roots
The ideological roots that became German National Socialism were based on numerous sources in European history, drawing especially from Romantic 19th century idealism, and from a biological reading of Friedrich Nietzsche's thoughts on "breeding upwards" toward the goal of an Übermensch (Superhuman). Hitler was an avid reader and received ideas that were later to influence Nazism from traceable publications, such as those of the Germanenorden (Germanic Order) or the Thule society. He also adopted many populist ideas such as limiting profits, abolishing rents and generously increasing social benefits - but only for Germans.
Nazism and the inferiority complex
The Nordic Myth has often been attributed to the reaction to an inferiority complex. Phillip Wayne Powell, in is book, Tree of Hate (1985), claimed that the Nordic Myth began to arise in 15th century Germany, when Germans resented the fact that Italians looked down on them as an inferior and unsophisticated people. In page 48, he states:
"In the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, a powerful surge of German patriotism was stimulated by the disdain of Italians for German cultural inferiority and barbarism, which lead to a counterattempt by German humanists to laud German qualities."
Fodor, M. W. claimed in "The nation" (1936):
"No race has suffered so much from an inferiority complex as has the German. National Socialism was a kind of Coué method of converting the inferiority complex, at least temporarily, into a feeling of superiority".[1]
Variants of Nazism and Hitlerism abroad
Nazism as a doctrine is far from being homogeneous and can indeed be divided into various sub-ideologies. During the 20s and 30s, there were two dominant NSDAP factions. There were the followers of Otto Strasser, the so-called Strasserites and the followers of Adolf Hitler or what could be termed Hitlerites. The Strasserite faction eventually fell afoul of Hitler, when Otto Strasser was expelled from the party in 1930, and his attempt to create an oppositional 'left-block' in the form of the Black Front failed. The remainder of the faction, which was to be found mainly in the ranks of the SA, was purged in the Night of the Long Knives, which also saw the murder of Gregor Strasser, Otto's brother. After this point, the Hitlerite faction became dominant. In the post war era, Strasserism has enjoyed something of a revival with many neo-Nazi groups openly proclaiming themselves to be 'Strasserite'. Whether they genuinely eschew Hitlerism in favour of Strasserism, or whether they simply think that by distancing Nazism from Hitler they can somehow make the ideology more acceptable is a matter of intense debate however.
Hitler's theories were not only attractive to Germans: people in positions of wealth and power in other nations are said to have seen them as beneficial. Examples are Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company, and Eugene Schueller, founder of L'Oréal. Nevertheless, the support for these theories was highest among the general population of Germany.
Key elements of the Nazi ideology
The National Socialist Program
The rejection of democracy, and consequently abolishing political parties, labour unions, and free press.
Führerprinzip (Leader Principle) as a total belief in the leader (responsibility up the ranks, and authority down the ranks)
Extreme Nationalism
Anti-Bolshevism
Strong show of local culture
Social Darwinism
Defense of Blood and Soil (German: "Blut und Boden" - represented by the red and black colors in the Nazi flag)
The Lebensraum policy of creation of more living space for Germans in the east
Nazism and race, Racial policies of the Third Reich and Nazi eugenics:
Anti-Slavism
Anti-Semitism
The creation of a Herrenrasse (or Herrenvolk) (Master Race = by the Lebensborn (Fountain of Life; A department in the Third Reich)).
White Supremacism; more specifically, ranking of individuals according to their race and racial purity, with the Nordic race favoured the most
Limited freedom of religion (Point #24 in the 25 point plan). [2]
Rejection of the modern art movement and an embrace of classical art
Association with Fascism or Totalitarianism[33]
Other new elements
Animal rights [3], [4]
Environmentalism [5], [6], [7], [8]
Kraft durch Freude The well-being of the working classes.
Public health [9] (Antismoking campaigns, asbestos restrictions, occupational health and safety standards) According to Bertrand Russell, Nazism would come from a different tradition than that of either Liberalism or Marxism. Thus, to understand values of Nazism, it would be necessary to explore this connection, without trivializing the movement as it was in its peak years in the 1930s and dismissing it as little more than racism.
Anti-Semitism was shown to be a handy tool for Nazis to gain support, mainly due to the popular Houston Stewart Chamberlain.[34] Personal accounts by August Kubizek, Hitler's childhood friend, have varied, offering ambiguous claims that anti-Semitism did and did not date back to Hitler's youth.[35] One reason is the higher Jewish community in Austria and Germany because Germany had been a haven for many Jews over the years, including influential families such as the Rothschilds, although World War I and the Dolchstosslegende ended that legacy. Anti-Judaism had already been widely transformed into anti-Semitism before 1914 due to the new Europe-wide post-Darwin theory of racism. Historians universally accept that Nazism's mass acceptance depended upon nationalistic appeals and fear against "unnormal people" (which also could include xenophobia and anti-Semitism) and a patriotic flattery toward the wounded collective pride of defeated World War I veterans. Early support for the Nazis, displayed in various parades, came from the old conservative order that was the military.
Many see strong connections to the values of Nazism and the anti-rationalist tradition of the romantic movement of the early 19th century in response to the Enlightenment. Strength, passion, frank declarations of feelings, and deep devotion to family and community were valued by the Nazis though first expressed by many Romantic artists, musicians, and writers. German romanticism in particular expressed these values. For instance, Hitler identified closely with the music of Richard Wagner, who harbored anti-Semitic views as the author of Das Judenthum in der Musik. Some claim that he was one of Hitler's role models, a comment of Kubizek's that is also disputed. Nevertheless, Wagner's most important operas of the Ring cycle express Aryanist ideals, and contain what some people interpret as anti-Semitic caricatures.[citation needed] Hitler admired Wagner's widow and visited Bayreuth Festival regularly.
The idealization of tradition, folklore, classical thought, leadership (as exemplified by Frederick the Great), their rejection of the liberalism of the Weimar Republic, and calling the German state the "Third Reich" (which traces back to the medieval First Reich and the pre-Weimar Second Reich) has led many to regard the Nazis as reactionary.
