For the next two years, the Kaiser exercised real power, bringing in his personal choice of Chancellor, a devoted civil servant and ex-army chief, Leo von Caprivi. This period is often referred to as “the new course” by historians, a period in which all of the Chancellors who were appointed had previous careers as successful politicians, nor with a tendancy to disagree with the Kaiser’s way of thinking. This is evidence in itself of the Kaiser exercising his power, however it seems to be the case that in the periods in which the Kaiser exercised his power, major political blunders occurred. His failure to renew the reinsurance treaty with Caprivi as his Chancellor no longer kept Russia bound to Germany in a treaty. This made a war on two fronts a distinct possibility, and also ended French isolation in European affairs, and European alliances. Despite the political move that would eventually become a crucial cause of Germany’s defeat in World War 1, there were positive aspects to come from Caprivi’s role as Chancellor such as an agreement with Great Britain in regards to the influence of the two countries in Africa and commercial treaties made with Austria and Romania. It is evident that the Kaiser had exercised real power following Bismarck’s resignation in hiring Caprivi and deciding not too re-sign the reinsurance treaty despite the fact that the latter of these was a terrible mistake and a misuse of the power and duty he had to the protection of the German people.
Following Caprivi, Chlodwig of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst became Wilhelm II’s third Chancellor. He was a private man and he was rarely seen in the public eye of German affairs. Kaiser Wilhelm did not exercise much power in this period as he left most of the administrative work to his Chancellor. He had previously set up the Navy Cabinet in 1889 which was responsible responsible for promotions, appointments, administration and issuing orders to naval forces, and with the Army Cabinet already in place, he seemed to have picked his chosen heads of affairs and allowed them to use his power to take care of the day to day affairs in Germany, rather than exercise his own power. After Chlodwig’s resignition on the 17th of October 1900, Kaiser Wilhelm II appeared to relinquish more of his power on to his Chancellor when Bernhard von Bülow became Chlodwig’s successor. Bülow and the Kaiser had a better relationship than the Kaiser had had with any of his Chancellor’s predecessors. The two met almost every day to discuss the running of the country and soon Kaiser Wilhelm had almost stopped using his own real power. Bülow often found himself in the mixed Reichstag defending the Kaiser and his decision making to the variety of political parties that it was now made up of. Despite having Bülow as his chancellor, the Kaiser was till unable to prevent himself from major political errors. His infamous Attila the Hun speech in China in July 1900 showed the Kaiser’s fascination with militarism and his inability to avoid public embarrassments. The speech was both aggressive and racist: “no Chinese will ever again dare to look cross-eyed at a German.” and again occurred in one of the few periods in which the Kaiser decided to exericse some real power, and did not use it very successfully at all. The Kaiser was reliant on Bülow to convince the rest of the government that he was a successful leader. Germany’s initial successes from the Moroccan crisis are mostly due to Bülow who was able to successfully persuade the Sultan of Morocco to reject France’s offer of assistance in his country, as well use his influence on the Kaiser and he encouraged him to make a pro-independent Morocco speech in Tangier. This act alone shows the Kaiser not exercising any real power and being influenced in his decisions by those around him, this time the Chancellor. The Moroccan crisis deepened for Germany and Bülow when news that France and Spain would control the police forces of Morocco reached Berlin. The Reichstag demanded that Bülow attended to defend what had happened as opposed to the Kaiser himself. The Kaiser was not seen as the key decision maker in this matter, nor the man responsible for it all. It was Bülow’s use of power that had caused it, and therefore it became his responsibility. Up until 1905, the Kaiser’s idea of “personal rule” and “being his own Bismarck” had only had an effect on three major German issues: the reinsurance treaty, the Boxer rebellion and the resignation of Bismarck. All three of these instances in which the Kaiser had exercised his real power, had a definite negative impact on Germany and the German empire.
The Kaiser’s fascination with his military was well known in Germany and Europe, and he was always keen to expand areas of his army and navy throughout his reign. The Kaiser dreamt of a navy powerful enough to both protect Germany’s overseas empire, and to compete with the British navy, the most powerful in the world. Despite the Kaiser’s obvious personal attachment to his navy, he employed Alfred von Tirpitz, as head of the naval office in 1897 and fed his plans, ideas and demands through to him, and then in 1889 to the naval office. Unfortunately the Kaiser’s aims were too vague, and his motives were not always justified, so much so that the Reichstag failed to pass any of his early navy expansion plans, despite the fact that his early speeches and decisions made it obvious that he would try to use his power to get what he wanted. After many appearances before the Reichstag, The Navy office, Tirpitz and the Kaiser had had slight success in implementing the Emperors wishes and by 1912, an amendmant to a naval law gave a precise size that the navy must be, and it coincided with the size of Britain’s. The Kaiser exercised his real power in his obsession with the navy, he had no clear aims or explanations as to why the German navy had to be so powerful other than to prtoect his empire, Germany did not have the necessary funds and resources to spare and yet a vast and hugely expensive collection of capital ships, small cruisers, torpedo boats and submarines were at the Kaiser’s control. There were both great internal and external repercussions of the increase in size and stature of the Navy. Anglo-German relations were at a new low in 1912 after disagreements concerning Navy size, and potential use of it, Germany was put under huge financial strain as she struggled to pay for the large Navy the Kaiser had ordered to protect Germany’s colonies that were in themselves losing money. The decision to risk aggravating the British, and expand the Navy was another move by Kaiser Wilhelm II to exercise his real power as German emperor, and another incident in which he was unsuccessful to achieve a positive turn of events for Germany.
