Nazi Germany

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International Baccalaureate History

GERMANY 1918-1945

  • THE WEIMAR REPUBLIC AND THE RISE OF THE NAZIS

The impact of the WW1 – before 1918 Germany was powerful and prospering country, full of working people, fine army BUT after 1918 when the German army was defeated Germany was destroyed, full of ill and powerless people dying, became an unstable democratic republic and was unable to improve the situation

The birth of the Weimar Republic – in 1918 the Allies won the war and offered Germany peace under strict conditions → Germany’s leader Kaiser abdicated his throne → the Socialist  leader Friedrich Ebert became the new leader and signed an armistice with the Allies (freedom of speech, freedom of worship and better working conditions) → but it was too quick change from traditional, autocratic system of govt. to democratic, therefore the German nation and esp. the politicians did not accepted it → despite this opposition in Jan 1919 1st free German elections took place (in the town of Weimar, b/c Berlin was thought to be unstable) and Ebert’s party won a majority of votes → Friedrich Ebert became the President of the Weimar Republic

The Republic in danger, 1919-1924 (Ebert’s govt. faced strong opposition from both left wing and right wing opponents)

  • The threat of the Left 

SPARTACISTS – a Communist party which was strongly against Ebert’s plan for a democratic Germany, they wanted a Germany ruled by workers’ councils or soviets (místní vláda) - Communists

        FREIKORPS – anti-communist ex-soldiers became vigilantes (members of a civil self-defence group) supporting Ebert, they were putting down the rebellion – Freikorps & Nazis

(conflicts between Spartacists and Freikorps, etc.)

The Communists were still failing in revolutions, but despite these defeats, they remained a powerful anti-govt. force in Germany throughout the 1920s.

  • The Treaty of Versailles  

The next crisis was in May 1919 when the terms of the Treaty of Versailles were announced – Germany was to lose:

  1. 10% of its land
  2. all of its overseas colonies
  3. 12.5% of its population
  4. 16% of its coal and 48% of its iron industry
  5. its army was reduced to 100 000 men, air force not allowed, and reduced navy, (only 6 battleships, no submarines, conscription was banned – soldiers had to be volunteers, the Rhineland (an important border between Germany and France) became demilitarised zone – no German troops were allowed into that area… )
  6. Germany had to accept blame for starting the war and was forced to pay reparations (the exact figure was agreed finally in 1921 and it was set at £6600 million, but it was later in 1929 changed under the Young Plan)

Germans were horrified – why should they be punished for Kaiser’s war and aggression, who was already gone?

→ opponents of the regime turned their anger to Ebert

→ Ebert had no choice but to sign the Treaty → he and his Weimar Rep. were forever to blame for the Treaty, because Germans believed they had been ‘stabbed in the back’ by the ‘November Criminals’ who agreed an armistice in Nov 1918

  • The threat from the Right

The right wing opponents were mostly the people who had grown up in the successful days of the Kaiser’s Germany, they liked his dictatorial style of govt., they wanted Germany to expand its territory, to have an empire,...

  • Kapp Putsch – March1920 - 5000 Freikorps (rebels and some of the army) were led to Berlin by Dr W.Kapp attempting to take power by force → the rebellion was saved by German industrial workers, who declared a general strike and stopped all the transport, power and water →  Kapp gave up and left the country (he was hunted down and died while awaiting trial)
  • Political violence in Germany – frequent political assassinations – in 1922 Ebert’s foreign minister Rathenau was murdered by extremists
  • Munich Putsch – November 1923 – Adolf Hitler led an attempted rebellion in Munich → he declared a formation of a new govt. and arrested von Kahr (head of the provincial Bavarian govt) → when von Kahr was released he turned against Hitler and Ludendorff → 16 Hitler’s supporters were killed by Munich police → Munich Putsch failed and they were arrested → Hitler spent only 9 months in prison (wrote his book called ‘Mein Kampf’)

Economic disaster – crisis

The Treaty destabilised Germany politically.

Germans protested that paying such high reparations was an intolerable strain on the economy which they are trying hard to rebuild after the war and they blamed the Treaty that it is responsible also for the economic chaos.

  • Invasion of the Ruhr
  • Germany had to pay reparations otherwise the Allies would invade it.
  • They paid 1st instalment, but failed to pay the 2nd
  • Therefore French invaded Germany and occupied the Ruhr Valley wanting to take what was owed to them in he form of raw materials and goods (They took over coal mines, factories, railways, steel works)
  • The govt. told Ruhr workers not to work for French – to put up ‘passive resistance’
  • This caused the collapse of the German currency

  • Hyperinflation 1923
  • passive resistance was effective in resisting the French, but the non-working worker had to be paid
  • BUT Germany was not making anything to sell, SO they were just printing money and soon it got out of control
  • The more money the govt. printed, the faster prices were rising, until became a year of hyperinflation
  • Millions of people faced starvation as a result of hyperinflation and middle class Germans lost their savings

  • The situation needed urgent action → in Aug 1923 a new govt. under Gustav Stresemann took over → he called off the passive resistance in the Ruhr, gathered the worthless marks and replaced them with a new currency called the Rentenmark
  • The hyperinflation had done great political damage to the Weimar govt. – lost the support of the middle class, etc.
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The Weimar Republic under Stresemann

Hitler and the Nazis

Stresemann’s govt. succeeded in stabilising Germany, but that were still political groups (e.g. Nazis) that counted between extremist opponents of the Weimar govt.

German Workers’ Party (Anton Drexler) → 1919 Adolf Hitler joined the party → Hitler put in charge of propaganda & political ideas → 1920 – Twenty-Five Point Programme (abolition of Treaty of Versailles, only ‘true’ Germans allowed to live in Germany, Jews were to be excluded, union of Germany and Austria, large industries and business to be nationalised, etc.) → ...

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Nazi Germany
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