The Eastern Front of World War 1 saw highly mobile warfare but also immense loss of life, with over 2.5 million Russian soldiers killed, captured, or wounded by 1915. Germany and Austria-Hungary were later joined by Bulgaria in attacking and eliminating Serbia from the war in late 1915. The Russian Revolution in 1917 and the subsequent Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signed by Vladimir Lenin removed Russia from fighting as a combatant nation, granting territory to the Central Powers.

1. The Eastern Front
• Much more mobile
more than the West
– But loss of life still very
high
– 1915: 2.5 million
Russians
killed, captured, or
wounded

2. The Eastern Front
• Germany and Austria
Hungary joined by
Bulgaria in Sept. 1915
– Attacked and eliminated
Serbia from war

3. THE TREATY OF
BREST-LITOVSK
Russians were weary of World War I and the
enormous sacrifices they endured. This
discontentment led to popular support of the
Bolshevik Party. Its leader, Vladimir
Lenin, promised that if he were elected to a
position of power, he would remove Russian forces
from the war. After winning the election in
November 1917, Lenin pursued an armistice with
Germany. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was
signed, and Russia was no longer a combatant
nation. The treaty granted the Central Powers
Vladimir Lenin was thecontrol of territory that included Finland and the
leader of the Russian Baltic provinces.
Soviet Socialist Party.

4. Lecture 3:
U. S. Involvement;
WHY??

5. U.S. Involvement
• The U.S. declared war on Germany in April 1917.
• Many reasons: unrestricted submarine warfare
(Lusitania), Zimmerman telegram, British
propaganda, the Russian Revolution
• With America’s entry, the war was transformed (at
least according to Woodrow Wilson) into a moral
crusade: an ideological conflict between democracy
and autocracy.
• He had been able to claim that because of the
revolution in Russia.

6. Freedom of the Seas
· The U.S., as a neutral nation,
claimed the right to trade with
either side in the war.
· However, Britain and Germany
set up blockades around the
British and German coasts.

7. · German submarines, called U-boats, torpedoed enemy ships and neutral ships trading with the
enemy.

8. German Submarine Warfare
U-Boats America’s Involvement
• Germany suffered because of the British • In 1915, Germany sank a luxury
blockade, so it developed small passenger ship to Great Britain called
submarines called U-boats to strike back the Lusitania, killing many, including
at the British. 128 Americans
• U-boats are named after the German for
“undersea boat.” • Americans were outraged, and Wilson
demanded an end to unrestricted
• In February 1915 the German submarine warfare.
government declared the waters around
Great Britain a war zone, threatening to • The Germans agreed to attack only
destroy all enemy ships. supply ships but later sank the French
• Germany warned the U.S. that neutral passenger ship Sussex, killing 80 people.
ships might be attacked. • Wilson threatened Germany again, and
• The German plan for unrestricted Germany issued the Sussex
submarine warfare angered Americans, pledge, promising not to sink merchant
and Wilson believed it violated the laws vessels “without warning and without
of neutrality. saving human lives.”
• Wilson held Germany accountable for
American losses.

10. What did it take to get the US
involved?
1. Blockades
•In May, 1915 Germany told Americans to
stay off of British ships
•They could/would sink them
10

11. · In 1915, a German submarine torpedoed the Lusitania, a British passenger ship, killing
approximately 1,200 people, including 128 Americans.

12. What did it take to get the US
involved?
•Lusitania torpedoed,
sinking with 1200
passengers and crew
(including 128 Americans)
•Was eventually found to
be carrying 4200 cases of
ammunition
German Propaganda Justifying Lusitania sinking
12

13. · Americans were infuriated with the destruction of the Lusitania.

14. What did it take to get the US
involved?
•The US sharply criticized
Germany for their action
•Germany agreed not to
sink passenger ships
without warning in the
future
Note in Bottle After Lusitania Disaster 14

15. What did it take to get the US
involved? •1917 Germany
2. Unlimited Submarine Warfare announced “unlimited
submarine warfare” in the
war zone
Why? Otherwise their
blockade would not be
successful
15

16. Re-Election, Espionage, and War
• Wilson promised not to go to war, and after his re-election in 1916 he
began to work for a settlement of “peace without victory.”
• When Germany restarted unrestricted warfare, the U.S. ended
diplomatic relations and started installing guns on merchant ships.
The Zimmermann Note The U.S. Declares War
• German foreign secretary Arthur • Wilson continued to resist.
Zimmermann sent a telegram to • Russians forced the czar to
a German official in Mexico give up absolute power and
proposing an alliance between formed a more democratic
Germany and Mexico. government, which
Americans liked.
• The Zimmermann Note asked
for Mexico’s help in exchange for • Then German U-boats sank
three American merchant
its lost Southwest territory. ships, and Wilson’s cabinet
• The Mexicans declined, but the convinced him to declare
British decoded the note, and war, which Congress
approved.
Americans called for war.
On April 6, 1917, the United States joined the Allies. Now they needed
to raise an army, train them, and ship supplies and troops.