Nazism and mysticism
Thule Society emblemNazi mysticism is a term used to describe a philosophical undercurrent of Nazism that denotes the combination of Nazism with occultism, esotericism, cryptohistory, and/or the paranormal. The esoteric Thule Society and Germanenorden were secret societies that, while only a small part of the völkisch movement, led into the Nazi party.[35]
Dietrich Eckart, a member of Thule, actually coached Hitler on his public speaking skills, and while Hitler has not been shown to have been a member of Thule, he received support from the group. Hitler later dedicated Mein Kampf to Eckart.
Heinrich Himmler showed a strong interest in such matters, although as Steigmann–Gall points out, Hitler and many of his key associates attended Christian services.
Ideological competition
Nazism and Communism emerged as two serious contenders for power in Germany after the First World War, particularly as the Weimar Republic became increasingly unstable. What became the Nazi movement arose out of resistance to the Bolshevik-inspired insurgencies that occurred in Germany in the aftermath of the First World War. The Russian Revolution of 1917 caused a great deal of excitement and interest in the Leninist version of Marxism and caused many socialists to adopt revolutionary principles. The Spartacist uprising in Berlin and the Bavarian Soviet Republic in 1919 were both manifestations of this. The Freikorps, a loosely organized paramilitary group (essentially a militia of former World War I soldiers) was used to crush both these uprisings and many leaders of the Freikorps, including Ernst Röhm, later became leaders in the Nazi party. After Mussolini's Fascists took power in Italy in 1922, fascism presented itself as a realistic option for opposing "Communism", particularly given Mussolini's success in crushing the Communist and anarchist movements that had destabilized Italy with a wave of strikes and factory occupations after the First World War. Fascist parties formed in numerous European countries.
Many historians, such as Ian Kershaw and Joachim Fest, argue that Hitler's Nazis were one of numerous nationalist and increasingly fascistic groups that existed in Germany and contended for leadership of the anti-Communist movement and, eventually, of the German state. Further, they assert that fascism and its German variant, National Socialism, became the successful challengers to Communism because they were able to both appeal to the establishment as a bulwark against Bolshevism and appeal to the working class base, particularly the growing underclass of unemployed and unemployable and growingly impoverished middle class elements who were becoming declassed (denounced as the lumpenproletariat). The Nazis' use of pro-labor rhetoric appealed to those disaffected with capitalism by promoting the limiting of profits, the abolishing of rents and the increasing of social benefits (only for Germans) while simultaneously presenting a political and economic model that divested "Soviet socialism" of elements that were dangerous to capitalism, such as the concept of class struggle, "the dictatorship of the proletariat" or worker control of the means of production. Thus, Nazism's populism, anti-Communism and anti-capitalism helped it become more powerful and popular than traditional conservative parties, like the DNVP. For the above reasons, particularly the fact that Nazis and Communists fought each other (often violently) during most of their existence, Nazism and Communism are commonly seen as opposite extremes on the political spectrum. However, this view is not without its challengers. A number of political theorists and economists, primarily those associated with the Austrian school, argue that Nazism, Soviet Communism and other totalitarian ideologies share a common underpinning in collectivism.
The simplicity of Nazi rhetoric, campaigns, and ideology also made its conservative allies underestimate its strength, and its ability to govern or even to last as a political party. Michael Mann defined fascism as a "transcendent and cleansing nation statism through paramilitarism", with "transcendent" meaning that the all classes were to be abolished in order for a new, organic and pure people: all classes are abolished by transition, all "others" (an estimated two-thirds of the German population alone[36]).[37]
Support of anti-Communists for Fascism and Nazism
Various far right-wing politicians and political parties in Europe welcomed the rise of fascism and the Nazis out of an intense aversion towards Communism. According to them, Hitler was the savior of Western civilization and of capitalism against Bolshevism. During the later 1930s and 1940s, the Nazis were supported by the Falange movement in Spain, and by political and military figures who would form the government of Vichy France. A Legion of French Volunteers against Bolshevism (LVF) and other anti-Soviet fighting formations were formed.
Post-1933 development
The British Conservative party and the right-wing parties in France appeased the Nazi regime in the mid- and late-1930s, even though they had begun to criticise its totalitarianism and in Britain especially, Nazi Germany's policies towards the Jews. However, Britain (from 1931 onwards under an overwhelmingly Conservative government) had appeased pre-Nazi Germany. Important reasons behind this appeasement included, first, the erroneous assumption that Hitler had no desire to precipitate another world war, and second, when the rebirth of the German military could no longer be ignored, a well-founded concern that neither Britain nor France was yet ready to fight an all-out war against Germany. In addition, some have argued[citation needed] that Nazi Germany was assisted in its development to create a front to counter early Bolshevik ambitions.
In 1936, Nazi Germany and Japan entered into the Anti-Comintern Pact, aimed directly at countering Soviet foreign policy. This later became the basis for the Tripartite Pact with Italy, the foundation of the Axis Powers. The three nations were united in their rabid opposition to Communism, as well as their militaristic, racist regimes, but they failed to coordinate their military efforts effectively.
In his early years Hitler also greatly admired the United States of America. In Mein Kampf, he praised the United States for its race-based anti-immigration laws and for the subordination of the "inferior" black population. According to Hitler, America was a successful nation because it kept itself "pure" of "lesser races". However, his view of the United States became more negative as time passed. In his later estimations, the United States was becoming a mongrel nation, calling it "half Judaised, half Negrified".[citation needed]
Economic practice
The neutrality of the style of writing in this article is questioned. Please see the discussion on the talk page.
See also: Economics of fascism
The Nazi Party utilized a right-facing swastika as their symbol, using the colors red and black to represent Blut und Boden (blood and soil).Nazi economic practice concerned itself with immediate domestic issues and separately with ideological conceptions of international economics.
Domestic economic policy was narrowly concerned with four major goals to eliminate Germany's issues:
Elimination of unemployment.
