History of Germany during World War I

The German Empire was one of the defeated Central Powers during World War I. It entered the conflict following the declaration of war against Serbia by its ally, Austria-Hungary. German forces attacked the Allies on both the eastern and western fronts, although the German territory itself remained relatively safe from widespread invasion for most of the war.

By 1918, however, the Central Powers were exhausted from fighting, and the Allies had just won the support of the United States. Even though the eastern front was hundreds of miles away from the borders of the Reich, the invasion of the Rhineland on the other front precipitated uprisings and an attempted revolution throughout Germany. By the end of that year, the country had capitulated and the Empire had been replaced by the Weimar Republic.

Weimar Republic

This article outlines political events from 1918 until the collapse of the Republic in 1933. The Nazi Germany article describes what came after (see also Gleichschaltung for details on how the Nazi dictatorship was installed). For discussion of the cultural climate in Germany between the wars see Weimar culture.

The Weimar Republic (German Weimarer Republik, IPA: [?va??mar?r repu?bli?k]) is the historical name for the republic that governed Germany from 1919 to 1933. This period of German history is often known as the Weimar period. The republic was named after the city of Weimar where a national assembly convened to produce a new constitution after the German Monarchy was abolished following the nation's defeat in World War I. Despite its political form, the new Republic still called itself "Deutsches Reich" (German Empire).

This first attempt to establish a liberal democracy in Germany happened during a time of civil conflict, and failed with the ascent of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in 1933. Although technically the 1919 constitution was not invalidated until after World War II, the legal measures taken by the Nazi government in 1933 (commonly known as Gleichschaltung) destroyed the mechanisms of a typical democratic system, so 1933 is cited as the end of the Weimar Republic.

The phrase Weimar Republic is an invention of historians, and was not used during its existence. Germany's legal name was still the "German Empire" (Deutsches Reich), the same name used by the German monarchy before 1919. The use of the English word empire and its adjective imperial may be confusing because the Weimar Republic was a republic; empire is an imprecise translation of the German word Reich (which does not have a specific monarchic connotation) and is increasingly translated as commonwealth or realm.

Controlled revolution: the establishment of the Republic (1918–1919)

From 1916 onwards, the 1871 German Empire had effectively been governed by the military, led by the Oberste Heeresleitung (OHL, Supreme Army Command) with the Chief of Staff Paul von Hindenburg. When it became apparent that World War I was lost, the OHL demanded that a civil government be installed in order to meet a key peace talk condition from United States President Woodrow Wilson. Any attempt to continue the war after Bulgaria had left the Central Powers would only have caused German territories to be occupied. The new Reichskanzler Prince Max von Baden thus offered a cease-fire to President Wilson on October 3, 1918. On October 28, 1918, the 1871 constitution was finally amended to make the Reich a parliamentary democracy, which the government had refused for half a century: the Chancellor was henceforth responsible to Parliament, the Reichstag, and no longer to the Kaiser.

The plan to transform Germany into a constitutional monarchy similar to Britain quickly became obsolete as the country slid into a state of near-total chaos. Germany was flooded with soldiers returning from the front, many of whom were wounded physically, psychologically, or both. Violence was rampant, with fights breaking out even between rival leftist groups at funerals for leaders assassinated by right-wing adversaries.

Rebellion broke out when on October 29, the military command, without consultation with the government, ordered the German High Seas Fleet to sortie. This was not only entirely hopeless from a military standpoint, but was also certain to bring the peace negotiations to a halt. The crews of two ships in Wilhelmshaven mutinied. When the military arrested about 1,000 seamen and had them transported to Kiel, the Wilhelmshaven mutiny turned into a general rebellion that quickly swept over most of Germany. Other seamen, soldiers and workers, in solidarity with the arrested, began electing worker and soldier councils modelled after the soviets of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and took over military and civil powers in many cities. On November 7, the revolution had reached Munich, causing King Ludwig III of Bavaria to flee.

Initially, the demands of the councils were modest: they wanted the arrested seamen to be freed. In contrast to Russia one year earlier, the councils were not controlled by a communist party. Still, with the emergence of the Soviet Union, the rebellion caused great fear in the establishment down to the middle classes. The country was on the verge of becoming a socialist republic.

From November 1918 through January 1919, Germany was governed dictatorially by the Council of People's Representatives composed of three representatives each from the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and of the "Independent Social Democrats" (USPD, for Unabhangige Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands), until withdrawal of the USPD left the SPD to rule alone. In these three months, the government was extraordinarily active, and issued a large number of decrees. At the same time, its main activities were confined to certain spheres: the 8 hour day, domestic labour reform, agricultural labour reform, right of civil-service associations, local municipality social welfare relief (split between Reich and individual states) and important national health insurance, re-instatement of demobilised workers, protection arbitrary dismissal with appeal as right, regulated wage agreement, and Universal suffrage from 20 years of age in all classes of elections - local and national. Occasionally the name "Die Deutsche sozialdemokratische Republik" (The German Social-Democratic Republic) appeared in leaflets and on posters from this era, although this was never the official name of the country.

At the time, the political representation of the working class was divided: a faction had separated from the Social Democratic Party, calling themselves "Independent Social Democrats" (USPD) and leaning towards a socialist system. In order not to lose their influence, the remaining "Majority Social Democrats" (MSPD, who supported a parliamentary system) decided to put themselves at the front of the movement, and on November 7, demanded that Emperor Wilhelm II abdicate. On November 9, 1918, the Republic was proclaimed by Philipp Scheidemann at the Reichstag building in Berlin, two hours after a socialist republic was proclaimed around the corner at the Berlin Castle by Karl Liebknecht.