17. What did it take to get the US
involved?
3. Zimmerman Note
•US intercepted a note from Germany to Mexico,
•It promised Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona back in return for an
alliance
17

18. Moving Toward War
Zimmermann telegram:
– secret message from
Germany to Mexico
urging Mexico to attack
the U.S. if the U.S.
declared war on
Germany
– Germany promised to
help Mexico regain land
it lost to the U.S. in the
Mexican War.
* The U.S. declared war
on the Central Powers
in 1917.

19. Zimmermann Telegram:
Decoded Message

20. What did it take to get the US
involved?
•Zimmerman Note +
the sinking of 4
unarmed American
ships led to a
declaration of war
20

21. Americans in the Trenches

22. The Spanish Flu (Influenza)1918
• Struck in the trenches of the western front and then
flourished when soldiers returned home.
• It became the greatest public health disaster of modern
history
– The pandemic killed between 22 and 30 million people
worldwide, or roughly twice as many as had died during the
fighting
– In Spain, it killed roughly 40 percent of the population (8
million), thus giving it the name of the Spanish Influenza.
– British colonial troops carried it to India where it killed 12
million.
– No disease, plague, war, famine, or natural catastrophe in world
history had killed so many people in such a short time.

23. Influenza Spreads—Did you know?
• Three waves of a severe flu epidemic broke out between 1918 and 1919 in Europe
and in America.
• Of all American troops who died in World War I, half died from influenza.
• On the Western Front, crowded and unsanitary trenches helped flu spread among
troops, then to American military camps in Kansas and beyond.
• This strain of influenza was deadly, killing healthy people within days, and during the
month of October 1918, influenza killed nearly 200,000 Americans.
• Panicked city leaders halted gatherings, and people accused the Germans of
releasing flu germs into the populace.
By the time it passed, over 600,000 Americans lost their lives.

24. Disease, Influenza and Pneumonia

25. Major Personalities
• General John J. Pershing
was a general officer in the United States Army. Pershing is
the only person to be promoted in his own lifetime to the
highest rank ever held in the United States Army—General
of the Armies

26. Marshal Ferdinand Foch
• general in the French army during World War I and was made
Marshal of France in its final year: 1918
• chosen as supreme commander of the Allied armies, a position that
he held until 11 November 1918, when he accepted the German
request for an armistice.

27. Field Marshal Earl Haig:
Earl Haig is a title in the Peerage of the UK
• Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig
• He commanded the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) from 1915
to the end of the War. Most notably he was commander during
the Battle of the Somme, the 3rd Battle of Ypres and the series of
victoriesleading to the German surrender in 1918.

28. Lt. Gen. Erich von Ludendorff,1865-
1937
• German Army officer
1916-he ran Germany's war effort in World War I until his resignation
in October 1918.
Hindenburg, Kaiser Wilhelm II, and Ludendorff in
January, 1917

29. Paul von Hindenburg
• was a German field marshal, statesman, and politician, and served as
the 2nd President of Germany from 1925 to 1934
• Was 84 years old when elected President!!
• Chief of the General Staff from 1916
• His deputy was Ludendorff in WW I
• The famed zeppelin, Hindenburg, that was destroyed by fire in 1937
had been named in his honor

30. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas
Edward Lawrence
• known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British Army officer
renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt of
1916–18. 1918 British armies defeated the Ottoman empire once and
for all!
• Lawrence of Arabia, a title popularized by the 1962 film Lawrence of
Arabia based on his life.

