In 1914, imperial Germany appeared stable, united and strong. Why then had the imperial regime collapsed in revolution by the end of 1918?

Fischer argues that the war provided the means whereby domestic reconciliation could be achieved between different sectors of society. This in turn, would relieve the pressure on the elite's to reform a political system which still worked very much in their own favour. War would, in other words, channel the drive of the middle and working classes into patriotism rather than sectional interest.

This meant that the SPD would lose its capacity to exert pressure for radical change and the whole impetus for democratisation would be reserved, as the national interest would have to come first. It seems unlikely that this was a conscientious plan in order to unite German but it possible that the aggressive policy followed by Germany up to August 1914 was based on a calculated risk and the attitude that the outbreak of war would be far from disastrous. This nevertheless suggests that the regime was not as stable as first thought.

Essentially Germany went to war in August 1914 united in a patriotic fever, with the strong belief that Germany was involved in a defence war which was not of its making. Hence there was a political truce between the various parties and interests, known as the 'Burgfriede'. Most groups in society seemed to benefit from this; the elite's especially as they were able to divert issues into a patriotic and nationalist crusade. Only the radical wing of the SPD opposed the war in principle.

The next years proved that the war served the purpose of revolution by destabilising the regime. Gradually however, this was undermined, resulting in creeping dictatorship and growing divisions within the sector of the population.

The thought of war had been beneficial; the prolonged experience was destructive. The losses for Germany were particularly heavy.

It wasn't long before the German army became disillusioned and tired of the fighting. The source shows German soldiers resting in a trench near Ypres in Flanders.

Picture made in the beginning of the trench warfare.

Approximately 2.4 million people were killed with even more wounded and permanently disabled. The shortage of food and imports became especially serious in 1917. This was partly because of the growing success of the British naval blockade and partly because of a cold winter in 1916-17 and a poor harvest in the summer of 1917. In 1918 civilian deaths alone totalled 293,000 (partly due to poor diets which led to disease and death). The German economy was dislocated through its deprivation of vital imports of raw materials and food. There was no alternative but to undergo total mobilisation to enable the military to try to break through the strategic stalemate on the western front. This was one of the significant factors, which contributed to the eventual collapse of the regime and revolution in Germany. The army's intrusions into Germany economy, politics and even civilian lives, was seen as particularly unacceptable, especially since it was mainly the working classes which were having to suffer.

At first the army's total mobilisation was only confined to the economic sector, with the establishment of the Raw Materials Department (KRA), which was responsible for distribution of key raw materials to where they were needed the most. The war ministry supplemented this with measures for the conscription of labour under the Auxiliary service law. This amounted to 'a complete mobilisation of society'; all males from seventeen to sixty were liable for compulsory labour service and the war ministry could direct them to work in particular areas of industry. Permission was required to change one's place of work and employers could not take on workers without proof that they had such permission. But the act could not stem a rising tide of disputes and strikes. Food shortages and black market made workers increasingly desperate in pressing their claims, and their impatience was exacerbated by the vast profits which industry continued to make out of the war.

By June 1917, although the fiction of civilian government was officially maintained, the real ruling force was the army. The Kaiser, so influential before 1914, now ceased to function effectively as head of state and the chancellor also became subordinate in effect to the military high command -OHL.

Economic mobilisation was intended to lay down the foundations for a swift victory but political dictatorship was a sign that this was not going to happen. The various groups within the population became disillusioned. The elite's found that the war brought internal dissension rather than external diversions. The middle and lower classes found that military crisis brought about the opposite of the democracy they sought. It was not so much that Germany stood out among the combatants in turning to authoritarian rule; Britain and France experienced a greater degree of authoritarian rule. However, whiles these remained democracies in essence which temporarily operated a state of emergency while Clemenceau and Lloyd George maintained full civilian control over the military. In Germany the problem was that the army had ultimate control over the civilian sector which had largely ceased to function on pre-war lines.

By august 1918, the situation in Germany was desperate. The prolonged war acted as a catalyst for the decomposition of consensus into the constituent parts. The military leaders realised that they wouldn't be able to win the war and a revolution emerged.

A German military victory would almost certainly have defused the crisis and in so doing retarded the process of political reform for a generation or more. Instead, four years of total war culminating in defeat brought the Kaiser to his knees, forcing him to eventually flee and bring the end of the second Reich. The political system of the imperial regime was based around the Kaiser and when the Kaiser was eliminated from the equation, with him went his Reich, as it could not function without him.

The war also massively dislocated the economy, wrecking the already parlous government finances, which in turn initiated run-away monetary inflation. Although many industrialists had benefited from the war, a lot more did not. The government had promised an expansion in the economic market (due to the reparations, which Germany would receive had it been victorious, from the allies), when it did not hold to its word, it lost the support of many industrialists, for whom the government was no longer beneficial.

Furthermore, the war was the cause of serious social tensions, which accentuated class differences. And it exacerbated the polarisation of politics of the Kaiserreich. The pre-war Germany there had been constitutional instability and occasional political crises. By the autumn of 1918 however, Germany found itself in a revolutionary situation.