Germany’s downfall in WWI

Key Factors

Military - The Long Lasting War

• Germany entered the war better prepared and mobilised than any other country.

• However they did not plan for a LONG war!

• As the war moved to trenches and stalemate, Germany had to mobilize her homefront economy. This was a challenge.

Political - An unresponsive Germany

• The Kaiser was quickly sidelined by his generals when the war began. They strategized and implemented with no reference to civilian populations or the Reichstag. Any attempt to cooordinate military and run a homefront economy failed.

• A poor system was set up to define which companies would produce war materials and provide the government/military (called the War Materials Office or KRA).

• The War Ministry then decided which men would fight versus which men were given a pass in order to work the machinery.

• Women were excluded.

• The War Boards Office then set up to solve disputes in the above system

Problems with the above...

• Industrial workers gained a great deal from the war boards and created social tensions

• The Federal Constitution had never specified a national income tax, which limited revenue

• No ceiling was imposed on war profits by businesses, nor were these profits even taxed at all prior to 1916.

• Basically, the government was only able to cover about 15% of its costs through taxes (in comparison, Britain was at about 39%).

• The government in turn printed paper money and sold bonds in order to recover the costs. inflation insued.

Economic - Allied ingenuity and strategy

• By imposing a crippling blockade, the allies shut off German colonial access and resources. Their internal European allies were no help either.

• Germany’s capture of Russian resources after Brest Litovsk only fueled allied anger, and it all so took them too long to coordinate efforts to extract and use these resources.

• In 1917, Germny embarked on a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare in an attempt to gain morale and break through the blockade, it was a poor gamble.

• Allied capture of Romanian oil fields in 1918 seald the fate of Germany. Ludendorff pushed onwards in his famous Spring Offensive in order to push to the negotiation table with some element of forcefullness and equality. This too failed.

• The allies debated relieving the blockade and famine in Germany at the armistace, but waited until after the full Treaty of Versailles was signed.

Effects of these three ideas

•Raw materials

•Food

•Disease

•Men

•Political movements and faith

•http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6qlyvp7L2k&feature=related