31. Society during the War
• Creation of planned economies
• People everywhere supported their countries (nationalism!)
• Men were drafted & women took their places in the work force.
Female nurses & doctors, served on the war front.
• Suffragettes put their campaign on hold during the
war….immediately after 1918…they go the right to voted in
Britain, Austria, & Germany…US?
• Daylight Saving Time was used for the 1st time! Though mentioned by
Benjamin Franklin in 1784, the modern idea of daylight saving was
first proposed in 1895 by George Vernon Hudson] and it was first
implemented during the First World War. Many countries have used it
at various times since then

32. Germany
• Had the most planned economy & the most advanced
chemical industry
• They had successfully created an array of synthetic
products, from rubber, to nitrates(for fertilizer, or
explosives)
• Walter Rathenau, Jewish industrialist, headed a German
program to utilize everything!
• Will serve as as Foreign Minister
of Germany during the Weimar Republic.

33. Total War
• “…if all the treasures of our soil that agriculture and
industry can produce are used exclusively for the
conduct of War…all other considerations must come
second.” --General Hindenburg

34. British Writers
• Siegfried Sassoon & Wilfred Owen
Wrote poetry around themes of irony & bitterness

35. Other writer’s
Oswald Spengler(German)-Decline of the West in 1919
book introduces itself as a 'Copernican overturning' and rejects the Euro-centric view
of history, especially the division of history into the linear "ancient-medieval-
modern" rubric] According to Spengler the meaningful units for history are not
epochs but whole cultures which evolve as organisms. He acknowledges eight high
cultures: Babylonian, Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Mexican (Mayan/Aztec), Classical
(Greek/Roman), Arabian, Western or "European-American". Cultures have a limited
lifespan of some thousand years. The final stage of each culture is, in his word use,
a 'civilization'.

36. Other Writers
• Thomas Mann(German)-1929 Nobel Prize laureate The Magic
Mountain
• widely considered to be one of the most influential works of 20th
century German literature
• novel about disease, not merely of individuals, but also of a whole age. Where
disease appears as the prerequisite of spiritual growth, Mann plays his favorite
theme of the polarity between spirit and life; the transcendence of this
polarity in the name of humanism is central to the novel. Where disease
stands as the symptom of the moral deterioration of the capitalist and
bourgeois order, Mann is the modern writer who must concern himself with
the issues of his time. To attempt "to see the real in the spiritual and the
spiritual in the real" was a fundamental maxim of his.

37. The end of the war!
• The German Defeat in the Great War!
• No other war had changed the map of Europe
so dramatically—four empires disappeared:
the German, Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and
the Russian.
• Four defunct dynasties, the Hohenzollerns,
the Habsburg, Romanovs and the Ottomans
together with all their ancillary aristocracies,
all fell after the war

38. ARMISTICE ENDS
THE WAR
After a three days of
negotiations, representatives of the Allied
Powers and Germany signed the armistice
on a railway carriage in Compiegne
Forest on November 11, 1918. The
expression “the eleventh of the eleventh of
the eleventh” is derived from this date.
The armistice went into effect at the
eleventh hour, on the eleventh day, of the
eleventh month. According to the
armistice, German troops were to leave
Belgium, France, and the eastern bank of
the Rhine. The remainder of the German
fleet was forced to surrender its weapons
The armistice was reached on and ships to the Allied Powers. Germany
also was forced to renounce its peace
November 11, 1918. treaties with Russia and Romania.

39. With the failure of the Ludendorf Offensive, and with the exhausted state of
Germany, the German generals recognized that it was time to sue for peace
with the Allies. The Kaiser was forced to abdicate on the 8th November and a
new democratic republic was established.

40. Peace at Last
· At 11 a.m. on November
11, 1918, Germany agreed to an
armistice, ending World War I.
•11th day, 11th hour, of the 11th
month!

41. On 8th November 1918, Imperial Germany came to an end when a
democratic republic was established. Though it was intended to have
Wilhelm tried as a ‘war criminal’ he was eventually allowed to spend the
rest of his life in exile in the Netherlands. He died in 1941.

43. The Costs of War
• Loss of life
– 8.5 million soldiers died
– 21 million were injured
– Civilians were also victims of the war
• Starvation, disease and slaughter
• Economic loss
– Estimated $338 billion
– Cities, towns, farmlands and homes were also
destroyed

44. * Approximately 13 million people died and 20 million were wounded in the war.