Rapid and substantial rearmament.
Protection against the resurgence of hyper-inflation
Expansion of production of consumer goods to improve middle and lower-class living standards.
All of these policy goals were intended to address the perceived shortcomings of the Weimar Republic and to solidify domestic support for the party. In this, the party was very successful. Between 1933 and 1936 the German GNP increased by an average annual rate of 9.5 percent, and the rate for industry alone rose by 17.2 percent.
This expansion propelled the German economy out of a deep depression and into full employment in less than four years. Public consumption during the same period increased by 18.7%, while private consumption increased by 3.6% annually. According to the historian Richard Evans, prior to the outbreak of war the German "economy had recovered from the Depression faster than its counterparts in other countries. Germany's foreign debt had been stabilized, interest rates had fallen to half their 1932 level, the stock exchange had recovered from the Depression, the gross national product had risen by 81 per cent over the same period.... Inflation and unemployment had been conquered."[38]
Some economists[citation needed] argue that the expansion of the German economy between 1933 and 1936 was not the result of measures adopted by the Nazi Party, but rather the consequence of economic policies of the prior Weimar Republic, which had begun to have an effect on factors such as unemployment. However, it was the policies of Nazi Germany that restored national confidence, arguably the key ingredient to any successful economic policy.
German marriages increased from about 511,000 in 1932 to 611,000 in 1936, while births rose from 921,000 births in 1932 to 1,280,000 in 1936. Suicides committed by young people under 20 dropped by 80% between 1933 and 1939.[39]
Internationally, the Nazi Party believed that an international banking cabal was behind the global depression of the 1930s. Control of this cabal, which had grown to a position where it controlled both Europe and the United States, was identified with an elite and powerful group of Jews. However, a number of people believed that this was part of an ongoing plot by the Jewish people, as a whole, to achieve global domination. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which began its circulation in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, were said to have confirmed this, already showing "evidence" that the Bolshevik takeover in Russia was in accordance with one of the protocols. Broadly speaking, the existence of large international banking or merchant banking organizations was well known at this time. Many of these banking organizations were able to exert influence upon nation states by extension or withholding of credit. This influence is not limited to the small states that preceded the creation of the German Empire as a nation state in the 1870s, but is noted in most major histories of all European powers from the 16th century onward. Nevertheless, after the Great Depression, this libelous and unverified manuscript took on an important role in Nazi Germany, thus providing another link in the Nazis ideological motivation for the destruction of that group in the Holocaust.
Additionally, many companies blindly dealt with the Third Reich. Many know that the Volkswagen was a Nazi project. Opel employed Jewish slave labour to run their industrial plants. Additionally, Daimler-Benz used POWs as slaves to run their industrial plants. Other companies that dealt with the Third Reich -- many of which claim not to have known the truth of what the Nazis were doing (some had in fact lost control of their German branches when Hitler was in power) -- were: BMW,[40] Krupp (made gas chambers), Bayer (as a small part of the enormous IG Farben chemistry monopoly), and Hugo Boss (designed the SS uniforms, admitted to this in 1997). There has also been some controversy whether IBM had dealt with the Nazis to create a cataloguing system, which the Nazis were to use to file information on those who they killed.[41]
Backlash and societal effects
Perhaps the primary intellectual effect has been that Nazi doctrines discredited the attempt to use biology to explain or influence social issues, for at least two generations after Nazi Germany's brief existence. However, in the 21st century there has been a renewed interest in the debate of nature versus nurture as well as ethnic and racial genetics.
The Nazi descendants have been mute in the post-war democracies, with some exceptions, when interviewed by psychologists and historians. In Norway, a group of descendants have taken the official stigmatizing appellation "War children" in order to break the silence and to protest against the continuous demonization of their families. Some historical revisionists disseminate propaganda that minimizes the Holocaust and other Nazi acts in order to remove the stigma attached to National Socialism. Often, attempts are also made to put a positive spin on the policies of the Nazi regime. Under these circumstances, research on the topic can raise high emotions when it fails to be precise in the analysis and to present proof of emotionalized themes.
People
Adolf Hitler walking out of the Brown House after the 1930 elections.Adolf Hitler: Hitler was more than just the leader of Nazi Germany: in 1919, Adolf Hitler joined the workers' party before it was the "Nazi Party": On January 5, 1919, the party had been founded in Munich as the German Workers' Party (German Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) by Anton Drexler, a Munich locksmith.[1][2] Working undercover for the German army, Corporal Hitler joined the Party in mid September 1919,[2][3] became propaganda boss (Propagandachef), renaming the party on April 1, 1920,[4][5] and became party leader on July 29, 1921.[5][2] Adolf Hitler ruled Nazi Germany from January 30, 1933 until his suicide on April 30, 1945, leading the German Reich throughout World War II.
German Nazis: Though Nazi Party membership was carefully regulated (and even closed off at a certain point), many non-affiliated citizens of the Nazi State described themselves as dedicated Nazis. After the war, the most prominent Nazis were convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity at the Nuremberg Trials, where 21 were executed. Party members - even those who were ordinary citizens - experienced a post-war "purge" where they were stripped of property, assets and often forced to abandon their positions. As part of Nazi Germany, Austria also experienced denazification, though this process occurred to a smaller degree only much later.
Foreign-Born: During and prior to World War II, there were a number of people outside of the German Reich who became adherents to the Nazi ideology. Some foreign born ethnic Germans had ventured from their homelands to become citizens of the Nazi State in the pre-war years. This was particularly the case around São Paulo, where people had left in the thousands despite the fact that, at the same time, efforts were being made to draw the Germany-born population into the region.
Nazi Supporters: Other Nazi supporters, such as William Joyce and the "Lord Haw Haw" cast, took flight from Britain, especially after the downfall of the British Union of Fascists. Similarly, parties supportive of the Nazis had failed to influence their own countries. Some people in the German-American Bund were incarcerated during the war, as were potential Nazi supporters in the U.S.
