Download The West between the Wars, 1919 * 1939 The Futile Search for

THE WEST BETWEEN THE WARS, 1919 – 1939
THE FUTILE SEARCH FOR STABILITY & THE GREAT
DEPRESSION
Objective: Assess the significance of the war
experience on global foreign and domestic
policies of the 1920s and 1930s.
Post-war era: neither stability nor
prosperity
• League of Nations: doomed by U.S. failure to join
• Dawes Plan sparked brief period of prosperity in late 20s
• Treaty of Locarno, 1925: new spirit of cooperation
• Germany joined League of Nations in 1926
• Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928: renounced war
Dawes Plan
Germany: economic & leadership woes
• Weimar Republic: weak democracy
• Hyper-inflation in Germany made money worthless
• Depression paved way for fear & rise of Nazism
Hyper-inflation in Germany
France: devastated by war but better off
than others
• Troubled years: largely led by weak coalition
governments
• Foreign policy: avoid another war; Maginot Line
Maginot Line
Great Britain: lost position as leading
economic power
• Lost markets to the U.S. & Japan
• John Maynard Keynes: advocated deficit spending
The U.S. emerged in good condition but
turned inward
• Isolationism: Congress rejected League of Nations
• Economic boom & bust in the 20s
• Black Tuesday: 29 October 1929, stock market crash
• The Great Depression: 25% unemployment; no direct
relief
• Franklin Roosevelt (FDR) became president in 1933
• The New Deal: active government intervention; “100 Days”
• Social Security Act, 1935: old age pensions