47. GERMAN EAGLE (to German Dove): "Here, carry on for a bit, will you I'm feeling rather
run down."

48. Germany
• Nov. 9, 1918, Kaiser Wilhelm II is forced to step
down
• Germany declares themselves a republic…the
Weimar Republic
parliamentary republic established in
1919

50. “a brittle compromise agreement between American utopianism
and European paranoia — too conditional to fulfill the dreams of
the former, too tentative to alleviate the fears of the latter” –
Kissinger

51. The Treaty!!
• Paris Peace conference
• meeting of the Allied victors following the end of
World War I to set the peace terms for Germany
and other defeated nations, and to deal with the
empires of the defeated powers following the
Armistice of 1918
• took place in Paris in 1919 and involved diplomats
from more than 30 countries

52. Coincidental Dates
• Arrival of Clemenceau, Lloyd George, and
Wilson on January 18, 1919
Anniversary of the beginning of the Second
Reich in 1871
• Signed June 28, 1919
5 Years to the day of Ferdinand’s death

53. David Lloyd-George
Woodrow Wilson
[Great Britain]
[USA]
Orlando [Italy] Georges Clemenceau [France]

54. The Big Four

55. David Lloyd George
• The prime minister of Great
Britain.
• He was a realist.
• An experienced politician who
realised there must be
compromise.
• The people of Britain wanted
revenge.
• He knew this would lead to war
but he represented the people.

56. Georges Clemenceau
• Premier of France.
• Clemenceau had seen France
invaded by Germany in 1870
and 1914, he wanted to
make sure this would never
happen again.
• France had suffered greatly
during the War they wanted
compensation and revenge.
• Uncompromising.

57. Woodrow Wilson
• President of the USA.
• Wilson was an idealist and
reformer, who wanted to build a
better and more peaceful world.
• He didn’t want the Treaty to be
too harsh as he believed this
would lead to revenge.
• He wanted to set up a peace
keeping body – The League of
Nations
• Wilson did not understand the
deep feelings of hatred in
Europe.

58. Wilson’s Fourteen Points
• In a speech to Congress before the war ended, President Wilson outlined a vision of a
“just and lasting peace.”
• His plan was called the Fourteen Points, and among its ideas were
—Open diplomacy, freedom of the seas, the removal of trade barriers, and the
reduction of military arms
—A fair system to resolve disputes over colonies
—Self-determination, or the right of people to decide their own political status and
form their own nations
—Establishing a League of Nations, or an organization of countries working together
to settle disputes, protect democracy, and prevent future wars
• The Fourteen Points expressed a new philosophy that applied progressivism to U.S.
foreign policy.
• The Fourteen Points declared that foreign policy should be based on morality, not just
on what’s best for the nation.

59. Fourteen Points
• Created by Woodrow Wilson
• First 5 points
– Ended secret treaties
– Freedom of seas
– Free Trade
– Reduced national armies and navies
– Colonial claims
• Points 6-13
– Readjustment of border changes for new nations
• What is self-determination?
• What was the 14th point?

60. Vittorio Orlando
• Italian Prime Minister.
• Wanted land and territory
for Italy.
• Self determination stopped
Italy getting the lands
especially Fiume.
• Walked out of the meeting
when he didn’t get his way in
April 1919.
• Returned to sign the Treaty in
May.

61. The Mood in 1919
 Most countries felt Germany should pay for the damage and destruction caused by
the War.
 The countries of Europe were exhausted.
 Their economies and industries were in a poor state.
 Millions had died. Almost every family had lost a member in the fighting.
 Ordinary citizens faced shortages of food and medicine.

62. The Aims of the Leaders
There was disagreement about what the
conference was aiming to do.
Some felt the aim was to punish Germany.
Some wanted to cripple Germany so it
couldn’t start another war.
Some felt the winning countries should be
rewarded.
Some aimed for a just and lasting peace.

63. Terms of the Versailles Treaty
(see class handout)
• G
• A
• R
• G
• L
• E

64. “G”
"The Allied and Associated Governments affirm, and Germany
accepts, the
responsibility of Germany and her Allies for causing all the loss and
damage to which the Allied and Associate Governments and their
nationals have been subjected as a consequence of a war imposed
upon them by the aggression of Germany and her Allies."
Article 231
GERMANY ACCEPTED RESPONSIBILITY
FOR STARTING THE WAR=Article 231

65. Versailles Treaty
- Germany was forced to:
· take full blame for the war; Article
231
· completely disarm
· pay huge reparations to the Allies
· give up it’s colonies to the Allies
* Germany was an
angry, humiliated
nation, setting the stage
for World War II.