Post-war Nazis: George Lincoln Rockwell, a former U.S. Navy lieutenant commander, became a prominent Nazi in the 1950s and formed the American Nazi Party. Some became admirers or sympathized with the plight of Nazi Germany because they saw it as the defender of Oswald Spengler's "West". From this point of view, the Nazi State was brought to its knees trying to solidify a self-sufficient Europe and ward of the influence of the Soviet Union and the United States, political and otherwise. Spenglerians such as Francis Parker Yockey supported this view, and his magnum opus, Imperium, has sold over twenty thousand copies since 1948. Essentially, Yockey was convinced that Nazi Germany was a step towards Spengler's Imperium, and during the Cold War, Yockey dedicated his life to promoting a general European rebellion against the overlordship of both the Soviet Union and the United States.
Esoteric Nazis: Others were fascinated by National Socialist philosophy in a spiritual or esoteric direction, including: Savitri Devi of France, Julius Evola of Italy, and Miguel Serrano of Chile.
Factors that promoted the success of Nazism
An important question about Nazism is the factors that promoted its success in Germany. These factors may have included:
A widespread acceptance of violence in politics (not only, but most significantly "Rot Front" (Communist Party of Germany) versus SA).
Economic devastation all over Europe after World War I.
Humiliation of Germany at the Treaty of Versailles, and the widespread belief that the German military were not defeated on the battlefield but "stabbed in the back" by politicians and Jews.
A perception that there were a disproportionate number of rich Jewish bankers controlling Germany's finances.
Appeal of nationalist rhetoric.
Rejection of Communism and the perception that Communism was a Jewish-inspired and Jewish-led movement; hence the Nazi use of the term Judeo-Bolshevik.
Fear by the middle and upper classes of the loss of possessions and wealth to Communism.
The split in the working class between Social Democrats (SPD) and Communists, exacerbated by the Communists' policy of treating the SPD as "Social Fascists"
The Great Depression.
Hitler's choice of taking power through legal political means rather than a violent coup after the failure of the Beer Hall Putsch.
Nazi/Third Reich terminology in popular culture
See main article, Hitler in popular culture.
The multiple atrocities and racist ideology that the Nazis followed have made them notorious in popular discourse as well as history. The term "Nazi" has become a genericised term of abuse. So have other Third Reich terms like "Führer" (often spelled "fuhrer" or less often, but more correctly, "fuehrer" in English-speaking countries), "Fascist", "Gestapo" (short for Geheime Staatspolizei, or Secret State Police in English) or "Hitler". The terms are used to describe any people or behaviours that are viewed as thuggish, overly authoritarian, or extremist.
The terms are also used to describe anyone or anything seen as strict or doctrinaire. Phrases like "grammar nazi", "Feminazi", "Open Source Nazi", and "parking [enforcement] Nazis", are examples of those in use in the USA. These uses are offensive to some, as the controversy in the popular press over the Seinfeld "Soup Nazi" episode indicates, but still the terms are used so frequently as to inspire "Godwin's Law".
More innocent terms, like "fashion police", also bear some resemblance to Nazi terminology (Gestapo, Secret State Police) as well as references to Police states in general.
Another similar effect can be observed in the usage of typefaces. Some people strongly associate the blackletter typefaces (e.g. fraktur or schwabacher) with Nazi propaganda (although the typeface is much older, and its usage, ironically, was banned by government order in 1941).
In popular culture such as films like the Indiana Jones series, Nazis are often considered to be ideal villains whom the heroes can battle without mercy. Video game website IGN declared Nazis to be the most memorable video game villains ever [10].
Nazi locations
Nazism, both before and after World War II, was a quasi-religion to its followers, and like many world religions, Nazism had its own venerated locations or sites, as opposed to Holocaust sites. National socialist Savitri Devi visited many of the Nazi sites during a tour of the sites circa 1953:[42]
Berchtesgaden, home of the Berghof;
Braunau am Inn, birthplace of Adolf Hitler (in Austria);
Feldherrnhalle, site of the failed Munich Putsch;
Leonding, where the parents of Adolf Hitler were buried;
Linz, where Hitler went to school;
Landsberg am Lech, where Hitler was imprisoned;
Nuremberg, site of the enormous Nazi rallies;
Wewelsburg, headquarters of the Schutzstaffel (SS); and
Wunsiedel, burial site of Rudolf Hess.
Devi also visited some sites, not directly connected to Nazism, but perceived to be of spiritual or German-national significance:[42]
Externsteine, pre-Christian mountain-pillar formation; and,
Hermannsdenkmal, statue of Germany's national hero Arminius the Cheruscan.
3 russia
4 Even before meeting in Versailles, the leaders of France, Britain, and the United States had stated their differing objectives for the peace conference. France wanted Germany to be punished, Britain wanted a relatively strong, economically viable Germany as a counterweight to French dominance in Continental Europe, and the United States wanted the creation of a permanent peace as quickly as possible, with financial compensation for its military expenditures and the destruction of the old empires.
The result of these competing and sometimes incompatible goals among the victors was a compromise that left nobody satisfied. Germany was neither crushed nor conciliated, which, in retrospect, did not bode well for the future of Germany, Europe or the world as a whole.
[edit] France's aims
France had suffered very heavy casualties during the war (some 1.24 million military and 40,000 civilians dead; see World War I casualties), and much of the western front had been fought on French soil. France wanted to be given control of many of Germany's factories. In wanting this, Prime Minister Clemenceau was representing the demands of the French public.
Coal from the Ruhr industrial region was transported to France by train. French military had taken over towns in key locations such as Gau Algesheim, forcing homelessness upon its inhabitants. German railroad workers sabotaged coal shipments to France. Around 200 German railroad workers involved in sabotage were executed by French authorities.
Clemenceau's intentions were therefore simple: punitive reparations and Germany’s military to be not only weakened for the time being, but permanently weakened so as never to be able to invade France again. Clemenceau also wanted to symbolically destroy the old, militaristic Germany – something that could have been achieved by never allowing the pre-1914 politicians back into politics and by hanging the Kaiser (who had abdicated towards the end of the war and fled to the Netherlands). He also wanted to protect secret treaties and impose naval blockades around Germany; so that France could control trade imported to and exported goods from the defeated country.
