/his/ - History

>>35058

Well it wasn't really a choice as to whether the 1918 revolution could happen, like the October Revolution in Russia, as the 1918 revolution was practically unavoidable so if you want to make it avoidable you're going to have to change a lot of the history of Germany.

>>35061

>However, since their kings were trained from the beginning of their lives on how to run a country, they did make better leaders.

Only first-born sons were trained to be kings, Kasier Willhelm was not a first-born son and so he fucked shit up. He was also mentally unstable, had an inferiority complex and most likely was a closet homosexual. These are not good qualities for a leader and a monarchy is basically a coin toss on whether there will be a great leader or a terrible one. Don't act like a monarchy is a good idea when it obviously isn't, I personally love the age of monarchies in Europe but fucking hell, it's not a good political system to rest pratically all decision making on one person supposedly appointed by God.

>>35062

Monarchy is a great in the context in which it was formed: an array of feuding chieftains or lords. The point at which it becomes obsolete is the industrial civilization, which is far too complex for a single man to manage.

So long as "Monarchy" equals "Wilhelm II", there was extremely little incentive to keep it.

Also, the whole "trained their whole life" thingie is pointless if the heir is an idiot. You can educate an idiot, but this will only result in a well-educated idiot.

>>35058

It depends. By the time Bismarck was fired and Twathelm II was in power it was better to remove the monarchy. If we're talking earlier a monarchy that slowly transitioned to a situation like the UK during the Victorian period would have been ideal.

I don't like assigning major historial events to a one man but Bismarck and Wilhelm II were very influential (as was Churchill post WW1).

>I've only glossed over the surface of German history out of personal interest, so my knowledge isn't as expansive as I would like. It would please me to discuss this and get a better understanding of the German revolution, and the state of Germany after WWI.

Weimar Germany was terrible. Great system on paper but a failure with a country that was so fractured politically.

>>35062

>Don't act like a monarchy is a good idea when it obviously isn't, I personally love the age of monarchies in Europe but fucking hell, it's not a good political system to rest pratically all decision making on one person supposedly appointed by God.

Monarchies are good as figureheads with almost no political power. The only role they should have is a ceremonial one with a theoretical control of the armed forces. The oath soldiers swear matters to them more than you'd imagine and this is generally to the Monarch not the government. Spain avoided a coup because of this and this was also the reason the oath in Germany was changed to be one to Hitler directly.

Also remember that the divine right of a monarch to rule is a fairly late invention for most countries in Europe.

>>35070

>Monarchy is a great in the context in which it was formed: an array of feuding chieftains or lords. The point at which it becomes obsolete is the industrial civilization, which is far too complex for a single man to manage.

This is the true irony of Queen Victoria. She was forced out of practical power while young but this benefited her (and her heirs) in political terms in the long run.

For both points I'll add an extra note. In the UK, from personal experience, I can tell you most people support the monarchy specifically because they are not elected politicians. Politician is a dirty word here and with good reason. The easiest American analogy is how 'federal' = corrupt.

The president, essentially an elected king in legal terms, is ironically the strongest argument against republicanism here.

>>35107

>Monarchies are good as figureheads with almost no political power. The only role they should have is a ceremonial one with a theoretical control of the armed forces.

Yeah, 100% agree, I was talking about a traditional monarchy rather than a constitutional monarchy.

>In the UK, from personal experience, I can tell you most people support the monarchy specifically because they are not elected politicians.

I'm a Britfag as well, from my personal experience people like the Royal Family because they're proud of the heritage of the Royal Family and like to remember when Britain used to be an empire. These people are pretty idiotic though, in my opinion, because, while history is nice, this isn't a reason why the Royal Family should be in power.

On the other hand, there are people who support the Royal Family because of how much money they bring in to the country; there's so much publicity about them in commonwealth countries and Buckingham Palace is one of the most visited places in London. Without the Royal Family there would not be the amount of tourism that there is as, otherwise, London is pretty bleak and a discount New York. So as long as the Royal Family give in more than they take out, I am completely fine with them staying.

>>35116

>I'm a Britfag as well, from my personal experience people like the Royal Family because they're proud of the heritage of the Royal Family and like to remember when Britain used to be an empire. These people are pretty idiotic though, in my opinion, because, while history is nice, this isn't a reason why the Royal Family should be in power.

Out of interest which region/country? Here in Scotland of all places people support them for practical reason not historical.

