Download The West Between the Wars

The West Between the Wars
Objectives
Futile Search for Stability
Weak League of Nations
Reparations
Germany made 1st payment, then out of $... Inflation
French occupied Ruhr Valley
1924: Dawes Plan
loan for German recovery
1924-1929 brief period of European prosperity
1928: Kellogg-Briand Pact (63 nations signed) denounced war
Great Depression
Causes:
economic downturn
of farm products led to falling prices)
US Stock Market crash
money
(overproduction
withdrew
Effects:
Germans 40% workforce unemployed
Renewed interest in Marxism
Communism popular with workers and intellectuals
Political leaders offering simple solutions (with dictatorial power)
Democratic States after the War
Germany – Weimar (VY mahr) Republic
1st President: Hindenberg, 77 year old WWI hero, not fully endorse idea
Inflation and depression caused middle class to support political parties
hostile to republic = rise of extremist parties
France
Political chaos
Great Britain
United States – 1932: FDR elected, New Deal
(avoided radicalism
Rise of Dictatorial Regimes
Totalitarian States
Gov’t controls political, economic, social, intellectual and cultural
lives of citizens
Conquer minds and hearts… mass propaganda
Single leader, single party
Reject limited gov’t power and individual freedoms
Individuals subjected to collective will of the
masses (organized and determined by the leader)
Fascism in Italy
Fascism: glorifies the state above the individual – strong
central gov’t with dictator, opposition is suppressed
Benito Mussolini
Middle-class support due to fear of socialism, communism & disorder
Patriotic, nationalistic appeals
King Victor Emmanuel III appointed Mussolini prime minister
“laws by decree”:
“Il Duce” (eel DOO chay) “The Leader” but never total, ruthless control…
New Era in the Soviet Union
1922: Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) formed
1924: Lenin died, power struggle
Leon Trotsky
Joseph Stalin
1928: Stalin launched first “Five-Year Plan”
Transform Russia from agriculture to industrial
Social and political costs…
Collectivization: private farms eliminated, gov’t owns, peasants work
Political purges (removal)
forced labor camps
Stalin: Man and Image
Methods Stalin used to achieve and maintain political power
Consequences for the Russian people of Stalin’s use of power
Authoritarian States in the West
Authoritarian = features of totalitarianism, like use of police power, but
not a new society…preserved existing social order
Political democracy failed in Eastern Europe
Only Czechoslovakia,
maintained its political democracy
1936: bloody civil war in Spain (Francisco Franco)
Foreign intervention
1939 Franco captured Madrid, dictatorship
Hitler and Nazi Germany
Adolf Hitler
Background: Austrian
Political career
1921 gained total control of party
1923 staged armed uprising against gov’t in Munich, Beer Hall Putsch… failed
Beliefs: prevalent in Mein Kampf
anti-Semitism, anticommunism and Social Darwinian theory of struggle
Right of superior nations to lebensraum (living space) through expansion…
Rise of Nazism
In 1932 became the largest party
depression helped… Hitler
appealed to national pride, honor, traditional militarism
1933 President Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor
Hitler created a totalitarian state
1934 Hindenburg died, presidency abolished
Hitler now Fuhrer (“Leader”) oath of loyalty from officials/soldiers
Nazi Germany, 1933-1939
Goal: Third Reich (German Empire of racial purity)
Aryan Race
Totalitarian state through economic policies, mass spectacles,
organizations
Use of terror
SS
under direction of Heinrich Himmler
Instruments of repression and murder
Economy – rebounded thanks to massive rearmament program
Nuremberg Rallies
mass enthusiasm & excitement
Anti-Semitic Policies
September 1935: Nuremburg Laws
November 9th 1938: Kristallnacht
Destructive rampage against Jews
Encouraged to “emigrate from Germany”
Cultural and Intellectual Trends
Mass Culture: Radios and Movies (1920s and 30s)
Political purposes – Nazi speeches/rallies, propaganda films
Joseph Goebbels (GUHR-buhlz) propaganda minister
Documentaries of rallies (“Triumph of the Will 1934 Nuremberg)
Artistic and Literary Trends
Surrealism
(Salvador Dali)