Territorially, France felt that Germany should be punished. Obviously, she demanded the return of Alsace-Lorraine to France, but also the demilitarisation of the Rhineland to act as a buffer zone against future attacks. Furthermore, Germany’s colonies should be taken from it and distributed between the victors.
France had suffered very heavy casualties during the war (some 1.24 million military and 40,000 civilians dead; see World War I casualties), and much of the war had been fought on French soil. Much of the country was in ruins, with extensive damage to historic and important buildings and resources. George Clemenceau of France wanted reparations from Germany to rebuild the war-torn country. In all, approximately 750,000 houses and 23,000 factories had been destroyed, and money was demanded to pay for reconstruction. In 1871, France and Germany had also fought, with Germany recovering an area with a predominantly German-speaking population that had been annexed by France in the 17th century, Elsaß/Lothringen-Alsace-Lorraine. Clemenceau also wanted to guard against the possibility of an attack ever coming from Germany again, and demanded a demilitarisation of the Rhineland in Germany, and Allied troops to patrol the area. This was called a "territorial safety zone". They also wanted to drastically reduce the number of soldiers in the German army to a controllable point. As part of the reparations, France wanted to be given control of many of Germany's factories.
Not only did France want to punish Germany, it wanted to preserve its empire and colonies. While America put forward a belief in national or ethnic "self-determination", France and Britain were also strongly motivated by a desire to hold onto their empires. Clemenceau largely represented the people of France in that he (and many other Frenchmen) wanted revenge upon the German nation. Clemenceau also wanted to protect secret treaties and impose naval blockades around Germany, so that France could control trade imported to and exported from the defeated country. In effect, Clemenceau and many other French wanted to impose policies deliberately meant to cripple Germany militarily, politically, and economically. He was the most radical member of the Big Four, and received the nickname "Le Tigre" for this reason.
Georges Clemenceau's aims can be summarized as follows:
To gain control of most of Germany's factories,
To humiliate the German people,
To permanently cripple Germany's armed forces so France would never be threatened again,
And to create a "buffer zone" by demilitarising the Rhineland.
[edit] Britain's aims
Though Britain had not been invaded, many British soldiers died on the front line in France; so many people in Britain also wanted revenge. Prime Minister David Lloyd George supported severe reparations, but to a lesser extent than the French. Lloyd George was aware that if the demands made by France were carried out, France could become extremely powerful in Central Europe, and a delicate balance could be unsettled. Although he wanted to ensure this didn't happen, he also wanted to make Germany pay. Lloyd George was also worried by Woodrow Wilson's proposal for "self-determination" and, like the French, wanted to preserve his own nation's empire. This position was part of the competition between two of the world's greatest empires, and their battle to preserve them. Like the French, Lloyd George also supported naval blockades and secret treaties.
It is often suggested that Lloyd George represented the middle ground between the idealistic Wilson and the vengeful Clemenceau. However, his position was a great deal more delicate than it first appears. The British public wanted to punish Germany in a similar fashion to the French for her apparent sole responsibility for the outbreak of the war, and had been promised such a treaty in the 1918 election that Lloyd George had won. There was also pressure from the Conservatives (who were part of the coalition government) demanding that Germany be punished severely in order to prevent such a war in the future as well as preserving Britain’s empire. Lloyd George did manage to increase the overall reparations payment and Britain’s share by demanding compensation for widows, orphans, and men left unable to work through injury. Also, he wanted to maintain and possibly increase Britain’s colonies, and both he and Clemenceau felt threatened by Wilson’s 'self-determination,' which they saw as a direct threat to their respective empires. Lastly, like Clemenceau, he supported upholding secret treaties and the idea of a naval blockade.
However, Lloyd George was aware of the potential trouble that could come from an embittered Germany, and he felt that a less harsh treaty that did not engender vengeance would be better at preserving peace in the long run. Another factor was that Germany was Britain’s second largest trade partner, and a reduced German economy due to reparations would lower Britain’s trade. Moreover, he (and Clemenceau) recognised that America’s status as an economic superpower would lead to the U.S. becoming a military superpower in the future, and subsequently, Wilson’s idealistic stance could not be laughed at if Britain and France were to remain on good terms with the United States. This helps to understand why the League of Nations, Wilson’s main idea (along with self-determination), was apparently jumped at by Britain and France when Wilson arrived at the peace conference. Furthermore, Britain wanted to maintain the 'Balance of Power' — no country within Europe being allowed to become a lot more powerful than the others. If France's wishes were carried out, then not only would Germany be crippled, but France would soon become the main superpower, and so disrupt the Balance of Power in two ways.
Lloyd George's aims can be summarized as follows:
To defend British interests by preserving Britain’s naval supremacy that had been threatened by Germany in the run up to the war, maintaining Britain’s empire and possibly increased colonial expansion;
To reduce Germany’s future military power and to obtain reparations,
Not to create an embittered Germany that would seek revenge and threaten peace in the long term future; and lastly,
To help Germany economically to become a strong trading partner with Britain. Since there had been strong isolationist sentiment before and after the United States entered the war in April 1917, many Americans felt that they should get out of European affairs as rapidly as possible. The United States of America took a more conciliatory view towards the issue of German reparations. Americans also wanted to ensure the success of future trading opportunites and favorably collect on the European debt.
Before the end of the war, President Woodrow Wilson put forward his Fourteen Points which were less harsh than what the French or British wanted and which the German public thought that the Treaty would be based around.
The Americans did not want a second war to happen. However, Wilson felt that by punishing Germany too harshly, a future war was inevitable.[citation needed] He proposed the establishment of an international institution, the League of Nations that would ensure that nothing like this could ever happen again. The theory was that if weaker and more fragile nations were attacked, others would guarantee the target of aggression protection from the aggressor. The European Allies felt that Wilson's proposals were too idealistic and unaware of how European power politics operated.[citation needed] This plan also relied heavily on American military commitment to foreign affairs.
