History of Germany during World War I
During World War I, the German Empire was one of the Central Powers. It began participation in the conflict after the declaration of war against Serbia by its ally, Austria-Hungary. German forces fought the Allies on both the eastern and western fronts, although German territory itself remained relatively safe from widespread invasion for most of the war, except for a brief period in 1914 when East Prussia was invaded. A tight blockade imposed by the Royal Navy caused severe food shortages in the cities, especially in the winter of 1916–17, known as the Turnip Winter. At the end of the war, Germany's defeat and widespread popular discontent triggered the German Revolution of 1918–1919 which overthrew the monarchy and established the Weimar Republic.
Background
Germany's population had already responded to the outbreak of war in 1914 with a complex mix of emotions, in a similar way to the emotions of the population in the United Kingdom; notions of universal enthusiasm known as the Spirit of 1914 have been challenged by more recent scholarship. The German government, dominated by the Junkers, saw the war as a way to end being surrounded by hostile powers France, Russia and Britain. The war was presented inside Germany as the chance for the nation to secure "our place under the sun," as the Foreign Minister Bernhard von Bülow had put it, which was readily supported by prevalent nationalism among the public. The German establishment hoped the war would unite the public behind the monarchy, and lessen the threat posed by the dramatic growth of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, which had been the most vocal critic of the Kaiser in the Reichstag before the war. Despite its membership in the Second International, the Social Democratic Party of Germany ended its differences with the Imperial government and abandoned its principles of internationalism to support the war effort. The German state spent 170 billion Marks during the war. The money was raised by borrowing from banks and from public bond drives. Symbolic purchasing of nails which were driven into public wooden crosses spurred the aristocracy and middle class to buy bonds. These bonds became worthless with the 1923 hyperinflation.It soon became apparent that Germany was not prepared for a war lasting more than a few months. At first, little was done to regulate the economy on a wartime footing, and the German war economy would remain badly organized throughout the war. The country depended on imports of food and raw materials, which were stopped by the British blockade of Germany. First food prices were limited, then rationing was introduced. The winter of 1916/17 was called the "turnip winter" because the potato harvest was poor and people ate animal food, including vile-tasting turnips. From August 1914 to mid-1919, excess deaths compared to peacetime caused by malnutrition and high rates of exhaustion and disease and despair came to about 474,000 civilians excluding "Alsace-Lorraine and the Polish provinces".
Government
According to the biographer, Konrad H. Jarausch, a primary concern for Bethmann Hollweg in July 1914 was the steady growth of Russian power and the growth of British and French military collaboration. Under these circumstances he decided to run what he considered a calculated risk to back Vienna in a local war against Serbia, while risking a big war with Russia. He calculated that France would not support Russia. It failed when Russia decided on general mobilization. By rushing through Belgium, Germany expanded the war to include England. Bethmann Hollweg thus failed to keep France and Britain out of the conflict.The crisis came to a head on 5 July 1914 when Count Hoyos Mission arrived in Berlin in response to Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister Leopold Berchtold's plea for friendship. Bethmann Hollweg was assured that Britain would not intervene in the frantic diplomatic rounds across the European powers. Reliance on that assumption encouraged Austria to demand Serbian concessions. His main concern was Russian border manoeuvres, conveyed by his ambassadors at a time when Raymond Poincaré himself was preparing a secret mission to St Petersburg. He wrote to Count Sergey Sazonov, "Russian mobilisation measures would compel us to mobilise and that then European war could scarcely be prevented."
Following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914, Bethmann Hollweg and his foreign minister, Gottlieb von Jagow, were instrumental in assuring Austria-Hungary of Germany's unconditional support, regardless of Austria's actions against Serbia. While Grey was suggesting mediation between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, Bethmann Hollweg wanted Austria-Hungary to attack Serbia and so he tampered with the British message and deleted the last line of the letter: "Also, the whole world here is convinced, and I hear from my colleagues that the key to the situation lies in Berlin, and that if Berlin seriously wants peace, it will prevent Vienna from following a foolhardy policy.
