What effect did WWI have on Germany

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What effect did WWI have on Germany?
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Writing frame
The German Surrender
Death injury
War defeat
The Ludendorff offensive
The Home Front
Discontent
Germanys military dictators
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Death Injury

• WWI began August 1914 with high hopes of German
  victory
• 10.7 million conscripts
• 60 casualties
• 2 million deaths
• 2.7 million permanently disabled
• 500,000 widows
• 1 million orphans

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Death Injury

• What impact would this terrible suffering have on
  Germany after the War?

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The Home Front

• Absence of men placed a huge burden on women and
  young left behind
• By 1917, most farms run by women
• Rapidly rising prices, caused by shortages of
  food and other goods
• Weekly wage increased 2x, but prices increased 4X

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The Home Front

• Rationing introduced in 1915, but amounts of food
  reduced rapidly
• 1916 potato harvest failed, causing greater
  suffering

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The Home Front
Monthly wages of a railway guard

• What do the tables
• tell us about the
• impact of rising
• prices?

Price of a kilogram of butter
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Discontent

• April 1917 300,000 Berlin workers went on strike
  over cut in bread ration
• Other cities followed their example
• July 1917 German Reichstag (parliament) voted for
  immediate peace (armistice) with Allies

?
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Germanys military dictators

• Power was in hands of military leaders,
  Hindenburg and Ludendorff
• Germany continued to fight
• April 1917 America joined war

Hindenburg
Ludendorff
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Germanys military dictators

• Why did military leaders ignore the vote for
  peace?
• What threat did the USA pose?

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The Ludendorff Offensive

• 1917 Russian Revolution
• Ludendorff launched massive attack against Allies
  on 21 March 1918
• Germany nearly took Paris, but suffered 800,000
  casualties
• Desertions increased dramatically
• July 1918 Allies, strengthened by 1 million
  American troops counter-attacked

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The Ludendorff Offensive

• The German army was famed for its discipline. Why
  do you think there were so many desertions in the
  summer of 1918?

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The German surrender

• Germanys allies (Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria
  Ottoman Empire) suffered defeats in autumn 1918
• Kaiser appointed a civilian (instead of military)
  government
• Ludendorff fled to Sweden wearing a false beard
• German navy made last ditch attack on British navy

Kaiser Wilhelm II
General Ludendorff
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The German surrender

• German towns and cities began to rule themselves
• Sailors, soldiers continued to desert or mutiny
• Kaiser Wilhelm abdicated
• Leader of Socialist Party Friedrich Ebert
  appointed head of government
• 11 November 1918, German armed forces surrendered

Friedrich Ebert
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The German surrender

• Use your own knowledge and the source opposite to
  list as many reasons for Germanys surrender as
  you can.

• From a letter from
• Hindenburg to
• German Chancellor, 2
• October 1918
• We cannot replace the very heavy losses we have
  recently suffered. This means there is no longer
  any prospect of victory.

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The German Surrender

• How do you think the following people would have
  felt about Germanys surrender
• woman with a young family
• A factory-owner
• A socialist politician
• A German general
• A British general
• The Kaiser

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