>On the other hand, there are people who support the Royal Family because of how much money they bring in to the country; there's so much publicity about them in commonwealth countries and Buckingham Palace is one of the most visited places in London. Without the Royal Family there would not be the amount of tourism that there is as, otherwise, London is pretty bleak and a discount New York. So as long as the Royal Family give in more than they take out, I am completely fine with them staying.

I'd agreee with this. The money they bring in from tourism alone pays for their continued upkeep.

>>35062

>tries to look intelligent

> Doesn't even knowthe difference between absolute monarchyand monarchy

the average user on this board sure is uninformed.

>>35123

Don't be a cock, I was replying to OP as he was specifically stating that Wilhelm II should have stayed in power in Germany, and don't say that Willhelm II was not an absolute monarch, the Bundesrat and Reichstag couldn't do shit and the Chancellor was just the Kaiser's mouth.

>>35119

>Out of interest which region/country?

South-West, specifically Bristol, bro. I mean it's pretty patriotic here, there were quite a few street parties during the Queens Diamond Jubilee.

>>35126

>South-West, specifically Bristol, bro. I mean it's pretty patriotic here, there were quite a few street parties during the Queens Diamond Jubilee.

Interesting. Up here (Scotland) there were almost no street parties though that's perhaps just the style.

>>35126

Wasn't Willhem absolutism entente propaganda?

>>35141

>Wasn't Willhem absolutism entente propaganda?

I don't understand why it would be, the Tsar ruled in a near-absolute monarchy which was very similar to Willhelm's (Reichstag = Duma). There were very few occasions when Willhelm's power was actually challenged, but on these occasions the Reichstag was dissolved and then re-formed. Look up the Hottenhot Election and German South West Africa if you want to see the biggest direct threat to the Kaiser's power.

>>35135

Well you Scots aren't being very patriotic at the moment :^)

>>35143

The Queen is actually quite popular here. The issue will be when she finally dies since none of the possible successors really have links to Scotland that seem sincere.

They've been upping the visits to Dundee recently, for example, likely because it voted Yes.

>>35141

By the time the war got stale yes he was pushed out of power and into a figurehead role.

The decisions he made before that (get rid of Bismarck, build a navy and upset the British and letting a treaty with Russia go to shit) was on him. He just wanted to play soldier/admiral and listened to whatever militarists would agree with him.

>>35147

>By the time the war got stale yes he was pushed out of power and into a figurehead role.

Yes, the silent dictatorship, Hindenburg and Ludendorff if anyone wants to read up on this.

>get rid of Bismarck, build a navy and upset the British and letting a treaty with Russia go to shit.

The Kaiser was such an idiot, his Foreign Policy was utterly retarded. He basically tried to make every single aggressive move that he could in order to make people HE WANTED TO ALLY WITH seem weak. He let that NAP go with Russia soon after he came to power which just made it seem like he wanted a war, insulted the British during newspaper interviews when he wanted to highlight how much he wanted to ally with the British and then was responsible for the First Moroccan Crisis and exacerbated the Second Moroccan Crisis in an attempt to make France look weak. He was just an idiot, a complete kid.

tl;dr I agree, anon.

>>35148

Good point on the Moroccan Crises too. They are what showed the world that not only was he aggressive he was a fucking idiot too.

>>35148

So much this. It's almost comical how WW1 perhaps would never have happened if Wilhelm hadn't been smitten with such a massive inferiority complex.

I mean sure, you'd still have the entire drama about the Balkans sooner or later, but Wilhelm's "foreign policy" (make an example of pissing off everyone you meet) eventually had Germany and the Entente powers just waiting to bash each others head in.

Actually, Wilhelm had almost no power, the foreign policy was made by the chancellor and the Kaiser had a pretty much representative function.

I recommend the sleepwalkers by Christopher Clark for an unbiased view on the events leading to WWI.

The entente cordiale between England, France and Russia happened because England viewed both of them as a greater threat to their colonial empire than Germany, so they thought they could afford worse relations with Germany because they were in no position to hurt them. The Moroccan crises were the result of French diplomats trying to cut the German empire out of a deal made a few years before, and the kaiser's reaction was appropriate.

Sure he was not a very capable diplomat and made many mistakes, but he didn't cause the war because he didn't have any actual power. The war was the result of Russian imperialism in the Balkans, Serbian irredentism and French yearning for revenge for 1871.

>>35230

>Actually, Wilhelm had almost no power, the foreign policy was made by the chancellor and the Kaiser had a pretty much representative function.