Wilson was so set on achieving the goal of creating the League of Nations that he would ultimately compromise on other ideas in his 14 points. Another thing that he was very keen on was self-determination for countries such as Poland which had previously been independent.[citation needed]
Wilson also did not want any more secret diplomacy eg. Secret Alliances, treaties etc. He also demanded that Germany should have a reduction in armament, which means that their army would be reduced to a smaller size to make another war completely out of the question.
Woodrow Wilson's aims can be summarized as follows:
To prevent another war at all costs,
To establish a "League of Nations" to help settle international conflicts peacefully,
And to end the writing of secret treaties which expanded the war. Negotiations between the Allied powers started on January 18 in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles; in bitter irony the German Empire had been first proclaimed there 38 years earlier to the day following the remarkably brief Franco-Prussian war. Initially, 70 delegates of 26 nations participated in the negotiations. Having been defeated, Germany, Austria, and Hungary were excluded from the negotiations. Russia was also excluded because it had negotiated a separate peace with Germany in 1917.
Until March 1919 the most important role for negotiating the extremely complex and difficult terms of the peace fell to the regular meetings of the "Council of Ten" (head of government and foreign minister) composed of the five major victors (the United States, France, Great Britain, Italy, and Japan). As this unusual body proved too unwieldy and formal for effective decision-making, Japan and - for most of the remaining conference - the foreign ministers left the main meetings, so that only the "Big Four" remained.[1] After Italy left the negotiations (only to return to sign in June) having her territorial claims to Fiume rejected, the final conditions were determined by the leaders of the "Big Three" nations: United States, France and Great Britain. The "Big Three"[2] that negotiated the treaty consisted of Prime Minister David Lloyd George of the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau of France and President Woodrow Wilson of the United States of America. The Prime Minister of Italy, Vittorio Orlando, played a minor part in the discussions. Germany was not invited to France to discuss the treaty. At Versailles, it was difficult to decide on a common position because their aims conflicted with one another. The result was an "unhappy compromise".[3] Henry Kissinger called the treaty a "brittle compromise agreement between American utopism and European paranoia - too conditional to fulfill the dreams of the former, too tentative to alleviate the fears of the latter."
[edit] Initial rejection of the terms by Germany
On April 29, the German delegation under the leadership of the foreign minister Ulrich Graf von Brockdorff-Rantzau arrived in Versailles. On May 7, the anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Lusitania, the Germans finally received the peace conditions agreed upon by the victors. Terms imposed by the treaty on Germany included partitioning a certain amount of its own territory to a number of surrounding countries, being stripped of all of its overseas colonies, particularly those in Africa, and limiting its ability to make war again, by restrictions on the size of its military. Because Germany was not allowed to take part in the negotiations, the German government issued a protest to what it considered to be unfair demands, and soon afterwards withdrew from the proceedings.
[edit] A new German government accepts the treaty
On June 20 a new government under Chancellor Gustav Bauer was installed in Germany after Philipp Scheidemann resigned. Germany finally agreed to the conditions with 237 vs. 138 votes on June 23.
On June 28, 1919[4]the new German foreign minister Hermann Müller and the minister of transport Johannes Bell agreed to sign the treaty, and it was ratified by the League of Nations on January 10, 1920.
[edit] Treaty terms
[edit] Overview
The terms of the Treaty, which Germany had no choice but to accept, were announced on May 7, 1919. Germany lost:
10% of its national territory
All of its overseas colonies (including Kamerun, German East Africa, German Southwest Africa, Togoland and German New Guinea)
12.5% of its population
16% of its coalfields, and half its iron and steel industry.
[edit] Territorial Restrictions on Germany
Alsace-Lorraine returned to France.
Saar coal fields placed under French control for 15 years.
Annexation of Austria prohibited.
Annexation of Czechoslovakia prohibited.
Annexation of Poland and Danzig prohibited.
Loss of all overseas colonies including Togo, Cameroons, Namibia, and Tanzania.
Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia became independant states. (Taken at Brest-Litovsk by Germany)
[edit] Military Restrictions on Germany
The Rhineland to be a demilitarized zone.
The German armed forces cannot number more than 100,000 troops and no conscription
Manufacturing of weapons is prohibited.
Import and export of weapons is prohibited.
Manufacture or stockpiling of poison gas is prohibited.
Tanks are prohibited.
Naval forces limited to 15,000 men, 12 destroyers, 6 battleships, and 6 cruisers.
Submarines are prohibited.
Military aircraft are prohibited.
[edit] Economic Restrictions on Germany
Article 231: War Guilt Clause was the basis for reparations of £6.6 billion.
[edit] Territorial losses
On its eastern frontier Germany was forced to cede to the newly independent Poland the province of West Prussia, thereby granting Poland access to the Baltic Sea, while Germany lost land access to the province of East Prussia. Danzig was declared a free city under the permanent governance of the League of Nations. Much of the province of Posen, which, like West Prussia, had been acquired by Prussia in the late 18th-century partitions of Poland, was likewise granted to the restored Polish state. Also transferred from Germany to Poland, as the result of a later plebiscite, was a significant portion of coal-rich and industrially developed Upper Silesia.
Germany was also compelled to yield control of its colonies. Although these colonies had proven to be economic liabilities, they had also been symbols of the world-power status that Germany had gained in the 1880s and '90s. Article 156 of the treaty transferred German concessions in Shandong, China to Japan rather than returning sovereign authority to China. Chinese outrage over this provision led to demonstrations and a cultural movement known as the May Fourth Movement and influenced China not to sign the treaty. China declared the end of its war against Germany in September 1919 and signed a separate treaty with Germany in 1921.