66. “A”=Army
100,000
De-militarised
A=ARMY

67. To do with Germany’s armed forces :
The German army was to be reduced to 100,000 men. It was not allowed to have tanks.
Germany was not allowed an airforce
The area known as the Rhineland was to be de-militarised
The Allies were to occupy the west bank of the Rhine for fifteen years
The German navy was to have no submarines or large battle-ships

68. “R”=REPARATIONS
Germany agreed to pay for the damage caused by her armies during the war. The sum
she had to pay was later fixed at £6,600 million($33 Billion)

69. “G”= Germany Lost Land
Germany lost ALL of her overseas colonies
Alsace-Lorraine was given to France

70. The Rhineland was to be de-militarized

71. The Saar coalfields were given to France for fifteen
years
The port of Danzig was made a Free City under the control of
the League of Nations

72. “L”= League of Nations.

73. “E”=Extra points
• Forbade Anschluss(A union of Germany and
Austria to create a 'Greater Germany', any
attempt at an Anschluss was banned by this
treaty, but Hitler drove it through anyway on
March 13 1938)
• Estonia, Latvia, & Lituania, independent states

74. Wilson’s Plan for Peace
President Wilson’s goals for peace after World War I, known as the Fourteen Points, included the
following.
· an end to secret agreements among nations
· freedom of the seas, free trade, and a limit on arms
· allow national groups self-determination
· formation of a League of Nations in order to protect the independence of all nations and settle
international disputes

75. The Great War was
to see the collapse
of four continental
empires. These
were to be replaced
by new nation
states.

76. - Based on the goal of self-
determination, many new nations
were formed.
Examples: Finland, Poland,
Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia

77. Creation of New Nations
 Austria-Hungary • The Ottoman Empire
empire was destroyed lost most of their
and split into 4 territory.
independent nations. • The empire was split
› Austria
between Great Britain
and France
› Hungary
– Palestine
› Czechoslovakia
– Iraq
› Yugoslavia – Transjordan
– Syria
– Lebanon

78. Creation of New Nations cont’d
• Russia lost land too
• Romania and Poland were given Russia
territory
• Other nations were given their independence
– Finland
– Estonia
– Latvia
– Lithuania

79. Pre-WWI Ottoman Empire

80. Post WWI- Ottoman Empire

81. Fight over the Treaty
• President Wilson returned to the U.S. and presented the treaty to the Senate, needing
the support of both Republicans and Democrats to ratify it.
• Wilson had trouble getting the Republican Congress’s support.
• The Senators divided into three groups:
1. Democrats, who supported immediate ratification of the
treaty
2. Irreconcilables, who wanted outright rejection of U.S. participation
in the League of Nations
3. Reservationists, led by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who
would only ratify a revised treaty
• Reservationists thought the League of Nations charter requiring members to use force
for the League conflicted with Congress’s constitutional right to declare war.

82. UNITED STATES DOES NOT SIGN THE TREATY
• Wilson presented the Treaty of Versailles to the Senate. He was met with stiff
opposition. The Republican leader of the Senate, Henry Cabot Lodge, was very
suspicious of Wilson and his treaty. Article X of the League of Nations required the
United States to respect the territorial integrity of member states.
• Many believed the League was the sort of entangling alliance the United States had
avoided since George Washington's Farewell Address.
• Lodge sabotaged the League covenant by declaring the United States exempt from
Article X. He attached reservations, or amendments, to the treaty to this effect.
Wilson, bedridden from a debilitating stroke, was unable to accept these changes.
He asked Senate Democrats to vote against the Treaty of Versailles unless the
Lodge reservations were dropped. Neither side budged, and the treaty went down
to defeat.

83. * Pres. Wilson refused
to compromise on the
treaty.
* In November of 1919
the Senate rejected the
Versailles Treaty.

84. How did Germans React to the Treaty?
Germans thought the Treaty was a “diktat” : a dictated peace. They had not been invited
to the peace conference at Versailles and when the Treaty was presented to them they
were threatened with war if they did not sign it.
Most Germans believed that the War Guilt Clause wasunjustified. The French and
British had done just as much to start the war
Many Germans believed the German economy would be crippled by having to pay reparations.
The loss of territory and population angered most Germans who believed that the losses
were too severe.