On November 9, in a legally questionable act, Reichskanzler Prince Max von Baden transferred his powers to Friedrich Ebert, the leader of the MSPD. It was apparent that this act would not be sufficient to satisfy the masses, so a day later, a revolutionary government called "Council of People's Deputies" (Rat der Volksbeauftragten) was created, consisting of three MSPD and three USPD members, led by Ebert for the MSPD and Hugo Haase for the USPD. Although the new government was confirmed by the Berlin worker and soldier council, it was opposed by the Spartacist League led by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht. Ebert called for a National Congress of Councils, which took place from December 16 to 20, 1918, and in which the MSPD had the majority. Ebert thus managed to enforce quick elections for a National Assembly to produce a constitution for a parliamentary system, marginalizing the movement that called for a socialist republic (see below).

The Reichswehr and the Revolution

To ensure that his fledgling government was able to maintain control over the country, Ebert made a pact with the OHL, now led by Ludendorff's successor General Wilhelm Groener. This Ebert-Groener pact stipulated that the government would not attempt to reform the Army so long as the army swore to protect the government. On the one hand, this agreement symbolised the acceptance of the new government by the military, assuaging concern among the middle classes; on the other hand, it was considered a betrayal of worker interests by the left wing. The new model Reichswehr army, limited by the Treaty of Versailles to 100,000 men, remained fully under the control of the Imperial military caste despite its nominal re-organisation. As an independent and conservative group in Weimar, it wielded a large amount of influence over the fate of the republic. Unlike all other revolutions, the men of the German Revolution asked the High Command how to bring the army home.

This pact also marked one of several steps that caused the permanent split in the working class's political representation into the SPD and communists. The eventual fate of the Weimar Republic in no small part derives from the general political backwardness of the German labour movement. The several strands within the central mass of the socialist movement adhered more to sentimental loyalty to alliances arising from chance than to any recognition of political necessity. Combined action on the part of the socialists was impossible without action from the millions of workers who stood midway between the parliamentarians and the ultra-leftists who supported the workers councils. Confusion through Weimar as a whole made acute the danger of extreme right and extreme left engaging in virulent conflict.

The split became final after Ebert called upon the OHL for troops to put down another Berlin soldier mutiny on November 23, 1918, in which soldiers had captured the city commandant and closed off the Reichskanzlei where the Council of People's Deputies was situated. The suppression was brutal with several dead and injured. This caused the left wing to call for a split with the MSPD, which, in their view, had joined with the counter-revolutionary military to suppress the Revolution. The USPD thus left the Council of People's Deputies after only seven weeks. The split deepened when, in December, the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands (KPD) was formed out of a number of left-wing groups, including the left wing of the USPD and the Spartakus group.

In January, more bloody attempts at establishing council communism by workers in the streets of Berlin were put down by paramilitary Freikorps units consisting of volunteer soldiers, culminating in the beating to death of Rosa Luxemburg and Liebknecht on January 15. With the affirmation of Ebert, the murderers were tried not before a civil court, but a military court, leading to very lenient sentences, which did not exactly lead to more acceptance for Ebert on the left wing either.

The National Assembly elections took place January 19, 1919. In this time, the new left-wing parties, including the USPD and KPD, were barely able to get themselves organized, leading to a solid majority of seats for the moderate forces. To avoid the ongoing fights in Berlin, the National Assembly convened in the city of Weimar, giving the future Republic its unofficial name. The Weimar Constitution created a republic under a semi-presidential system with the Reichstag elected by proportional representation. The Socialist and Democratic parties obtained a solid 80 per cent of the vote.

During the debates in Weimar, fights continued. A Soviet republic was declared in Munich, but was quickly put down by Freikorps and regular army units. Sporadic fighting continued to flare up around the country. In eastern territories, forces loyal to the Kaiser fought the republic, while the Polish population fought for independence: Great Poland Uprising in Provinz Posen and three Silesian Uprisings in Upper Silesia.

The socialist roots of Weimar

The carefully thought-out social and political legislation introduced during the revolution was generally unappreciated by the German working-class. The two goals sought by the government, democratisation and social protection of the working class, were never achieved. This has been attributed to a lack of pre-war political experience on the part of the Social Democrats. The government had little success in confronting the twin economic crises following the war.

The permanent economic crisis was a result of lost pre-war industrial exports, the loss of supplies in raw materials and food stuffs from Alsace-Lorraine, Polish districts and the colonies along with worsening debt balances and reparations payments. Military-industrial activity had almost ceased, although controlled demobilisation kept unemployment at around one million.

The Entente permitted only low import levels of goods that most Germans could not afford. After four years of war and famine, many German workers were exhausted, physically impaired and discouraged. Millions were disenchanted with capitalism and hoping for a new era. Meanwhile the currency devalued.

The German peace delegation in France signed the Treaty of Versailles, accepting mass reductions of the German military, heavy reparations payments and the controversial "War Guilt Clause". Adolf Hitler later blamed the republic and its democracy for the oppressive terms of this treaty.

The Republic's first Reichsprasident ("Reich President"), Friedrich Ebert of the MSPD, signed the new German constitution into law on August 11, 1919.