Posted on 07/21/2023 10:40:19 AM PDT by DallasBiff
Under the Treaty of Versailles, the German emperor was supposed to be tried as a war criminal. Why wasn't he?
The accusations were explosive: a head of state had not only begun an illegal war but egged his troops on to a series of horrific atrocities that left thousands dead and an entire continent in ruins. By then, the accused was one of history’s most hated and debated figures, a monarch known for making erratic decisions and doubling down on his sometimes inexplicable actions.
There was just one problem: The accused, Wilhelm II of Germany, couldn’t testify. The accused had been dead for 75 years
It could have been the trial of the century—if it had been conducted a century before. The trial of Wilhelm II, Germany’s emperor between 1888 and 1918, was a moot one, conducted by historians and legal experts grappling with one of the great mysteries of 20th-century history. Was Wilhelm II guilty of war crimes?
It’s a question that was never answered during Wilhelm’s lifetime. Though the Allies accused him of starting one of history’s bloodiest wars and violating international law, and his troops of committing barbaric acts, he never stood trial. Today, these accusations are remembered as the first stirrings of a modern conception of war crimes. But at the end of World War I, Wilhelm’s responsibility for the bloodshed was a hotly contested—and ultimately unresolved—issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at history.com ...
It’s my interpretation of events as I read them either in John Keegan’s First World War, or The Guns of August. What’s to dispute? You even admit in your post that Serbia was agreeable to the Ultimatum, until Britain intervened.
Franz Josef was living large, yachting while the Ultimatum was delivered. The apology was going to be concluded all rather quickly until the bad news. With all the treaties involved, once the Ultimatum was declined, at the demand of the British, all the treaties created the domino effect leading to mobilization. At that time in history, armies mobilized and they went to war, there was no way to stop it.
Where’s the source that British blocked Serbia? I don’t agree with that. Maybe I’ve forgotten I don’t have time right now to verify.
What war crimes did Ludendorff or Hindenburg commit? Ludendorff is the mastermind behind the only double-envelopment in military history since Alexander the Great.
Unrestricted submarine warfare.
I gave you my sources. I’m not going to read the books again, it’s been quite some years. Ask yourself, why did Serbia change its mind on the Ultimatum? They were influenced to do so from their allies.
Listen to yourself. The Allied Powers were using civilian vessels to transport military arms. That has been verified.
Winners make the rules.
They were only playing leapfrog, they were only playing leapfrog
They were only playing leapfrog when one Staff Officer jumped right over the other Staff Officer's backs
Thеy were only playing leapfrog, thеy were only playing leapfrog
They were only playing leapfrog when one Staff Officer jumped right over the other Staff Officer's backs
Really interesting background info - thanks for taking the time to provide a detailed reply. I love it when I learn stuff on FR, which is generally a function of the quality of the folks who drop by here.
I’ve read recent sources. The ones you quoted are quite dated. I will when I have the time go back and check, just can’t do it tonight.
Yeah.....He didn’t start it. Nor did Germany. In fact, Wilhelm did more than just about any other head of state to try to prevent the outbreak of war. Germany was not seeking land or conquest. It had no territorial ambitions. Its war aims were defensive.
Von Hindenburg was a stabilizing force in the Weimar Republic, unfortunately it wouldn’t survive him.
Serbia was not willing to admit to their responsibility in the assassination - and they were responsible. They funded the terrorist group, fomented its actions and even provided the very pistol that was used to carry out the murders.
The Hapsburgs knew it.
That’s true the Germans did know Russia was modernizing quickly. The Germans were their largest investor!
Russia started mobilizing. The Germans learned of it and since their defense depended on speed (they had to knock out France before Russia could fully mobilize) Wilhelm talked to Nicholas I and told him Russian mobilization would put him in an impossible situation and begged him not to do it. Nicholas assured Wilhelm that he would not mobilize on Germany’s border.
The Russian generals then told Nicholas that they had no plan for partial mobilization and it was therefore all or nothing. They chose to mobilize everywhere knowing full well that would force Germany to go to war as a matter of national survival. I emphasize the word “chose”. They didn’t have to. They had no defense treaty with Serbia which was the aggressor in the whole thing.
It certainly was not America’s problem. I would call American entry into the war the greatest foreign policy blunder in the nation’s history. It wasn’t our fight. We got 118,000 American boys killed for nothing.
Without American involvement, both sides were hopelessly bogged down, out of men and out of money. They would have had to strike a reasonable deal everybody could have lived with.
The Hapsburg Empire would not have been broken up creating an enormous power vacuum in central Europe. Germany would not have been left embittered and ripe for the plucking by the first strong nationalist who came along...which turned out to be a complete madman in Hitler.
Without American involvement, no Hitler, no death camps, no Second World War.
Because the Royal Navy blockaded Germany. Was Germany just going to sit back and allow aid to come to Britain?
And everybody thought at the time it would all be over by Christmas.
Well they were right. Christmas of 1918!
I agree Austria Hungary was not blameless. However, they were pretty slack when it came to all the various nationalities within the empire. They didn’t step on anybody particularly hard and there was very very little by way of repression and certainly nothing beastly like mass murder or ethnic cleansing or concentration camps.
The Serb minority in Bosnia may not have liked being ruled over by the Hapsburgs but these were civilized gentlemen in comparison to anything that came after them. Franz Ferdinand was well known to be a liberal reformer. There was no apprehension on anybody’s part that repression was going to get worse when he rose to power....and that’s why the Serbs wanted him dead. Its a lot harder to foment rebellion when you’re dealing with a civilized and moderate guy than with a jackbooted hardass.
The Serbs also knew that Austria had been planning on war with Serbia for a long time and were just looking for an excuse.
Clemenceau was a very stupid A-hole who got the French to write checks with their mouths that their azzes could not back up. Which got them a brutal smackdown by the Germans 20 years later.
Wilson was even more of a stupid A-hole for letting Clemenceau get his way rather than putting the screws to him and France to make a reasonable peace people could have lived with......kinda like the very reasonable treatment France got at the hands of Metternich after Napoleon had run around terrorizing the continent for 15 years in the early 1800s.
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