85. “A Peace Built on Quicksand”
• Was the Treaty of Versailles effective?
• The United States rejected the treaty
– They wanted to stay out of European affairs
• Others felt cheated by the treaty
– Germany
– Colonies in Asia and Africa
– Japan
– Italy

86. The Forgotten Allies
• Japan • Italy
– Provided large amounts of – Failed to annex land they
war materials to the Allies were promised by the British
– Seized German possessions in and French
the Pacific – Italy felt like they were not
• Later given mandate over being recognized enough for
these areas what they had given up
– Japan felt that they deserved during the war
more • “Mutilated Victory”
– Proposed a “racial equality” – Economic issues
clause to the Treaty of – Paved the way for fascism
Versailles
• It was rejected

87. Impact in Europe
• The effects of World War I in Europe were devastating.
– European nations lost almost an entire generation of young men.
– France, where most of the fighting took place, was in ruins.
– Great Britain was deeply in debt to the U.S. and lost its place as the world’s
financial center.
– The reparations forced on Germany by the Treaty of Versailles were crippling
to its economy.
• World War I would not be the “war to end all wars,” as some called it.
– Too many issues were left unresolved.
– Too much anger and hostility remained among nations.
• Within a generation, conflict would again break out in Europe, bringing the United
States and the world back into war.

88. The Treaty of Versailles was signed on 28th June 1919. It officially
ended the 1st World War. Many historians believe that it was a
major cause of the 2nd World War.
Most Germans were horrified by the harshness of the Treaty.
There was anger amongst all groups in Germany, no matter what
their political beliefs. Some German newspapers called for revenge
for the humiliation of Versailles.
However anger was also directed against the government in
Germany. Already there was a myth growing in the country that
the German army had been “stabbed in the back” by
politicians…the so called “November Criminals”. Now these same
politicians had signed the “Diktat”, the dictated peace. The new
democracy in Germany was now closely linked with the
humiliation of Versailles.

89. Weaknesses of the Treaty
• The Treaty of Versailles was written up by the allied powers without any input from
the Germans.
• It failed to create a lasting peace.
• The treaty was ruinous to Germany in many ways. It contained a "war- guilt clause"
under Article 231 which forced the Germans to accept all responsibility for
damages caused to any of the allied countries during the war.
• It forced demilitarization of the Rhine, an elimination of the German air force and
near elimination of the German navy, and a maximum allowance of 100,000 troops
in the German army.
• The Germans were forced to give up the territories of Alsace and Lorraine to
France, and a great deal of Prussian territory went to the new state of Poland.
• To be given the opportunity of signing a peace treaty at all, the Germans were
forced to accept a democratic government.

90. What can be learned from this
Treaty?
• Following the desire for revenge is ultimately
UNSUCCESSFUL!
• Forcing one nation to assume all the blame is neither
practical or fair!
• All nations should be included in the peace process!
• If a major nation doesn’t support a treaty, the terms are
not on firm ground!
• If a world peacekeeping body is going to be effective it
must have REAL POWER!

91. In Reality….
• Were the terms of the Treaty of Versailles
actually carried out?
• See class handout!

92. Historical Interpretations
• Reasonable
– Germany left mostly intact
– Kinder than Brest-Litovsk
• Unreasonable
– Reparations impossible
– Polish corridor unfair
• Too much middle of the road
• Helped Adolf Hitler ascend to power

93. THE TREATY WILL BE A MAJOR CAUSE 0F
THE RISE OF HITLER
• Feelings like these led to a great deal of unrest in Germany in the
years from 1919 to 1922.
• Returning soldiers formed armed gangs, the Freikorps, who
roamed the streets attacking people. In March 1920, they tried to
seize power.
• There was an attempted revolution by the Communists in January
1919, the Spartacist Revolt.
• There were many murders, including two government ministers,
one of whom had signed the armistice.
• A number of extremist political parties were set up, including the
German Workers' Party, which Adolf Hitler took over in 1921. He
based his support upon the hatred that many Germans felt for the
Treaty of Versailles.

94. AFTERMATH
OF WORLD WAR I
In the aftermath of World War
I, other conflicts that were a direct
result of the war took place.
Germans believed the Treaty of
Versailles was unfairly punitive.
Adolf Hitler gained popularity in
Germany when he urged Germans to
fight the injustices imposed on them
after World War I.
The collapse of the Ottoman Empire
caused conflicts as nations sought to
control territory in the Middle East.
These conflict would intensify
throughout the twentieth century
and into the twenty-first century.
future Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler

95. Reparations
• About $32 billion US dollars ($400B today)
• Cut in half later in the year (still impossible)
• John Maynard Keynes: The Economic
Consequences of the Peace (1920)
– Would cripple German Economy
– Would lead to European depression
• Weimar solution: print more money
• 1923: French troops occupy Ruhr, German
industrial heart land, to force payment