A lot of historians consider his troublesome birth, and the defects that were caused by this breech-birth to be a crucial factor in understanding the Kaiser’s troublesome time in power however in trying to debate whether or not Wilhelm II exercised any real power of his own during his thirty year reign, the short and long term effects of his difficult early life only legitimately effect the choices he made concerning his foreign policy attitude towards Britain. In many other aspects of foreign policy, Kaiser gave power to his chosen foreign ministers whom he trusted and again appeared to take a step back from power. Bülow, Alfred von Kiderlen-Waechter and Gottlieb von Jagow all had terms in the foreign office under the Kaiser and he rarely exercised his power in the smaller matters of foreign affairs and left a lot of his power in the hands of his handpicked foreign ministers. Unfortunately for the Kaiser, failed understandings with other powers, incorrect predictions leading up to the outbreak of war, and a financially inept empire occurred during his time in power, and at the hands of his Forign secretaries that he had chosen. He had failed to exercise his own power in many foreign issues and relied upon the foreign office to make crucial decisions, a power structure that failed and reflected badly on the Kaiser.
Kaiser Wilhelm II’s personal relationship with, and his attitude towards Britain was inconsistent to say the least. His British Mother, Princess Victoria, has been argued by historians, to be the reason for his British resentment. Princess Victoria did not have a very close relationship with her son, and often failed to hide her disappointment in his disability, indirectly caused by British surgeons. Despite this point of view, the Kaiser’s attitude towards Britain was very difficult to judge during his reign and no conclusive evidence exists to explain why the Kaiser seemed to often contradict himself with acts towards Britain. Whenever there was an issue concerning Britain until 1914, he felt it necessary to exercise his real power, a rare occurrence throught his reign. He failed to renegotiate a treaty with Britain at the same time he decided not to extend the reinsurance treaty, a sure sign of a negative attitude towards Britain. During the Second Boer war, he offered support to South Africa, again putting a strain on Anglo-German relations. The Kaiser, taking matters involving Britain into his own hands, also believed that the entente cordiale was a plot to encircle Germany by Britain, France and Russia. The short term effects of this claim were not very crucial, slightly more strain was put on Anglo-German relations, however the long term effect of the fear that this caused both the Kaiser and the German public began to create an even more unstable European climate in the run up to World War1.
In 1914, when World War 1 broke out, it was the Kaiser who finally signed the mobilisation order, and the Kaiser who became Germany’s “Supreme War Lord” however it is heavily debated amongst historians as to whether or not he had any say over German policy at this time. John C. G. Röhl’s perspective that the Kaiser “must bear a large responsibility for plunging the old Europe into war and catastrophe” can be justified by studying the periods during the Kaiser’s reign in which he exercised his real power, and then investigating the effects of these actions. Throughout the Kaiser’s reign, mistakes were often made and errors in judgement were common amongst his cabinet and chosen government officials. Although the matters in which he involved himself the most were the most blunder-prone, these errors came at a time when he was surrounded by powerful advisors. Tripitz was able to persuade the Kaiser to reject a seemingly fair proposal by the British government in 1908 that would repair Anglo-German relations in return for a decrease in the rate of German battleship production.
In the few months leading up to the outbreak of war, and throughout the war period itself, Wilhelm II is referred to by many historians as a “Shadow Kaiser”, and if we are to believe Gordon A. Craig, that Hindenburg and Ludendorff were effectively running the country and the war by 1916, then this is a justified point of view. Although he still had final authority in the majority of his government’s matters, the decision making was mainly left up to his high ranking Army officials, who had a better understanding of war and strategies than he. Kaiser Wilhelm II had taken a step back from power when war broke out in 1914, and passed his power on to his military leaders, however his last act and his first positive use of his own power came in 1918, when he decided that Germany should sign the armistice treaty and no longer be part of the war.
Kaiser Wilhelm II’s thirty year career as Emperor of the German Empire was tarred by a handful of key mistakes, uninformed decisions, and culminated in the outbreak of World War 1. It is fair to say that for all the power and contorl he had, he only exercised his real power on a number of occassions, and quite notably in the period 1890 to 1903. The major events in which the Kaiser excercised the power he had been given include the resignation of Bismarck, the Naval race, decisisons to break up Bismarck’s alliance systems and his speech in response to the Boxer rebellion. Despite the negative effects of these decisions, and the major embarassment that some of these blunders caused Germany and the Kaiser himself, there is still evidence of the Kaiser exercising real power at points during his career. The period between the resignation of Bismarck, and the introduction of Bernhard von Bülow and Alfred von Tirpitz was when the Kaiser used his power the most. Without powerful foreign secretaries or chancellors to influence his decision making, it was in this period that the Kaiser was closest to fulfilling his aim of personal rule. In these years, the Kaiser hired and split with three Chancellors and his premier-minister, as well as made some of his biggest mistakes in charge. This period of ten to thirteen years is the point in German history in which Kaiser Wilhelm exercised real power over the German Empire. Unfortunately for the Kaiser his use of power often coincided with a major political mistake and it is for this reason that is apears that the Kaiser wasn’t in full control of his country or using his power. Unfortunately for the Kaiser, he was using the great power he had been given, but always failed to cope with the great responsibility he had been given either.
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