Wilhelm II (No Communism)

Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany was the ruler of the German Empire from 1888 to 1918. He was the last Kaiser of Germany.

Early Years
Wilhelm was born on January 27th, 1859 in Berlin, Germany. Wilhem suffered a traumatic "Breech Birth", which left him with a withered left arm due to Erb's palsy. It has been suggested by some historians that growing with this disability affected Wilhelm's emotional stability. Indeed, in many photos taken in his later life, he tried to make his arm appear longer by holding gloves in it during photos and resting it on the hilt of his sword to give the impression that the limb was merely being rested on a dignified angle.

Wilhelm was the son of Crown Prince Frederick (future Frederick III) and his wife, Victoria, the royal princess of the United Kingdom. He was the first grandchild of Victoria, queen of England, and hence 6th in the line of British Succession. He was also 2nd in the Prussian line of succession, on his father's side.

Starting at the age of six, was tutored by the 39-year old teacher Georg Hinzpeter. It has been stated that this instructor never offered one word of praise for the young prince's efforts. As a teenager, he was educated at Kassal, at the Friedrichgymnasium and the University of Bonn, where he became a member of the Corps Borussia Bonn. Wilhelm possessed a quick intelligence, but unfortunately this was often overshadowed by his cantankerous temper. Wilhelm took an interest in science and technology at this age, but although he liked to pose in conversation as a man of the world, he remained convinced that he belonged to a distinct order of mankind, designated for monarchy by the grace of god. Wilhelm was accused of megalomania as early as 1892, by the Portugese man of letters Eca de Queiroz, then in 1894 by the German pacifist Ludwig Quidde.

As a scion of the Royal house of Hohenzollern, Wilhelm was also exposed from an early age to the military society of the Prussian aristocracy. This had a major impact on him and, in maturity, he would rarely be seen out of his military uniform. The hyper-masculine military culture of Prussia in this period did much to frame Wilhelm's political ideas as well as his personal relationships.

Crown Prince Frederick was viewed by his son with a deeply felt love and respect. His father's status as a hero of the Wars of Unification was largely responsible for the young Wilhelm's attitude, as in the circumstances he was raised; close emotional contact between father and son was not encouraged. Later, as he came into contact with his father's political opponents, Wilhelm took on a more ambivalant view of his father, given the percieved influence of his mother over a figure who should have been possessed of masculine independance and strength. Wilhelm also idiolised his grandfather, Wilhelm I, even attempting to foster a cult of the first German Emperor as "Wilhelm the Great".

In many ways, Wilhelm was a victim of his inheritance and the machinations of Otto von Bismarck. Both sides of his family had suffered from mental illness, and this may have explained his emotional instability. The Emperor's parents, Frederick and Victoria, where great admirers of the Prince Consort of the United Kingdom, Prince Albert, who was Victoria's father. They planned to rule as consorts, like Albert and Queen Victoria, and they planned to reform the fatal flaws in the executive branch that Bismarck has created for himself. The office of the Chancellor responsible to the Emperor would be replaced by a British-style cabinet, with ministers responsible to the Reichstag. Government policy would be based on the consensus of the cabinet. Frederick was of the opinion that the Imperial constitution was "ingeniusly contrived chaos".

Bismarck's Pawn
When Wilhelm was in his early twenties, Bismarck tried to seperate him from his liberal parents with some success. Bismarck planned to use the young prince as a weapon against his parents in order to retain his own political dominance. Wilhelm thus developed a dysfunctional relationship with his parents, but especially with his english mother. After Frederick's death in 1888 In an outburst in April 1889, wich Empress Vicotia conveyed to her mother, Queen Victoria, Wilhelm angrily implied that "a English doctor killed my father, and an English doctor crippled my arm - which is the fault of my mother" who allowed no german physicians to attend to herself or her immediate family.

