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World War 1 ended with the signing of an armistice between the remaining Allies and Germany, leaving the Allies feeling victorious as they had prevented Germany from “winning”. Germany although was under the impression that no one had in fact won the war as the signing of the cease fire left no distinctive successful or defeated country, and it was blind-sided by the treatment it received and its essentially non-existent position during the negotiations of the Treaty of Versailles.
Unfortunately, by Germany signing the war guilt clause they were accepting the blame, which meant that they now had to accept the punishments and the resulting problems without complaint. This treaty then had detrimental effects on Germany’s political, economic and social condition, effects that led to long lasting upheaval and disorder throughout Germany. Many have gone as far as to say that this treaty was directly responsible for the tumultuous state Germany had found itself in that allowed Hitler, one of the most ferocious leaders in history, to come to power.
During the post World War 1 period there is little doubt that Germany was in political upheaval. Following the fall of the German monarchy and the abdication of the Kaiser, leaders met in the town of Weimar to set up a new democratic government in 1918. It was believed that The Allies would be more willing to negotiate and work with a democratic government following the war. On November 11, 1918, three representatives of the new German government went to France and signed the armistice agreement , officially marking Germany’s surrender in the war, and the first move of this ill-fated democratic government.
The people of Germany were under the impression that no one had won the war, so they were shocked to learn that they had ‘lost’. This newly formed government was blamed for the position Germany found herself in after the war, and the people of Germany felt that they had been betrayed by their system and were to never fully trust the Weimar Republic. The biggest flaw with the Weimar Republic was its voting system. In electing the parliament (better known as Reichstag) people had to vote for an entire party, not just a candidate. If a party got one percent of the vote, than it received one member in parliament .
It was the party officials, not the voters, who decided exactly how those seats were to be filled. Because of this, the government was never truly representative of the people. If no single party held power, then two or more parties could band together to form a coalition. These coalitions were easy to break apart and the result was fourteen years of instability, including numerous political assassinations and twenty different governments coming and going. With Germany in the position as ‘the defeated one’ and her inability to rise out of the ashes of her economic and political turmoil, Germany suffered a loss of status.
Her reputation as one of the great powers was no longer. Germany’s new rank on the scale of world powers was one that her people found unacceptable and intolerable. As more and more stipulations were placed upon Germany, and many aspects of the treaty were coming to light to the German people, the displeasure with this failing democracy only rose. All of the problems facing Germany at this time had solutions ??? all of these solutions were extreme and therefore represented by extremist parties.
There were left-winged communists and right-winged fascists both of which were unhappy with the mediocre position and solutions that the Weimar Republic democratic government were offering. As these two opposing ideologies were on the rise in interwar World War 1 Germany, the common civilian who was also unhappy with the performance of the Weimar found themselves falling in with either one of these two parties. The rise in popularity of both these ideologies was mostly due to the dissatisfaction with the Weimar and not because of the attractiveness of the alternative ideologies.
Hitler gained enough support for his own party and was elected chancellor in 1933, marking the end of the Weimar Republic. One of the very first acts Hitler imposed when he came to power was to cease all payment of reparations. Unfortunately for the Allies, because going back to war was not an option, there was really no way for them to reinforce the payment of these reparations. Once this was in effect, it was soon realized that Germany did not have to abide by any of the other stipulations placed upon them by the Treaty of Versailles that had angered them so much.
With this in mind, Hitler and his Nazi party headed full force in the opposite direction of the former democratic Weimar government. Germany soon remilitarized, and Hitler was on course to leading the most well-known and horrific dictatorial rule in all of history. It is fair to say that the rise of Hitler can be directly linked to the Treaty of Versailles and the extent to which Germany was penalized after World War 1. The economic, political and social state of Germany during and after the war greatly contributed to the dissatisfaction of the German people.
The amount of discontent and resentment that arose as a result of the treaty combined with the poor economic and political conditions throughout Germany created the perfect breeding ground for the Nazi Party and their anti-Semitic leader. It can be said that Hitler was literally a product of the Treaty of Versailles, a treaty led by misguided and unrealistic leaders who were too consumed with their own needs that they failed to see the probable repercussions of their actions, and a product that would lead a crusade towards the extinction of an entire race of people.