The After Affects of WWI

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The After Affects of WWI
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A High Price to Pay

• World War I was expensive in terms of money,
  people and property. In money alone, the war cost
  over 350 Billion.
• But of course, no one can calculate the
  price paid by the soldiers, their families and
  civilians who lived through all the horrors of
  this war.

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Death Toll

• 10 million soldiers killed thats more than
  twice the population of Georgia. One fourth of
  these died from war related diseases such as
  gangrene or dysentery.
• 21 million soldiers wounded many blinded or
  severely malformed from poisonous gas.
• 6 million civilians killed includes women
  children who just were in the wrong place at the
  wrong time.

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Left Behind

• 5 Million Widows
• 9 Million Orphans

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Destruction

• Thousands of factories, roads, hospitals,
  schools, churches, office buildings and bridges
  all over Europe were totally destroyed.

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Often Entire Cities Lay In Ruins.
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Germany

• Nowhere had the war taken a greater toll than
  in Germany where whole villages had been blown
  off the map. More than 60 of the factories had
  been destroyed. Farmland that had once been used
  to grow crops and livestock had been ruined by
  war. Thousands of people were hungry and
  homeless.

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What next?

• The world had experienced the greatest loss
  from war in recorded history until that time.
  How would the people recover? How would they
  rebuild their homes and lives? What would the
  Allies terms of surrender mean for these people?

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Treaty of Versailles

• In January of 1919, representatives from more
  than 30 countries met in the great French palace
  of Versailles to write a peace treaty to formally
  end the war. This peace treaty, known as the
  Treaty of Versailles, set the terms for the
  Central Powers surrender.

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Germany Gets Blamed

• To many, it seemed that this was not a peace
  agreement as much as it was a list of punishments
  designed to hurt Germany. The treaty said that
  Germany alone was responsible for the war and
  should pay for all the damages done to all the
  Allies.

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Germans Suffer

• The people of Germany were ordered to pay 32
  billion in damages. Of course the Germans had no
  real way to do this. Their factories were
  destroyed, their cities were in ruins, and there
  was no way Germany could repay this large amount
  of money.

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Could It Get Any Worse?

• The people of Germany were desperate.
  Unemployment was sky high. People were hungry.
  The government was in shambles. Because they
  couldnt pay the money demanded by the Treaty of
  Versailles, Germany had to pay with coal instead.
  This left Germany with little coal to heat their
  own homes or power the few factories that it did
  have left.

Who would they turn to for help?
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Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures

• And so, the people of Germany looked to an
  unlikely source of help during those times of
  extreme hardship. A source they might have never
  otherwise chosen and would surely live to regret.