Besides the loss of the German colonial empire the territories Germany lost were:
Alsace-Lorraine, the territories which were ceded to Germany in accordance with the Preliminaries of Peace signed at Versailles on February 26, 1871, and the Treaty of Frankfurt of May 10, 1871, were restored to French sovereignty without a plebiscite as from the date of the Armistice of November 11, 1918. (area 14 522 km², 1,815,000 inhabitants (1905)),
Northern Schleswig including the German-dominated towns of Tondern (Tønder), Apenrade (Aabenraa), Sonderburg (Sønderborg), Hadersleben (Haderslev) and Lügum in Schleswig-Holstein, after the Schleswig Plebiscite, to Denmark (area 3 984 km², 163,600 inhabitants (1920)),
Most of the Prussian provinces of Posen and of West Prussia, which Prussia had annexed in Partitions of Poland (1772-1795), were returned to Poland. This territory had already been liberated by local Polish population during the Great Poland Uprising of 1918-1919 (area 53 800 km², 4,224,000 inhabitants (1931), including 510 km² and 26,000 inhabitants from Upper Silesia).
Parts of West Prussia were ceded to Poland to provide free access to the sea, along with a sizeable German minority, creating the Polish corridor.
The Hlučínsko Hulczyn area of Upper Silesia to Czechoslovakia (area 316 or 333 km², 49,000 inhabitants),
The east part of Upper Silesia, to Poland (area 3 214 km², 965,000 inhabitants), although after plebiscite 60 % voted for Germany
The area of German cities Eupen and Malmedy to Belgium
The area of Soldau in East Prussia (railway station on the Warsaw-Gdańsk route) to Poland (area 492 km²),
The northern part of East Prussia known as Memel Territory under control of France, later transferred to Lithuania without plebiscite.
From the eastern part of West Prussia and the southern part of East Prussia Warmia and Masuria, a small area to Poland,
The province of Saarland to be under the control of the League of Nations for 15 years, after that a plebiscite between France and Germany, to decide to which country it would belong. During this time the coal to be sent to France.
The port of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) with the delta of Vistula river at the Baltic Sea was made the Freie Stadt Danzig (Free City of Danzig) under the League of Nations. (area 1 893 km², 408,000 inhabitants (1929)).
Germany acknowledges and will respect strictly the independence of Austria.
[edit] Reparations
Main article: World War I reparations
Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles assigned blame for the war to Germany; much of the rest of the Treaty set out the reparations that Germany would pay to the Allies.
The total sum due was decided by an Inter-Allied Reparations Commission. The war reparations that Entente demanded from Germany was 226 billion Reichsmark in gold (around £11.3 billion), then reduced to 132 billion Reichsmark. In 1921, this number was officially put at £4,990,000,000, or 132 Billion marks.
In many ways, the Versailles reparations was a reply to the reparations placed upon France by Germany through the 1871 Treaty of Frankfurt. Signed after the Franco-Prussian War, France took huge loans in order to pay the reparations by 1873, because the Treaty conditions allowed the German Army to occupy France until the war reparations were paid. The Versailles Reparations came in a variety of forms, including coal, steel and agricultural products.
The standard view is that the reparations were the cause of Germany's economic woes and the concomitant rise of Nazism to power. However, this is a topic which is still the subject of debate among historians.
[edit] League of Nations
The treaty provided for the creation of the League of Nations, a major goal of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. The League of Nations was intended to arbitrate international disputes and thereby avoid future wars. Only three of Wilson's Fourteen Points were realized, since Wilson was compelled to compromise with Clemenceau, Lloyd George and Orlando on some points in exchange for retaining approval of Wilson's "fourteenth point," the League of Nations.
[edit] Reaction to the treaty
[edit] Reaction of the Allies
The French felt that they had been slighted, and subsequently voted out Clemenceau at the next election. Britain as a whole was at first content, but then felt that the Treaty was too harsh. Of particular concern were Germany’s eastern frontiers, which were seen as a potential trouble spot for the future. For the United States, it was seen as Europe’s problem, but that, overall, the Treaty was too harsh.
United States U.S. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge who opposed ratification of the Treaty of VersaillesThe United States Senate refused to ratify the Treaty of Versailles, making it invalid in the United States and effectively hamstringing the nascent League of Nations envisioned by Wilson. The largest obstacle faced in the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles was the opposition of Henry Cabot Lodge. It has also been said that Wilson himself was the second-largest obstacle, primarily because he refused to support the treaty with any of the alterations proposed by the United States Senate.
[edit] Reaction in Germany
See also: Dolchstosslegende
The treaty evoked an angry and hostile reception in Germany from the moment its contents were made known. The Germans were outraged and horrified at the result - since Wilson's idealistic fourteen points had painted the picture of a different outcome. They did not feel that they were responsible for starting the war nor did they feel as though they had lost. The German people had understood the negotiations at Versailles to be a peace conference and not a surrender. At first, the new government refused to ratify the agreement, and the German navy sank its own ships in protest of the treaty.
Upon learning of the full terms of the treaty, the German provisional government in Weimar was thrown into upheaval. “What hand would not wither that binds itself and us in these fetters?” asked Chancellor Philipp Scheidemann who then resigned rather than agree to the Treaty. Army chief Paul von Hindenburg did the same, after declaring the army unable to resume the war under any circumstances. Only an ultimatum from the Allies finally brought a German delegation to Paris to sign the treaty on June 28, 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. As President of the newly-formed Weimar Republic, Friedrich Ebert finally agreed to the agreement on June 28, 1919.
Conservatives, nationalists and ex-military leaders began to speak critically about the peace and Weimar politicians, socialists, communists, and Jews were viewed with suspicion due to their supposed extra-national loyalties. It was rumored that they had not supported the war and had played a role in selling out Germany to its enemies. These November Criminals, or those who seemed to benefit from the newly formed Weimar Republic, were seen to have "stabbed them in the back" on the home front, by either criticizing German nationalism, instigating unrest and strikes in the critical military industries or profiteering. In essence the accusation was that the accused committed treason against the "benevolent and righteous" common cause.