This isn't true, look at the Daily Telegraph Affair and you can understand the Kaiser's rambling take on Foreign Policy.

>unbiased view on the events leading to WWI.

>unbiased

>view

Impossible, in your opinion it's unbiased, no "view" or source can ever be unbiased.

>The entente cordiale between England, France and Russia happened because England viewed both of them as a greater threat to their colonial empire than Germany, so they thought they could afford worse relations with Germany because they were in no position to hurt them.

True, but this entente would not likely have been created if Germany didn't allow their NAP with Russia to lapse, not renewing their NAP was just a sign of aggression.

>The Moroccan crises were the result of French diplomats trying to cut the German empire out of a deal made a few years before, and the kaiser's reaction was appropriate.

So saying that France did not deserve to own Morocco despite winning it through conquest was an appropriate reaction. Personally landing in Morocco to incite rebellion was an appropriate response. Sending a war-cruiser outside Morocco for little to no reason except to provoke is a appropriate reaction.

>Sure he was not a very capable diplomat and made many mistakes, but he didn't cause the war because he didn't have any actual power.

His "blank-cheque" towards Austria-Hungary and his encouragement towards war with Serbia shows the Kaiser had power and the intention to go to war.

>The war was the result of Russian imperialism in the Balkans, Serbian irredentism and French yearning for revenge for 1871.

All of these were reasons for the war to start but they weren't EVERY reason, the Germans were responsible, as were the Austria-Hungarians for annexing Bosnia, which threatened Serbia's borders and left them without access to the sea which was essentially asking for violence. During this time Germany also threatened war with Serbia and Russia if war with Austria-Hungary was invaded.

>This isn't true, look at the Daily Telegraph Affair and you can understand the Kaiser's rambling take on Foreign Policy.

Sure he was an influential person due to being the official head of state, but he did not excercise any real power. The chancellor and other government officials made sure of keeping him from power precisely because he was an idiot

>Impossible, in your opinion it's unbiased, no "view" or source can ever be unbiased.

well at least it's a lot less subjective than the traditional narrative of germany as the sole aggressor

>True, but this entente would not likely have been created if Germany didn't allow their NAP with Russia to lapse, not renewing their NAP was just a sign of aggression.

Sure in hindsight it appears as a mistake, but it was not intended to be an aggression, Germany just wanted to have a "free hand" in international politics, just as every other great power had.

"The primary aim of German foreign policy in the Bismarck era was to prevent the emergence of a hostile coalition of great powers. For as long as it continued, the tension between the world empires made this objective relatively easy to accomplish. French rivalry with Britain intermittently distracted Paris from its hostility towards Germany; Russia’s hostility to Britain deflected Russian attention from the Balkans and thus helped to stave off an Austro-Russian clash. As a mainly continental power, Germany, so long as it did not itself aspire to found a global empire, could stay out of the great struggles over Africa, Central Asia and China. And as long as Britain, France and Russia remained imperial rivals, Berlin would always be able to play the margins between them. This state of affairs enhanced the empire’s security and created a certain wriggle room for the policy-makers in Berlin.

But the Bismarck strategy also exacted a cost. It required that Germany always punch under its weight, abstain from the imperial feeding frenzies in Africa, Asia and elsewhere and remain on the sidelines when other powers quarrelled over global power shares. It also required that Berlin enter into contradictory commitments to neighbouring powers. The consequence was a sense of national paralysis that played badly with the electors whose votes determined the composition of the German national parliament. The idea of colonial possessions – imagined as eldorados with cheap labour and raw materials and burgeoning native or settler populations to buy national exports – was as bewitching to the German middle classes as to those of the established European empires.

It should be noted that even modest German efforts to overleap the power-political constraints on imperial expansion met with sturdy resistance from the established world powers. In this connection, it is worth recalling an obvious but important difference between the belated German Empire and its world-imperial rivals. As the possessors of vast portions of the earth’s inhabited surface with a military presence along extended imperial peripheries, Britain, France and Russia controlled tokens that could be exchanged and bargained over at relatively little cost to the metropolis. Britain could offer France concessions in the Mekong delta; Russia could offer Britain a demarcation of zones of influence in Persia; France could offer Italy access to coveted territories in northern Africa. Germany could not credibly make such offers, because it was always in the position of a parvenu with nothing to trade, pushing to gain a place at an already crowded table. Its attempts to secure a share of the meagre portions that remained usually met with firm resistance from the established club."