After his father's death, Wilhelm succeeded him as German Emperor and King of Prussia. Although in his youth he had been a great admirer of Bismarck, Wilhelm's characteristic impatience soon brought him into conflict with the "Iron Chancellor", the dominant political figure in the foundation of the Empire. The new Emperor opposed the Chancellor's careful foreign policy, preferring vigorous and rapid expansion to protect Germany's "place in the sun". Furthermore, Wilhelm was under the impression that he was to rule as well as reign, unlike his grandfather who had been content to let Bismarck handle the day-to-day administration of the Empire.

Split with Bismarck
Early tensions quicky poisoned Wilhelm's relationship with his Chancellor. Bismarck believed that Wilhelm was a lightweight who could be dominated, and showed scant respect for the Emperor's policies in the late 1880s.

It was during this time that Bismarck, after gaining an absolute majority in support of his policies in the Reichstag, decided to make the anti-socialist laws permanent. His Kartell, the majority of the amalgamated Conservative Party and the National Liberal Party, favoured making the law permanent, with one exception; the police power to expel socialists from their homes. This power had been used excessively at times against politcal opponents, and the National Liberal Party was unwilling to make the expulsion clause permanent. Bismarck would not give his assent to a modified bill, so the Kartell split on the issue. The Conservatives would not pass a modified bill, and threatened to veto the bill entirely, which they eventually did.

As the debate continued, Wilhelm became increasingly interested in social problems, especially the treatment of mine workers who went on strike in 1989. Following his policy of active involvement in the government, he routinely interrupted Bismarck in council to make clear where he stood on social policy. Even though Wilhelm supported the altered anti-socialist bill, Bismarck pushed him to support the veto of the bill in its entirety, but when Bismarck's arguments failed to persuade the Kaiser, he became excited and agitated until uncharacteristically he blurted out his motive for having the bill fail: he wanted the socialists to agitate until a violent clash occured that could be used as a pretext to crush them. Wilhelm replied that he was unwilling to open his reign with a bloody campaign on his subjects.

The next day, after realising his blunder, Bismarck attempted to reach a compromise with Wilhelm by agreeing to his social policy towards industrial workers, and even suggested a European council to discuss working conditions, presided over by the German Emperor.

Despite this, a turn of events led to Bismarck's increased distance from the emperor. Bismarck, feeling pressured and unappreciated by Wilhelm and undermined by ambitious advisers, refused to sign a proclamations regarding the protection of the workers along with Wilhelm, as was required by the German Constitution, to protest Wilhelm's ever-increasing interferance with Bismarck's previously unquestioned authority. Bismarck also worked behind the scenes to break the Continental labor council that Wilhelm held so dear. The final break came when Bismarck attempted to secure another majority in the Reichstag, as his Kartell had been voted out after the anti-socialist fiasco. The remaining powers in the Reichstag where the Conservative Party and the Catholic Centre Party. Bismarck desired to form a new bloc with the Centre Party, and invited Ludwig Windthorst, the party's parliamentary leader, to discuss an alliance. This would be Bismarck's last political maneuver. Wilhelm was furious to learn of Winthorst's visit. In a parliamentary state, the head of government depends on the confidence of the parliamentary majority, and certainly has the right to form coalitions to ensure his policies a majority, but in Germany, the Chancellor depended on the confidence of the Emperor alone, and Wilhelm believed that as emperor he had a right to be informed before his minister's meeting. After a heated argument in Bismarck's estate over Imperial authority, Wilhelm stormed out, both parting ways permanently. Bismarck, forced for the first time into a situation he could not use to his advantage, wrote a blistering letter of resignation, decrying Wilhelm's interferance in foreign and domestic policy, which would only be made public after Bismarck's death. When Bismarck realised his dismissal was imminent, he utilised all the resources at his disposal, even going so far as to ask Wilhelm's mother, Victoria, to use her influence over her son on his behalf. However, "the very qualities which Bismarck fostered in the Emperor in order to strengthen himself when the Emperor Frederick should come to the throne have been the qualities by which [he met his downfall]". With what must have been a mixture of pity and triumph, Victoria told him that her influence over her son could not save him as he himself had destroyed it.

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