These theories were given credence by the fact that when Germany surrendered in November 1918, its armies were still in French and Belgian territory. Not only had the German Army been in enemy territory the entire time on the Western Front, but on the Eastern Front, Germany had already won the war against Russia, concluded with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. In the West, Germany had come close to winning the war with the Spring Offensive. Contributing to the Dolchstoßlegende, its failure was blamed on strikes in the arms industry at a critical moment of the offensive, leaving soldiers without an adequate supply of materiel. The strikes were seen to be instigated by treasonous elements, with the Jews taking most of the blame. This overlooked Germany's strategic position and ignored how the efforts of individuals were somewhat marginalized on the front, since the belligerents were engaged in a new kind of war. The industrialization of war had dehumanized the process, and made possible a new kind of defeat which the Germans suffered as a total war emerged.
Nevertheless, this social mythos of domestic betrayal resonated among its audience, and its claims would codify the basis for public support for the emerging Nazi Party, under a racialist-based form of nationalism. The anti-Semitism was intensified by the Bavarian Soviet Republic, a Communist government which ruled the city of Munich for two weeks before being crushed by the Freikorps militia. Many of the Bavarian Soviet Republic's leaders were Jewish, a fact that allowed anti-Semitic propagandists to make the connection with "Communist treason".
[edit] Treaty violations
The German economy was so weak that only a small percentage of reparations were paid in money. However, even the payment of this small percentage of the original reperations (219B Gold Reichsmark) still placed a significant burden on the German economy, accounting for as much as one third of post-treaty hyperinflation. Furthermore, the provisions forcing the uncompensated removal of resources and industrial equipment sowed further resentment.
Some significant violations (or avoidances) of the provisions of the Treaty were:
In 1919 the dissolution of the General Staff appeared to happen. However the core of the General Staff was hidden within another organisation, the Truppenamt, where it rewrote all Heer(Army) and Luftwaffe(Air Force) doctrinal and training materials based on the experience of World War I.
The Treaty of Rapallo was an agreement in the Italian town of Rapallo on 16 April 1922 between Germany (the Weimar Republic) and Russia SFSR under which each renounced all territorial and financial claims against the other following the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and World War I. A secret annex signed on 29 July allowed Germany to train their military in Soviet territory, thus violating the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. The first post-war German tanks and aircraft were tested and exercised under this.
In March 1935, Adolf Hitler violated the Treaty of Versailles by reintroducing conscription in Germany and rebuilding the armed forces. This included a new Navy (Kriegsmarine), the first full armoured divisions (Panzerwaffe) and an Air Force (Luftwaffe). For the first time since the war, Germany's armed forces were as strong as those of France.
In March 1936, Hitler violated the Treaty by reoccupying the demilitarized zone in the Rhineland.
In March 1938, Hitler violated the Treaty by annexing Austria in the Anschluss.
In March 1939, Hitler violated the Treaty by occupying the rest of Czechoslovakia.
In September 1939, Hitler violated the Treaty by invading Poland thus initiating World War II in Europe.
[edit] Historical assessments
A common view is that France's Clemenceau was the most vigorous in his pursuit of revenge against Germany, the Western Front of the war having been fought chiefly on French soil. This treaty was felt to be unreasonable at the time because it was a peace dictated by the victors that put the full blame for the war on Germany. Many modern historians, however, argue that was an over-simplification.
Henry Kissinger called the treaty a "brittle compromise agreement between American utopianism and European paranoia — too conditional to fulfill the dreams of the former, too tentative to alleviate the fears of the latter."
In his book The Economic Consequences of the Peace, Keynes referred to the Treaty of Versailles as a "Carthaginian peace".[5] More recently it has been argued (for instance by historian Gerhard Weinberg in his book A World At Arms[6]) that the treaty was in fact quite advantageous to Germany, the Bismarckian Reich being maintained as a political unit instead of being broken up, and Germany having largely escaped post-war military occupation (in contrast to the situation following the Second World War.)
In retrospect, a good case can be made that Germany was in a superior strategic position in 1919 than it had been five years earlier, at least with regard to its eastern flank. Instead of having an economically expanding and threatening Russian Empire allied with France, Germany now faced a diplomatically isolated Russia that was also embroiled in revolution and civil war. Germany's former ally, the large (though increasingly enfeebled) Austro-Hungarian monarchy had been replaced by a group of small, weak republics that were to prove little obstacle for a revitalized Germany two decades later.
Regardless of modern strategic or economic analysis, resentment caused by the treaty sowed fertile psychological ground for the eventual rise of the Nazi party. Indeed, on Nazi Germany's rise to power, Adolf Hitler resolved to overturn the remaining military and territorial provisions of the Treaty of Versailles. Military buildup began almost immediately, in direct defiance of the Treaty, which, by then, had been destroyed by Hitler in front of a cheering crowd. "It was this treaty which caused a chain reaction leading to World War II" claimed historian Dan Rowling (1951).
[edit] Alternative viewpoints
The interpretation that Germany was seriously weakened and humiliated by the Versailles Treaty has been disputed by some historians. Some arguments include:
The commissions to supervise disarmament were withdrawn and the reparations payments were reduced and eventually cancelled, to mention just some of the changes made in Germany's favour. It is worth mentioning that the financial burden of reconstruction was shifted from Germany to those countries that were actually occupied and devastated by the war.
Germany's industry and economic potential were less affected than her European enemies, and although weakened by the war, Germany was relatively stronger vis-a-vis her enemies in 1919 than she had been in 1913.
The creation of Poland, so derided by the critics of Versailles, shielded Germany from her potentially most powerful adversary, Russia. Independent Poland thwarted the Bolshevik advance into a war-weakened Europe at the Battle of Warsaw in 1920, at a time when Germany faced Communist-inspired unrest and revolution.
The postwar situation in the Balkans left Germany infinitely more powerful than any of her eastern or south-eastern European neighbours, none of which showed any signs of working together against Germany.
In short, Germany was strong enough to dominate Europe once more within two decades of her defeat in World War One.