This might explain why Germany abandonded the NAP

>So saying that France did not deserve to own Morocco despite winning it through conquest was an appropriate reaction. Personally landing in Morocco to incite rebellion was an appropriate response. Sending a war-cruiser outside Morocco for little to no reason except to provoke is a appropriate reaction.

There was a treaty that Morocco's future must be decided by all the great powers together. The French foreign minister of the time refused to talk to the Germans because he thought them to be "swindlers", so he came to agreements with each of the other great powers about Morocco, purposefully ignoring German interests.

>His "blank-cheque" towards Austria-Hungary and his encouragement towards war with Serbia shows the Kaiser had power and the intention to go to war.

Actually the kaiser tried to prevent war until the very end. Apart from that, the Austrian attack on Serbia was justified: high government officials of Serbia were involved in the assassination of the Archduke, and the government refused to cooperate in the investigation afterwards.

> the Germans were responsible, as were the Austria-Hungarians for annexing Bosnia, which threatened Serbia's borders and left them without access to the sea which was essentially asking for violence.

How did it threaten Serbia? The Bosnians didn't even want to belong to Serbia (a country with a history of political turmoil and a bad economy, while Austrian rule was pretty good), the Serbs just refused to acknowledge them as a separate ethnic group and wanted to annex the area. And why should Serbia be entitled to access to the sea when there weren't even any Serbs living at the sea?

>During this time Germany also threatened war with Serbia and Russia if war with Austria-Hungary was invaded.

That's the purpose of an alliance. France also threatened with war should Russia or Serbia be invaded.

Also, french diplomats conceived the "Balkan inception scenario" as the optimal way for a war with Germany, and french pressure led to the Russians mobilizing against Austria, which led to the World War. So France actively wanted exactly this war while Germany tried to prevent it (the Kaiser wrote letters to the czar begging him not to go to war)

>>35241

>The French foreign minister of the time refused to talk to the Germans because he thought them to be "swindlers", so he came to agreements with each of the other great powers about Morocco, purposefully ignoring German interests.

This is wrong, the Kaiser knew of the Anglo-French agreement and had spoken to the King of Spain that he was not interested in territorial gains in Morocco, ignoring his chancellor Bulow's advice at the time. Germany was happy with having trade with Morocco until the Kaiser actually realised that colonialism was actually a good thing but by that time he was too late so he decided to encourage Moroccan Independence which, obviously, annoyed the Entente.

>Actually the kaiser tried to prevent war until the very end.

No he didn't.

>Apart from that, the Austrian attack on Serbia was justified: high government officials of Serbia were involved in the assassination of the Archduke, and the government refused to cooperate in the investigation afterwards.

Actually, Serbia agreed to all but one of the, largely threatening and unreasonable, demands by the Austrian government, they only disagreed in letting Austrian investigators into the country as this was, essentially, opening their borders to Austrian spies. Instead they offered to investigate the murder in their own borders, but it was largely a Austrian affair as Princip was Bosnian and therefore a Austrian centre. Also, where are you pulling out "high government officials" were responsible for the assassination? This was debunked years ago.

>The Bosnians didn't even want to belong to Serbia (a country with a history of political turmoil and a bad economy, while Austrian rule was pretty good),

Serbia was a growing power in the Balkans and what are you talking about, the Austria-Hungary empire was stagnating and in threat of collapse by the early twentieth century, there's been theories that they even deliberately started the war to redirect attention from domestic issues in a last ditch attempt to save its empire.

>And why should Serbia be entitled to access to the sea when there weren't even any Serbs living at the sea?

There were nationalistic Serbs living in Bosnia and also Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia knowing that the Serbs had the intention for conquest there, they were asking for retaliation from a nationalistic country with a strong sense of identity, a dangerous opponent.

>That's the purpose of an alliance.

And to me, and I think to everyone actually, shows that Germany had responsibility for the war rather than being dragged in as you are suggesting.

>french pressure led to the Russians mobilizing against Austria

Austria told Serbia that they would retaliate if Serbia did not accept their points, Serbia's ally is Russia hence Russia's mobilisation of troops.

>Germany tried to prevent it (the Kaiser wrote letters to the czar begging him not to go to war)

This was the Kaiser realising that he had fucked up, all three cousins wrote to each other basically saying they shouldn't go to war because they were family but after the Kaiser's needless "blank cheque" and Austria's aggression towards Serbia, events were already in motion.

>>35240

>>35240

Who wrote that? pretty interesting.