After the war the public, particularly the soldiers felt that the Weimar Republic had “backstabbed” Germany as they felt they had not been defeated in the war as there was no force occupying Germany and by signing the ludicrous Versailles peace treaty the government had betrayed Germany and it’s people. This was a bad start for the Weimar and very soon they became despised and blamed by many, particularly the extremist parties of which there where many. From the end of the war to the end of 1923 Germany was a political quagmire, due to the make up of the Weimar i.e. proportional representation, there were no majority parties in the Reichstag which meant coalitions had to be formed, this added to the political instability as parties didn’t often work together, Also during this time Germany was full of extremist parties intent on seizing power and causing general mayhem for the Weimar. For example in it’s first four years the Weimar encountered a Spartacist revolution in 1919, the Kapp Putsch in 1920, the Munich Putsch in 1923 by Hitler and many Communist uprisings all in its infancy, all of these attempted uprisings were unsuccessful but they reflect the political unrest and instability inside Germany.
It seems that up to 1923 Germany was in turmoil; there were the financial problems with the huge reparations and the ruined currency due to hyperinflation, as well as this the Weimar was becoming unpopular and extreme parties were feeding off this. At this point Germany needed a strong man to take control and stabilise Germany, this man came in the form of Gustav Stresemann a right wing member of the DVP, he became foreign secretary in November 1923 and took the position of chancellor for a few months in August 1923. He made huge advances in stabilising Germany’s economic affairs and her political standing in the world and because of this he is regarded as one of the few Weimar politicians with any ability and strength to sort out the problems
One of the first things Stresemann did was to try and help the economy to recover by ending the passive resistance in the Ruhr, which had been crippling Germany and halting progress. At the same time he started paying reparations again thus France and Belgium had no reason to occupy the Ruhr and they left so it was able to start producing goods again and make money. In order to end the hyperinflation the Doitschmark was abandoned and a limited temporary currency was brought in called the Rentenmark. Once the value of money stabilised, a final currency was introduced call the Reichsmark which was made permanent and ended the inflation of the early 1920’s. He employed a cunning manoeuvre to make the army more pliable getting the strongly right wing army to halt the left wing revolts in Saxony and Thuringia, this not only crushed the revolts but gained favour in the eyes of the army who Stresemann hoped to set against the dangerous right wing parties in Bavaria. He still had much to do in order to stabilise the economy and Germany’s political affairs, this was made harder by the constant burden of the reparation payments. Luckily an American banker called Charles Dawes created the Dawes plan of April 1924; America loaned huge sums of money to the German economy in order to kick-start industry and help pay off reparations and thus gain favour with some of the European states . Stresemann’s real forte was in foreign policy were he had the aim of becoming a respected country in the eyes of the world so that Germany could negotiate the terms of Versailles and he also hoped that this would encourage the separate parties of the Weimar republic to work in unison. His progress in foreign affairs is obvious with the treaties and pacts that countries signed with Germany. For example The Locarno treaty of 1925 whereby western Borders of Germany were fixed but eastern borders were negotiable, this was a big step as it undermined the Treaty of Versailles and proved that Stesemann’s policies were having a positive effect and thus avoid internal criticism of his dealings but also make the negotiating of eastern borders a viable option. In 1926 Germany joined the League of Nations, talking with the likes of Britain and France in the assembly and the council of the League another big step for Germany’s ranking in the world affairs. Also in 1926 Germany signed the Berlin treaty with Russia, assuring Russia that if she was to go to war with a third party Germany would stay neutral. One of Stresemann’s final contributions was to organise the Young plan, this helped to ease the reparation payments even more than the Dawes plan and spread them over a period of 59 years and lead to the removal of British, French and Belgian troops from the Rhineland, earlier then Versailles dictated.
This period of time in Weimar history is often referred to as a “period of prosperity” or a “period of stabilisation” and it is apparent why if you compare the state of Germany in the mid to late 1920’s to the state it was in prior to Stresemann’s influence. It is clear that Germany did undergo a period where the economy did stabilise and politics did calm down which can be seen in the voting figures of the extreme parties during this period. At this time many German goals were achieved; premature ending of the occupation in the Rhineland, military controls were slackened, Germany became a respected member of the European community (League of Nations), reparations became more manageable and the possibility of expansion in the eastern borders. It is obvious that all of these are positive gains for Germany and many people prospered during this stable time but it can also be argued that this stabilisation was superficial or the gains were irrelevant.
The problem was that the economic boom in Germany during this time relied very heavily on U.S loans through the Dawes and Young plans which could be called in at any time causing disastrous effects. This U.S dependency can be seen in the Wall Street Crash, whereby all Germany had gained was ruined due to the withdrawal of these loans. Many people at the time particularly the extremist groups argued that it didn’t matter what advancements were made in the negotiation of the Versailles treaty because if these parties were in power the treaty would be destroyed, this train of thought for many undermined the work Stresemann had done to lighten the terms of the treaty. Other problems still remained, like unemployment, which was very serious during this time as jobs weren’t being produced fast enough to provide work for the growing population, also agriculture went downhill as produce was imported from Poland at cheaper prices thus ruining German farmers.
My personal opinion is that during this time Germany did stabilise and this was due to Stresemann’s intelligent policies to work with the system as opposed to working against it. This stability may have been dependent on America but statistics show that there was prosperity and less extremism during the 1920’s compared to the time immediately after the war. At the same time I also understand that the stability was based on an unpredictable factor and that was the loans from America. As well as this I realise the Weimar was a weak government due to internal flaws and it is unlikely that even if Stresemann had lived past 1929, the Weimar would have survived much longer than it did and perverted the coarse of Hitler’s evil regime.
