How Significant Was Stresemann

Most people were dissatisfied with the current German government for several reasons. One was that they had surrendered to the Allies when their leaders had been telling them that they were winning World War I. The other was that they felt that the terms of the surrender were excessively harsh. Because they did not know that they were losing when they heard the government was suing for peace, they expected the terms to be equal, not to be completely in favor of the Allies. They also felt that even with the war reparations the government should have been doing more to help them out and not to hyperinflate their currency.

How did the Treaty of Versailles help cause WWII? The same treaty that ended the first world war played a huge role in starting the second. WWI ended on November 11th, 1918 with 17 million casualties, 7 months later the official document to end the war, the Treaty of Versailles, was created & signed. Leaders of the United States, France, and Great Britain shaped the terms of the treaty.

No party ever gained majority government during the history of the Republic, and this weakened the government. Proportional representation was responsible for a series of coalition governments, which ruled Germany through the years of 1919 and 1933. However, the only time that a pro-Weimar party held majority was in the first elections of 1919, and every time after Weimar was the minority.

The Treaty of Versailles formed after World War I forced Germany to pay great amounts in reparation payments, which was severely damaging to their economy and to their collective national ego. In addition, they were forced to greatly weaken their army by demobilizing, abolishing universal compulsory military service, and by having their army be comprised by no more than seven divisions of infantry and three divisions of cavalry. Furthermore, the country was also forced to return lands which they had viewed as 'Germanic' and had laid claim to, as well as overseas colonies, back to various other countries.

The importance of the First World War in shaping Germany's historical development is large; A German victory in 1918 would have certainly defused the crisis and in doing so retarded the process of political reform for a generation or more. It plowed Germanyinto economic crisis, causing hyperinflation

During the hardship of the 1920s and1930s, political incompetence was highlighted, the Weimar Government proved its incompetence time and time again. .The instability of the Weimar Republic was so great that the average life-span of Reich cabinets was from 6-7 months. Their incapability of providing justice to outbreaks of violence, such as political assassinations is one example of the incompetence of the Weimar Republic. When Germany found its self in undesirable economical situations due to the Treaty of Versalles, they printed money to pay off reparations, which resulted in super-inflation. During the period of super-inflation people’s life savings became worthless which contributed to the downward circle of a reduction in standard of living. As unemployment rose and people began to afford less and less with their money, people commenced searching for a better alternative to the Weimar Government. Hitler’s ability to build upon these feelings whilst offering security, prosperity and full employment, convinced Germany, in a state of disillusionment, to support the nazi party. The Weimar’s instability contributed to the collapse of the Weimar republic provided perfect conditions for the nazi party to rise to power.

It led to economic problems and a lack of food or jobs. These in turn

Germany emerged from World War I with huge debts incurred to finance a costly war for almost five years. The treasury was empty, the currency was losing value, and Germany needed to pay its war debts and the huge reparations bill imposed on it by the Treaty of Versailles, which officially ended the war. The treaty also deprived Germany of territory, natural resources, and even ships, trains, and factory equipment. Germany’s population was undernourished and contained many widows, orphans, and disabled veterans living in poverty. The new German government struggled to deal with these crises, which had produced a serious hyperinflation.

Friedrich Ebert took over the Weimar Republic as its first leader, who received resistance from the Freikorps and the Spartacists. While he did, for the most part, defeat the communist threat from the spartacists and the threat from the Freikorps, many were infuriated when on November of 1918 he agreed to sign the treaty of Versailles, dooming all the public to pay the backlash of the armistice and causing them to loathe Ebert and the Weimar republic. Gustav Stresemann, in August of 1923, had taken over the Weimar republic. Many praised Stresemann seeing that he turned the economic problem around and he was competent enough to renegotiate reparations payments. Under his leadership times were prosperous, considering the economy and political stance were both stable, culture was free-spirited, and foreign policy was a great exultation for Stresemann because he was able to reverse some of the terms of the treaty of Versailles and remove British, French, and Belgian troops from the Rhineland. Nevertheless, the government under Stresemann had its downside such as the fact that his policies didn’t seem to cater to the middle class and peasant farmers of the time, many Germans did not like the moral decline that came with the break loose style of the culture, and the fact that Stresemann joined the league of nation infuriated most Germans as it inclined them to infer that he accepted the treaty of

The Weimar Republic was set up mainly to help Germany out of their economic crisis at that time. Germany lost a lot of its land and the German people very

Their military was downsized to the maximum of 100,000. All weapons that remained from World War I were to be scrapped in efforts of disarming Germany. Submarines and aircraft were banned completely in Germany and only 36 ships were allowed to serve as the German Navy (Goldstien, Dillion, p.124,1988). Under the conditions of the treaty, Germany was also responsible for an estimate of 6.6 million dollars-worth of war reparations (Goldstien, Dillion, p.130,1988). In result of the high war reparations, Germany suffered great economic depression. Due to depression, the high rates of unemployment and severe inflation caused the people of Germany to become resentful toward the Treaty of Versailles deeming it’s terms too harsh. During these times of economic difficulty and doubt all throughout Europe, people were hopeful for leaders that were capable of reversing the severity of the current conditions.

However, this success seemed to be short-term and relied on Germany’s unguaranteed success to keep people from voting for extremist parties. Although Stresemann’s Germany looked promising, there was still political instability because no one party could gain a majority in the republic. Governments had to be formed from coalitions of parties working together. This meant that decision-making was difficult and could easily be overturned by a smaller, less significant party. Up to 1930, the Social Democrats always won the most votes, but never enough to govern on their own. There were twenty-five

Since the Weimar Republic was established in the aftermath of World War One, it was almost inevitable that it would be blamed for Germanys surrender and the Treaty of Versailles. The supposed surrender was even harder to accept since in 1918 Germany had signed an armistice with Russia. Weimar was in essence ‘brought about by defeat’ . The ‘November Criminals’ who signed the armistice were always associated with Weimar, thus making it difficult for Weimar to be associated with anything but defeat and humiliation. The war guilt clause was also difficult to accept because it lay all the blame on Germany for starting the First World War. This along with reparations were crippling not only the economy but German society itself

The collapse of the Weimar Republic can not be seen as solely indebted to the severe economic problems faced during the period of its rule, but consequently it was the economic issues that became a footstep to the ultimate demise of the Republic. Subsequent to Germany’s defeat in the First World War and German Emperor Kaiser’s abdication from power, the Weimar Republic was proclaimed. The Republic that had emerged from the German Revolution of November 1918 would inevitably fall as a result of numerous issues. However, the extent of which economic problems had in the dissolution of the republic, and how these issues caused or came about due to separate concerns faced by the new democratic system became a major contributing factor.

There were various factors that contributed to the failure of the Weimar Republic of Germany and the ascent of Hitler’s National Socialist German Workers Party into power on January 30, 1933. Various conflicting problems were concurrent with the eventuation of the Republic that, from the outset, its first governing body the socialist party (SPD) was forced to contend with.