When the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum was presented to Serbia, Kaiser Wilhelm II ended his vacation and hurried back to Berlin.
Bethmann Hollweg, much of whose foreign policy before the war had been guided by his desire to establish good relations with Britain, was particularly upset by Britain's declaration of war following the German violation of Belgium's neutrality during its invasion of France. He reportedly asked the departing British Ambassador Edward Goschen how Britain could go to war over a "scrap of paper", which was the 1839 Treaty of London guaranteeing Belgium's neutrality.
Bethmann Hollweg sought public approval from a declaration of war. His civilian colleagues pleaded for him to register some febrile protest, but he was frequently outflanked by the military leaders, who played an increasingly important role in the direction of all German policy. However, according to historian Fritz Fischer, writing in the 1960s, Bethmann Hollweg made more concessions to the nationalist right than had previously been thought. He supported the ethnic cleansing of Poles from the Polish Border Strip as well as Germanisation of Polish territories by settlement of German colonists.
A few weeks after the war began Bethmann presented the Septemberprogramm, which was a survey of ideas from the elite should Germany win the war. Bethmann Hollweg, with all credibility and power now lost, conspired over Falkenhayn's head with Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff for an Eastern Offensive. They then succeeded, in August 1916 in securing Falkenhayn's replacement by Hindenburg as Chief of the General Staff, with Ludendorff as First Quartermaster-General. Thereafter, Bethmann Hollweg's hopes for US President Woodrow Wilson's mediation at the end of 1916 came to nothing. Over Bethmann Hollweg's objections, Hindenburg and Ludendorff forced the adoption of unrestricted submarine warfare in March 1917, adopted as a result of Henning von Holtzendorff's memorandum. Bethmann Hollweg had been a reluctant participant and opposed it in cabinet. The US entered the war in April 1917.
According to Wolfgang J. Mommsen, Bethmann Hollweg weakened his position by failing to establish good control over public relations. To avoid highly intensive negative publicity, he conducted much of his diplomacy in secret, thereby failing to build strong support for it. In 1914 he was willing to risk a world war to win public support. Bethmann Hollweg remained in office until July 1917, when a Reichstag revolt resulted in the passage of Matthias Erzberger's Peace Resolution by an alliance of the Social Democratic, Progressive, and Centre parties. Opposition to him from high-level military leaders, including Hindenburg and Ludendorff, who both threatened to resign was exacerbated when Bethmann Hollweg convinced the Emperor to agree publicly to the introduction of equal male suffrage in Prussian state elections. The combination of political and military opposition forced Bethmann Hollweg's resignation and replacement by Georg Michaelis.
1914–1915
The German army opened the war on the Western Front with a modified version of the Schlieffen Plan, designed to quickly attack France through neutral Belgium before turning southwards to encircle the French army on the German border. The Belgians fought back, and sabotaged their rail system to delay the Germans. The Germans did not expect this and were delayed, and responded with systematic reprisals on civilians, killing nearly 6,000 Belgian noncombatants, including women and children, and burning 25,000 houses and buildings. The plan called for the right flank of the German advance to converge on Paris and initially, the Germans were very successful, particularly in the Battle of the Frontiers. By 12 September, the French with assistance from the British forces halted the German advance east of Paris at the First Battle of the Marne. The last days of this battle signified the end of mobile warfare in the west. The French offensive into Germany launched on 7 August with the Battle of Mulhouse had limited success.In the east, only one Field Army defended East Prussia and when Russia attacked in this region it diverted German forces intended for the Western Front. Germany defeated Russia in a series of battles collectively known as the First Battle of Tannenberg, but this diversion exacerbated problems of insufficient speed of advance from rail-heads not foreseen by the German General Staff. The Central Powers were thereby denied a quick victory and forced to fight a war on two fronts. The German army had fought its way into a good defensive position inside France and had permanently incapacitated 230,000 more French and British troops than it had lost itself. Despite this, communications problems and questionable command decisions cost Germany the chance of obtaining an early victory.